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The Book of Ruth and Clarkson’s Farm

Blog, Scotland, The Vet Who Came In from the Cold, Vet, Writing, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I handed in my notice at Inchcolm yesterday. It hasn’t been an easy decision. There are times when I can see that I could love this job, but before I began, the agreement was that I would be working from Dumfries, with a day in Dunfermline once a week. After two and a half months, I’m still living at Valerie’s, working full time away from home, and I don’t feel the communication and trust are there for me to work remotely. I could push for it, but I don’t think it would be easy. At two and a half months in, I feel this should be the honeymoon phase, when I have begun to find my feet, understand what I am aiming for and built up some rapport and understanding with everyone.

It’s wonderful how things work out sometimes. Just at the time when I decided I was going to leave, John called to say that he was buying tickets to come over. I’m still in probation, so I only have one week’s notice. John has ten days over here, so I will have the flexibility to spend time with him, whatever his plans are.

I don’t have a new job lined up, but there seem to be many possibilities opening up and I am looking forward, either to returning to something I’ve done before, or trying out something new. I’ve been in discussion with Dean at APHA. I’ve had a chat with Kelly, who runs a recruitment agency and is looking for locum positions for me, and next week, I will be speaking to someone from Hallmark, who fill temporary government positions at short notice. I feel that the future is wide open.

I’m not sure whether I have mentioned my new phase of Bible reading. Last year, I read the whole Bible for the first time. I was using an app that gives three different portions of the Bible each day, two Old Testament and one New Testament. While it was an interesting exercise, my mind found it difficult to keep track as I moved between the portions, so this year, I am reading the first of the three portions daily and reading around it, so that I can follow better and understand more. Until yesterday, I was reading Judges, which describes a turbulent period in Israel’s history.

At the lowest point, in Judges 19, a man is travelling with his concubine (a kind of secondary wife) and stays overnight in a stranger’s house. A bunch of marauding men demand that the man comes out to have sex with them, and rather than defending the household, he throws his concubine out to them. The marauders rape and kill her and leave her on the doorstep.

I opened the app this morning, expecting more horrible tales and found instead, that I have moved onto the book of Ruth, which is already one of my favourite stories in the Old Testament. When I came to it the first time round, last year, I found the source of the wonderful, “Intreat me not to leave thee,” passage that I had known from reading My Friend Flicka as a child. This time round, I can see the comfort Ruth found in following God. I’m almost afraid to write that I am also finding comfort in following and trusting in God, as professing faith is uncomfortable to me, and frankly, I’m afraid to lose friends, but here I am, doing it anyway.

Moving on to an easier topic, I have been watching the latest series of Clarkson’s Farm with Valerie. If you haven’t seen it and don’t want spoilers, you probably shouldn’t read this part.

I haven’t watched all the series religiously, but have seen enough to think that Clarkson’s Farm speaks wonderfully for farmers. He shows the hardships of farming, the ups and downs, and the sheer resilience farmers need in current times as they navigate a world of rules and red tape, of low prices , conglomerates and cheap foreign imports.

The end of the series was desperately sad though, as one of his cows was tested for tuberculosis and came back twice as an inconclusive reactor. This meant that she was taken for slaughter, despite being in calf with twins. When she was taken to the abattoir, they didn’t find anything, so sent back a report saying, “no visible lesions.”

I was slightly frustrated at that part. I’m not sure what support Jeremy and his crew received from their APHA vet, but they misunderstood that report to mean that the cow didn’t have TB, which isn’t actually the case. I’m not sure how it works in England as the rules are slightly different in the various parts of the UK, but in Scotland, there would still be further testing, to see whether they could grow the bacteria that cause TB, despite finding no lesions.

And that is because, “no visible lesions,” doesn’t mean the cow didn’t have TB. It means that she did not have TB that was advanced enough for them to find lesions, which can take a long time to form, even when the bacteria are there. The fact that they had a number of other cattle with borderline results suggests to me that, even if none of the animals are actively infected, it’s likely there has been some contact with TB infection, because the skin test they did is an indicator of an immune response.

Valerie asked the same question that Jeremy Clarkson asked, which was why couldn’t they wait until she’d calved. If she had no TB lesions in her udder (those form very late, and would mean the cow would be very infectious) she wouldn’t be that likely to pass TB on to her calves, if they were removed quite quickly. However the cow is meant to be kept in strict isolation (which is already hard on her as cattle are herd animals) and they had already shown a film of her escaping. If she was indeed infected, the longer she is there, the more likely it is that she will spread the bacteria into the environment and on to other animals, including wildlife.

The reality is that, despite finding no visible lesions, that the cow might have been infected. The skin test is not very reliable in that it can sometimes miss infected animals. However, where the test is positive, it’s very highly likely there is some level of infection, even if they didn’t find anything to confirm it. In that way, it’s actually a very accurate test, when done right. If anything, vets are likely to err on the side of not sending away cattle unless it’s a definite reactor, which might be one of the reasons TB is rife in England and Wales.

And that is the reason why, after a reactor is found and culled, all the other animals in the herd will need to be tested again after 60 days. That will give them a much better idea of where they stand. TB can be in a herd for years without showing up on tests, and that is another reason it is so difficult to eradicate.

Jeremy also asked the very reasonable question, why are they not able to vaccinate. That one is also easy to answer, in technical terms, if not ethical and personal. It’s about international trade. Various diseases are classed as Notifiable Diseases and that designation is not a UK thing, it is agreed internationally. Notifiable Diseases present a risk, either to human life, to animal welfare, or economically. TB can spread between animals and people. Bird flu can too, but it is so nasty that the birds really suffer. Foot and mouth is another Notifiable Disease and that one doesn’t spread to people, but it is incredibly infectious and causes huge suffering to the animals. It has an economic impact as suffering animals don’t eat, and thus don’t grow or produce much milk.

So back to the vaccination question. The fact is that the skin test, which is the international standard test that is used, cannot tell between a cow that is vaccinated and a cow that is infected. If the UK decided unilaterally to vaccinate, it would prevent a huge amount of international trade, that would cost farmers and the country billions. They are trying to develop tests, but it is taking years and the scientific proof would need to be good enough to convince the groups that make the international rules. If you are interested in this topic, there’s a lot of good information here: TB Hub

So much as I love Clarkson’s Farm and think it does a lot to highlight how tough farming is, Irish someone had explained the TB situation to him more thoroughly. I have had to deal with farmers with TB outbreaks and I know how devastating it is, but the implication that the process is entirely unreliable and unreasonable is unfair. It’s a complex and nuanced problem and I’m not sure that the UK’s approach is working, but it’s being done with the intention to improve the situation. It’s far from perfect, but it wasn’t (in my opinion) unreasonable to remove the cow, even though I’m sure that was painful.

Anyway, this turned out to be quite long and I haven’t even touched on last weekend, when Valerie’s son Kyle came up with his lovely fiancée Candice. It was amazing to see Kyle. The last time I saw him, he was a teenager. We spend Saturday exploring the area where he and Candice are having a ceilidh in September (I’ve been invited!!!) and looking at campsites where guests might stay. We ended up on the banks of Loch Lomond, which was beautiful. Val and Kyle decided to take a paddle.

Anyway, I am very honoured to be invited to the celebration and I wish Kyle and Candice all the best.

I took a few more photos of Loch Lomond while I was there, so I shall leave you with those. Thanks for reading and have a good week all!

Miscalculation and an Aberrant Foxglove

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I shall begin with the aberrant foxglove. There are lots of gorgeous foxgloves in Valerie’s garden and I was reminded of something odd I’d seen in my own garden, last time I was home. I talked to her about it. Basically, my one, lonely foxglove has all the normal bell-shaped flowers on the lower part of its stem. At the top though, where there should be tapering buds, instead mine has a veritable flamenco dancer of a bloom. She wondered whether it was a different flower altogether, but I had taken a photo and when I showed her, she agreed that it almost certainly was a foxglove. “It’s very beautiful,” she commented. So here it is. My aberrant (but beautiful) probable foxglove. Feel free to comment if you can shed light on it!

The miscalculation related to where my call was on Monday. The farm was near Kelso, which is in the Scottish Borders, south of Edinburgh. I was in North Yorkshire and mentally calculated that (as I said last week) there was no point driving north to Airth, only to go south again. Equally to go to Dumfries would be an hour’s unnecessary driving as it’s also not on the route between where I was and where I needed to be. I’m now driving the practice van, so I’m very much aware of the mileages and not using it for personal use.

Anyway, in my mind, Kelso was in the Scottish Borders and Dumfries is near the border with England, so I was imagining that traveling to Kelso, then on to Airth (or Dunfermline) would be a similar journey to traveling to Dumfries, then on to Airth (or Dunfermline). The first leg of the journey (I thought) would be shorter than the second. What I had not taken into consideration was that Scotland’s border with England isn’t a nice, level line from West to East. It’s actually more at a 45 degree angle – much further north in the east than in the west. In addition, I think Eleanor said the farm was in Jedburgh, which is actually south of Kelso. I’ve made a map image to show where Kelso is (the red marker) in comparison with Dumfries and Airth, which is near Stirling.

The bright yellow road running up the west side of the country should also have been included in that calculation. It’s the M6/M74 which connects with all the motorways in the central belt of Scotland. It’s also nearly a straight line from Dumfries to Stirling. Driving up through the Borders takes way longer and is a massive detour.

Anyway, having got up and set off early, in order to get to Kelso by the allotted time of 11am, I found that, in the van, on these windy roads, the journey took even longer than expected. I couldn’t find the farm when I got there either. The postcode I’d been given took me to a small housing estate on the edge of a village. Sometimes when that happens, you discover there are chicken sheds hidden by some trees, but not this time. By the time I finally found the farm, it had taken me four hours to get there and I was also thirsty, as I hadn’t had time to stop for coffee along the way.

The visit itself went well. Some lovely, free range hens, very healthy and well looked after. It was only when I got back in the van and put Airth as my destination into the app, that I found I was only an hour and forty five minutes away. Worse still, I had to skirt round Edinburgh, which meant that Dunfermline was marginally closer.

So by now I was thinking that the boss would be wondering how I had taken quite so long on a call that was less than two hours from home. It was also around two in the afternoon. It’s a half hour drive from Dunfermline to Airth so (for me anyway) it made more sense to go to Airth and work from home for a couple of hours. I had enough to write up, after all. Technically, from the practice’s point of view, I had actually done the least amount of miles and the lowest number of hours worked. My conscience remains clear, but I am finding the expectations of private practice quite tough. At APHA, I had a lot of freedom. My boss trusted that I would plan my days effectively. He and I would have laughed together at my miscalculation. Nor would he have expected me to travel the three hours back to Airth (I was in Yorkshire for work) in my own time, knowing I would still have to put in a full day’s work on Monday.

From all of this navel gazing, you might have worked out that all is not entirely well in my new job. I chose to go back to Airth anyway, knowing it might not be popular, but unwilling to enter into a lengthy discussion over what had happened. Where there is no trust, I find it hard to function and (frankly) I’m too old for mind games.

For what it’s worth, I had a lovely weekend in Yorkshire, staying with mum and dad. I had a lovely walk on Saturday, in between rain showers, so I will end on a positive note, with some photos. Thank you for reading. Hopefully next week’s post will be more cheery. Have a good week all.

Springtime in Blackbird Lane

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I was truly spoiled last weekend. It was a time of eating and… well eating more! There was some wine, but really… it was a food fest. Saturday dawned sunny, but there was such a cold wind that wild swimming didn’t seem like such a good idea any more. Instead, we sat in the garden, with the chiminea guzzling wood, as we did the same to a tube of Pringles. By Sunday morning, finding clothes to fit was more of a challenge than I had anticipated, but happily a new top came to the rescue for going to church, where my spirits were lifted. After a delicious lunch of leftover pizza, I headed down the road feeling replete, in more ways than one.

What I was though, was ripe for plucking! As a scrolled through Facebook, I came across a walking app called WalkFit. If I took up walking, it said, I would get to my goal weight in three months (ambitious, to say the least) but sooner than that, it promised that in a week, I’d feel better… and in two, I’d look better. I was hooked.

It has certainly had the effect of making me walk a lot more, but with two days left before the week is up, what I feel is not so much better, as knackered! My feet and legs are tired, I feel heavy and bloated and I haven’t been sleeping well. This is not really what I expected, though it might point to ME as a diagnosis for my neuro ills.

That said, the last time I started to walk, having had a vitamin B injection, the effect was that I quickly got fitter and did feel better. I’m not taking vitamin B in any form at the moment, so that’s something to try. Anyway, a nice side-effect is that I have been walking further along Blackbird Lane, enjoying all the birdsong and the flowers and the wonderful sense of peace.

The photo at the top of the page is from one of my morning walks. The dew is still wet on the grass and in the shady corners, there are frosted leaves and flowers.

Everything is growing with the gentle vigour of Scottish springtime.

The eponymous blackbirds are out in force, darting about, calling their sweet songs, curiously brave as I pass, but flitting away when I pull out my phone to take their picture. As so often before, I wish I had a camera with a lens that would allow me to capture them from further off, but still I do my best, and here it is.

The daffodils are passing now, but a few remain.

This week, bluebells have started to appear.

The hawthorn is decked in exquisite white and gold flowerettes.

And in the last two days, these hardy but cheerful perennials have reared their heads.

Meanwhile, back in my neglected garden, spring is also working its magic.

Nature perseveres and so shall I! Have a good week all and thanks for reading.

Endings

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Last Sunday, in the evening, I met Donna and some of her friends for a picnic in the park. Everyone brought food and it was a great spread, with old favourites, like delicious egg sandwiches, to more modern twists, such as salty caramel shortbread. This was in preparation for a spot of outdoor culture – in the shape of a performance of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.

It was a great evening. The makeshift stage stood in front of the Chrichton Memorial Church and the entertainment was occasionally enhanced by dive-bombing seagulls. Romeo and Juliet isn’t my favourite Shakespeare; I prefer comedy to tradgedy. Juliet’s mother’s big red beard and broad shoulders were an interesting diversion, as was Romeo’s habit of turning his back on Juliet when she was on the balcony (though I understand this was probably related to the combination of a limited stage and the difficulty of being heard outdoors) but it was a great evening and lovely to get out for some entertainment on a sunny evening.

Monday morning started with a visit to my new physiotherapist. I asked my GP to refer me recently when I heard there was a year long weight to see a neurologist for non-urgent problems. I can’t remember whether I mentioned that GP visit, but occupational health at work advised me to go in order to re-examine the neurological problems I had in 2017-19, which resolved to the point where I can work full time, but have never completely gone away. I had physio three times a week, back in 2018-19 and it made a massive difference in getting me back on my feet.

I could see my new physio was somewhat bemused by me. I suspect most patients she sees are significantly impaired, whereas what I want is to build muscle and get as close to full fitness as I can. I suspect there are differences in attitude from Norway. I was much worse, back in 2018, but I can recall being told to warm up for every session, then do three sets of eight, deep squats, three times a week, very early on. Here I’ve been asked to do five to ten, a couple of times a week.

Realistically, I’m more likely to stick with a gentler routine that I can build into my day, which hopefully should be my aim. She did ask me if there was something I wanted to achieve – a goal I could set. I couldn’t think of anything concrete on the day, but after chatting to a colleague, it crossed my mind that I would like to be able to go (downhill) skiing again.

For that, I would want to lose a lot more weight, as well as regain a higher level of strength and fitness, so it’s quite a lot to aim at, but hopefully a worthwhile goal. To give my UK readers bit more context regarding the differing attitudes in Norway and the UK my lovely line-manager, Kirsty, who retired yesterday asked me whether I wasn’t worried about breaking bones. I am, to an extent, but in Norway, most ski slopes have a policy that skiing is free for people who are 70 or over, and it’s not just set up that way as they know nobody will take them up on the offer.

Midweek, Donna and I drove over to visit a friend of hers, who is selling some cottages and (hopefully) some furniture. Assuming none of the people buying the cottages have prebooked sales, hopefully I will be buying three wooden bedside tables from her, along with a matching mirror. I’ve been struggling to find any I liked that weren’t too expensive, so hopefully that will solve that issue. The image at the top of the page is the view from the garden of one of the cottages she has sold, and while we were there, we also met her lovely pig, Dotty. It was a lovely evening.

Yesterday was a lovely day as I went over to Stranraer, where Kirsty was working her last day. Several of us made the trip and we had lunch together and then lots of hugs. She and I discussed Stranraer, where I used to work, many years ago. The office there is very small and much more cosy somehow, than the office in Dumfries. I do sometimes wish I worked there, though due to Donna, and various connections, I have a better social life in Dumfries than I would have over there. There’s also the not inconsiderable matter of Dumfries being a two hour drive from Mum and Dad. Stranraer would nearly double that journey.

Tonight, I have booked to go on an evening wildlife walk with my colleague, Cris. Hopefully the rain will hold off, but whether it does or not, I am looking forward to it.

I will finish off with some photos of the the fields around Blackbird Lane, with some cattle basking in the lovely sunshine we’ve had over the past few days. I wish you all an enjoyable weekend and good week.

Beetroot, Bees and Bindweed

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I had a wonderful weekend last week, with Valerie. Back when the children were young, I met Valerie outside a classroom door. Her youngest, Stacey, was in the same class as John. We were both newcomers to the area and she quickly became one of my favourite people. She looked after Andrew when he was a baby and none of the child minders in the village had space for him. We both worked nights, but when we had time, we used to go for lunch at Jimmy Chung’s – a Chinese restaurant that did a fantastic buffet.

Meeting up made me feel I had gone back in time. With some friends, even when you haven’t seen them for years, you can pick it up where you left off and it was like that. Effortless and joyful. There were some new things. Valerie has a hot tub and evenings in the water with a glass of red wine (thoughtfully bought by her husband, Charles) were a wonderful new addition.

We also visited the Kelpies, which are not far from where I used to live. I’ve seen them in photos before, so it was lovely to see them, and that also fitted in to the daily walks I am now taking.

Valerie still looks amazing, despite all those Jimmy Chung’s meals and a bout of long Covid, caused by working in the NHS, in the front line, with no PPE. I had more protective gear as a technician in a chicken slaughterhouse in Norway. The chronic underfunding of public services in the UK has been going on for many years now. I hope it changes. Treating hard-working staff badly is not a recipe for a happy and healthy workforce.

I was in Ayr this week, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. My colleague (Pilar) was duty vet and I was shadowing her. While I was there to learn, it was an instructive lesson. Monday was fortunately quiet, but the two queries that took longest to deal with were about primates and alpacas. She also was put under pressure by a very grumpy vet, who probably knew he’d done something wrong and was taking it out on our staff. It didn’t inspire confidence in me that the role of duty vet is going to get any easier.

I did have time to wander around Ayr though, which was interesting. It’s on the coast and there’s a tidal river running through the town centre. It no longer seems deep enough for ships: perhaps years ago it was dredged and deeper, but there are many signs that it was once a thriving dock.

On the town centre side of the river, over the old bridge, which is now used as a foot bridge, there are some new buildings, such as Marks and Spencer.

But on the north side of the river, there are older buildings that speak of sailors and ships and a different life for the town. These is the old bath house.

The seaman’s mission:

And while the oldest bar in Ayr still looks to be in use, the oldest restaurant seems to be falling into a sad state of disrepair.

I can be difficult finding good food in new places, but I happened upon The Stravaig while wandering in search of inspiration on Tuesday evening. They served me a wonderful beetroot and goats cheese salad, with pickled walnuts. It was properly delicious and I will definitely be going back.

I have been doing the Second Nature program, primarily to lose weight (I’ve lost 5kg/11lb so far) but the program encourages better habits and lifestyle changes, rather than concentrating exclusively on food and calories. There are articles each day and a theme each week. So far we’ve had Prepare for the Program, Reset Your Lifestyle, Nutrition – Focus on Meal Planning, Mindset – Develop a Positive Mindset, Exercise – Increase Your Steps and this week’s Stress – Start Deep Breathing.

While I think it is a good program, and hope I can stick with it, it has struck me this week that an awful lot of it is about managing stress. The obesity epidemic undoubtedly has a lot of causes, from too much sugar, high availability of fast food and so on, but as I have embraced trying to sleep better and get into different routines, it did strike me as rather sad that my life is indeed filled with stress that I have to manage, and always has been. I’m sure it’s true of a lot of people and perhaps the reasons for that should be explored. Working hours in the UK are much longer than those in Norway, for example. After three in the afternoon, I’ve already worked out I’m not good in front of a computer. Out in the field, I can keep going, but I don’t achieve more by staying those extra hours.

Living in Norway opened my eyes to the horrible work situation in the UK. I remember sitting in a hotel at breakfast, listening to some southern businessman pontificating to his friend about how he knew who to promote as it would be the person who stayed late and really put in the hours. Perhaps he should have looked a bit harder at those who managed to finish their work within the allocated hours and prioritized their home life over crawling up the boss’s backside.

I felt a bit smug sitting there, having escaped all that. Nobody in Norway thinks that way. And now I’m back and it hasn’t changed, but I am thinking hard about what I can personally do so as not to slide back into those attitudes. I’m not going to be able to change the civil service, but in time, I may be able to change my own pattern of working. Deep breathing is all very well, but it should be an add on in a healthy lifestyle, not a lifeline to cling onto to survive.

I will finish with some photos from Blackbird Lane. The hedgerow is filled with flowers and weeds and twined with different plants. I was struck yesterday by the bindweed, which is both pretty and efficient, though it achieves its height by strangling others. It isn’t just climbing through the hawthorn, but even engulfed a dead nettle and other flimsy plants. Anyway, they are all climbing towards the light and though it’s not been a warm summer, I still find new things there daily. The bees at the top of the page were there too.

Have a good week all!

Colour, Light and Sound

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Sunrise/sunset: Up all day.

We are into the last few days of the midnight sun. Andrew is away at the moment and John is about to go on holiday for four weeks, as are many others who work at the abattoir. Next week the abattoir will be closed, so Friday had a real end of term feeling. So much so that I almost forgot that I don’t have holiday until John comes back.

The reality is that I’m going to have a few days here on my own. It feels rather odd: a taste of things to come I think. I don’t know how I feel about living alone again after so many years of having family with me. Sometimes I think it will be great to be able to do what I want, but I know I am going to miss them. Moving on in life can be difficult. I don’t often talk about my marriage on here, but though I know leaving was the right thing to do, the part of my life once all the children have left is much more of a blank canvas than it would have been if I was still in a relationship with a committed partner.

Andrew is going to Folk High School down in the south of Norway, and after giving it a good deal of consideration, I’m going to drive him down. So in four week’s time, when my own holiday actually arrives, I will be taking a major road trip. We may take Triar with us. I’m not sure, as yet. A lot of things are still up in the air at the moment.

With buying the house and all that’s been happening through the winter, we haven’t been out and about nearly as much as I would have liked, but last Saturday, John and I decided we were going to have a day out. We drove down to Andørja, which is an island that can be reached by a bridge from Senja. Had we driven further, through the tunnel that links to Rolla island, we could have taken a ferry to Harstad, but that might be a trip for another day. For now, John and I just went to see the mountains of Andørja and though they were lost in the clouds, because it wasn’t a picture perfect sunny day, they were still spectacular: rocky mountains that fall steeply into the fjord.

The bridge to the island is somewhat brutalist, being made of concrete with no additional supportive structures or suspension. It is spectacularly high though, to allow ships to pass underneath it. Here is a photo, taken from a distance.

And here’s John, looking good in amongst all that scenery!

And a random shot of a tree stump, that I just liked the look of!

On the way back, we went to Patricia’s Gatekjøkken for a delicious burger.

I am not very good at checking Facebook, so when I went on it on Thursday evening, I was surprised to see an invitation to a blues concert from my colleague Kaj. Kaj has been working with me a lot at the abattoir lately and is a great source of information, both about how things function at work and about Norway and Norwegian life in general. I knew that he played drums in a band, so I decided I would ask him about it the next day. I thought though, in general, that it would be lovely to get out for an evening. So I was very pleased to discover, when I spoke to Kaj at work on Friday, that he would indeed be playing. There were three bands performing and Kaj’s was up second.

The venue was intriguing. The concert was at Moen Kulturlåve, which I had never heard of. It’s actually a barn, where there can be cattle on the ground floor, though I don’t know whether they would be outside at this time of year. Kaj told me that the farmer has assured him that the cows seem to milk better after there’s been a concert, which is intriguing, if true. Certainly, cattle do sometimes seem to like having a radio playing when they are inside, so who knows?

Anyway, John and I drove over and bought tickets on the door and I’m very glad we did. Certainly it’s a very different venue from any I’ve ever been in and there was a wonderful atmosphere, even before the band arrived.

John and I had a couple of beers. Mine was alcohol free as I had to drive, but it felt great to be out doing something so very different.

And here is Kaj’s band, who were fantastic. I don’t know how long the concert went on, as John and I left as it was approaching midnight, but it was a brilliant night out for both of us.

And I will leave you with a few flower pictures, because there is so much colour in the world at the moment and it’s an amazing contrast after so many months of snow and ice. Have a good week all and thank you for reading.

Cows in the Field

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Sunrise/sunset: 05:15/20:17 Daylength: 15hr01min

Well the flat handover went slightly worse than I expected. Though I had assumed the landlord might be quite fussy and exacting, I hadn’t expected him to go into full rage mode. We looked round the flat together on Sunday evening and for the most part it went quite well. There was a moment of triumph for him when he found I hadn’t dusted on the top of a couple of very high, inbuilt cupboards and heard I hadn’t cleaned out the U-bends in the bathroom, but despite their expressed disbelief that I could have done the cleaning in two days (I was told over and over that it had taken them fourteen days to clean the three bedroom flat before we moved in) they seemed satisfied. It was agreed that I would go back and rectify the dusting and U-bend situation and so we left to go and eat as it was late and there were still three days of the lease to go.

I received a message while we were eating, to say I hadn’t vacuumed under the seats on the sofas (I had forgotten) and that we had removed an office chair (a miscommunication between John and Andrew, who had both removed one) but otherwise I was quite pleased myself. The remaining work would only take a short time to do, and then I would be free. They hadn’t taken a deposit, so I thought that if I could do the work to a reasonable level, and they were adequately satisfied, there would be no further comeback.

Andrew had offered to come and give me a hand on the Monday evening. So relaxed was I about finishing up, that I almost took some of the afternoon off work and went myself, though perhaps it was some sixth sense that protected me. I collected Andrew after school and we went round to the flat. We hadn’t even had a chance to begin, when the front door of the flat was slammed open and the landlord strode into the room and right up to us. It was obvious immediately that he was angry. He told us in a tight voice that not only had we not come close to cleaning the flat well enough, but that we had damaged three items.

I asked him to show me the items, the first of which was the board under the sink in the bathroom. There had been an ongoing problem with the U-bend, which he knew about as I had asked him how to fix it the first time it cropped up. Indeed the very first time I found I had wet feet on running the tap, I had opened the cupboard to find the MDF was already warped, and so I had concluded that it was not a completely new problem.

I politely pointed out this fact and he began to get angrier, insisting that he knew it had been fine when we moved in because he’d replaced the panel before we came. Ironic that it didn’t even cross his mind that his statement was a clear indication that there was a problem with the U-bend if he had to change the board before (without taking the sensible precaution of getting a plumber out to fix the actual problem) but by this time he was working himself up into a full head of steam.

By the time we left the bathroom, he had gone into full ranting mode. Even with Andrew there, I felt uneasy and uncomfortable. The fact that there had been a sock under the cushions on the couch seemed to be a particular point of vexation. Not sure why they found it quite so shocking. He was shouting by this time and I made the decision that we should leave, so I handed him the key and Andrew and I left. By the time we got home, there was a terse message on my phone about the fact that I was “refusing to engage with the process” with ten photographs, which included a cupboard door where the hinge at the top had come slightly loose and a photograph of the drawer under the oven, which I had opened during cleaning, to find that the base was entirely rusted through, with large rust bubbles bursting out through the black paint, which definitely had not occurred over the course of two years.

It ended up with me blocking their numbers. John went round to further tell them, in no uncertain terms, why I had left. Unsurprisingly he was met with much less aggression, as he is about four inches taller and visibly stronger than the ex-landlord. Typical bullying behaviour to yell at a woman and a young man with Asperger’s and be polite to someone who could easily take you out. I guess I wasn’t entirely surprised. A year earlier, he had randomly come out of the house and yelled at Anna and Andrew for some made-up misdemeanour. In fact, it was after that that I started to look for somewhere new to live. In the event though, it was all pretty unpleasant, and utterly unnecessary. Had he engaged in a normal fashion, I would have completed the remaining tasks and probably would even have agreed to pay a small amount for the damage under the sink. Never have I been so glad, however, that the one thing they had neglected to do was to take the sizeable (two month’s rent) deposit from me.

Anyway, with all that said, what I mostly feel is relief that we have moved out and pride in my sons, both of whom helped me handle a difficult situation. I was shaking when John came home, and he was incensed, but he had the presence of mind to take a calming friend with him. It’s a wonderful feeling every time I see something that tells me that I have raised some truly decent human beings who also love me. The best feeling in the world!

The rest of the week has gone much better. I was in Tromsø for a couple of nights, catching up with all my far-flung colleagues from around the region.

Wooden fishing boat in Tromsø harbour

The end of the week has been really very pleasant. I came home from Tromsø to find that John had strimmed the veritable hay field at the back of the house, where the grass had obviously not been mowed for a good long time. John is likely to move back into the house (though he might stay in his caravan outside the abattoir during the long working days of the season) and it is lovely to have so much help. I’ve really wanted them all to feel like this is truly a home they can return to, should they want or need it, and it’s obvious John is enjoying working on making it a truly pleasant place to live. I would enjoy doing it on my own, but it’s even better with family to share it with.

He called me up on the way to work yesterday, to say that there was ground fog over the valley and that if I wanted to take some photos for this blog, now was the moment. And so I drove out to find that not only were there wonderful views over the valley, but that there was frost on the ground and all the leaves were swathed in white.

Sunrise over the Målselv valley with frosted field in the foreground and fog over the river

Yesterday was the only weekday when I was likely to have a chance to take enough time off work to get some things sorted in the house, so I had arranged for the beds to be delivered, a new heat exchanger/air conditioning unit to be installed and, most importantly, a builder to assess the work that needed to be done on the roof and (money permitting, after the roof was fixed) various jobs inside the house. It seems likely that the roof will cost less to fix than the 50,000-100,000 NOK (round 5,000-10,000 British pounds or US$) and so we will hopefully have more to spare for other things.

And all day, as I worked in and around the house, I could see that there were cows in the field across the road. Of all the domesticated animals, dairy cows are easily my favourite. They are such calm, curious creatures. I had a real feeling of “cows in the meadow, all’s right in the world”. I know that’s not a real saying, but it works for me. It won’t be long before the winter arrives and then the cows will be inside, but they’ll be out again next summer and the summer after that and the summer after that. I have a really good feeling about the move we’ve just made. Onwards and upwards!

The cattle on the other side of the road

Confidence

Blog, In Darkness and In Light, Life in Norway, , ,

Sunrise/sunset: Down all day.

It’s been a mixed sort of week. As there wasn’t so much to do here on the 26th and 27th of December, we drove around a good deal during the brief periods when it was light. Though the days are very short, what light there is has a wonderful luminous quality. Coupled with the landscape of Senja, it becomes difficult to know when to stop taking photographs.

I took Anna to the airport and Charlie to the bus on Tuesday. Both arrived home safely. Always a relief, particularly when travelling to somewhere outside Norway, as Anna was doing.

My return to work was abrupt. Anja phoned me on the afternoon of the 29th December. A difficult case that I had dealt with before (and which I believed was under control) has flared up again. I am frustrated not to be able to discuss it more. It comes down to a dispute, as do so many of our cases. And if I judge it wrong, then animals will suffer.

Though I’m not in the UK, I saw a lot about the recently on social media about another child who had been beaten and killed by her mother and partner. The press always goes to town on those cases and reports unquestioningly from all those related people who made reports that were ignored. The subtext is always that the social workers were stupid to ignore such clear evidence.

Though obviously the main grief is for the child, I have a degree of sympathy for those professionals involved. So many of the cases I investigate involve a judgement regarding who is telling the truth. If those reporting were always good people, then it wouldn’t be complicated. But through my work here, I am learning that it is rarely straightforward. Obviously there are those who mistreat their animals. But there are also vindictive people who use the authorities to make lives difficult for others. There are even occasions when those people send in their flying monkeys if they see that they have not been successful themselves. It really isn’t cut and dried that lots of reports mean that there is something seriously wrong.

And so it comes down to a judgement about who is telling the truth, bearing in mind that sometimes it might be both or neither, and that there can also be misunderstandings. I am lucky to have a supportive team around me. I had advice from Torkjell, the regional big boss, and he chatted to Hilde, despite the fact that she was on holiday. I feel fortunate to have had help.

Regardless of difficult cases, family life goes on. The pond in the middle of the town is frozen and a couple of days ago, someone came and cleared away some of the snow, making tracks for ice skating. John and Andrew went and bought some skates, and for the past couple of evenings, they have been out on the ice doing circuits.

Tracks on the pond for ice skating

And of course Triar also needs to go out. John and I took him out for a walk up on the ski slope a few days back. There was fog over the fjord, but as we drove upwards it cleared. It was another of those days when it was hard for me to keep going as the temptation to stop and take pictures was overwhelming.

Triar is wearing his winter boots.

I posted a picture of our kransekake on social media. It’s one of my favourite Norwegian deserts, chewy rings of almond flavoured deliciousness.

Kransekake with crackers and Norwegian flags

Usually, people say how lovely the photo is, but this time someone asked whether it was meant to look like a dalek. And now I’ve seen it, it’s impossible to unsee. Of course, the only thing to do with that kind of information is to embrace it. Next time, the crackers should be placed to point straight out in front, and if I’m feeling really keen, I will create a plunger out of chocolate to give the full effect.

Anyway, I hope that 2022 is a better year than 2021, and that wherever we find ourselves, we can find some brightness in the road ahead. Happy new year to you.

Concerning Welfare

Hillwalking, In Darkness and In Light, Life in Norway, Vet, , , , , , ,

Sunrise/sunset: 09:01/ 16:00. Daylength: 6hr58min

Back in June I wrote a post about complaints from animal rights organisations about Mattilsynet: Trouble in Paradise. Last weekend on my Facebook feed, I found a post from a colleague with a link to a new article from NRK, Norway’s public services broadcaster. It contained the stories of whistleblowers from within Mattilsynet regarding the distress its inspectors are feeling about their inability protect the welfare of the animals they are supposed to oversee.

Link to article in Norwegian: We have to close our eyes to suffering animals. *See note below for translation tips

One of the things I have noticed in my job is that almost every other week, changes are introduced to policies and protocols. There’s a lot to learn in any role and a year in, I feel I’m still picking things up, which would be enough already without the feeling that anything I learn might shift again next week. Then there’s the “paperwork”. Most of it is digitalised now, but there is a whole load of report writing, which often takes up far more time than the actual visit.

I am catching up gradually with some of the politics, and it seems that the current concentration on bureaucracy relates to criticism from the official Norwegian Auditor General in 2019 regarding the poor quality of case processing. It was stated that Mattilsynet lacked good tools and systems to deal with the animal welfare supervision it had to carry out, and that the result was that serious breaches of the animal welfare laws were not being followed up. It also said that Mattilsynet employees were not using the tools they had to penalise those who broke the law, and that it took too long for those who didn’t take proper care of their animals to be banned.

There’s a certain irony to what is happening now as a result of these accusations. I haven’t been here long, but one of the major constraints is the computer system we have to work with when processing cases. We use a system called MATS. I don’t know how old it is, but it is so complicated to use that it slows everything down. It sets out protocols and you have to work through the elements in order and tick off certain actions before you can proceed to the next. So if I receive a message from the public regarding a concern about animal welfare, it comes to me in MATS. I have to process that message and work through various stages on a list, and then at some point I will come to the end of that segment and have to move onto the next.

Once you click through to the new section, you can’t go back and change anything in the previous section if you’ve made an error. Thomas always tells me I have to be very careful before I click onwards, and I often check with him. But as I am trying to stand on my own feet a bit more, there have been cases where I have got as far as writing a report or a response to an animal owner who has asked for permission for something, and then had to go right back to the beginning as I realised I had linked the case to the animal owner’s personal file, and not to their business, or some other easily made system error that cannot be rectified.

MATS is also clunky in other ways. Almost nothing is automatic. Before we leave the farm or home, following an inspection, we have to write a “receipt” with a summary of what we have checked and what our assessments were. This used to be on paper, but now most of them are sent electronically. So we type our observations into an app. This would be very useful if there was an integrated system. If the observations we recorded in the receipt were transmitted automatically into MATS, and then perhaps used in the report, then it would be truly useful. As it is, we have to open MATS and the receipt and copy and paste all the information from one to the other.

The report itself has to comply with strict parameters in how it is set out and before I can send it to the owner, I have to run it past a colleague, and then afterwards past a control team, all the time making amendments, and then often sending it back and forth multiple times until everyone is satisfied.

Instead of rebuilding the system, they are adding things like the receipt system (and another system that allows us to add photo evidence) before the problem of MATS has been addressed. It seems to me, that they are trying to tweak something that is so fundamentally flawed that they are actually making the situation worse instead of better.

Of course all of this really comes back down to funding and monitoring. The argument is that they can’t afford a new system, though not affording it is probably costing millions. I have watched similar events in the public sector in the UK. The health service and school systems have both wandered into this territory where funding is reduced, then criticisms are made, and rather than improving the situation, new systems for monitoring are introduced, which increase the workload in ways that do nothing to correct the problems, but increase the cost of the operation. That the Norwegian government is paying veterinary surgeons to copy-paste long lists of observations and check and recheck whether the reports we write comply exactly with a template, which could presumably be automatically applied if the will and funding was there, seems brainless to me.

In addition, there are certain routine visits we carry out, for example those to check the farmers are following the rules with regard to ear-marks, disease control and traceability. Common sense would suggest that if no breaches of the rules are discovered, the feedback report could be generated automatically. Not only would that save direct work for the vet who did the inspection, but it would sidestep all the report-checks for compliance and would ensure their other aim – that everyone is dealt with the same way, wherever they are in Norway – was met without any effort whatsoever. Reducing the time it takes to process cases would free up time so that we could carry out more inspections. It seems like the system is set up in a way that prevents us from doing the most fundamental part of the job, which should be getting out and checking whether the animals are okay.

Anyway, I’m not going to comment any more on this for now. Our area is actually better off than those in the report, for which I am grateful. The report mentions an area where the inspectors have been told they can’t take on any more cases until the old ones are cleared up and we haven’t reached that stage. Thomas often tells me of his frustration that we are firefighting cases, rather than preventing problems before they start. Because I’ve only been here a short time, I can’t compare it with how things used to be, but he feels things have become more difficult. I am also aware of how much Thomas takes on, in comparison with what I can do at the moment. Though I help as much as I can, I know he is taking responsibility for the worst problems, as I work to follow what he’s doing and ensure the case timelines are kept in order. I am learning a lot about how cases should be handled, but even writing up the timelines shows me how frustrating the system is. There has been a change in government in Norway and the new government is more left-leaning, so I can only hope that some of the budget cuts, that have been happening forever, start to be reversed.

*****

Though the snow has gone for now, it was beautiful while it lasted. Triar and I followed the same trail last Saturday as we had the week before. There were amazing views as I reached the higher ground and I went a little further than last time, though I think I was still only about halfway along the trail to the peak. I need to find someone to go with me before attempting the whole walk.

Looking back at the snowy trail up to Kistefjellet

And on Tuesday evening, there was a snowstorm. Though it was windy, the temperature was around zero. When it’s really cold, the snow is powdery, and when the wind blows, it doesn’t stick to anything. But this snow stuck to everything. I went down into the town centre to get something, and had to stop to take photographs of the trees as they were so beautiful against the overcast sky and the streetlights.

I am looking forward to winter now. Though snow can be inconvenient, I still feel a childlike excitement when I wake up to find the world has turned white. And in a month, the polar night will be here. I hope you will follow and share it with me.

*If you want to read a Norwegian article in English (or any other language) you can paste the URL into Google Translate (set the languages at the top). A link will appear in the “Translation” side. If you click on the link, it should take you to a translated version of the article.