It's been super sunny but freakishly cold last few days, which we've been spending taking out terrace after terrace of the old vineyard, getting ready to replace some of the grapevines with honey plants - namely anything which grows on shitty soil in harsh winters and even harsher summers. We'll probably need a water cistern to help with irrigation for when droughts hit. But I've been shopping for thyme, lavender, rosemary and so on for a while now, so we'll have all these karst-savvy herbs and occasionally some very bloomy tree. Mum saw I bought a star magnolia and grabbed it for herself :D

The General offered to make pizzas today, and the poor sod is always so worried about making food - he's an excellent cook - he'll stress to no end, even though he buys enough ingredients for a restaurant and one can totally fuss about anything they could ever possibly desire: I personally like thicker, gummier dough of a Margarita base, added brie, poultry ham, mozzarella, garlic in olive oil, spices, prosciutto, a spoon of sour cream and a pinch of horseradish. 

Needless to say, although he bought the wrong flour, it came out perhaps even better than the classic white base. But then the round tray didn't fit into my mum's oven, and that was so oily it literally kept catching fire - smoking up the house, which no-one but him found out of the ordinary. He forgets what a weird trail it is, cooking in someone else's kitchen. In the meanwhile, in the next room, we were stuffing our faces. His is the only pizza I eat. It was his best so far. 

I've walked uphill twice these days, as the car as full of plants and tools, and as it can happen when it's really cold, my legs really hurt. Of course then we worked all day and ate like nuts and by the time we returned home, we were just out of it. It can get so warm in the sun you strip down to your T shirt, then the wind blows from the mountains and you remember it's minus 2. Also, I've been waking up at five, eager to have a few hours for myself to carve. Not that I can feel my fingers anymore. LOTS to learn. Half the time I don't even know if I am holding the knives correctly or I've just managed to pick the hardest damn wood imaginable.