KW-41 A sense of place

And a confounded metal beast

This was one of those time out weeks. Not in a pirate leaves the barracks sort of a way - that, most excitingly, is this week’s adventure - more in a time mostly stops kind of a way, characterised by other people being here.

I made a pretty yellow thing

I know, I know, it’s October. People don’t come to The Barracks in October.

For the first half of the week, my mentor, my friend the most supportive supporter of the barracks left her French Chateau in the middle of nowhere - house of the first and only feminist creative residency in Europe - to spend some time discovering the barracks and being all inspirational and stuff. The outcome of which is lots of ideas for residencies and exchanges all around Happy Doomerism for next year.

And in a complete change of pace, the latter half of the week saw the barracks occupied by Radio Télévision Luxembourg - or RTL as they are known these days. They filmed the piggies and the pirate for a couple of days. Oh my, dear reader. We are going to be on the tellybox. I don’t know exactly when, but when I do, you will be the first to know. Probably in about a week.

being quizzed by a nice young reporter from RTL television here in Germany

They (those nice people from the box) also want to do a segment with me in Berlin. I don’t know exactly what the plan is. Maybe they are hoping for a Crocodile Dundee moment. Should I take a “that’s not a knife” knife with me? Or shall I jump whenever a tram trundles past? Expostulating “What is that confounded metal beast?” and jumping half out of my skin? I wonder what the German word for confounded is… I shall have to look it up before I go.

How to take a 1950’s style photo with your camera phone - turn all the lights off and let the flash do its worst

As for the rest of the week:

• Get everything out of the ground - potatoes, sunflowers, quinoa - and prepare them for storage.

• Also the last of the beans

• Dry piles and piles of spinach. This is a new experiment for this year

• Go mushrooming at least once more

• Figure out a plan for insulating the front office

I know what I want to do to trap some more warmth in for this winter, but it does involve a degree of deconstruction first. So it would make sense for me to prep everything before I start, and have a clear idea what’s going to happen when.

Lastly, in the fields, cabbages, carrots, fodder beets can stay where they are. I have started feeding the piggies with the fodder beets though. They are getting used to the taste again, but they appear to like the crunch!

I don’t think this is my finest newsletter. Sorry, I didn’t really realise it was Monday, and you’re getting it all a bit rushed.

I’ll try to do better next week.

Until then

Much pirate Love

your Pirate Ben

xoxo