Grrrr. I had a bad time with tendonitis in my right shoulder during November and December but a course of anti-inflammatories seemed to sort it out over Christmas. However, a spot of light wrestling with a hay bale two days ago has brought it back. Darn. I don’t like feeling decrepit. As you can see, it makes me grumpy.

And I was doubly grumpy over Christmas since the doc warned me off having too much salt while I was taking the drugs in case it gave me diabetes. I know, slightly weird, but possibly something was lost in translation. That’s the perennial problem living in a foreign language! Concerned about the diabetes element, I limited my choccy intake too. Slightly. Benj was also on a restricted sweet treats diet with his medication so it was a season of healthier than usual eating in the Dagg household, albeit unwillingly.

On the food subject, here are a couple of photos for you. First up, sitting on your food is a good way to stop other people getting at it.

Noel, Carol and Mistletoe were born just before Christmas

Noel, Carol and Mistletoe were born just before Christmas

And secondly, and returning to the shoulder theme, Chris went to remove his home-produced prosciutto (formerly known as Porky the pig) from the salt it’s been in for 4 weeks in order to air dry it for six months now before we start to eat it. The special preserving salt he used had solidified around the shoulder of ham due to the humidity so he had to set to with a hammer and chisel to get the ham out!

ham2

There’s a lot of work involved in home butchering and curing, but so far all the results have been very well worth it. We’ll keep you posted about the proscuttio in July!