11-IX-2021.: The annual party

On 10th I slept until 11:30, dunno why, probably needed it. After lunch went to Čankovo to mow and clean. I ate a lot of dust, but okay, can do once a year. Used to do it with a vacuum cleanerr, but the big r2d2 with water filtering is now at Lena's, the one she bought seven years ago is kaputt, so she's got this one now. I was kaputt too, but got the job done, with a broom. Upgraded the obstacles a bit to prevent neighbor's daughter from entering to steal.

In the evening we went to Lidl to buy stuff for tomorrow. I usually do it on my own in the morning, but we ran out of stuff anyway, so why not. I managed to remember what else we miss there (hot aleva peppers in case of any skin cuts, the charcoal because the last year's leftovers were stolen too, simple knives were mostly missing but bought that at detelina in the morning when I bought the hens fodder).

Since I decided I won't be drinking tomorrow, because it's not like before when we stayed deep into the night and I stayed overnight, we sat in the evening and tried the theoretical mix of tutifruties. We needed and empty cask so we kept pouring from the fourth one of last year's tutifruti, because it was barely half full. The plan was to share some and then distribute the remainder on first three casks. Well, didn't work, we emptied it and even in this bottle there was only 0,2 liters left, so I poured from #1 and that was the sample of what would it have been. Well, it was good, we went to sleep around 2:30. Our drunk playlist is enriched by a few entries again, we added Tom Waits last time (his popularity has waned for me, he became too similar to what he mocked) and „Barcelona“; this time some wailaid Russians.

This morning I got up at 7:30 - I stick to my habit of not having a habit. Slowly drank my coffee, made cigarettes for the day, then she got up too, all in due time. Packed eos70, nanovo (with updated playlist and pictures from last two years), speakers, brandy, and went for more groceries. Not much left to visit, just bakery. Got a kilo of mantijas, which are a kind of two-bite burek (half with ground meat, half with cheese) and a loaf of like rye bread (unsung trash, it's not like sponge or hay, it's rather cotton wool), and drove to Dragana's. Sat a cigarette with her and then we went, not the shortest route but through Topličina, where she'd meet a girl from IV₄ who held a CD with her latest scans. Luckily, she was waiting curbside, so I didn't have to peek out the house numbers, as it's one of those streets where the sides are out of sync - she was standing in front of 38, and the one across was 29. Our street is worse, the difference is about 40.

When we got to Čankovo, I kept looking into the mirror, as a car was following me, and I prefer to park with back to the gate, so I need to have perhaps 20 seconds of nobody coming. So I parked Joda slanted on the left curb, waiting for this guy to pass, then to pull back to the right. But the guy didn't pass, he parked in front of the house. OK, I parked and then guess who came out of that nondescript asphalt-colored something - Todor. Aaaah, that's what it's going to be, I heard the story from the other neighbor this week, that he's waxing nostalgic about his old house how he's sorry that he sold it and would like to buy it back. He even went on TV with the story, with footage of himself at the house's front. So yes, heard it from horse's mouth this time. You don't have the money, I said, we invested once more what we paid you, and then add eleven years of work on top of that, and a hundred fruit trees. There, buy your uncle's house (where the thieves live now). It's a ruin, he said. Well tear it down and make a new one. Or come in fifteen years and then we'll talk. Ah he won't be needing it by then. Well that's when I may get bored with this. And he keeps refering to Dragana as if she were my wife... is it possible that he forgot how she looked, or he thought I remarried? I said quick goodbyes and went to unlock the gate. She said the guy was obviously waiting to be invited into a tour, and then I told her how he put it on sale so fast, that it was over before his father cooled. Not even the traditional forty days passed before money and keys changed hands. As the neighbor said, he was happy when he was counting the money, no repents now*.

Then the we two took out the tables and chairs, laid out the meze, sat for almost two hours, had a shot (me about a half of one and that was it for the day; she had about two halves), and chatted endlessly until Staša came. He, of course, took the short road over the dam, there's perhaps 7km that way, otherwise it would be 20 or more. Around noon the others came as well - Bajlo, Čombe and Mandža in one car, Borko and Žuca next, Sredljak solo, Mima solo. We fired up the barbecue at 12:40, some of ćevapčići were charred on outside and still red on the inside, because Bajlo kept intervening and kept the lid off, lots of oxygen and open flame. He also dropped a few, so Mima took them to wash and then give them a brief burn to dry. But all the same, the charred side didn't bother anyone, the taste was equisit, and the neck steaks were even better (boneless, well fuck the 300 dinars difference). A bit later Jasmina came with a cake, she's a grandmother again, her daughter had birth at home, with a midwife. I was surprised to hear that it's now possible here, it's a first time I heard of that. Just when I got into explanation how Nina bore the twins on the Philippines with a doula, and how much would it have been if she gave birth in the US (Sredljak: „did you translate the amount - is that hundred to hundredsixty thousand dinars?“ - „no, dollars“), when it turned out that doulas are well known here now, and well organized. Nina later told me that this is no news to her, it's a fairly common practice and she's following them on the web.

Jozda appeared the last, as usual, and amazingly wasn't in a rush, didn't hurry to go anywhere. I warned him about the rule about not shooting the pianist, and he just tried to get out of me the title of the first hit of Indeksi, to which I tried with „Magnificent seven“ (yup, they did even western movie music in the beginning), but then when the foobar 2000 played Korni grupa's „Picture“, he just stood with a finger pointing to the speakers, and stood like that, as if thinking of what to say, for a full minute.

Amazingly, nobody felt like leaving, and they stayed quite a while. The last shot is a poser (Bajlo, Žuca, Jozda), them bracketing her in the middle, „only one stripe left visible“, at 18:40. The disperse began some half an hour before that, when Staša had to go change the shitbag (his shitduct got redirected during the last surgery). Soon after him Dragana felt like going, as her leg started giving her trouble (said she'll have to restart the bee sting poison ointment, it worked and now that she's stopped it's back again), so Borko and I swapped chicks - he drove her and Žuca will return with me. She and the other two girls stayed to wash the dishes, help me bring in the tables and chairs and everything and put it back as it was before. During the ride home Žuca talked a lot about everything and anything, about her years of driver's staž, and how once, on the day of the big snow (probably december 2012) they gathered at the same hunters' lodge where we'll see again in a week, with her office mates (from social security), had a feast and everyone got drunk. Gavra was the host, and the gas burner was faulty so he got into the car to go to town to fetch another. Upon return he reported „folks, the trucks are leaving vagašes“ (from hungarian vágás, a cut, slot), i.e. the snow was afoot. By the time they parted, it was more than a foot, and she managed to drive each of her drunken passengers home. And then five or six more such stories.

I got home a few minutes before 20:00. She had just arrived at a conclusion that I gathered a long stay gang and I'd be staying overnight to sit with them and drink, so she locked the door bare two minutes before my arrival. The girls were very happy to see me, specially Sanda, who ran into me screaming „Deda! My deda!“, then she and Linda took turns running into my lap while I sat on my chair, and I'd then catch and lift the one I got. Took a good quarter of an hour, I even held both of them in my stretched hands, as if cordwood. There, someone's so happy to see me come.

Went to bed at 23:00, quite tired. So this was it from IV_5pp for this year.

Processed the photos by lunchtime the next day, sent them to dropbox, sent the link in a collective email. In the afternoon we took the girls back to Čankovo, as I forgot to turn the water off - but did turn off the water heater, only forgot that I did. There was still hot water in it, so she filled a bucket, gave the girls two kitchen sponges and a squirt of dish detergent, undressed them completely so they'll have dry clothes in which to return, and let them at it. Took two more buckets and a dozen squirts, and they had lots of fun. She picked two more buckets of plum, some pear and apple, I got a bucket and a half of vineyard peaches and it still looks there may be one more batch to pick before we close the season. Well until the pumpkins and quinces ripen, if there's any pumpkins left - the thieving neighbors already started stealing them, even though they are not ripe yet. And squashed some stalks, they are already drying where they tread on them. And yesterday I took Dragana to show her the pumpkin patch, it was all green and untouched.

A bee stung her middle finger while she was picking the plums, so she quickly plucked out the sting, squeezed out the poison as much as she could and... well no soft soil at hand, leaves perhaps the wring kind... she poked her finger into a plum. Said it didn't have the time to hurt, did swell a bit, later. That plum went, of course, into the bucket with the others. Then in the evening, while we had a tutifruti, we said that this batch will be a house special, „tutifruti with bee sting poison“, there must be a few molecules of it, in proper homeopathic proportion, that'll cure everything. We'd serve that some time in the winter, specially for Dragana and her left leg.

Went to Lidl on monday, didn't drop by Roda to play because the icecream would melt. I patched the rear tyre on my bike, the tiny needle I found was screwily small, but I'm equipped - the stronger spectacles and a tongs from her set and the tub with water, all the kit and kaboodle, did it slowly and thoroughly. Found a way how to fix the garage doors - the panes sagged a bit and the tongue of the lock is hitting below the hole in the frame, so instead of moving the bit down the frame, drilling new holes etc, I'll simply extend the existing holes downwards for a couple of millimeters.

The visits on sGradlj.com are already numbering more than they did in whole june, and almost july too - the forecast currently stands at 9800 and often hits 10100, which didn't happen much since 2016. Could be that Gugao (the Gugao, but... derived backwards from „gugla“, which is the genitive, the nominative could be both „gugl“ and „gugao“) changed its mind, or the algorithm calculated that I'm now kosher. And I did nothing, structurally, for more than a year.

Wednesday. Ran the van to the inspection and there you go, central brake light and foglights don't work. Okay the brake light, that's a must, but about foglights I wasn't quite aware that it has them, they never worked, the seller said they never worked, they were more a decoration. Last three times they completely ignored them, now they must work. Took it to the majstor who did the electrics before, he replaced the brake light, but with foglights he had trouble finding the cause. „I don't do wiring anymore... got a starter or alternator trouble, bring it and I'll fix it... wiring... well, you're an old customer, so let's take a look“. Still, he couldn't find it so he gave up. Took it to the other guy who replaced the central lock receiver last time, said he's got only half an hour left, will do in the morning.

In the morning this guy also had lots of trouble finding it - as it had two causes, first the relay switch was not among other such switches, it was dangling between battery and front grille, uncovered, just loosely wrapped in electric tape. Eventually he replaced that and replaced the wire between it and the right foglight, hour and a half altogether. Took it to the agency again, and while I was waiting for my turn, Dragana calls. „So how's it going, abstinent?“ „Ouch that was nasty I ate almost nothing for four days, just drank that awful solution... now that I'm in the swing I can go on five more days without food... but okay, I passed the colonoscopy, it's all okay, I'm clean and... sister brought me some delicacies to recover, don't know where to start from“.

In the afternoon Bajlo called, he'd give us a ride on saturday, not to go it alone, as his cousin wouldn't be coming (eventually he did come but from some other direction). So okay, I called Borko to tell him that he need not drive, which he was glad to hear.

Seventeenth, last picking in Čankovo - more plums, apples, pears and vineyard peaches. Sanda and Linda had a good time, just get them naked with a bucket of water, have towels ready for later. A beach.

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* the proverb goes "after a fuck there's no repents" - „posle jebanja nema kajanja“

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Mentions: burek, Čankovo, ćevapčići, detelina, Dragana Vitas (Dragana), eos70, Gavrilo Taroški (Gavra), Gradivoj Sredljev (Sredljak), Gugao, IV₄, IV_5pp, Jasmina Vlajin, Jelena Sredljević (Lena), Joda, Joško Čobzanin (Čombe), Jovan Zdanić (Jozda), Linda Sredljevich Aquilla (Linda), majstor, Mališa Borkovski (Borko), Merima Tabarski (Mima), meze, nanovo, Nenad Bajlo (Bajlo), Nevena Sredljević (Nina), Sanda Sredljević Aquilla (Sanda), sGradlj.com, Slavoljub Mandić (Mandža), Stanoje Serdarević (Staša), staž, Todor Mirča, Živana Armatović (Žuca), in serbian