A SURPLUS of mushrooms gave me a rare domestic economic gesture. I chopped the mushrooms up in the food processor with every intention of freezing the result for a soup ingredient at some unspecified date. Three pound of mushrooms was quickly reduced to pulp. I walked away to get a freezer bag and instantly forgot about the mushrooms, as at the same time I was packing to go away for a few days babysitting in Newcastle. My daughter Bryony's childminder was ill and she needed me to look after granddaughter Jessica. Three days into my stay and John rang to ask what he should do about the green, foul-smelling gunk climbing out of the food processor bowl. "Dump it" I said. He did. In the muck spreader. Plus the processor blade.

In order to entice me out into the field where he had been muck spreading my blade, John asked if I would help with injecting the ewes. "We'll get out in the field early" he said "There's going to be a frost overnight so the ground in the corral will be frozen solid and we wont get covered in muck and blather when we're catching the ewes up. You'll enjoy it. It will make a lovely start to Valentines Day."

A fine promise. The ground looked solid, but one dainty step from a ewe, and a considerably less dainty step from John, and me and we were straight through into clinging mud. Seeing us chase after the sheep was like watching a film in slow motion. The corral area where the crush and run are sited is open to the elements. Every time we work in it John says "I must put a cover over this", and never does. The corral is sited in the crossing point between four fields, which would make it a muddy hole even without the added ingredient of a regular chase round to persuade cattle or sheep to deliver themselves up for some ad hoc veterinary treatment. As I got head-butted yet again by another ewe determined not to be sent down the run, I thought of the Valentine's Day treat that my friend Rosie was having to submit herself to that evening.

Each year, my friend's husband cooks her a romantic meal for Valentine's Day. She dreads it. "I forget how many pots and pans, knives, whisks, spoons, bowls and chopping boards I possess until they're all left out to wash up after Graham has cooked me a meal," she said. "He's totally prone when we actually get to eat the food with the mental and physical exhaustion of putting a meal together, but I go through hell while he's cooking it. I have to shut myself away as I can't stand the swearing and clattering. Last year the smoke alarm went off as he forgot he'd left the crme brule under the grill and set fire to the caramel. He usually gets half way through a recipe and realises he's forgotten the main ingredient and also is a genius at misjudging quantities of ingredients so either we have enough to feed the village or not enough for a starving budgie."

A phone call the next day was reassuring. "It was a triumph" she said. "Graham, and I, have learnt from experience. The meal was simple, but sophisticated. The seared tuna had maybe a touch of the thermo nuclear about it, but I was able to persuade Graham that perhaps if I helped him with a few of the dishes whilst he was cooking, we'd both be able to relax afterwards."s

Wish I could say the same about injecting the sheep. No relaxing after that job. Just trying to persuade them to go back through the mud into the field they came from in the first place. Sheep don't learn from experience, and neither it appears, do we.

Updated: 10:45 Wednesday, February 19, 2003