Friday 23rd June - Nearly a Day Off

Apart from a piano pupil at 4pm, my diary was clear! That must be a first since Term started back in April. (Slight guilty conscience - I realised too late that I'd forgotten to warn the other members of a drumming group I lead that we weren't meeting this evening. Oh whoops)

So, what did I do?

I redeemed my voucher for a free drink and cake at Waitrose (Americano with hot milk, and a slice of lemon drizzle).

I ate sushi for lunch, bought from the new sushi counter at Waitrose. It was OK.

I did gardening. That took up most of the afternoon. I have these plants, bought on Monday, waiting to go into a newly/nearly cleared border.

 One of them is about four feet tall - slightly tricky getting it into my car.

Two were bought from a garden gate plant sale near a school I visit on Monday mornings. I took pictures of the detailed labels, as they had to be left behind. The tall one, with little purple flowers at the top, won me over with "... hardy...self seeds, self stakes, flowers over a long period".

The main attraction of this little silvery plant was the magic description "good ground cover in dry sunny places - SPREADS!"

So this blog will act as a reference when I've forgotten what they are called. The other two plants in the blue tub are geraniums, of the cranesbill type, chosen for "thrives in a poor soil". One has while flowers, the other purplish-pink.

Here's the flower bed; stage 1

stage 2, after he has attacked it with a sort of claw-hoe implement

and stage 3, after I have spent an hour digging over it with a hand fork, as I can't manage to drive a border fork into the compacted earth.

I'll ask him nicely to do the "dig a hole twice the size of the pot" business, and hopefully get the plants in before the end of the weekend. I've also got various pots of variegated ivy that I will put in, and then cover the whole lot with a fine bark mulch. Then any plant that appears subsequently will be considered to be a weed and removed with extreme prejudice. That's plan, anyway.

After a cup of tea, I turned my attention to the dining room table - it's got itself into a state again, somehow.

There's a bit more clear space now, and the heaps have been slightly reduced and squared up. That will have to do.

Nearly a day off?

Wednesday 21st June - New Look - Invisibility

I collected my new glasses this morning and have been wearing them all day.

For the past four years, every sing I started wearing varifocals full-time, from the moment I wake up, until the moment just before I turn out the light at bed-time, I have been wearing frameless glasses pretty much like these..


I thought it was time for a change. My new glasses have Metallic Purple/Red/Pink Frames!
Maybe a bit more red than the pink in this picture.

I have taught seventy-five children and worked alongside at least ten adults today since I put these glasses on.

The glasses appear to be invisible - I've only had one comment, from a child; "Have you just started wearing glasses?"

No dear, I've been wearing glasses for a long time now.

Does that mean the glasses are so unexpected and unsuitable that everyone is remaining tactfully silent? Or does that mean that they suit me so well that no-one has noticed?

I shall see what happens over the next few days.

June 21st - Foraging

"Shall we have pasta and slow-cooked lamb for supper?"

I'm too hot to even think of eating pasta.

So one again, I've raided my tiny vegetable plot. One rather young lettuce, and a handful of spinach leaves make a sort of salad, with bought new potatoes and bought tomatoes. Our tomatoes as still flowering rather than fruiting. I few slices of cold meat... a glass, or several, of Chablis - supper.


Tomorrow we will have about ten broad beans each, and maybe a couple of courgettes from the garden to supplement things from the shops.

It has been properly hot here all week. I can't imagine what it is like for people doing the Ramadan fast in this weather. Hats off to them, I say. Much tougher than trying not to eat chocolate or drink alcohol during Lent.

Tomorrow we have a met office warning of rain - bring it on, I say. My veggies need it.

Wednesday 21st June - Slug-catchers

Who would have thought that our silicone mini-tongs



would have made such brilliant slug-catchers? (We've got the pink ones).

Don't worry, I put them through the dishwasher afterwards.

I might add these



to my birthday list ready for next year's war-on-slugs.

I'm reluctant to poison them because of birds and hedgehogs and I'm too squeamish to squish them or drop them into a bucket of water, salty or otherwise. Throwing them over the back fence into the waste ground isn't a reliable solution, as they are homing creatures. You need to whang them at least 20 metres away, apparently.

So, I pick them off the plants and drop them into the garden waste recycling bin. That's still not the perfect solution, as every time I open the lid they are at the top, ready to make a slow sprint for freedom.

Saturday 17th June 2017 - Tea

To cut a short story shorter, we ended up having lunch at an unusual, but very elegant tea-shop. I'll keep the story even shorter, but when did you last have your tea-shop tea served on vintage china, with a real teapot?

And check out that sweet little salt pot and spoon!

After delicious smoked salmon sandwiches and salad, we had equally good cake.

We were on another round exploring local churches. We had intended to visit three, but it was too hot, and we spent too long in the teas hop, so the medieval church of St Mary's Bletchingley was as far as we got.

The walk to the church looked exactly like this picture (from the wikipedia site)



The church hasn't changed much either;

https://www.achurchnearyou.com/bletchingley-st-mary/

Who would have known that Bishop Desmond Tutu spent some time as a curate here?

from his wikipedia page;

Tutu then attended King's College London, (1962–1966), where he received his bachelor's and master's degrees in theology. During this time he worked as a part-time curate, first at St Alban's Church, Golders Green, and then at St Mary's Church in Bletchingley, Surrey.^[5] He later returned to South Africa and became chaplain at the University of Fort Hare in 1967.

 

 

Friday 16th June - What's that noise?

Heard a strange rapid flapping noise from the other end of the room....


one of my souvenirs of Kircudbright is a helenium plant, handed to me in a small cardboard box. I'm hoping it should eventually become something like this.

https://www.saga.co.uk/magazine/home-garden/gardening/plants/perennials/how-to-grow-heleniums

I've put it on the kitchen windowsill, but hadn't got round to chucking the box into the recycling bin, so it is still on the floor in the dining room.

The cats have been taking it in turns to try it for size. It does seem to be rather small for them, or maybe the cats are just a bit big for the box. Who knows.

The strange sound was Leo waking up and shaking her head, so that her ears were rattling against the sides of the box. Wouldn't you have thought that would be a bit painful?