Wednesday 6th April - Gardening

The weather this morning was hideous - that grey mediocre rain that varies from uncertain mizzling to determined downpour. It really got going as we set off for me to go and have a routine blood test (the cocktail of pills and potions I swallow means I have regular six-weekly blood tests to make sure that "kill or cure" is going the right way. So far, so good). As usual, especially as it was raining, the cramped local hospital car park was a chaos of slo-mo cars jockeying for position; a driver of one car waiting for someone who is about to leave so focused on making sure no-one else "steals" their space that they are oblivious to the log jam they have caused, stretching back out into the main road... But that's the huge advantage of a) a walk in clinic - you are not worrying about being late - and b) being driven there by BB - I can just leap out and leave him to slowly inch forwards and backwards.

A friend came round for coffee afterwards, bearing chocolate cake. She can come again anytime!

After lunch I was sitting about doing this and that - ie nothing - and suddenly noticed that it looked warm and sunny outside. A cautious foray proved this to be the case, and I made a start on getting the primulas and bulbs transferred from tubs to our "woodland area".

Digging proved to be hard graft. The soil was loose enough - it has been dug over a couple of times - by me, I might add - in the last few years. But any kind of exertion soon makes me breathless. So, two square feet, and a cup of tea.

I suspect these little violas may not survive the assault on the goosegrass. (My  Canadian friends regard them as a trial andf tribulation and spend their time rootling them out of their lawn. We don't have a "lawn", more a patch of rough grazing in the middle of the back garden)

The cats came out to keep me company. Hmm. That encouraged me to complete any work I wanted to do on the patch of turned earth, because I know that they like digging too.

Another yard - and stop to make a telephone call. A bit more, and another cup of tea.    

I got this amount cleared in the end, and two tubs of gallant primulas and depressed daffodils (they came to nothing this year, probably planted too deep in the tub).

I may have saved the violas, there, by those whitish daffodil stems - time will tell - and possibly some of the wild strawberry plans.

And I'm hoping that I have seriously discouraged the lush and over-enthusiastic goose grass that rises up to laugh at me every year.

Anyway, making a start has made me happy. Let's hope I can also make an end of the job too.