More spring cleaning, transplanting and stuff

Martyn was in radical mood yesterday, and cast a critical eye on the overflowing shelves in the bigger garage.  Various dried out cans and tubs of paint, grout and the like are no longer there.  Some other materials, though still viable, date from days when we were more agile, and capable of DIY rather than our now preferred GSI.  Others still were left by the previous owners, eg some unopened cans of melamine paint.  Well, since the oiky builders have been at intermittent work over the road for a good six months, I decided to pass on the useable stuff to them, saving us a trip to the tip or a posting on Freegle and the email that it would generate.

Our iris sibirica are doing pretty well.  It’s a pity their flowering season is so short, but the various generations seem to be flowering in sequence, and so the various clumps extend the flowering.  I’ve lifted polyanthus plants today from the bed at the front door, and replaced them with almost the last of the rudbeckia seedlings (from seed saved last back end).  The polys are now in a bed at the back where we can see them next spring, inshallah.  

The second sowing of runner and dwarf French beans has done better than the first, so they’re hardening off, and just about ready to plant out.  The sweet olive tomatoes are putting out side shoots that I’ll harvest in a day or two to propagate.  Haven’t tried that before, so will do some in water and others in gritty compost, and see how the differing pundits’ advice compares.  Chives, dill and basil are germinating well, and Martyn’s sowing of salad leaves looks like feeding the snails pretty well before long.

One nice surprise is a pale pink oriental poppy.  We had the front garden largely grubbed up and membraned a couple of years ago, and that process included the poppy.  They say, though, that if you leave just a bit of oriental poppy root in the soil, you’ll have it forever, and it has popped (sorry...) up again this year after a year off.  Membraned and altogether, and with rather too little in the way of slate chips on top, the front needs weekly weeding.  Mañana.  Talvez.

Cummings

We learned this week that the principal advisor to the Rt Hon First Lord of the Treasury, suffering together with his wife from Covid-19 symptoms, elected to drive some 250 miles to his parents’ property in Co. Durham.  This despite government injunctions to stay at home and travel only in case of urgent necessity.  He argues that this was necessary to assure the care of his child should he and his wife become incapacitated, which, frankly, does not begin to hold water.  As the author of much of the present government’s policy, and presumably that regarding confinement, this is nothing less than contemptuous, arrogant hypocrisy.

As if that weren’t bad enough, said Rt Hon First Lord of the Treasury is backing him.  This morning we were assuming that Cummings would have to go.  Now, it seems to us that Johnson’s days must be numbered.  In decades past, he would by now have had a visit from the men in grey suits.  Unfortunately, Parliament is now pretty much devoid of suitable stateswomen and men.  Where are the Willie Whitelaws, Jean Trumpingtons and Peter Carringtons?  Well, there seems at last to be one on the front bench opposite the dispatch box, and it’ll be interesting to see how the House supports him.

Something rotten...

Yesterday we noted a blast of mercaptans from around the fridge, but isolated it to the drawer unit next door.  Somehow, the tail end of a packet of prawns had found its way - goodness knows how! - into the bottom drawer, and nature had taken its course.  The good news is that it wasn’t a case of dead vermin.  A friend tells us that sewing some prawns into someone else’s curtains is a suitable revenge in appropriate circumstances.  Sure beats leaving a paper hanky in their washing machine!

We have therefore done some rather necessary spring cleaning (have we sprung clean?), and our noses are no longer assailed when we go looking for a teaspoon.  We’ve taken the opportunity to do some clearing out of cutlery and kitchen tools, and there’s a big bag of stuff to go to the charity shop.  While we were at it, I got on my hands and knees and scrubbed the kitchen floor tiles, which needed it.  Given the creaky hands and knees, this was something I’d been putting off for too long, and I am hurting.  But I’m not in an induced coma and on a ventilator, so I really mustn’t grumble.

The garden is giving us much pleasure - and a degree of pain, of course.  Our first rose is in flower and there are lots coming on.  I have heaved a load of horse on the climbers at the side of the house, and the tomatoes are now planted out, for better or for worse.  We’ve sown various beans indoors and out, plus basil and lettuces.  Of the dozen dwarf French beans we sowed a few weeks ago we got precisely one seedling.  We’ve upped the numbers this time!  The runner beans did not appreciate the cold and strong wind of recent days, so I’ve sown another batch.  I took a couple of little trays of fuchsia cuttings a few weeks ago, and half a dozen have rooted nicely.  As usual at this time of year, we’re struggling to know what to do with all the seedlings and cuttings, since we’re fast running out of vacancies.  I suppose we just need to apply ourselves to the weeding to create a bit of space.  The big cistus purpureus which gave us such a wonderful show last year had become very leggy, and was conflicting with the clothes line.  We hacked it back, but the die-back we’d already registered was rather advanced.  So that has come out, and I’ve used its place to plant a pot of tête-à-tête that did nothing but foliage this year, together with a little crimson dianthus seedling, which ought to provide some ground cover in years to come.

The garden waste collection resumes tomorrow, which is just as well.  The compost bin is also pretty full, so we’ve taken to heaving weedings, grass cuttings and prunings behind the leylandii.  We shall hide when the bin men come: the bin is rather heavy!

It’s an ill wind...

Yesterday brought a most welcome email with news of Robin, a former colleague from BT days (almost 20 years ago).  Isolation leads us to our keyboards, and to thoughts of what is of real value, notably the many lasting friendships that we don’t refresh often enough.  Today I’d a phone call from a neighbour who I’m sure wouldn’t mind my describing her as elderly, just checking that we were both OK, since she hadn’t seen us out and about.  Rather ashamed that I hadn’t checked on them, other than to log mentally a sighting of her husband putting the bin out the other day.  But I’ve grabbed their XD phone number now, so now have no excuse.

The last couple of days have been chilly, so it’s a moot point whether it’s a good thing we’ve got the majority of the summer bedding in the ground.  I’m glad we’ve got them out of the sitooterie, though!    The runner beans are looking a bit stressed by the strong winds, and of the twelve dwarf French beans sown, we have precisely one seedling.  The tomatoes were starting to stick roots out of the bottoms of their three-inch pots, so I’ve potted them up for a boost while we await better weather for planting them out in their big pots on the terrace.

Another rite of passage: it’s less than 90 days till I achieve my biblical span (if I’m spared), whereupon my driving licence expires.  Today I’ve applied to renew it, which involved five minutes or so tapping away at my iPad.  No trip to the Post Office for a form, no need to dig out a recent photograph, no need to go for a doctor’s cerstifficate.  It’s good news in a way that govt agencies appear to be talking to each other: part of the authentication process is the use of my National Insurance number, and the photo for my new licence will be dug out of the passport office.  The bad news is that said photo is dreadful, but all too recognisable.

I think I managed to complete a tree canopy survey of our parish yesterday.  Our local U3A is doing it on behalf of the Forestry Commission, with the intention of highlighting areas in the country that need more tree planting.  The software generates cross-hair points on a google earth image, and you just have to say whether the point is on a tree or something else.  It took over 650 sample points to get the standard error inside the required 2%, so my mouse hand is protesting a bit.  (300 points are usually enough for urban wards). It’s not as easy as it sounds: it’s fine if the cross hairs land on the street, a ploughed field, the railway line or someone’s roof , but it’s often hard to tell from the aerial photo whether you’re looking at a tree or something smaller, eg a hedge or a whin, which don’t count.  Anyway, our ward appears to be almost 40% treed, which probably accounts for the hay fever.  I hope it’s worth the effort.  At least it fills time we’d otherwise fritter away with trips to Eastbourne for fish and chips.

Influences on the language

Recent events have introduced new usages, or blown the dust off some old ones.  Six months ago, the expression ‘clapping for carers’ would have elicited blank incomprehension.  Now it is a weekly national institution.  ‘Social distancing’ would have sounded distinctly sinister, and reminiscent of apartheid. Now it just means staying out of coughing distance of other people.  Until recently, ‘furlough’ was a word I had only seen once, back in the early 1960s, in my brother’s apprenticeship indentures, and in that context it meant the yearly holiday allowance.  (And come to that, I don’t think I’ve seen ‘indenture’ since then either.)   And then there’s ‘lockdown’, of course, which sounds like a hideous transatlantic neologism.

Apart from that, our concentration has been on the garden - yet again.  Our neighbouring nursery is keeping the cash flow trickling in by allowing customers to book and pay for supplies on the phone, and then go and collect at a specified time.  We loaded up the Egg with bags of compost, muck and gravel and schlepped it all home.  Good job we have a sack barrow to ease the strain on elderly backs.  We’ve got a few dozen more bedding plants in, and shall continue while the weather stays good.  The warm days have really boosted the potatoes, which are past the tops of their growing sacks.  The runner beans are planted out: it’s a bit early for them, but they were growing so vigorously in their pots that we’d little choice.  The tomatoes can wait a few days yet.  We’re going to grow them in decorative containers this year since we have them available, and we'll be growing them on the terrace, where we spend a fair bit of time in the summer.

As I write, we ought to have been soaking in fjord scenery while enjoying a prolonged and excessive breakfast in the lido on the Queen Victoria... That trip is rescheduled for July next year, and given that it’s cold and showery over there today, that may turn out to be a better option.  Of course, whether cruising can continue as in the past is a wide open question.

I have to say that I’m not missing the hobby much.  In my final years, the pattern was of short days after last minute changes of plea, chronic prosecution failures and the consequences of Grayling’s ill-advised and chaotic privatisation, now mercifully reversed, of the probation service.  That’s before we come to the shabby working environment - but since that’s all behind me, I needn’t dwell on that. [Oh go on then: one of the lavatories had a notice on the wall enjoining us to leave it as we’d expect to find it.  I resisted the temptation to add a postscript: ‘oh, you mean you want me to strip and repaint the flaky walls, fix the dripping tap, replace the broken lavatory seat that I reported a year ago and rake out and replace the filthy grouting?’]  But there were good times too, and I don’t need to go to court to keep in touch with my lovely colleagues.

It’s a shame that my stopping sitting coincides with the suspension of art group, German conversation etc.  The weekly ride out to Fortnums hardly compensates.  Still, thank goodness it’s happening during an unusually pleasant spring: it would be misery in the winter.

Much Gardening in the Marsh

I almost reached pre-retirement stress level yesterday, trying to master the tree canopy survey software that our U3A has volunteered us for.  I gave up when, after reporting on the 600 sampling points it took to get within the required 2% Standard Error, I found I couldn’t save and shut down.  Frustrated close to tears, I shall start again on Monday, with help, I hope, from the fellow who has asked us to do it.  I hope I don’t have to start again: if I never see that poxy golf course in Sevenoaks again, it’ll be far too soon.

Thank goodness for a day of weather that allows one to Get On With Stuff.  Once two lots of washing were on the line, I went out in search of canes for the runner beans.  I came home with a bag of grated mozzarella and a bottle or two of wine: the queues at the DIY sheds and supermarkets were longer than I felt like hanging  around in, and I did the residual shopping in the mini-Sainsburys opposite the station.

Thanks to his inexhaustible supply of common sense, Martyn suggested we make do and mend, and we have found enough bits of bamboo to support a modest crop.  The plants, meanwhile, are hot to trot, so have been hardening off outside today, and will go out in a few days’ time.

So, the washing is dry and unter Dach, the rockery is weeded thanks to Martyn’s efforts, the cosmos are planted out and I’ve taken a large number of box cuttings, having seen to a straggly one on the rockery.  The tagetes are hardening off in the space in the cold frames vacated by the cosmos, and we have pots available again for a few of the seedlings.  The spuds took three bags of compost to earth up today, so I’ll load up a few more on Monday on my weekly foray to Fortnums.  Their compost looks to include a large proportion of sawdust, but at £1.99 a bag, I don’t mind beefing it up as and when with a spot of blood, fish and bone.

I’m getting better at tying the bandana before I enter shops now.  Few people seem to be bothering about masks and distancing, which is a worry.  I’ve been outwith our curtilage twice this week, and that’s once more than I oughter.

We ought tomorrow to have been boarding the Queen Victoria for her cancelled cruise to the fjords, and have rescheduled that for summer next year, if we’re spared.  Just as well, since the forecast for our planned itinerary is looking dull, grey and COLD!  It’s an ill wind, eh?