The Garden Fence - help and support in tough times

FairyPrincessk

Particularly sad given there may be someone waiting for an allotment who would jump at the chance to put the work in.

I've not heard the expression 'cold steel' GQ. It reminds me of my family teasing me about there being three ways to do things, the easy way, the hard way and FPK's way--the really, really hard way. It is funny, but also a testament to the fact that I'm fairly curious and like to learn by trial and trial and trial...and error. My OH and I were discussing baking the other day and some of my failed attempts at bread which I've thankfully moved beyond. I started to say that even if I don't necessarily want to make a skill part of my daily life I still like to know how things...and he jumped in and said 'don't work?' I guess knowing how things don't work is just one step closer to knowing how they do work.:rotfl:

GreyQueen

FairyPrincessk wrote: »

Particularly sad given there may be someone waiting for an allotment who would jump at the chance to put the work in.

I've not heard the expression 'cold steel' GQ. It reminds me of my family teasing me about there being three ways to do things, the easy way, the hard way and FPK's way--the really, really hard way. It is funny, but also a testament to the fact that I'm fairly curious and like to learn by trial and trial and trial...and error. My OH and I were discussing baking the other day and some of my failed attempts at bread which I've thankfully moved beyond. I started to say that even if I don't necessarily want to make a skill part of my daily life I still like to know how things...and he jumped in and said 'don't work?' I guess knowing how things don't work is just one step closer to knowing how they do work.:rotfl:

The expression cold steel, they don't like it up 'em is from Dad's Army (the TV series). But it's a good metaphor for gardening.

Now, as some of you know, I have ME, and have had for 30 years now. I'm also a menopausal woman with a gammy hip and a day job. But I'm extremely stubborn and positively bliddy-minded and have discovered that where some are fleet and some are muscle-bound, they don't have the staying-power of the naturally stubborn.

Plus, I reckon as a mammal with a lot of bits of wood tipped with cold steel, I can outmanoever s0dding plants, even tho they're on the job 24/7.:rotfl:That horsetail is a positive challenge, though, I regard wrangling it as a bit like Zen or summat; you'll never defeat it, you can but slow its progress and in the doing of it become a better and more patient person.*

Lyn, the gang from the middle of the site where I used to share a plot before I got my own, whom I mentally call The Old Boys (seventy is a lad in that crowd) have been gardening on our site since they were kids and their old dads before them. They always reckon that the trouble with a lot of these allotment noobs is that they watch 30 minute gardening programmes and think that's how it's done.

Boy oh boy, do they have a few surprises in store for them. An old hand near me, seeing a noob in his twenties down on his knees trying to cultivate in 100 sq m of couch grass with a hand fork, kindly pointed out that he would find it easier if he got a proper digging fork.

So he did. Then she saw him using the digging fork, still kneeling down, but holding it by the top of the tines. This wasn't a person of learning disability, insofar as we could tell. I offered him the loan of the mattock and demonstrated the way to use it but he didn't take me up on the offer. And he gave up and we got another ignoramus.

* I think there's a Zen saying along the lines of Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood and carry water.

chickens11

Greyqueen .....I really feel for you and your allotment , what can I say , Lyn as summoned all up......

Fairyprincess.....You must feel a great sense of satisfaction from decorating your home and on a budget , and doing your gardening too .......I love doing things myself , well I have too now im on my own, im getting my garden work easier as im trying to go low maintenance , ive replaced some flower borders with Hebes, they are a slow growing flowering shrub , which the bees and butterflies love , they only grow to about a metre X metre ......

Ive planted up my pots today , I did buy a 125 litres of compost from B&Q @ £6.34 , that is really cheap , it filled 4 large pots and ive planted 2 with osteospermum which will flower from now until christmas , and the other 2 I put Euonymus evergreen shrubs that grow to about a metre .....
So it cost me £21 for the 4 pots , which is my kind of bargain ......

My poor hubby isnt very well in the nursing home , he had the dr out on Wednesday because he was finding it hard to breath and he as a chest infection and she has prescribed anti biotics , he hasnt got out of bed since Wednesday , poor man , so im going to see him tomorrow again , its a 64 mile round trip but I must go see him , he is very well looked after in the home , which im very pleased with ...........

.So im going to get up at 5 and quickly have 2 large mugs of tea , then I will take Bo out in the woods , there I can hear the dawn chorus while I walk , then home for breakfast , few odd jobs to be done , like feed the hens , then off I go at 8 , call into tescos and get him his favourite flowers , lilys cos they smell fantastic , then on to the home .......I will take Bo with me because hubby loves him so much ..........
Its suppose to rain in the morning then turn out nice later morning , we could do with a bit of rain , my grass seed has been down 7 days now and I can see that its germinated already , pleased with that , mind you I water it daily .........

Toomuchdebt....Im sure you will make new friends in your new house , it is very unsettling moving .....

Right Eastenders on soon , then Gardeners world , then bed for me , hope you all have a peaceful weekend whatever your doing ...Sheila

silvasava

FPK - There's an adage that says people who never made a mistake never made anything!
GQ - I'm standing shoulder to shoulder with you - bayonet at the ready
Spent a lovely day in the garden with DH - some more power washing and sorted out my pots. I also took down some netting over my fruit bushes. It was fine stuff and a couple of times last year I rescued Blackbirds that had got caught up in it. I've changed it for much heavier stuff that they can't get tangled up in. I never mind the birds having a small share of the soft fruit - its a repayment for the pleasure they give me.

GreyQueen

Silvasava, I am very envious of you having a pressure washer to play with. I love using them. My very first job as a teen was prepping trade in cars at a big garage for resale and the first stage of that was playing with the old pressure washers. I sometimes got to wash 30 cars at once, deep joy.

Plus they'll bring up patios a treat. I've tried to talk the parental units into buying or hiring one so's I can do their patio but they won't, bah.

Have had SuperGran over here this evening with the latest installment of the ongoing soap opera which is life in Shoebox Towers. In the past few hours we have had (in no particular order) CID chasing a certain person around the walkways, ambulances, police cars, violent domestic rowing, a lot of skunk smoking and various acts of criminal damage, larceny, calumny, libel and slander. And possibly fencing.*

There's probably a partridge in a pear tree somewhere, too. And now night is falling on Provincial City and Clubland will be revving up to serve all your entertainment needs.

* There is an old saying that Good fences make good neighbours. But I don't think it applies to these kind of fences, but I'm good for sources of knocked-off perfume, cheese, chickens and bicycles.

Softstuff

Gawd GQ. I'm hopping mad with you. Theres few bits of gardening that don't respond to elbow grease, so its bad enough they're not willing to give it that. But to encroach on yours too is not on.

Fairyprincess, know just how you feel on a couple of counts there. Have a virtual hug... you will get there in the end. It might take a bit longer, but you'll know you did it the sensible way and earned every bit of it. Ask GQ to send you Nursie... she'll deal with the !!!!!!s next door.

candlelight_2013

I thought perhaps Nursie had been retired, I haven't heard of her adventures recently, did she ever return from Australia

Candlelightx

Softstuff

candlelight_2013 wrote: »

I thought perhaps Nursie had been retired, I haven't heard of her adventures recently, did she ever return from Australia

Candlelightx

I know i put her in [STRIKE]a box and mailed her back[/STRIKE]...er... on the flight back

candlelight_2013

SOFTSTUFF naughty:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Candlelightx

moneyistooshorttomention

Should think Nursie has responded to obvious need and is undercover in Indonesia at the moment - judging by the spam on MSE over the latest couple of days being for an abortion drug supplied from Indonesian sources:rotfl:. So she's making herself useful at dealing with certain defects in medical provisions...

Well...I fancied waking up my braincells for the day with googling to see what that spam in a foreign language translated into and whose language it is..