Cooking for one (Mark Three)

[Deleted User]

I decided that I could not face more painting tomorrow, I normally like doing nothing much on a sunday, while listening to the archers. So second coat is done, I started early and discovered that my long window cleaning pole also screwed into the roller. That made short work of all of it and 10 litres are completely finished, then started the big clean up. I decided to put all the tubings and downpipes back into the water butts first but clean up took me far too long. Worst was the back of my car, drat, I never realised how far roller spray goes and it was everywhere and solid.. Bit of rain after but nothing to worry about, enough sun to do a good drying job and that is that done and dusted and I am never painting a big outside job again. however I have saved £300 and not watered any of the paint, not like the last professional that someone here employed, so he could use a pump roller

Lunch was quick, shepherds pie from the freezer and rhubarb and ice cream. Thank goodness I have single portions of fish, lamb and turkey in the freezer, I reckon tomorrow will CBA, it will be grab or nothing. Going to be granola teatime plus gooseberrie, ooh and yes it looks like a wonderful crop this year, nothing last year because I made supported standards from all my gooseberry plants. This summer I can sit underneath each plant and pick from above. Bottled gooseberries in light syrup are wonderful. I am eating 2015 production

Transplants done and am being choosy about varieties, more my size. Duncan cabbage up nicely and kalibos but poor germination. Tom thumb lettuce with poor germination and mazur old seeds with 100%. I have sown 4 different kales for a change, quite pricey to buy and I am loving it stir fried. I recently learnt that organic farmers are allowed to use pyrethrum, wondered how they didn`t get whitefly. It normally comes off in a great cloud if I brush past. So now I bought pyrethrum, strictly only to use when the bees have gone to bed

I am done sowing apart from a few swede next month. Its very worth the effort, come winter

Farway

kittie wrote: »

. Going to be granola teatime plus gooseberrie, ooh and yes it looks like a wonderful crop this year, nothing last year because I made supported standards from all my gooseberry plants. This summer I can sit underneath each plant and pick from above. Bottled gooseberries in light syrup are wonderful. I am eating 2015 production

Now there's an idea, nicked, ta.:j

I get stabbed when I pick mine, but it is an untamed bush which I was thinking of digging out and replacing with yet another apple, except I could not find the apple variety I wanted at a price I was willing to pay.

I'll keep eyes open for a red goosegog and try making a standard out of it


PS, dinner decided, from freezer, Long Chawton, Stilton & mushroom Wellington [AKA posh pasty] & frozen chips

[Deleted User]

farway, I turned my two heavily productive thorny invictas into standards, I got 40lb of fruit off those two plants 2015 but picking was very hard going. I stripped all the side branches right up to maybe three top branches and I hammered metal stakes in. I had also bought 2 hinamaki which contained 4 plants, bought them when hubbie was alive as he loved gooseberries. They were also stripped to the top few branches. I did this in 2015/2016.

Only a dozen berries last year and I was constantly taking off the new side shoots. All of them look wonderful this year, have a nice canopy and are covered in flowers. I will have to watch the staking, in case they get too top heavy, the hinamaki ones as they still have fairly slender stems. The second invicta looked as though it died that winter, not surprised as it had very rough treatment. Then I saw a little shoot at the base and am now training that up, it is supported by a metal stake plus eventually the old thick invicta stem. They actually, all of them look very imposing as standards

caronc

Good evening everyone,
Beautiful weather here this afternoon, didn't even need a cardi:D. Vit D levels have been topped up and I can feel the sun pleasantly on my skin, I'm hoping the rain coming in forecast is wrong but suspect it won't be.
Productive time in the garden this afternoon, huge planter of finished daffs tied back, various things pruned and soil topped up, and a four pots of pansies & petunias made up. Definitely my kind of afternoon and I can feel muscles not used much over the winter complaining a bit;).

Pork ribs are ready for whenever, I forgot to add honey but cba now, I'm sure they'll be fine without it. Just need to decide what have with them now:).

PasturesNew

What a bizarre day ... hot first thing, then it clouded over and went grey... then the sun came out. About 3ish I had to go out to "kill time for a few hours".... went into 4ldi for a shuffle round, came out and it was battering down with rain!

After 10-15 minutes the sun came out again .... but it was still a bit coolish. At 7 I spotted a road where you can park after 7 o'clock that I'd not known about before, so parked up and headed for the water front ... just 400 yards away, got half way there and suddenly, from nowhere, a wind storm whipped up, it was furious, people were running, you had to hold onto your hat/bag/coat ..... but I kept going and it stopped after 5 minutes, but the sky looked ominous, so I went back to the car and it TIPPED it down - huge rain spots the size of florins. Then the thunderstorm started.

Right now I'm in the middle of a thunderstorm and rain storm.

Veggie chilli, rice and chips for tea....

caronc

PasturesNew wrote: »

What a bizarre day ... hot first thing, then it clouded over and went grey... then the sun came out. About 3ish I had to go out to "kill time for a few hours".... went into 4ldi for a shuffle round, came out and it was battering down with rain!

After 10-15 minutes the sun came out again .... but it was still a bit coolish. At 7 I spotted a road where you can park after 7 o'clock that I'd not known about before, so parked up and headed for the water front ... just 400 yards away, got half way there and suddenly, from nowhere, a wind storm whipped up, it was furious, people were running, you had to hold onto your hat/bag/coat ..... but I kept going and it stopped after 5 minutes, but the sky looked ominous, so I went back to the car and it TIPPED it down - huge rain spots the size of florins. Then the thunderstorm started.

Right now I'm in the middle of a thunderstorm and rain storm.

Veggie chilli, rice and chips for tea....

Sounds like a typical "summer" day here :rotfl::rotfl:

PasturesNew

It's official. The L1dl veggie chilli is .... absolutely !!!!!!. NEVER be tempted to try it; if you like their meaty one (which is dead nice), do NOT think this is in anyway similar.... it's not. From what I could see (fading light) it was mostly tinned tomatoes with a few indiscernible lumps ... and tasted not one iota of chilli.

Gutted. Utter waste of a lot of good money.

Brambling

I spent the day with 2 of my sisters and all 3 of us survived it :rotfl: lovely sunny day nice Italian lunch and too much money spent. Just a glitch with the train on the way back, but it's southern so not unexpected. At least it waited until I got home to rain, hopefully that's it as I need to get out in the garden tomorrow.

I need to decorate my lounge/dining room but like the rest of my house it will need replastering if I want to get rid of the wallpaper, I have some great Polish builders I've used over the years who I will get in to plaster and paint but they are always really busy. I need to wait awhile until the cat settles in before I bring noisy strangers into the house I should have got it done first as I was told today...

moneyistooshorttomention

You realise all this mentioning of the cat means we'd like a photo of them up here Brambling:)

wort

No rain here yesterday , got home from work and sat in conservatory to read ,nice and warm, I had fish fingers chips and beans. But not long after had an urge for something else, so had some wine and a huge bag of black pepper crisp, managed to put them down before the end of the pack but not much:o

This morning brought the rain, dgson is here just made him bacon sausage and egg, toast for me.
My dd1 is coming at 6pm and has promised to get us a takeaway for tea. I'm glad I got the washing done as the rain looks set for the day.:(