Crazy Cat Lady Chapter 4 - The Aftermath

DawnW

Seriously CCL, chunk it. For 15 minutes I reckon I can do anything. Today's joy is washing down the bathroom walls and ceiling. I shall take my timer and set it for 15 mins. If I haven't lost the power of rational though at the end of that, I will do another 15. I would seriously swap for picking up litter in your garden

Chrystal

Tomorrow is supposed to be lovely weather up here CCL,,, time to make the kids sing for their supper. 3 of you each doing 20 mins and that's a whole hour of rubbish picking.  Garden should be immaculate (or at least  cleared of rubbish ) by then.

PS the rest of the week is supposed to be lovely as well, so set the kids 1 metre weed clearing each from the borders each day.  Threaten DS with no more Xbox, or better still no more of his favourite chicken!  Not sure what threat you can hold over DD but I'm sure you can think of something.    XX

foxgloves

The thing is, CCL, nobody leaps out of bed in the morning joyously shouting 'Whoop, whoop, garden litter picking!!' It's tedious. I do love gardening, but I love the nice jobs....the growing, the 'painting with flowers' of putting a pretty border together, the picking, the sitting by our wildlife pond watching assorted little critters enjoying what we've created. Weeding is ok if I take a small amount at a time. Anybody spending an entire weekend on litter picking & clearing/weeding, etc, is very likely just to be put off. Years ago, I had a friend who did exactly this. She moaned endlessly about me having a nicer garden than her & her excuse was that if her garden was as small as mine (my previous house), she'd be able to have a nice garden too, but this was rubbish! If she'd had a garden the same size as mine, it would still have been a weedy unkempt mess .....but a smaller one! If she had actually gone out & done 1m of weeding every time she ear-holed me about how unfair it was that her garden looked cr*p she'd have had a pretty decent garden. The other issue was that she never grew anything. So there was nothing to look at or enjoy. And her garden really was then just an annoying gatherer of weeds, litter & long grass. As it is difficult to deny that weeding, litter picking & lawn cutting are chores. she never had any enjoyment of her garden at all. because it's all she ever did. Then she said she couldn't afford to buy plants, so my Mum & I divided up all sorts of nice ones & delivered them & I helped plant them, but it was to no avail. The weeds took over again, subsumed the plants....which were then weeded out & chucked next time there was a grumpy weeding session. I then suggested they dig out all plants & shrubs and pay someone to turf the whole lot, as that would mean that the only job necessary would be grass cutting. I still think that is a viable way to go for people that just have zero interest in creating any sort of garden.....maybe a pot by the front door for some daffodils in Spring & a geranium for summer.....you know, absolutely 0.0001% effort things, because that could still provide a pretty splash of colour next to the front door.
Gosh, I'd forgotten all about that friend & their garden! It just came back to me because I was always telling her that the jobs she hated (lawn cutting, weeding, clearing, litter picking etc) are chores for everybody. 
There are 3 of you, CCL, so doing a timed 'How quickly can we get all of this garden litter picked up & bagged?' & setting a timer, could have you all racing about in the spring sunshine & that'd be a portion of your daily exercise too, for sure. 
I'm always on a mission here to pick up bits of old plastic because even though we've lived here since 2002, we STILL regularly find rubbish strewn (& actually buried!) by the previous owner. Could tell some stories there, but given the sheer volumes of debt letters which kept arriving for her over our first 3 years here, I can't guarantee she wouldn't be a user of this site).
Well, I'd better get my own diary post done,
Stay safe,
F xx 

Humdinger1

CCL

Nothing wrong with 'the kitties'!  They are plainly much loved.  I've heard it said that they know they were worshipped in ancient Egypt,  and have never really got over it.  Also agree with Foxgloves re roping in the whole household for litter picking.  The weather is certainly a silver lining right now.  Humdinger x 

crazy_cat_lady

Evening all  
First of all - huge apologies for mixing the pair of you up foxgloves and f0xh0les. It was just a matter of time for me, and without day to day teaching to get the names mixed up then the inevitable has happened. 
So, the litter picking in the garden is done. Turns out some of it isn't litter but a membrane sneaking through from under the gravel. Someone has told me to get the gravel that's fallen underneath it out and put it back on top. It's not doing a good job at keeping weeds out unfortunately as they are springing up left, right and centre through the gravel. So I now have a litter free garden with reasonably short grass and a lot of weeds. It's a step further forward than yesterday - and you're right you lot - it was much easier with the kids than on my own. DS used it as an excuse not to walk after lunch but dd still came out with me. Bright and warm but windy too, which was good for me. We just did a fairly short walk this afternoon into town to get bread rolls and milk that we can't manage without for another day. Then we sat in the garden this afternoon and read for a couple of hours. It's been nice, but I can honestly say that I would have been just as happy if it were all paved over - I'm just grateful for outside space, even more so at the moment. It was fab when the kids were little, and I think it's nice to sit out there and enjoy some sun but I don't need any flowers or even the grass I don't think. Suppose I'd better investigate some pet friendly weedkiller next to try and sort that little disaster out.
Day 3 of being back on my diet properly. I was going to use lockdown as an excuse to lose weight but I had to get my head in the game first. I kept starting well then descending into a share bag of crisps or massive bits of cake to get me through the general trauma of the state of the world at the moment, but I think I've gotten it for the moment. Need to make the most of it while I can because goodness knows I won't be in that headspace for ever and I still have a lot of weight to lose. 
Other than that - not much else to report. Today seems to have gone in a bit of a blur - the time in the garden seems to have flown by, and as I've already said I am incredibly grateful that I have some private outdoor space that I can use - even more so because it's completely surrounded so nobody can see us out there except for the neighbours either side and at the back.

crazy_cat_lady

I just got a text through from my travel agent with a payment reminder about our summer holiday. I know I need to pay it, but I can't seriously believe that they think we're going to get away on that holiday - because I definitely don't.

alipops1986

crazy_cat_lady said:

I just got a text through from my travel agent with a payment reminder about our summer holiday. I know I need to pay it, but I can't seriously believe that they think we're going to get away on that holiday - because I definitely don't.

   Hiya CCL, 
I'm a frequent lurker - but depending on when your holiday is, some major operators are offering an extension on the payment by a few weeks in case that is of use for you, rather than handing over money to then wait for it back! A few weeks could make all the difference in the current situation. 
  Fingers crossed
     Alipops x

crazy_cat_lady

Thanks alipops I will look into it - I'm going to pop it on the cc when I do have to pay because then I'll have that extra protection as well.

apple_muncher

Do you think it was just an automated text reminder? I had a dentist reminder one last week...

Well done on the garden tidy-up session.

beanielou

Sad to say I really dont think any summer breaks this year