Awful weather - typical Brits talk

Dustyevsky

Farway said:

My postie arrived, with my seeds, bills and an old codger meals brochure. Have I got some of your mail in error Dusty?

Well, I've no seeds on order currently, no bills usually come by post and the other thing doesn't apply to me, so I don't think so. 

I agree with Arb, language constantly evolves according to fashion, but also function. When mobiles first became a  consumer item, texting was laborious, so many went abbreviated in a big way. Since predictive text etc, I've noticed a return to normal speak, but YMMV.

Going back even further, I remember a police leaflet from the 1960s warning North Devon surfers about thefts of surf boards, written in the vernacular of the sub-culture at the time. I'm not a Faceache person, but the link below may give you access to a newspaper article about it in picture format:

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1104420907678550&set=pcb.1104420997678541&locale=fr_FR

I had better credit the Braunton Surf Museum for that. If only the police were as keen today, eh?

OT; Sunny intervals here, and that brisk wind you folk have elsewhere, but only a little rain....so far! Apparently you lot in Scotland have Storm Kathleen arriving, with yellow rain....Better than 'yellow snow' I suppose. Never eat that!

Farway

Wet & windy start to the day, it was the same outside when I got out of bed

ArbitraryRandom said:

I think it's going to be reasonably warm here this morning, forecast is rain from about 6pm - hoping it stays dry tomorrow as there's a carboot that I want to get to. Hoping that someone will be selling tomatoes etc given mine don't seem to have sprouted still. 

No rush with toms Arbs, plenty of time yet. Are yours in somewhere warm, like airing cupboard, kitchen window etc?

My back still stabs me now & then, I may risk it and sow some new seed arrivals, Aquilegia & Lavender for a start. The packet tells me Lavender may take a few months to germinate, so I better remember to label them up.

pink_poppy said:

I had a lovely wander around a garden centre this afternoon - so much choice. I saw a blue delphinium called Blue Bird and that reminded me of YBE's delft. Loads of trees - I could have spent a fortune. They had column apple trees - I think the variety was Discovery. All very, very expensive. If only I was rich...

I tried column trees years ago, went well until my back came along again & I could no longer hop up a ladder to trim / prune, and they went wild. 

Took them out in the end. I think column tree these days are more genetically bred to stay as column and not require pruning.

I hope there are none at Morries locally, or things may take a turn for the worse next week

A bit of a mystery, had e-mail from Yodel, parcel delivery due today. No idea what that is if it's not a scam. The only thing I can think of is Little Miss Figgy from T & M, but I've had nothing from them about being dispatched.

Time will tell, big reveal once I find out.

Today's pic is the climbing beans poking heads above the loo rolls, mix of runners & French. Germinated on damp paper before transfer to loo rolls.

pink_poppy

I was in Morrison's on Sunday and no column trees to be seen, twopenny, unless they were new from Monday onwards. The ones I saw in the Garden Centre yesterday were priced between £45-£55. Daylight robbery if you can buy them for £15 in a supermarket.

That's interesting that you've put your climbing beans in or on top of a layer of compost inside the loo rolls, Farway - I wouldn't have known to do that. I'm not planning on growing beans, but would I need to do that with leeks?? I haven't bought the seeds yet, but hopefully the week after next I can start looking.

It's a cold and grey day here - not quite the calm before the Storm as we've had heavy rain this morning. Tomorrow and Sunday don't look good, thanks to Kathleen.

We're taking the pussycat to the V E T this afternoon - poor thing always gets sweaty paws when he goes there  

kiss_me_now9

I germinated some bean seeds (french, runner and broad) I stole from my inlaws over Easter on some wet paper towel in a takeaway box and have just shoved them in the ground alongside my peas. Can't remember where I put the peas apart from two that have started to poke up so we'll see what a mess of climbers we get in the summer if any of them do spring up. Probably should have put them into something else first to get them properly going but I'm out of compost and if there's anything I am, it's lazy and tight so I can't be bothered to go buy any more. 

I will need some more soon as a lot of my seedlings now have true leaves and need potting on, but that's tomorrows problem. 

Very windy here today, according the inflatables fun park that always sets up for 8 weeks in Spring here the wind is around 38 mph (so they've had to close, I presume to avoid any children being blown off an inflatable or blown away with it). Great for drying the washing, except there's also massive grey and black clouds in the sky and I'm off out in a bit. 

Dustyevsky

pink_poppy said:

That's interesting that you've put your climbing beans in or on top of a layer of compost inside the loo rolls, Farway - I wouldn't have known to do that. I'm not planning on growing beans, but would I need to do that with leeks?? I haven't bought the seeds yet, but hopefully the week after next I can start looking.

Yes, you could do that with leeks, though they're not particularly fussy about being transplanted. I used to grow my leeks in the tubes, but for several years I've not bothered, and it doesn't seem to have made a difference by harvesting time. The worst fault is not getting them going early enough, though they do seem to keep growing in mild winters.
I agree with Farway, there is still plenty of time to germinate and grow-on tomatoes, Arb. They'll literally come up within the week if you can give them 20c, or thereabouts, in day time.

Farway

My unknown parcel was delivered , turns out it was Little Miss Figgy from Mr F not T & M, I think I may need a memory cell update.

Looks OK, a couple of small bits of die back, but trimmed those off OK. Potted on & photo taken for tomorrow:

I've left seed sowing, my back was starting to twinge so stopped I then.

pink_poppy said:

That's interesting that you've put your climbing beans in or on top of a layer of compost inside the loo rolls, Farway - I wouldn't have known to do that. I'm not planning on growing beans, but would I need to do that with leeks?? I haven't bought the seeds yet, but hopefully the week after next I can start looking.

The compost in the bottom of trays is twofold. I put the loo rolls in the tray, then add compost to the loo rolls, being somewhat slap dash I miss at times , and it spills over into the tray.

In turn, it helps support & steady the loo rolls

However, I find that it does help because the roots then have access to extra moisture etc when they reach the bottom of the loo rolls, takes a way some urgency in the need to plant them out

With leeks, it would be the same, no need to do it, but it's my lazy way of filling the loo rolls, does no harm and may do some good giving an extra source of moisture

Paspatur

No gardening here since Sunday
Went from glorious on Sunday to baltic on Monday and then has rained all week since
Part of me wishes I had cut the grass but looking at a neighbours lawn who did and it just looks dragged and damaged
Just got a message saying it will be 8 degrees warmer tomorrow
Wonderful, checked forecast and this will be accompanied by 45 mph winds
Good info on figs and sunshine, mine will have to live in the greenhouse but I will let her out on sunny days
So many jobs to do, so little weather to do them
I should be used to it
Happy gardening to anyone who can

Paspatur

Off topic - winningest is definitely open season on the English language 
Today I saw the non word catlets - I nearly spat my porridge at the laptop
On topic the tomato seeds have increased from a germination rate of 8 from 12 to 11 from 12 in the last few days
might give number 12 the benefit of the doubt for a bit longer

ArbitraryRandom

Nipped into B&Q today to look at some hose and wood (didn't actually buy any, but good to know what's there).

Did have a quick wander around the garden section and bought a tray of shallot onions (6 cells, about 8 or 9 plants looking at it) for £2... and a single tomato (veranda red) for £1.75, just because. 

Still off to the car boot tomorrow, but I only really wanted one tomato, so if my balcony red do or don't germinate no real harm done  

twopenny

It's actually been really warm and almost sunny today   
The odd gust but nothing to write home about.
Got loads done. Agree Pas that mowing the back lawn was a waste of time. The grass is just floppy and coarse but the edges needed doing so I could see the beds.
But the front showey off bit looks great. You can't see all the moss unless you get up close.

More later as I'm too happily pooped to wind up the computer to download photos........