Call me a quitter

Well, you wouldn’t be far wrong. It’s not that I’m quitting on the garden altogether – far from it – but taking it to the next level (e.g. getting some frigging fertiliser into the veg patch soil) is a bit beyond me at the moment. In his last e-mail, garden guru Peter acknowledges that ultimately the only solution is to get him over here from England to supervise, as he has done for his various offspring in their time of horticultural need. This isn’t going to happen soon, I suspect. So, in the meantime I carry on watering what does survive and enjoy the tomatoes. As for anything more serious: next year.

Call me crazy.

And you will win you here this. Having stumbled on the veg growing lark, I need another project. I know! I think, as Mike and I are walking from the car back to the house. There is nowhere to sit at a table outside and have a meal or even a cup of tea. Given that I’ve had much more success with landscaping than I have with growing food, this seems an obvious next step.

And I spy exactly where this new feature should go.


It’s a nice spot, close to the house, so Mike can easily use it, too, under the trees, but it does get dappled sunshine in the afternoon. Perfect. Now all I need to do is excavate all the rocks which comprise 90% of the mound.

Set to it, armed with a recycling box to dump and move the rocks and the brush and pan we use for cleaning out ashes from the woodstove. Clearly not the best tools for the job (not that I have any idea what the best tools for the job are), but they are what’s at hand. After an hour, add a dairy crate to sit on, rather than kneeling on the rocks.

After three hours, some visible progress has been made.

Clearly this is going to take weeks. Bit back breaking, but also quite therapeutic. I’ll get there in the end. Mind you, at this rate, the summer – and its opportunities for enjoying sitting outside – will probably be long over. Never mind. Imagine the satisfaction when the job is done.

Go inside to get a bottle of beer and realise, coming out of the house, that I am a complete bloody idiot.


There is already a nice, flat area right outside the back door which would be perfect for a table and chairs. All I have to do is move the herbs and the flower pot. Smack myself on the head (seriously, I really do) and wonder what the hell I had been thinking.

Okay, so this is going to be a bit easier than I thought.

Watch this space.