The Fourth Allotment

This blog is of course named after Jarrow's allotments, and I've been itching to get back to earth, work and location permitting.  The last allotment I had, the third one, in West Kilbride, was fun whilst it lasted.  In fact, I remember thinking, if nothing else, I've taught myself to dig an irrigation ditch.

But it was always a bit too far away, and it needed a lot of work which I couldn't give it, working away from home so much at that time.  I hope someone with a good back took it over and got all the stones out, and I like to think that whatever else happened, it's properly drained now.

But with the (imminent) move to Glasgow, there are four sites within a couple of miles cycling, and I'm getting my name onto waiting lists.  I'm told that cycling and hard gardening is the best exercise at my age, and I certainly need it stuck at this feckin laptop and thinking all day.

I spoke to the Old Man on the phone and he's been faithfully keeping my tools safe for me: an African hoe I brought back from Libya, (never see them used in Europe), and a very posh spade, passed to my Aunty Mabel by a neighbour who worked for South Tyneside council, and which we reckon had the shiny looks of the spade kept by to turn the first sod at the site of a new school by the Mayor, or some other twat, whilst someone from the Shields Gazette took a photo.  How the neighbour came by it is a case of least-said-soonest-mended.

I've also got a coffee jar half full of papaver somniferum seeds from the Second Allotment, the one I shared with the Old Man.  They've been in the jar for years, and smelt a bit ripe when I checked them the other day, but poppy seeds are notoriously robust, so we'll wait and see.  Pig Sty Avenue comes to Glasgow.  


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Leech or flatworm? Ants and Swiss Chard

Image
For the 2nd time in a week or so, (1st time regarding dwarf beans ), I'm following Alys Fowler's advice, this time with regard to Swiss chard .  Long story short, after midsummer plants which often bolt if planted in spring will resist the impulse to do so, probably because of shortening days; (I say shortening, but in Glasgow, in July, we're still getting 18 hours of daylight).   I got a packet of Bright Lights , at a good price, (another reason to wait until July before sowing, lots of bargains, I've noticed). But where to sow them? Most of the 2nd bed is under a tarpaulin, but it wasn't quite big enough to cover the whole bed, so the last 5ft or so went under a sheet of plastic, (in the background of the photo in this post, here .) Transparent plastic was a foolish idea, weeds were growing underneath it, so I covered most of it with sheets of metal from the old shed. I decided to leave the tarp, but use the area beneath the plastic for the chard. Who-ah there...
Read more

"Chevy Chase. Fuck ever happen to him?"

Image
As Paulie Walnuts said in The Sopranos. It got me thinking. As it happens, he's been working steadily , but you can see what Paulie means. It's like that with film and television actors: you don't see them in anything for a year or two, and you wonder if they're dead or perhaps on a lengthy charlie and booze session. Or maybe doing proper acting on the stage? Only appearing on the telly gives them meaning to us. That video with Paul Simon was on one of the cable music channels the other day. It always makes me smile. As for Paulie and the rest of the crew, the clock's ticking. Of course, America already knows how things finish, but we don't. My mate Ian was telling me about a friend of his, visiting the States a few weeks ago, flicking through the channels in his hotel bedroom, he hit on a repeat of THE final episode, just beginning. What a quandry! He watched it, as it goes, but kept shtum when he came home.
Read more

How many pallets can you fit in the back of a Fiat 500?

Image
At least 1. Maybe I could have got 3 altogether, at a pinch. Also 200+ gorse seeds, which have begun to look in danger of damping off, so I'm thinking they'll be better off at the allotment in the fresh air. I'm worried about slugs, snails and woodpigeons, though, so I put them in a wheelbarrow, covered with a net. Also this morning, planted a row of beetroot detroit.
Read more