Sorrel retires and making ends meet........

Sorrel is seemingly enjoying her retirement after leaving her high powered job at Pfizer recently. Found this picture of her (centre with the sling and balloon on her head) at one of her leaving dos in "my pictures" this morning,
I suspect that she will take to retirement very well as ,like me she does enjoys a good "potter"
Mind you the hysteria of the " credit crunch" and sudden cost of living rise, makes life for the newly retired ( and for me who has to budget) that much more difficult.
I have noticed the instability within the big supermarket industry the most, and with the risk of sounding like a real no hoper, I am appalled at the blatant way they manipulate food costs in what seems like a totally arbitrary way.
Last week for example, sainsbury's own firelighters were 10p more than they were the week before! (duh....why?), various other items had similar "vast" increases,which (according to the BBC ) has raised the average family's food bill 800£ a year., We as consumers take this drip-drip erosion of our weekly budgets without complaining, but I must admit it is worrying. I am not surprised that for the first year, vegetable seed sales have out striped flower sales, as more people are having to "grow your own" in an effort to makes ends meet........

Sunburn

Another 8 hours on the allotment and can you believe it, I have sunburn.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Salad potatoes, radish,beetroot, more salad leaves and broad beans have been planted in the bottomn plot, and I have left enough room for a huge bed of sweetcorn (already sprouting on the windowsill of the bedroom),Pumpkin,marrow,and runner beans.
The more delicate French beans,sweet peas and peppers won't be planted out until June, already I am realising I have not got enough room for everything. Tomorrow I think I will start digging out my fifth vegetable bed.
George and Maddie have spent the day on the allotment with me. Maddie has spent most of her time in the shade of the water butts whereas George has spent a hot few hours stalking Duncan. (see above) The rooster has realized that 1) George cannot get through the wire to worry the flock and 2) he is smaller and slightly less brave than Duncan indeed is. So both have spent the day posturing at each other without actually doing anything.violent
I am worried too about Blanche who remains fixed on her nest in the big coop. Titbits have been ignored, corn is left untouched and I haven't seen her drink for a while dispute the water and food being inches from her head. I try to take her off the nest physically to encourage her to eat, but so far she walks as though she is in a stupor. Apparently this is common for some birds to do this, and some get so fixed on their eggs that they can literally die of self neglect....sounds bizarre I know
Chris got stuck in Bangor this evening due to a rail breakdown so I had to drive over to Llandudno to pick him up. We stopped at Osborns for an impromptu dinner, which was a nice treat

Boris..........bless.........

He does make me laugh

On saturday Ken Livingstone, Boris Johnson and Brian Paddick were all vying for the pink vote at Stonewall's Mayoral Hustings.

Johnson was reported as saying "If gay marriage was OK - and I was uncertain on the issue - then I saw no reason in principle why a union should not be consecrated between three men, as well as two men; or indeed three men and a dog."

Pure Boris...........

Sunshine and Humphrey Littleton

At last, a nice day. I have spent 8 solid hours outside today, finishing the work required in the front garden, clearing the weeds from the vegetable beds and tidying the hedges on the bottom boundary of the field.
The Scotties have kept me company in the field all day and have behaved themselves nicely despite being let off their leads for most of the time. George has sneaked a few sorties at the hen enclosures but has been kept at bay by a somewhat angry Duncan, who has shadowed his every move.
The small polytunnels are filling nicely with the salad crops, which even the toughest of rabbits cannot infiltrate, tomorrow I may dare to plant my salad potatoes and more beetroot.
Sad to hear that The spring series of BBC Radio 4's comedy show I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue has been cancelled after long-serving presenter Humphrey Lyttelton was admitted to hospital.
Lyttelton, who has presented the "self-styled antidote to panel games" since 1972, is to undergo surgery to repair an aortic aneurysm and although always sharp as a dye, he WAS sounding just a tad frail during the last series.
I do hope he is well enough to make a comeback in Clue.! His acid sharp and "dry as a Nun's skirt" delivery makes the programme, I will miss it this spring.

I hate myself

Against my better judgment I watched the awful I'd do anything, this evening, I wasn't surprised to see the most talented actress and singer (the slightly lumpy but personality filled Francesca) get booted off the show amid a tearful gaggle of teenage Nancy girls..........Andrew Lloyd Webber is such an arse.....

Gardens Open & Dinner out

The dragon sculpture outside the Welsh college of Horticulture

*

Having an amble around someone else's garden is the perfect solution to a slight hangover on a Sunday morning. We have visiting various private gardens taking part in the National Gardens scheme(http://www.ngs.org.uk/gen/default.aspx?) for a couple of years now and some of them have been truly lovely. Today we visited The Welsh College of Horticulture in nearby Northop. The grounds were pretty enough but I do prefer visiting the private homes in the scheme as you get a chance to glimpse how the other half live (these houses are often large,stylish and very expensive).

Last night we had a lovely huge nosh out at Anna and Tim's. Too much good food, too many gin and tonics and relaxed conversation that ranged from immigration,the setting up of a village community group ( Chris is thinking of setting up a reading group),Scottish ancestry (Ned is a "Welsh" Macdonald), family gossip and the banalities of everyday life.We had an enjoyable night.

Weather remains cold but a tiny bit more spring-like. Wild flowers are starting to bloom along the field borders.

Little to report

Weather is cold and blustery today. Chris is suffering from academic writers' block so is watching The Spy Who Loved Me on TV with a blanket, and It's halfway through my holiday and I still have loads to do.

The white indian runner ducks eggs from a breeder in Dorset arrived safely today and have been installed into the Brindisi, I have potted up more sweetcorn and runner beans ( the back bedroom looks like a bloody nursery) and have planted out French Tarragon into the garden; it is far too cold to do anything else in the allotment except to clean out the hens and feed them.

Off to Ann and Tim's this evening for dinner (off diet specially)........

Theatre Clwyd, Golf course embarrassment and Blanche remains a star

Caught up with Hazel this morning and accompanied her to Theatre Clwyd to see an exhibition by Welsh artist Helen Booth. Most of the abstract pieces are for sale, and Hazel being a bit of a new art buff, was hoping to buy a large painting for her front room. The art is certainly not my cup of tea, but is striking (left) and I was glad that she found a couple of canvas' she actually liked.
Thank god for Theatre Clwyd!. It remains a small beacon of cultural sanity for me along the entire North Wales coast....sometimes I do miss places such as Sheffield's Millennium Galleries, Weston Park Museum,Showroom Cinema and Lyceum Theatre, but at least I can shoot down the A55 and be sipping proper coffee at Theatre Clwyd's cafe in 20 minutes thus re charging my culture batteries.
In between art watching, and collecting horse shit from a local farm (oh how very Sex and The City!) I took the dogs and Jess for a walk along Bishop's Wood. I was late so all 5 dogs were pretty hyped, so I wasn't at all surprised when walking across Meliden golf course, a very angry passing Labrador started a fight between Jess and Meg. The two bitches had got to a bit of an "understanding", but like two slutty slags from the wrong side of the tracks it only took a tiny spark ( in this case a bark of a passing dog- instead of a ton of vodka and red bull) to ignite a bit of hair pulling.
Jess bit Meg ,Meg clamped onto Jess. William and George jumped in thinking this was all great fun, and all this in front of an elderly woman holding the aforementioned Labrador and four golfers waiting to tee off.
Meg bit harder on Jess, Jess bit hard on Meg. I pulled Meg off, and Jess jumped up and dragged her down again. William jumped in again, bouncing up and down on both of them whilst George ( seizing his chances) sneaked into the fight and bit Jess several times in quick sucession.
After a couple of minutes the whole thing was attracting a small crowd, with various people "tut tutting" and pointing at how badly behaved this bloke's dogs were. Red faced and rather pissed off I finally stalked off with one thrashing bitch under one arm , the other firmly clamped under the other and three dogs dragging behind on their leads.. Minutes later the whole thing had been forgotton, with a rather benign Jess licking the blood off a knackered Meg's face in the boot of the Belingo

No such bad behaviour from Blanche when I finally got home late afternoon. Still sat on her large clutch of duck eggs, she hardly moves all day. Water and feed is not touched at all, so we have to go through the daily ritual of dragging the irate hen off her nest, throwing her outside the hen house, for a brief pee,poo and snack, before she stalks back to the job in hand...muttering quietly to herself...