It's turning out to be a gorgeous late winter. It's been sunny nearly everyday for ages. Well, it seems that way anyway.
I skivved off work today, lured by the birds singing and the blue sky, and made my way up to the allotment. Oh boy have I got some digging to do! I managed to dig a good 5 or 6 square metres today, and planted a row of shallots. The battery on my camera was about to die, so I've just got a couple of naff piccies, but you can JUST FEEL the sun and blue sky. You can see what's left of my dinky savoy cabbages, Jon's are at least six times the size. Also, you can see my lovely kale in the background. You could almost describe it as busy up there today, with Peter and Dougie both doing stuff on their plots. Pete is an inspiration. He can hardly see a thing, yet his plot is immaculate. He rides a motor powered bicycle from Kettering to Thorpe, (slightly worrying!) and he must be atleast two-hundred and eighty. Actually, he's one of the more youthful of the gang, I guess he must be around seventy years old.
Due to the storms we had recently, there are LOADS of fallen branches. I went around and gathered as many as I could. I'll either make a pretty fence, or some wigwams to grow baby pumpkins up. I also managed to get loads of pea sticks from the copse at the back of the alllotments.
My plastic sheeting that was keeping the weeds down was ripped to shreds by the storm. I'm going to re-use the bits that are left to make ponds. Not for show, but to gather as much water as possible for the summer.
Yesterday, on my way back from a crap afternoon in Kettering, I stopped by the allotment. It was just dusk, and the whole sky had the most incredibly beautiful rosy glow. Just as I was stood there, an enormous flock of rooks flew over, no doubt making their way back to their rookery by the hall to snuggle up for the evening. I LOVE rooks, ravens and crows. If I ever have a daughter, I would be tempted to call her Raven.
I'm in the process of trying to twist Nick's arm into helping me up there tomorrow. I've been on at him all week. The general response I get is a face that looks like all the muscles have been taken out of it, resulting in every feature on it drooping downwards...seriously, you have to see this face to believe it. The "face" is usually accompanied by a kind of "nooooo-ho-ho-ho-ho-hoooooo", followed by him clinging to me and burying his face in my neck. The very same response can be generated by the phrases..."will you take me to Hobbycraft please" or "can we go for a cup of tea at the garden centre". It's worth saying these things just to witness the performance, regardless of whether you want to go or not...ha!
Anyway, I better go have a bath as I smell like a pirate. (due to the digging, I don't usually smell like a pirate).
