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Didn’t go out as we were expecting a washing machine delivery from Amazon… which they cancelled and rescheduled for Sunday…
A wasted day though did do work work at my desk… that work life balance is not going too well at the moment! Weather: Sunny though cold. 0° overnight… again! Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and sultanas Lunch: Sausage rolls (vegan) and tinned baked beans Supper: Hmmmmm - can't remember at the moment...
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Following a long day yesterday we were both a bit slow this morning, though up early to get work done - Richard checking and editing yesterday’s work and me getting on with my usual work work and work…
Popped to the plot at the end of day, though really just for a quick walk - noticed little purple crocus are out by the poly. Weather: It was cold overnight, though likely to be colder overnight tonight. The day was sunny, and lovely. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and sultanas Lunch: Carrot & Lentil Soup, Pitta, Hummus, a little coleslaw and cucumber Supper: Quorn Steak Pie, roasted carrots and potatoes, and roasted frozen Brussels with sliced onion… and instant gravy Early editing again, though this time for Monday’s segment of AWATP to go onto Planet Vegetaria.
A quick trip to Lidl, chatting to a neighbour on the way back, then breakfast and to my desk. Richard was off for an exit interview in the afternoon so we had an early lunch. Bright and sunny, though mainly a desk work work day. Weather: Clear, and mild again. The sun came out mid-morning and really helped warm things up, but definitely cooler. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and sultanas Lunch: Carrot & Lentil Soup, Ryvita, Hummus, leftover coleslaw Supper: Microwave Spinach Omelette, Lidl Skin On Fries and tinned Baked Beans Both up early, and I’m soon at my desk. The weather looked as though it would be better in the afternoon, and I want to get that large soft fruit bed finished, so…
After a long desk work work morning, and lunch, I got to the plot and completed the large soft fruit bed - raking, cardboard, fertile mulch and old bags of compost, then topped with wood chip. Happy days!!! Weather: Cooler, though still mild, around 8°. Very sunny afternoon, feeling more like 13°. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt, and sultanas Lunch: Richard did Halloumi wraps with grated carrot and celery. Supper: Baked potatoes,butter, grated cheese and a White Cabbage Coleslaw (mayo, red onion, carrot, radish and white cabbage) Editing A Week at the Plot early doors… with a cuppa.
Still feeling that little bit bluh… so a home day Bath in the afternoon and then supper down the road at a friend’s house. Weather: Much milder - actually warmer, around 12°. Blustery and wet - which makes it feels a tad cooler than it is. In the afternoon the sun puts on a brave effort, though it can't really break through the cloud. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and sultanas Lunch: Carrot & Lentil Soup and a grilled (toasted) sandwich of Quorn ham and some cheddar cheese. Supper: Lidl Veggie Sausages, sauteed Green Beans & Potatoes, carrot salad, onion and cucumber salad - even the more delicious for not having to make it!  22 February (Saturday)
It's funny how we have a revolving get-up routine - one of us being the first to get up for a period of time, and then it switching round. For the last four or five days it's been Richard up before me, and then at some point it will be me up before Richard. Whoever's up first, tea needs to be made or at least a first cup or two heated up in the microwave. Looking out the bathroom window, there seems to have been quite a lot of rain overnight. It started around seven last night and seemed to just heavy drizzle through for hours, me even hearing it when I heard three bongs when I woke up mid-sleep. Again, the coughing is getting less frequent though I still feel pretty ridden of any energy. Whatever respiratory virus I've had, it's really taken hold of me like no other one has in the past decade or so. Usually, if I feel ill on a Saturday (as I did a week ago!) I'm generally feeling much improved by the Sunday evening, and by the Monday or the Tuesday I'm sort of back to normal; maybe a little drained though fully up and at it. It certainly hasn't been the case this time. I've even noticed that after coming up to my office and sitting down at my desk, I need to take a good few deep breaths because I'm already feeling slightly puffed out by the time I sit. I really do hope I can shake this off in the coming days, as it's really quite miserable… HOWEVER, I know many, many hundreds of millions are having it much worse in so many different ways. After my lunch has gone down, I sort of force myself down to the plot. I just want to check on the broad beans, to see if there’s any movement in the compost - ground heave as we call it in the trade! I also haven’t been down since Tuesday (is that right!) and by now I imagine the compost within the modules will be beginning to dry out, and those beans will want a little drink! At this early stage I certainly don’t want to deny them anything that will not encourage them to grow as well as I want them to. On go my slightly dirty jeans, as I have an inclination I might pick up the hand fork when I get down there and grab a kneeler and do a little more gentle hand weeding of the large soft fruit bed. With the sun out and lovely, there’s quite a number of fellow plotters around, and with the increased population due to the paddock plots, some of whom have already moved to larger plots on the ‘main site’ (though we hate to call it that as we are all equal - size doesn’t matter!) there’s quite a lot of hoots and hollers and running of smaller footed humans. I would say the average age of plotters since the paddock plots were tenanted has fallen from around 60 years to early 50s; we now have quite a few new tenants in their late twenties and thirties, with kids and dogs in tow. Generally, of course, the dogs are very well behaved. On my way to my plot I have a word with a neighbouring plotter, chatting about broad beans, seed potatoes, the broken glass pane in her greenhouse she’s replacing… “Oh”, says me. “Let me check if I have one”, and after a mooch around I find I don’t, or maybe I do though I can’t find it nor think exactly where it is - so, basically, I am of little help. After a chat, I turn the corner to the plot and look over to the greenhouse. Is there any ground heave? Thankfully, yes. Maybe about eight to ten of the 48 modules of broad beans are showing some sign of life, and all of them are in some need of water too! As I water them I feel the germinating seeds give a silent shout of joy, as they nestle back into the moistness of the compost - hopefully more will be up tomorrow. I grab a hand fork and kneeler to begin a little work on the bed. I’ve already taken the two gooseberries out of the greenhouse; I put them in there as it only dawned on me after I’d taken them from the soil on Tuesday that we’d likely have sub zero temps overnight - I don’t think we did, though better safe than sorry. These two will have to be taken right back to bare root, and then washed thoroughly, in doing so removing all the soil from the roots and then hopefully being able to tease out all of that embedded grass weed and all their myriad roots. It’s a job, though it gets done. As I get to the bed with my hand fork and kneeler.. Look down, mull, ponder, think, know… I decide I have to do what is right - this bed needs more than a good hand weed. It needs the fruit bushes removing, the soil well forked over, the bed thoroughly weeded, another very good hand weed to get out roots of weeds I miss when forking, then levelling of soil with a rake and the plants being heeled back in… then cardboard to suppress, compost to feed, then woodchip to mulch… though I won’t get even half of that done this afternoon, I’m just too exhausted already. Grumble mumble grumble mumble… grumble mumble grumble mumble… It’s time for your big boy pants Paul! Down with the hand fork and kneeler, into the shed for the large fork, spade and rake… out with the fruit bushes, in with the fork, and weed, fork, and weed, fork… onwards and forwards to a weed free bed! It takes time, as doing a job properly often does. And yes, by the end of it I‘m bloody exhausted. However, the job’s been done well and the fruit bushes, in the coming years, will be thankful. I will have to leave the placement of cardboard, compost and wood chip until another day. That age-old saying of the Earl of Chesterfield to his son came to mind… “If a job needs doing it needs doing well”! In truth, he didn’t say it quite so succinctly… “If care and application are necessary to the acquiring of those qualifications, without which you can never be considerable, nor make a figure in the world, they are not less necessary with regard to the lesser accomplishments, which are requisite to make you agreeable and pleasing in society. In truth, whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well; and nothing can be done well without attention: I therefore carry the necessity of attention down to the lowest things, even to dancing and dress. Custom has made dancing sometimes necessary for a young man; therefore mind it while you learn it that you may learn to do it well, and not be ridiculous, though in a ridiculous act. Dress is of the same nature; you must dress; therefore attend to it; not in order to rival or to excel a fop in it, but in order to avoid singularity, and consequently ridicule. Take great care always to be dressed like the reasonable people of your own age, in the place where you are; whose dress is never spoken of one way or another, as either too negligent or too much studied.” I couldn’t agree more… Weather: Wet, though at least not raining first thing. At first it was a little cooler than yesterday, maybe around 11°, and then by early afternoon the sun was out and it felt much warmer. Breakfast: Bran sticks and yogurt Lunch: Homemade Carrot & Lentil Soup, Hummus, Pitta, Carrot batons and radish Supper: Falafel from the freezer, cooked in the leftovers of the Hob Pasta Sauce, over wholewheat couscous. Awake at five bongs then back to sleep until 6.40, when Richard got up.
We both had a desk morning - Richard checking through our YouTube uploads, adding thumbnails on early ones, decluttering our Playlists and unlisting a few older videos that he feels adds nothing to the channel. Me, I’m doing mainly work work again… That work / life balance!?! The cough continues, maybe a little less frequently today. I need to go through a whole load of notes in the afternoon, which I have occasionally done on my tablet while watching an episode of Murder She Wrote. Today, it's the first ever episode of Endeavour. The good thing is, knowing these classic series so well, I can get on with what I'm needing to do whilst also having some company in the background; a bit like listening to an old friend chattering away at you whilst your mind both listens to them and wonders onto other things. I guess it's a bit like mum when she always used to have television on. Richard's doing a Live at 6pm, so I've taken out some baked beans from the freezer to thaw, and we'll have this with couscous and some chunks of cucumber. Weather: Wet, though a very mild start. Still blustery and a high of 15°. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and a banana Lunch: A soup of softened Lentils, leftover soup, miso and some leftover tinned baked beans mashed, Egg Mayonnaise, Richard's bread & Cucumber Supper: Baked Beans, Wholewheat Couscous and chunks of cucumber 20 February (Thursday)
Sleeping OK, though waking early and listening to Radio 4. Feeling a tad better again, though that cough is hanging around, with a particularly bad coughing fit mid-afternoon - as soon as I move from one room to another, with their differing humidities and temps the coughing kicks off. Need to think about my work work / work / life balance… it’s not ideal currently. Weather: Much milder - actually warmer, around 12°. Blustery and wet - which makes it feels a tad cooler than it is. In the afternoon the sun puts on a brave effort, though it can't really break through the cloud. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and a banana Lunch: Vegan Welsh Rarebit - using homemade bread too! Video to come! Supper: Hob Pasta Sauce - onion, celery, carrot, miso, mediterranean herbs, tin of tomatoes and a Loyd Grossman Puttanesca. Had with wholewheat spaghetti and some grated cheese.  19 February (Wednesday)
One of the staff at For Earth's Sake who regularly does a few days each week, always including Wednesday, is now travelling through India for 3 months or so. This means Vanessa's covering in the shop more than usual; the impact of this is that she and I need to discuss things and get a morning's work done or at least planned before the she needs to go over the road, put out the newly delivered fruit and veg and open the shop, ergo, I'm up early and at my desk, getting on with work work. I'm definitely still feeling under the weather, and even though I was hoping to get down to the plot this afternoon to continue with the soft fruit bed I accidentally started doing yesterday, even early on I'm not sure that it’s actually going to happen. A full morning at my desk, sending out loads of emails, setting about planning socials, and also much other work including pricing, stock checks, blah, blah, blah. We've also decided to up the ante on our socials for both For Earth’s Sake and the Great Green Barn. Of course, Richard’s now more free generally than he was so what we're going to do is plan mini videos for him to film... of Vanessa and the shop and the barn. We can then have these in the can (so to speak) and schedule a couple of regular socials each week for the next month or so. It seems to make sense that we do this and utilise Richard's skills and time. He’ll come down and do a full day with me and then spend two further days editing and getting things ready to go on to socials. We've decided on a day for next week, so we'll see how it goes. In the afternoon, with a very full day's work work already done in the morning, I decide to take some unread library books I have back at the same time as I take some due books back. I'm in a funny time at the moment where I'm reading regularly - a few chapters before bed and on a Sunday. However, it is a fact that many books that I’ve reserved to read have all become available at once, or at least this month. Clearly, in my view at least, it's unfair to hang on to books and just renew them and renew them; if I'm five or six or seven or even eight weeks off of reading a book why hang on to it, or take away a new one that's arrived? I'm sure other people don't feel the same way and will hang on and renew books until the date they cannot renew them further, eventually returning them unread - raised eyebrows! Of course, this is simply selfish and denies others the opportunity to read them in the time they've been hung on to! Now, as the library is in the same area as Lidl, I decide to do a full round and go to the library, then popping into Lidl to do a small but not minor shop on the way back. I don't take Fenella to Lidl. 95% of the time choosing to walk there with my backpack to do the shopping. However, by the time I was walking back with a heavy-ish rucksack and another bag in my hand I was definitely feeling exhausted, and it dawned on me yet again that I need to pace myself and think about balance... and how I'd really overdone that soft fruit bed work at the plot yesterday. The rest of the afternoon I spent catching up on things with Vivi by phone and seeing where she is on her home move. I also made further notes, planning more work work at my desk, getting a few emails off in between times, and further thinking of those FES and GGB socials. Oh, and about twenty minutes ago as I was typing this I got an email from our local library to say that another book I’d reserved had arrived and was ready for collection… Weather: It’s around 6°. The sun’s out quite a bit today, though still it feels cold. Breakfast: Bran sticks, yogurt and a banana Lunch: Leftover Red Cabbage Coleslaw, pitta, hummus and a tinned if soup mixed with some leftover soup from a day or so ago Supper: Linda McCartney Burger (I thought they were the mozzarella ones, though they weren't), Red Cabbage Coleslaw and a slice of Lidl pumpernickel loaf. A relatively good night's sleep, thankfully!
I heard five bongs of the clock as I woke, dozing in and out of sleep for another half hour or so. When I was sure I was awake, and would likely doze no more…though also not prepared to get up!... I popped on Radio 4 on BBC Sounds on my phone and listened through my Bluetooth earpiece, warm and cosy under the covers. Richard started stirring just before 7am, and we were both soon up and a cup of tea was not far away! I was still not feeling A1, though definitely feeling better than I was yesterday and the day before and the day before. After a full desk morning of work work and with the sun being so glorious in the sky, I got down to the plot just to check on the broad beans (no they haven't germinated), and have a little wander around the plot. No work, just a wander… Looking at the larger soft fruit bed, I decided to give it a little hand weed… As I did so, I realised there was far more couch grass and bindweed than I’d expected, and as one does I sort of got carried away with myself. I decided that the bed needs to be completely redressed, with two of the plants being removed and bare rooted as they're both completely compacted with weeds around their crowns. I guess it's fair to say that I rather overdid it. Hey ho… Weather: Warmer today, with the sun coming out early and staying through the day. Breakfast: Porridge, bran sticks and a banana Lunch: Halloumi wraps with carrot, celery and something else - Richard did them, for which I was very grateful! Supper: Linda McCartney Burger (I thought they were the mozzarella ones, though they weren't), Red Cabbage Coleslaw and a slice of Lidl pumpernickel loaf. |
Paul SavidentFollowing on from A Guernsey Gardener in London, I've decided to try and write a regular blog, and we'll see how it AND 2025 go! Archives
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