Finally did some gardening

As usual I forgot to take any before pictures, so you'll just have to take my word for it that it was very reminiscent of a wild jungle! I kept expecting to find a small tribe as yet undiscovered by civilization lol. Sadly all I found is slugs, snails and about a dozen worms in weird and wacky places!

Considering that the garden had been ignored for about 18 months it could have been much worse. We (Mum and I) were out there for about four hours yesterday, and we got quite a lot done. I lopped down some of the huge cherry tree next door (before the rapidly falling blossom turned into cherries); pruned some roses, a forsythia, a Japanese maple (which I also repotted after sawing through the roots that had burst through the bottom of the plastic pot it was in! The pot is now a heap of plastic pieces as I had to smash it to bits to get the plant out lol), pulled up about a thousand weeds, planted a sad looking pink camellia in the ground, emptied the ashes out of the incinerator from the Beltane bonfire, top-dressed another Japanese maple, chopped down and fought with some suckers on the roses, swept the small patio and struggled with Mum to put up our gazebo. There is still a lot to do, but we both felt too tired to carry on. Mum was suffering with her back and dodgy shoulder and my right ankle became too painful to stand on for very long... all signs to go indoors and rest.

All told, though, I feel very happy with the progress we've made :0) Fingers crossed we both feel well enough to go out again later today and do some more.

Fruit trees for a small garden!

New Mini Orchard Collection With Free Secateurs - Plants, Seeds & Bulbs - Trees - Fruit Trees - Garden Centre Online
Very interested in these... now to find the money haha.

Link to a brief herbalism article

http://www.ladyoftheearth.com/herbs/beginner.txt
I'm determined to do some kind of herb garden this year. I've neglected the garden for about a year and I have to sort it out. My main reason for not going out there is that I have to be so wary of the cats escaping. They're both indoor cats and it is now too easy for them to access the main road at the front of the house (and we have three separate bus routes running up this hill!!)
Anyway... I'm definitely going to attempt to finish the herb garden I started... while I have the money to do so.

What a bloody cheek!

And the day had so much promise before I went to bed last night, LOL! I had planned to do so many things... I was going to get out in the garden and now the weather looks as if it's going to pour with rain... and I am a total fair weather gardener (bad, I know).

I've also been put into a pissed mood by the delivery of the post this morning. We received an invitation to a wedding reception from my cousin... well, Mum and Dad did, I wasn't even mentioned, so I presume my presence is surplus to requirements, then!! I'm only the one that would have to drive them there, and I then, what? turn around and come home again?! Plus we aren't even worthy to attend the actual ceremony, just the party afterwards! So we can't actually go the bit that matters, but we can go the part that means we have to take a gift! Bloody cheek... they basically want our money in the form of a present then, not for us to actually see them get married. Fuck off!!

This is why I like not having a close knit family... most of them are total bastards that don't give a shit! This invite from the cousin that I haven't seen since the death of our grandfather about 14 years ago. I seriously could have walked past him in the street and I wouldn't have known it, I can't even remember what he looks like anymore. He knows where we have been for all of these years, we haven't moved, unlike him who has been all over the country and then was in India for I don't know how long. I would have preferred to have got no invite at all instead of the one for the reception. Whatever, but then I'm not invited anyway, am I? It's addressed to Mum and Dad only, my name is nowhere to be seen!

It's also on the same day as the final part of the first aid course I have to do, and I'm sorry, but the first aid is vastly more important to me than attending the wedding of a virtual stranger, so I wouldn't be going even if I had been invited! He can take his invitation, roll it up into a tight tube and then shove it up his arse as high as he can get it!! That is what I think about his "reception only" offer! See how he sits at the top table with that little lot blocking his rectum! LOL!

Dad has said that sadly he's not going to be able to go, as his leg is going to be hurting and stop him from walking that day... such a shame  **laughs like a manic**

To top off the day being crap before it even started, I woke up with my arm hurting as much as ever, and now I have to work with our 16 year old autistic guy at 3pm until he's collected (whenever that maybe) tonight (I love him dearly, and am looking forward to seeing him, don't get me wrong, but I'd planned to not be working until Monday... and I always get a bit fed up when I have to change my plans at the last minute  **grumpypants**)

The way your interests change

I was reading at one of my favourite forums about the religion of Ancient Egypt and about the modern day people that follow it in Pagan circles and I replied saying just how uninteresting I now find the topic... amazing when you consider just how I was obsessed with Ancient Egypt about 8 years ago! I have books (over forty of varying ages), tv shows, figurines, jewellery... I even have two scarves that have hieroglyphics on them, lol!

What's weird is that now, at this present time, I have no interest in Ancient Egypt at all... nothing, nada, zip! I was watching a programme about Hatshepsut the other day and I couldn't have been less interested if I'd been watching paint dry... to say I was bored would be an under statement... and I don't understand it at all. To go from thinking about virtually nothing else for years, to being in this state of abject not caring is fairly alarming, even worrying to me. Very rarely do I lose total interest in something that I used to love, and when I do I sort of seem to enter a kind of mourning phase for the thing/s I leave behind... and most of the time it doesn't last very long and something always comes along to pique my interest again after a while. Sadly I don't think anything is going to relight my passion for Ancient Egypt... I've felt like this for roughly 8 years and as each year passes I seem to care less and less.

I asked for advice on how to re-ignite my interest... but I don't think there is going to be an answer that will help me. I wonder if I've moved on from that phase in my life to something else? I don't know what to, as I have no current obsession with anything much at present, just many things I like, nothing that would be classed as obsession.

I wonder if I'm just too tired, in pain and worrying about my job to give my full attention to much of anything these days... (though I'm hoping to get out in the garden over the weekend and have a bit of a tidy up, bad arm permitting... I'm actually hoping that giving it some gentle exercise will help in loosening it up and help me to move it more, well it can't hurt... well, it really can, but I guess it hurts anyway so at least I can get the dead plants out of the ground and still be in pain rather than stare at their woody corpses out of the window all of the time LOL!!)

It's all just so weird!

**I have a new keyboard now which makes typing easier, if not painless, so at least I can type without having red hot daggers flare up under my skin... always nice I find to not have that feeling, LOL!**

Yay... more rain

I hope it rains hard enough to water my containers... I'm still not feeling energetic enough to drag the hose and watering cans round the place, lol!

My cold is finally going away... it's taken nearly three days in bed, copious amounts of painkillers, a bottle of Sinex nasal spray and a whole box of tissues, mind, but at least I'm starting to feel better.

Am watching the news and there is tennis being played at Queen's Club... so that means that Wimbledon is shortly here... yay!! I adore watching Wimbledon... best two weeks of the year, and it usually means that there is lots of lovely rain and I don't have to water the garden myself, hehe! Me, cynical? Never! LOL.

My garden is like a wilderness...

... and I haven't the heart (or the energy) to do anything about it!! LOL

After being neglected for about eight months the things that have grown out there have GROWN! My tamarisk is now roughly seven foot high!! The broom has gone bonkers (even though half of it was killed by the snow at the beginning of the year)... the hollyhocks that flowered last year have set seed in the very same (awkward) place as last year (and last year they had spikes of over seven feet, too).

Everything seems to have gone bonkers... and I don't have the heart to mercilessly hack away at all of their growing, just so that it is more pleasing to me :(

I think I actually prefer it looking wild... it feels enclosed and cosy somehow... very lush and peaceful... the way a garden should be (as long as you ignore all of the rubbish that always seems to accumulate in my garden, anyway... oh, and the six lanes of motorway at the end LOL!).

Now... if I could just find a way of blocking my view of him next door, it would be perfect (him and his "drinking buddies" actually put me off of going out there in the summer... for some reason I feel quite intimidated by them all and his "foghorn voiced" children and screaming grandkids. He, personally, is a nice guy - we get on well... and he has a very sweet cat :) )

No onions today...

... and I feel fine. No nausea, wind, bloating, flatulence... nothing! I even had a small amount of chives on some sushi earlier and nothing, though granted, it was a very small amount, more like a garnish (and I couldn't even taste them). I'm going to stay onion-free until the weekend and then, if I feel brave enough, I'm going to eat some onions and see if they effect me. I'm going to try a cheese sandwich tomorrow, and then I'll add some onion to a similar sanwich over the weekend (just so that the test is sort of controlled, and I'll know it's not the bread or cheese if I'm fine with them on their own).

Still no contact from the boy's Mum... there have been many messages left for her and still no reply to any of them! I have no idea where I stand with her anymore, and the not knowing is annoying me (although I am forcing myself not to worry, as in the past I always have, and nothing has happened to us, so I'm staying positive and hoping that like will attract like as it seems to do for everyone that I know!! Most of the people I know could fall in shit and come out smelling of roses, so I'm hoping some of it will rub of on us if I adopt the same way of thinking... certainly can't hurt, LOL!)

I'm hoping to get out in the garden tomorrow... I lost a couple of plants over the dreadful winter we had and they are now looking all sad and brown, so I want to get them out and put some potted plants in their places. I have a large rosemary that I'd love to get in the bed with the other herbs, and I also have a bay and a lovely camellia that are just crying out for a nice earthy home (that is not in a pot!) I'm hoping that I have some growmore or something like it in the shed as I can't afford to buy any at the moment (and I like to get my plants off to the best start by giving them some food to draw on when I plant them in the ground). I've finally got my compost for sowing my seeds and also potting up my houseplants, so I'm hoping to get most, if not all of that done in the remaining three days I have off :)

I'll have to clean the small greenhouse and do a patch job in repairing the polycarbonate sheet that was cracked last year in a gale, but I'm hoping it won't take too long to do... once that's done all I'll have to do is move the power supply in there and plug in the heated propagators (and hope they still work!). Once I do all that, it'll be sowing time... and I love sowing seeds, and I really get excited when I see those little green shoots pushing through the soil, hehe.

Bye-bye roadworks.

So glad to see you bugger off, lol! Wonderful to be able to park near my house, on either side of the road and not be too far away from home so that I can take my Dad the places he needs to go without having a mile hike to get to the car! There are still roadworks, but they are now at the bottom of the hill, not sure what they're doing, but I'm happy as long as they are doing it way over there.

We lost our appeal of the parking ticket, so we have to pay that soon (just one of those things you use as a life lesson, I suppose)... thieving bastards!!

I have got a very sensitive tooth at the moment... I'm hoping that it's just a touch of neuralgia and not a cavity! Don't have the money to go to the dentist and I did have sore teeth all over my mouth a few weeks ago. It doesn't hurt all the time, I can't bite down on it very hard and it is very "jabby" when I have stuff that's cold, but it doesn't hurt otherwise and doesn't hurt when I brush my teeth, so I'm a little confused. I do have fissures in my teeth, but the dentist said when I was younger that my mouth structure is too small for the large teeth I have, so to relieve the pressure it created fissures in my teeth. I also have a dodgy wisdom tooth on the same side (it grew at a strange angle, and sometimes makes all of the teeth on that side sensitive :( ) FIngers crossed that is all it is.

Anyway... I mustn't grumble, and we had a beautiful day here today... sunny and warm, and I cleaned the car (again) so I'm hoping it doesn't rain now (usually does when I clean the car, hehe).

I was in the garden and I've seen some of the things that I want to do this year... some plants I want to get in the ground and out of pots, and also I have an idea for growing some herbs and veg (must start off the seeds soon, need to get a little greenhouse, too). Exciting times are just around the corner in my little patch of heaven :)

So tired now...

... I don't know why, maybe earlier, maybe just a general feeling of blahness (is that even a word? lol).

I just want to crawl into bed, pull the covers over my head and stay there until the spring. I never used to hate the winter, it used to be my fave season, but since the snow and ice came and made everything so dangerous it has gone down in my liking and I can honestly say that I am really looking forward to the start of spring... I can't wait to get out in the garden and take out my frustrations on the weeds, hehe. I also can't wait to get planting seeds and other things out there. I'm hoping to get a decent herb garden going this year, and maybe start off some different veg, maybe some mini veg, I'm sure I'll think of something to do with the ground.