Skip to main content

Half time at the allotment

In better times...

We’ve battled rain, wind, rain, snow, some more rain, deer, rain and some strange orange weevily things with a very high leg count. And now we’re losing the plot.

As any keen gardener will tell you (probably whilst leaning on a garden fork and looking knowledgeable and suitably weathered), it’s been a tough year.

A late, cold, spring, amounts of sunshine that the word “inadequate” fails to accurately describe, then the soggiest winter since records began, have left many a horticulturist downhearted, under-vegetabled, and contemplating trying to grow rice to see if that will cope any better.

For mere weekend-weeders like us, it has been particularly harsh. With jobs consuming Monday, Friday and those other ones in-between, Saturday and Sunday have to accommodate all those other life-enhancing things that need doing too. Like decorating, shopping, trying not to think about Monday and wishing, desperately, that your Lotto numbers come up soon.

The universe has been busy mocking us too. Almost every time we’ve had a couple of hours available to head up to our paddy-field plot, it’s been pouring. I don’t know about you, but when an ark is more appropriate than a fork, it tends to put you off somewhat. That and the fact that wellies only come up so far.

Of course, every time you’re compelled to visit family or friends, have to take the car to the garage, or need to go and have an optician tell you to stop talking to the hat stand, you can pretty much guarantee that it will be dry.

The inevitable consequence of all this has, therefore, been a pretty disappointing season. It would have been easier and cheaper to have just brought most of the stuff we did manage to grow.

Alternatively, boiling up the seeds and bulbs we planted would have provided a greater source of nutrition that the meagre return we got from putting them in the ground and waiting for the green shoots of goodness that rarely came.

Keeping on top of everything became akin to the proverbial paint job for the Forth Bridge – by the time we’d got the last bed dug over, the first one looked like a scene from a Tarzan film (but with marginally less deadly animals and people wearing loincloths).

With heavy hearts, we’ve therefore taken the difficult decision to reduce our oasis of earth to half it’s original size, and let someone else have a go at 50% of it.

We might be able to cope better with half a plot. Look at Midsomer Murders – they’ve got along just fine all these years, so it clearly works.

Perhaps we will now be able to devote more time to beautifying the beans, romancing the raspberries, getting fruity with the apple tree and ensuring the highest standards of courgette etiquette.

The scores at half time: Allotment 1: Us 0. It is a game of two halves though, and I reckon we can pull it round. Oranges? Nah.

This post first appeared as my "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column, in the North West Evening Mail, on the 19th of February 2016.

Yes, we're giving up half of our patch, even though it's probably nearer to being up to date than it has ever been. The trouble is, whilst we were getting there on having it all neat and tidy, actually getting stuff planted, then properly tended, just wasn't happening. 

We even considered packing it in altogether, but then realised the apple tree, raspberries, strawberries, gooseberries and rhubarb will all pretty much get on it with the growing game by themselves. Hence, even if we do practically nothing, we recoup the cost of having the plot in fruity goodness. Anything else we get planted is a bonus.

I've also formally announced that I'm packing in being Chair of the Allotment Association. The fact that I know sod all about gardening doesn't seem to have been a problem, but I just can't put the time into it that the role deserves.

All change, then. Dig it.

(Wow, this Argentinian History of ELO radio series will take a long time to listen to. 24, 1 hour, episodes. Currently on episode 2, and they've only just got to The Move...) 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Making an exhibition of yourself

Now and again, it’s good to reaffirm that you’re a (relatively) normal human being. One excellent way of doing this is to go to a business exhibition. Despite what you might have surmised from reading my previous columns, I am employable, and even capable of acting like a regular person most of the time, even joining in the Monday morning conversation about the weather over the weekend, and why (insert name of footyballs manager here) should be fired immediately. The mug! True, there are times, often involving a caffeine deficiency, where it is like having the distilled essence of ten moody teenagers in the room, but I try and get that out of the way when people I genuinely like aren’t around to see it. As part of my ongoing experiment with what others call ‘working’, my ‘job’ involves me occasionally needing to go and see what some of my colleagues get up to outside the office, and what our competitors do to try and make sure that they do whatever my colleagues do better than ...

Unstable Stables: Throw away the key

It’s comforting to know that there is one less threat to the people of Cumbria this week, following the conviction of white supremacist, Ethan Stables. The 20 year old from Barrow had planned to attack the town’s New Empire pub in June 2017, in the midst of a gay pride event. Despite social media posts saying he was “going to war” and planning to “slaughter”, online searches about how to make bombs and chemical poisons, and expressing hatred of Muslims, Jews and gay people, he claimed his online comments were merely to impress far-right friends. Fortunately, following Facebook posts about his intentions, the police were tipped off and armed officers intercepted him as he headed towards the pub. His aim was to kill anyone he found, with a machete. In a bizarre slip-up, Stables had erroneously added an innocent woman to his neo-Nazi Facebook group. When he vented his outrage at the Furness LGBT support group’s event, the shocked woman contacted the authorities. He’ll have ple...

Is it foggy? No.

When I get put in charge (which is bound to happen soon), I'm going to introduce a whole raft of new laws, for I shall be a just and fair ruler. I'm quite liking the title of 'Most Marvellous Emperor Of Sensible Regulations And Bountiful Lovingness Not To Mention Exceedingly Handsome', but it might be a bit long. On that basis, I'll settle for the more informal 'He Who Is Smashing' from my loyal subjects. Anyway, I digress. I do that sometimes - had you noticed? Here, then, is the first law that will introduced: grumpyf1 law No.1 - Turn your fog lights off, you complete git. Don't get me wrong; If it genuinely is foggy, fog lights are quite handy. The reason for introduction of this law is because 96% of the time (based on my own in-depth research) it isn't foggy when some utter cockwomble blinds you. This has always been a bit of a problem but in the last couple of years it seems to have escalated out of control, possibly because of the...