The forecast in the screenshot
above seems to be fantasy. I don't recall any
sunshine earlier, although the sun is making a
valiant effort to try and squeeze through a
crack in the clouds as I write this. The
latest revision doesn't seem to be available
because like most government run web sites it
is crap, and seems to have failed. The last I
saw said there would be one shower sometime
this afternoon, and that it would be overcast
for most of the day, but the sun might appear
now and then. At 21° C it should be a little
warmer than yesterday. Tomorrow is likely to
be another mostly overcast day, and probably a
similar temperature. It is not until towards
the end of next week, perhaps next Thursday,
when the weather turns summery again.
Yesterday morning was not as wet
as I thought it might be, and by midday I
thought it looked dry enough outside to give
my new strimmer a test run. Before I was able
to do that I had to sort out an extension
lead. The longest I had was just about long
enough, but it had a blown fuse in the plug.
Many years ago, when I used to actually do
constructive things in my workshop, I would
have been able to put my finger on a box, or
drawer of fuses instantly, but they must be
hidden under untold heaps of crap. I had to
find a new fuse from an existing plug. I had
no idea I had fused so many leads with
appropriate fuse ratings. I went through
almost a dozen before I found a plug with TV
marked on it, and that was incorrectly fused
with a 13A fuse. The plug donated it's fuse,
and the lead it was attached to was only a
couple of feet long, and so I threw it away.
With a new fuse in the extension lead I
was able to spin up the strimmer, and hit the
grass. My first impression was that it was
harder to use than expected. Two things made
it hard. After a while it starts to feel quite
heavy despite having a two handled grip. The
weight problem was made worse by trying to get
the cutting height right. Too high and the
weeds growing in the grass are not properly
decapitated, and too low can result in bald
patches and soil flying everywhere !
It is going to take some practice to
get it right, but it was certainly easier than
using shears. I am also happy to say that it
made mincemeat of the thick covering of weeds
at the end of the lawn nearest the house. That
ground is all lumpy, and full of rubble and
old cat litter. One day it will become part of
the lawn - at least that is the plan, but it
is going to take a lot of hard work. In the
meantime, the grassy area can slowly be beaten
into submission at becoming a lawn. One day,
when I am feeling more enthusiastic, I ought
to dig out some of the weeds, and seed the
bare places with more grass seed.
In the meantime some of the lawn
actually looks like lawn when seen from a
distance ! It is the end nearest the camera
that needs lots of hard work to sort out. I
might even have to invest in a riddle to sieve
out the rocks and bigger pebbles before laying
down grass seed. I should have done that with
the grassy area as well. There are still lots
of big pebbles to be found between the grass
blades.
Amongst the ever present weeds
there is some colour in the garden. I expected
much more than 2 blue flowers, and two white
flowers (still not fully in bloom) when I put
a load of seeds in this area. I put them in
before I had any means of watering the garden
beyond taking out a few old 2l cola bottles,
and some of these seeds could have been baked
to death. Before the grass protected the soil
it would bake like clay in sunny weather.
There is another blue bud developing, and
maybe more of it will come to life soon. I
took this picture before doing a bit of
weeding, and now there are less weeds, but
still weeds. I haven't got the patience, and I
can't stay bent over for long enough to do
efficient weeding.
Across the other side of the garden
there is a bit more colour. The yellow/orange
flowers are the last of the plants from my
window boxes. I thought they were all dead,
but this one seems to have picked up a lot
since being planted into the garden. The
straggly looking plant with then tiny white
flowers was also from my window boxes. That
too was near death when planted directly into
the garden, and now continues to flower. The
blue flowers are on a plant that has grown
from a seed I planted there. The only mystery
is why the other 100 seeds, sown at the same
time, didn't grow ?
I felt quite hot and sweaty after
spending maybe an hour in the garden. As well
as using the strimmer I pulled up a load of
weeds. I also tried to pull up more of the ivy
that keeps cropping up by the back fence.
There is a lot of underground root, and it is
still alive, and bloody difficult to pull out,
but I think I am slowly winning. I haven't
spent any time on it for maybe 2 months now,
and there wasn't a lot to pull out or cut off.
I looked forward to a nice lazy
afternoon, but my laziness was soon spoiled by
a call from Jodie. She was bored, and wanted
to come over to have a few beers together. I
said yes, and then had to rush around doing
stuff like cleaning the bathroom hand basin
and stuff. Also putting a few beers in the
fridge. In all the rush, which I didn't need
to do because it seemed like hours before
Jodie finally turned up, I can't remember if I
had any lunch. I am sure I did, but I can't
recall what it might have been.
I think it was gone 4pm when Jodie
arrived with about 5 cans of beer. I think we
drunk 4 of them, plus 2 or 3 bottles of my
beer, and one can of mine. My beer stocks,
apart from Carling Black Label, are now
getting quite low. I amused Jodie, and myself,
by playing some old cassettes. A recent gadget
purchase of mine was a little box that is
about half the size of a cigarette pack, and
records mp3 audio directly to either a USB
memory stick, or an SD card. The latter turned
out to be better because the first USB stick I
tried seemed to be too slow, and made the
audio recording stutter every now and then.
The cassettes I played, and digitally
recorded, were some bootlegs that Jodie would
have originally recorded at some gigs we used
to go to in the early 1990s. The secret of
getting the recorder past the bouncers was
that it was just a Sony Walkman, but one that
had a record button, and the ordinary Sony
headphones worked really well as microphones !
Sometimes it could sound good, and sometimes
rather horrible. It helped a lot if the band
had a decent P.A., and didn't try and push it
too loud. The other thing was being in a venue
with good acoustics - some pubs were like
being in echo chambers !
I didn't expect Jodie to stay so late,
and I think it was just gone 8pm when she
left. For the last couple of hours my mind was
distracted thinking about dinner. I was
hungry, and maybe that suggested I didn't have
any lunch. I was looking forward to the last
two Iceland curry ready meals I had in the
fridge (but not freezer, and so I had to eat
them sooner or later). One was a biryani, and
I treated that as just as rice accompaniment
to a bhuna. The latter was more like chunky
gravy. Both were improved with some splashes
of hot chilli sauce.
By the time I had finished my dinner it
wasn't far off bedtime - 9pm. I did read for a
bit after going to bed, but all the beer, and
a stomach full of hot food made me feel very
sleepy, and it wasn't long before I was fast
asleep. maybe 2 or 3 hours later I was awake
again, and suffering from heartburn - complete
with curry flavoured burps. A couple of
Rennies sorted it out, but not before it felt
like I had lost a lot of sleep. I was still
suffering from a bruised thigh/buttock, and
that made getting to sleep sometimes
difficult.
I woke up around 6am, and it seemed
like I should get up, but I still felt very
tired, although maybe not sleepy. After an
hour or so I went back to bed, and it didn't
feel like I slept, but about 2 hours flashed
by in no time at all. It was 9am when I got up
again, and still not feeling good. I am not
sure why I don't feel good. I am sure it is
all in the mind. It is a Sunday, and therefore
a depressing day - and that despite Sunday
being very little different to any other day
now.
My weight and blood glucose are both up
a little bit because of the beer and curry,
but that was to be expected, and so not really
a source of gloom. I could blame my gloom on
the gloom outside, but as I write this the sun
has unexpectedly come out again. If I had any
confidence that it would stay out for more
than a few minutes it might inspire me to do
something productive, but as soon as I started
writing that last sentence the light dimmed
again, although I must admit it didn't dim
that much.
I don't know what I am going to do
today. Maybe I have a few aches from doing the
gardening yesterday, and maybe the mild
headache I have is a legacy of yesterday's
beer (I did feel a bit drunk at the end of
it). Of course aching limbs, and a headache
are symptoms of Covid-19, and so maybe life is
going to get "interesting" soon, but I think
I'll have a lay down, and do some quiet
reading first. In fact I can't think of
anything I would rather do than slump into
idleness with a good book to read !