Again

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It is still raining.  All being considered this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone.  After all it is North Devon, it is autumn and I have a lingering Hammer House of Horrors cough to nurture.  Mr and Mrs G swanned off first thing telling me they had a very important meeting to attend, leaving myself and Slasher in charge.   There were many apologies and heart felt regrets that they would not be able to assist us today, there may well have been tears.  Instead they would be having an absolutely dreadful time in the warm dry “lunch included” meeting.  They leapt onto the No. 1 “going out to meetings and other important events” tractor and waved farewell.  I swear I heard Mrs G shout “QUICK DRIVE!” as they slowly screeched off into the distance.   Poor things, I thought as I stood alone in the drizzle.

Today, I decided, would be an excellent day to tackle the problem of the long raised bed.  This bed is very long.  I wish I had paced it out to give you some detailed information but I imagine that more accurately it would be regarded as very, very, long.  To accentuate this longicity it is also rather narrow, probably less than 2m wide.  The mythical previous owners had planted this raised bed with some very unsavoury characters.  These plants are not only invasive but, far worse and almost unforgivable, they are extremely dull.  “Walk past and not notice” tedious.  “Nod off half way through the conversation” boring.   I had been promised that Slasher could be my slave for the day (although I had been denied the badge that I wanted him to wear).  As always he seemed keen to help.  That lad has a very short memory.

So we began, SS attacking some particularly gruesome grass with all the grace and elegance of a brick (not SS you must understand, the grass. SS is very elegant).  I was tackling one of the islands of Jerusalem artichoke, with its creamy quick release tubers, which didn’t even have the decency to flower this year.  As we worked we chatted about the joys of working outside, even when the weather was inclement.  We mocked the soft-handed office folk, we chortled about how a little bit of wet never hurt anyone.  As if testing our resolve the rain got steadily heavier, the wind stronger and gustier.  The persistent downpouring had found a weak link in my armour, discovering a gap where a gap should not be.  There was the sound of dripping water, from nose, sleeve and ankle.  A morass was beginning to form, the bed was fighting back.  Eventually we looked at each other “a bit heavy now don’t you think” and ran for cover.  Discretion truly is the better part of valour.

Into Each Life a Little Rain Must Fall

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And it did.  And it wasn’t really a little.  Less shower, more downpour.  And I had left my waterproofs at home.  I know, “call yourself a professional” and all that, but I have not been my usual super-efficient self of late.   Mind you, I may have imagined that self.  The deluge began in earnest just as I was getting vicious with an out-sized cornus.  Perhaps it was for the best.  So I took my consumptive self inside to discuss plants and make plans with Max’s Dad for a couple of exhausting hours.  Looking through catalogues, googling, gossiping, swooning and dreaming, with me playing the devil on MD’s vulnerable shoulder.  Not a bad way to spend a morning.  Beats working for a living.  Mind you that cornus still needs some work, don’t think I’ve forgotten you!

Ten Go Mad at Rosemoor

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“Oh yes”, I bragged, “we will be there at 10.00, forming an orderly queue or hammering on the door dependent on how much coffee I have drunk”.  So confident was I that we would be early than an illicit meeting had been arranged with Rusty Duck in the car park for the furtive exchange of “goods”.  You don’t need to know any more.  Anyway, as so often follows an outbreak of cocky-istis, our prompt arrival was scuppered due to some serious over-sleeping (me) and roadworks (North Devon). Hero had arrived on her motorcycle combination promptly but had to be entertained by Mr OTE (many would call it interrogation) until I ran down the stairs and straight out the front door. Changing from your onesie bunnie PJ’s into your special garden visiting outfit in a sidecar is a tricky undertaking, I can tell you.  Anyway, in the end we were only a little late, we completed our “business” with the Rusties and headed to the restaurant for our rendezvous with rest of the All Horts crew.   There they were, the Dream Team – organiser extraordinaire SDG, the Farmer’s Wife and Hartland Harry (wot no trousers) of course Hero, Mr and Mrs Rusty and myself.  With late arrivals of the out-of-countyers, who apparently had to contend with long queues at passport control so can be forgiven, Mad Cat, Didcot Dave and the Taunton Gardener.  After necking one of the best cheese scones I have ever had (and I have had a lot of cheese scones) and a large black coffee I was ready for adventure.

A detailed itinerary was devised (look around garden, eat, look around garden some more, shop, eat) and we were off.  November did its best for us and we wandered around in t-shirts and even in some very optimistic cases (or someone in training for a Christmas job with the Post Office) shorts.  The gods were smiling on us.  So much to recount, I will make it a snappy.  We saw the winter garden, with beautiful abutilon and liquidambar, the allotments with outrageously perfect salad rows, a hobbit house with hobbit cat, the still steaming Hot Garden and curiously abandoned pumpkin, the technicolour lake, the shining apple arch of the vegetable garden where gourds hang ominously.  Through the tunnel to Lady Anne’s garden, past Land of the Giant gunnera and bamboos, metallic grey monkshood, striking blue of decaisnea seed pods, the forbidding stare of the dolls eye cimifuga, impatiens, salvias and cannas.  Really it was all too much to compute or even recount.  Sustenance was needed.

Lunch was taken al fresco, and was without complaint until a slightly dodgy moment when Didcot Dave’s pud was a little tardy in arriving.  I swear I could detect a slight green tinge coming to his forehead.  Then, with renewed vigour and full bellies, we were off again to wander around the potager and rose gardens for more wonder and inspiration.  Scented pelargoniums tumbled with heliotrope and pink verbena, scarlet rose hips and terracotta nasturtiums.  Fennel and thyme, curving drystone walls softened with helianthemum and erigeron.   Informal, relaxed and useful, a good place to end our tour.

Then something wonderful happened.  There had been whispers but could it really be true?  It was!  There was a sale on at the Plant Centre!  Can my beating heart take much more?  The Farmer’s Wife, no messing about, went straight for the trolley.  And the dash began.   I bagged an astelia, Digitalis parviflora, something beginning with z that I had never heard of before but that TFW knew (swotty pants) and a well won Diascia rigescens that I had been admiring a little earlier (thanks DD).  I could have lingered longer, but when I got caught by a member of staff searching for scything pictures in the Poldark book I made a hasty, rather reddened exit.

Then coffee, cake, a final chat and then adieu’s until the next time.  Rusty had injured her ankle earlier in the week, whilst undertaking an extremely complicated move in the Argentina tango, but very bravely managed to hobble about for the whole day.  Her bravery may have in part been influenced by our keenness to push her around in a wheelchair.  I have a feeling she may not be the trusting type.

As always when in such esteemed company, this trip was an education.   I learned that Salvia discolor tastes like purple and that boys’ sense of smell isn’t as good as girls’ to save their sanity. Rather shocking was that Mad Cat is mad about cats and not actually a mad cat.  Disappointingly, that neither Rusty or the Farmer’s Wife can bake cakes.  And most impressively that SDG Skypes with his dog and can actually talk fluent Woof.

There is something about being with like-minded people.  These trips are the antithesis of an AA meeting.  We are addicted but we don’t want the cure, we relish it, and these meetings amplify it. It is joyous.  It is not a competition, it is about sharing.  I know this one, you know that, we learn, we laugh.   Stand up and be proud, we are All Horts!  Thank you everyone for making it a wonderful day.

Evil

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The internet is evil.  Nothing but bad can come of it.  You meet people who you are unlikely to come across in the real world.  Strange virtual folk with strange virtual habits.  Unknown, scary, likely to have hidden agendas and devilment on their minds.   But I have found these demons to be kind and generous.  They speak my language.  They enhance my life.  It doesn’t matter where they come from,  what colour they are, their religion, inside leg measurement or favourite member of Take That.  They are trusting and trustful. The few that aren’t exist in the real world too and are probably just as malevolent.

Thank you to my blogging pal Chloris from http://www.thebloominggarden.wordpress.com for a most welcome parcel of seed and cuttings that arrived today.

Beware the evil internet. You have been warned.

Poorly

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I was meant to be working in Lavinia and Lionel’s garden today.  Yesterday I was due at The Farm and the day before Max’s was scheduled.   None of these obligations were completed.

At least I made it to Max’s.  Here I struggled on pathetically for an hour before throwing in the towel and staggered home, drooping tail between my leaden legs.  I was poorly.   Proper “not being able to get out of bed” poorly.  Of course it was just one of these virus malarkeys, but it was a truly mean and nasty one.  Firstly it replaced the skin on the back of my throat with acid infused sandpaper and neatly partnered this with a rasping hack.  It then swiftly moved down the alimentary canal to bring nausea and stomach cramps.  The inability to lift my head or keep my eyes open was exacerbated by a raging thirst that could not be quenched.  As these symptoms eased a little, it heralded the arrival of a Godzilla versus King Kong headache and I mean H E A D ache, every sinus in my cranium was imploding as they battled it out.  Faster than the Barnstaple to Exeter Express this shot down the track of my spine to linger in the lumber region, making lying or sitting painful and standing impossible.  Enough now before the word “mucus” or “phlegm” offends anyone.  I expect you get the picture.  I was poorly.

So what has this meant.  Well; no gardening (definitely a bad thing, I have missed being outside, my folk, my cake), no computer (not necessarily a bad thing, in fact a very good thing), lots of sleep (good, but being unconscious for 20 hours a day is not the most thrilling way to get through the week), a detox (also good, but perhaps you should do it for more than 3 days and now I need to build up my strength), an appreciation of my health and how important it is (much-needed and a fine lesson indeed).

This quince lives at L&L’s house.  Where I should have been today.  But I was poorly.

ps  You probably guessed, I am feeling much better.