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Things done : gardening
Nov. 20th, 2011 02:46 pmI am very snoozy at the moment. Everything apart from sleeping seems to require an enormous effort. It must be the autumn.
None the less, today I am making a rabbit, venison and apple stew, cleaned the kitchen windows, and have done a tiny bit of gardening. It's SO WARM for November! I put on my fleece and cardi to walk the hounds this morning, but by the time I'd got down the road I was baking and had to take them off and carry them (the clothes, not the hounds). The campanulas which normally flower in June have come back into bloom, and so have a lot of the perennial geraniums and the periwinkles which normally do their thing in May! The mahonia is in bloom, a little early I think, but that is at least supposed to be a winter bloomer - but I noticed today that it is absolutely buzzing with bees! I can't decide if I dislike mahonia or not : you have to give it credit for being a nice striking shape and flowering reliably in winter, but the spiky leaves are such a pain to pick up.
I fear that despite the shortness of the days, the jungle is still growing, and I've had a really lazy gardening year this year, so it was already more than a little unkempt. However, I have at least now taken all the figs off the fig tree - there were absolutely piles that hadn't quite managed to ripen this year, so I am ever-hopeful for next year.
I wonder if we are actually going to have a normal (non-frozen) winter for a change. The local shops are all selling shoe-spikes and bags of salt, and I actually saw an advert for winter tires the other day. If Sod's Law is operating normally, this should all mean a winter where the main equipment required will be wellies and a waterproof hat.
None the less, today I am making a rabbit, venison and apple stew, cleaned the kitchen windows, and have done a tiny bit of gardening. It's SO WARM for November! I put on my fleece and cardi to walk the hounds this morning, but by the time I'd got down the road I was baking and had to take them off and carry them (the clothes, not the hounds). The campanulas which normally flower in June have come back into bloom, and so have a lot of the perennial geraniums and the periwinkles which normally do their thing in May! The mahonia is in bloom, a little early I think, but that is at least supposed to be a winter bloomer - but I noticed today that it is absolutely buzzing with bees! I can't decide if I dislike mahonia or not : you have to give it credit for being a nice striking shape and flowering reliably in winter, but the spiky leaves are such a pain to pick up.
I fear that despite the shortness of the days, the jungle is still growing, and I've had a really lazy gardening year this year, so it was already more than a little unkempt. However, I have at least now taken all the figs off the fig tree - there were absolutely piles that hadn't quite managed to ripen this year, so I am ever-hopeful for next year.
I wonder if we are actually going to have a normal (non-frozen) winter for a change. The local shops are all selling shoe-spikes and bags of salt, and I actually saw an advert for winter tires the other day. If Sod's Law is operating normally, this should all mean a winter where the main equipment required will be wellies and a waterproof hat.
