A Peacock

The allotment quarterly meeting took place on Friday. The meeting was concluded quite smartly which left plenty of time for apres meeting drinking. Steve, the wise one, and his missus and Ali plus me and H had a very nice time over Guinness for the gents and fruit base drinks for the ladies.. The ladies retired leaving Steve and I to the tender mercies of Di the Land lady.

Saturday dawned too soon and in my head I had a long list of things to do and could be done. I cleared up the garden and got he chiminia going to burn up the rubbish and spare wood. I tidied up the garage and whilst the garage was clear I decided to fit a bit of carpet. When I cleared the dining room for the new wood flooring a reserved the carpet. I cut a piece out of the middle of the carpet and fitted it in the garage. Sorting the carpet made space in the greenhouse. I did not have time for lottie paths so set about the old wheelbarrow.

I have to walk over the 100 yards from where I now have to park Degsy over to the hives. Supers and brood chambers are heavy so I need something to ease the load. I put my feelers out for an old wheelbarrow. Alan, a friend of mine, found an old wheelbarrow in a ditch. The frame was sound but the bucket was shot and the tyre was soft. I took the angle grinder to the rivets holding the bucket to the frame. The used the hammer and dot punch to free the rivets and with it the bucket. With the frame released I pumped up the tyre. I had a two square piece of plywood, in the shed, which I bolted to the frame. I put a lip on the lower end of the plywood to stop supers sliding off the base. I happened to have some green panel paint. I gave the timber a good coating of paint and left it aside to dry. All the while I kept he chiminia going. I had a run out to the tip to drop the wheelbarrow bucket, junk from the garage and junk from the garden. After dinner H and I watched a DVD, The girl with dragon tattoo. We watched in Swedish language with sub-titles. It was an excellent film.

Sunday 1AM British Summertime started. I could use that hour. I heard on the radio that America has daylight saving and that started two weeks ago. Who knew? I need petrol for Degsy. I went over to Swad then to the stables, back to the lottie to empty the trailer. Whilst at the lottie I filled the bird feeders and put the house recyclables in the compo bin. I noticed that the weed killer is starting to have an effect. Then back to the stables to return the trailer. Next was to run up to the bees. I dropped off the bee barrow, as it is now named. Its new home is under the Holly tree by the fence by the Mease. I had a look at the bees. One hive is stronger than the other but that is to be expected. However both colonies are alive and that is good news. I took ten minutes to write in my journal and to revel in the peace. I had a look into the river. The Mease, although not very wide is quite deep. I figure it is at least five foot deep in places the ankle deep in others. Whilst sitting there I saw A Peacock butterfly. I had the check again to make sure what I saw. Mr Internet proved I was not dreaming. It was indeed a Peacock butterfly.

After lunch was a trip to B&Q for a few bits and pieces. I set up the chop saw when I got home. It was a short job to get the old architrave and skirting board off the door frames. Again a relatively short job to cut the new architrave and skirting to size and fit. Having cleaned up and still some daylight left I looked to the bike. Then it was dinner. A glass or two a clean cold Chardonnay and I was done.

Treasure for a pound

It is the spring equinox is upon us so time to visit the potato men of Newall. My order of seed spuds was ready and waiting. This year I am trying Sharpes Express as a first early. Then we have the old favorites, white Duke of York and Cara. H came with me. We sat there waiting for the old giffers in front us collect their orders. One chap had bags and bags of chemicals. Has he never heard of horse manure? As usual I have bought too many seed potatoes.

I went to the lottie for a few hours. I was trying to get the path adjasent to the ditch completed. By the end of the stint I had competed half of the path. It is heavy work so I was glad to get a text from H to say she was off to collect Miss L from the train station. Now Degsy is fitted out I was able to have a brew. My new lottie neighbours came down to start fettling their new plot. The plot has been well looked after for the past few years so it should not take them long to get the plot the way they want it.

Miss L was back home for the weekend so no lottie on Sunday. I ran the trailer back up to the stables though. When I got back I made breakfast. We went a car boot sale, Miss L was looking for something. I got a piece of treasure, a metal carrying box with a random collection of bits in it for £1. The chap was glad to be rid of it. At home I ferreted in the box and found some good items the rest of it went for recycling or the bin. I got three trays ready and tipped the seeds spuds into the trays, one variety in each tray. The Duke of Yorks and Cara went into the shed. The Sharpes Express were put in the greenhouse hopefully to bring the Sharpes on and hold back the the others.

H has been "tiding up" in the garden. H has cut back the jungle that ajoins the pond. Whilst surveying the devastation I cast my eye about and saw that the minarets Pear tree buds are bursting. It is couple weeks ahead of it neighbouring Apples. The clocks go forward next week so the evening will stay lighter for much longer.

The weary shoveller

I had half a day free today. I went down to do a job that I have been preparing for sometime. The ditch side of my plot is eroding away with weather and beasties digging holes into it. It is also full of weeds. I got a load of industrial carpet. It happens to be green too! I started at the bottom end. I went round to the ditch side of the lottie and pulled up the chicken wire and the grass and nettles entangled in it. Back round on the lottie side of the fence and unrolled the carpet strips. I then pushed them under the wire making sure the carpet hung down at least half way down the bank. Then I cut the carpet to leave it about half way across the path. Next I pulled the chicken wire to turn the foot of the fence toward the path instead outwards. After some heaving and hauling it got the wire in some kind of order. The wind netting was tucked into the bottom of the wire.

Then the heavy work started. I went up to the stone bund to fill the trailer, spade full by spade full. Then the trailer was run back to the lottie and the contents shovelled into the wheelbarrow. The wheelbarrow was tipped onto what was to be the path. I just had to spread the gravel about trying to make sure the wire was buried and the wind netting tucked in. I manged four trailer loads before I ran out of time and back muscles. I raked the gravel flatish and tramped it down. Between loads and two and three I made a brew. I have the Trangie in the back of Degsy so hot tea is available for the weary shoveller.

I finished shovelling but had only completed about a quarter of the long path. And there is the whole other side to do as well. I needed a bit a rest before going home. Having tidied up I sat in the back of Degsy for half an hour. The sky was very blue and the sun was low. There was chill in the air. There had been a sharp forst last night. This did not seem to worry the birds. I saw the usual characters, Tits and Robins. There were a few Long tailed Tits to be seen. Then the "peewit" of the Lapwing wheeling over the adjacent field. Then the lazy wing beat of the Buzzard. I was reluctant to leave but it was tea time.

Busy, busy, busy.

Friday a message was left on the home phone to say the tank and mudguards were ready. I went over to Swadlincote on Saturday to collect them from the painters. They have done a nice job.

I also got a call on Saturday from the farmer fretting about weed killer on the new allotments. I arranged to meet him and get the chemicals and knapsack sprayer off him. That done I went over to the lottie and following the farmers directions mixed the chemicals and walked up and down the new plots pumping and spraying. It was quite a still day and sun was shining so I took advantage of the moment. The wind, when it blew, blew across the plots carrying any over-spray away from the old plots. I gave the brambles a couple of doses. The contractors should be able to start the ground works in a fortnight. H and I went over to B&Q to pick up a few and pieces to finish dining room. After that I set about the fitting the remaining skirting boards. Then I fillered the holes and gaps. Next I fitted the oak capping on the stairs. I countersunk and piloted the holes. I screwed in the brass screws to secure the capping. It looks great.

Later on H and I went over to our friends in Measham for dinner. We had a lovely time.

It rained all night but brightened up towards the morning. After a pleasant breakfast and a short read of my book I started by sanding down the patched plaster in the dining room. I put some sugar and water on to boil. I was going to make some bee candy. Whilst the water warmed I mixed some wallpaper paste and liberally coated the new plaster. I finished off the candy and set it aside to cool. It prepped the room for papering. I had a eke that needed adjusting. I quick few passes with the electric plane and the job was done. I put the candy and eke in Degsy. Another brew and Degsy and I went off to collect the poo trailer and feed the bees.

The sun shone brightly but the wind was cold. As I walked up to the hives the wind dropped as I stepped in to the shelter of the hedges. The bees were flying and carrying pollen. That means the Queens are alive. When I took the hive roofs off I found that not all the candy had been eaten from the last feed. So regardless of my assistance the bees continue to do there own thing. I re-organised the ekes and feeders and dropped in the new candy. The bees were fairly active and a a bit cross but within ten minutes of finishing with the bees they had settled down. I picked up the trailer on the way back from the bees.

Another brew whilst a mixed the paste for the wallpaper. I set about the remaining wall. H had bought patterned wallpaper and it took quite a bit of work to get the paper to line up. In the end it worked out well enough but it was a trial. H got dinner going whilst I tidied up. I ran the poo trailer round to the lottie. I filled the bird feeders. I wanted to stay to a watch the sun set. It was very low but tea was nearly ready so I could not stay. I and drop in on Steve to collect some books. Tea was ready when I got home. We some very nice pork chops. That was a very busy weekend looking back on it. Day off tomorrow.

Mizzle

With H birthday a memory I could get back to sorting the dining room. This weekend I needed to move the radiator and sort out the wall. The radiator move was straight forward enough except:

A. The garage had to be emptied to get at the pipework
B. One joint insisted on leaking repeatedly. I sorted it on the second attempt. Luckily it was in an accessible place.
C. It started to mizzle.

My born and bred South Derbyshire neighbour came over to see if H and I wanted to join him and some other neighbours for a meal to celebrate the royal wedding. H and I have plans that weekend so had to decline the offer. Whilst chatting the weather was mentioned. In Manchester it would be drizzling. In South Derbyshire it was mizzling. I was in leak solving mode, with half the contents of my garage outside in the mizzle but he did not see my urgency. I was polite you will be glad to know. I dismantle the joint again, this time I daubed the joint with flux and tinned it then resembled the joint and ran in some more solder. That got it. I filled up the heating system again, no leaks so I was able to replace the lagging. Only then could I get all the garage goods back inside. There was not enough of the day to start the other big jobs so tidied out the garage instead, chucking rubbish into Degsy, and went off to the tip. From he tip I went over to the next town to get fuses and insulating tape for the bike.

I had a leisurely breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast. I figured I would give my neighbours a chance to get moving before I started knocking the plaster of the wall. There was a dividing wall in the dining room. When I took it out I found that the original plasterers had plastered to different depths on either side of the wall. If I left it as it was it would show as a hump under the paper. I had to knock off only the plaster that was too high. Precision stuff with a lump hammer and bolster chisel. When I was happy there was no high spots I mixed up some plaster and make good the holes. I left it dry. There was a patch of wallpaper that could not be removed until to shifted the radiator. I got the trusty steamer out and in no time the wall was clear of paper. The another tidy up session.

With some trepidation I set out my stall to tackle the Oak plank. One of the many things I learnt as an apprentice plumber was to prepare your work space. Get all your tools to hand and set up where your power tools as needed. It is easier to do a good job when you are comfortable. I have been contemplating the plank this week. I figured it is not square. I pinged a chalk line one inch in the from the edge. Guess what? It was not square. I ran the circular saw down the chalk line. The strip of waste cut off was thicker at each end than in the middle. I now had a straight edge. I ran the plane down the new edge to remove the circular saw marks. H liked the chalk line. It as ancient tool. My chalk liner is just a modern application that re-chalks the line when it is retrieved. The Romans used chalked lines. My chalk liner is a metal case which contains a spool of string, just like a fishing reel, except the container is full of chalk, red in my case. As you can imagine the line gets covered in chalk. The end of the line, poking out from the case, is the end of the string with a tag so you hook the line at one end of the work. You just pay out the string to the other end of the work, place the string on your mark and pull the string tight. Then you pinch the string and lift it up whilst maintaining the tension then let in snap back on to the work. The slap of the string on the work transfers chalk to the work marking a straight line. You can mark very long, perfectly marked straight lines with a chalk string. Having cut down the plank I was able to make the wall capping. The last thing to do was to was drill the pilot holes for the screws. That done I gave the capping a good coating of Danish oil. It is in the greenhouse drying out. Then just a case of cleaning up.

H and I took Degsy up the the lottie. We dropped off the home waste for the compo bin. I filled the bird feeders. H had a sit on the seat at the far end of the lottie to watch the birds. I dug out the old big compo bin and tipped eight wheelbarrows worth of compost onto the Asparagus bed. with the Asparagus bed top dressed I tried up and had a walk round to see what wants doing. There is plenty to go at. Whilst I tidied up up the birds came in to feed. The stars for me were the Yellowhammer and Bullfinches.

H's new blog

Click HERE for H's new blog. I have added a permanent link on my blog too.

Bockelin

Just before Christmas I had to put the demi-johns of wine in the shed to be out of the way. I brought them back inside the other day. As they warmed up I was worried they might start fermenting again. I could not bottle the wine if it was not finished fermenting. After a couple of days in the kitchen the demi-johns were up to temperature. I judged that all but one wine had stopped.

I had been saving wine bottles over the Christmas period so had loads to sort through. I needed thirty bottles. I tried to find five matching bottles per demi-john. Having sorted through the pile and found pretty much what I needed. Then it was just a case of washing the bottles, syphoning off the demi-johns into the bottles, capping or corking the bottles, checking the specific gravity, writing labels. Then the small matter of washing out the demi-johns and cleaning up. And that was the bockelin done.

The demi-john that needed more time has been put in the corner of the dining room until it stops bubbling. This d-j is the wine made from my own grapes. The finished bottles were put away in the shed until the summer.

Quarter sawn

In the revamped dining room there is a ledge that needs a finishing touch. I was at Staunton Harold the other day with H and her sister and spotted a big plank of quarter sawn Oak for sale. I did not have the right car with us so I could not take away the eight foot by 18inch plank by 1inch. I went back the next day with the right car only to find a posh couple cooing over the plank. I went straight over to chap. He remembered me from the previous and was only too happy to have me press a bunch of fivers into his hand. The couple were a bit put out when the chap elbowed them out of the way and walked off with "their" plank and man-handled the plank into the car. The quarter sawing brings out the figuring.

I just have to run the plank down to size and fit it. Easier said than down. H wants a frame for a mirror from the planks as well.

It is really nice to think that we will have a bit of timber from the local forest.