Sunday, April 18, 2010

Records, Veg and International Men of Mystery

It's been a busy old weekend - the weather has been nice, there has only been a couple of light aircraft (flying low-ish) to disturb the peace and I've been out and about doing things for different reasons.
Yesterday (Saturday 17th April 2010) was Record Store Day and, as a friend had asked me if it might be possible to get a couple of UK exclusive 7" singles, I bussed it down to Adrians in Wickford.  This is where the International Man of Mystery comes in - I found a stall in Wickford selling second hand DVD's and CD's and picked up Austin Powers in Goldmember, which completed my Austin Powers trilogy, for £2.  Bargain!  Made for entertaining viewing on Saturday night (after the obligatory Doctor Who session - of which I can only say: iDalek.)
Upon my return (with the requested records!) I decided to repot and plant out some of the various plants that have been littering my various windowledges over the last couple of months.
Here are some pics I've taken:
My garden table, covered with various pots and tubs taken out of the mini-greenhouse for a bit of direct sun and fresh air; the looking slightly dead thing in the middle is an old mint plant that I left out all winter - it seems to be reviving!  The other plants are Tomatoes, Sweetcorn and Peas.  Behind is the refurbished mini-greenhouse, containing the first of the chillies to sprout, plus yet more tomatoes and some more peas.

Slightly in shade, these are some runner beans - my first go at growing the things.

Another first, some peas!  I have more in the mini greenhouse, and another tub of similar size waiting for them!

The first of the sweetcorn to get planted in the ground - I've had success growing sweetcorn in this particular patch in the past and, as I haven't deliberately planted anyting here for a couple of years, I thought I'd give it another go now.

I've also done something I saw in a gardening programme (the first I've ever deliberately watched!) "The Edible Garden" - I've pulled up as many of the nettles I can find in the garden, bunged them in a bucket and drowned them in water - in a few weeks, hopefully, I'll have a nice rich nettle 'soup' for the tomatoes!


Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Catching up

First of all, I have the lurgi.  Again.  I just got over this last week and started getting set up to record some more interviews for my non-sport trading card podcast when I had to postpone due to one of my interviewees being lurgied; no sooner had I recieved the email telling me this than I started to feel that back of the nose tickle...  Meh.

However, I do feel well enough to update the blog.
Easter was fun for me as far as TV and Family was concerned - I got to have a nice roast dinner with my parents and sister on Easter Sunday, and also to watch brand new series of Ashes to Ashes (s3) and Doctor Who (s5) on Friday and Saturday respectively.  Plus there was a new feature length Jonathan Creek on the Sunday and the box set of the first 4 series (and two Christmas specials) of the same show turned up on Saturday (an Amazon bargain for which I exchanged some of my ill-gotten gains from having Amazon.co.uk associate links on my various websites!)

Gardening news (for which I have started a Twitter hashtag of #vegcrop2010 - though no-one seems to have picked up on it!): Most of the seeds I started planting in pots on my various windowsills have started to grow and (fingers crossed) flourish; some of them have been moved into the mini-greenhouse on my patio.  So far, three different types of tomato, sweetcorn, two types of pea, runner beans, radish, chillis and sweet peppers have sprouted, along with one plant that is either a globe courchette OR a butternut squash - the only thing that seems to have sprouted from the seets I took from last year's crop - the plants look much the same at this stage and I haven't a clue which it is (and won't until it starts to fruit!)
I have also started a run of potatoes and there are a couple of onions that seem to have been left over from last year's planting that have overwintered and popped up!
The garlic (from The Garlic Farm was mostly planted when I got back from the Isle of Wight in October last year and is doing terrifically well - all in tubs and troughs and all looking nice and leafy.