No photos

Yesterday I picked up a few more eating apples and noticed that the odd Bramley had fallen so I decided to pick a few up. Some were quite large although not as many as in years gone by but at least they seem to be healthy, certainly much better than in previous years.
 My Best Pal rung up this morning saying he would call if convenient so off I went once more to pick a few more eating apples for the two of them. I don't know if I mentioned this but his Daughter bred a lavender and last winter with the weather being so wet, all of their plants died. Luckily enough I had a couple that had just survived but to be honest they looked very poor. I managed to get a few cuttings off them and sow them and I honestly think some will survive.
 Oh dear, I have just has a short power cut which turned off everything, what makes it worse is that I was writing this blog. It took quite a while for it to go back to my original page. The Television was also affected and it takes about 5 minutes for it to work again.
 I gave my Pal a few Bramley apples with the eating apples plus some Scabious plants which the bees and goldfinch love.
 My next door neighbour has done another fence panel making it 5 in all and to be candid, they look very nice. I am sure that it will be sufficient for now.
 The young Man from next door is on holiday at the South East coast so has missed my Pal. He has asked me several times when he would be calling. When I eventually told him that it would probably be the end of September, he seemed to be a little disappointed but I did tell him that he would probably be here again in October. More soon.

At last

AT last I have Windows 10, how long I keep it is a matter of conjection as I have found many things I just can't do which I could on Windows 8.1
 I fist tried to download some photos which I could not do so I took my SD card out and entered it in the computer. I managed to get them on my computer but the big problem was that when I put my SD card back into my camera a message came up that I could not use the card.
 Oh well! I thought at least I had the phots on my computer but when I tried to upload them on to this blog, it did the normal things and when I pushed the add button nothing happened and I tried to close the programme, also delete the programme and the only way I could get out of the mess was to go back to my blog.
 I found that I had started my blog but there was no photos on at all. I tried this twice so I will wait to see if my mate can sort it out. IF not I shall revert back to Windows 8.1
 Mind you it was not easy getting Windows 10 on my computer. I know that I have a slow download speed but I started on Friday evening and stopped the preparing to download after a couple of hours.
 Saturday morning I turned on and it continued. It was 11.07 when it finished preparing so started to download. It eventually finished downloading some time after 7 20pm. I was asked if I wished to continue or schedule a time to continue so I did this.
 First thing Saturday it started to install Windows 10 and eventually this was completed soon after Noon. It took me several hours to find out where things were but this has disappointed me. First my SD card is now I presume corrupt and although my photos are on my computer I can not manage to upload them to my blog. The photos were of the next door neighbours fitting of a few fencing panels. I will have to see what happens next.
 Mr. K.E. I think you are 100% correct with your comment. Let us hope I can still write the odd notes here. More perhaps.

I was right

I saw the lad from next door yesterday and he confirmed that I would not be looking after the chickens next week. Incidentally the Lady of the home who is the carer called to give me some fresh yeast and she confirmed that her Son would be staying there while they were away on holiday.
 Yesterday morning the doorbell rang, I went to open the interior door when I noticed a vehicle on my drive. I was a little surprised as I have my gates closed but I went to the main front door and was pleasantly surprised to see Calor's Service Engineer Lee waiting to come in and service my Central Heating boiler. I told him he was lucky to catch me in because Calor had not given me a date of when the engineer would be calling. I told him what had happened and I also requested a free installation of a Carbon Monoxide alarm. Anyway I didn't have to move much and he is so nice and obliging and he got on with his work.
 He had asked me originally to inform the receptionist to instruct the engineer to bring with him a full Worcester service kit. I reminded him about it but he then told me he had been to Worcester on an update course and it wasn't necessary until the pressure on something dropped. He checked mine and it was fine. He did tell me that the 2 most popular installations were Glow Worm and Worcester, Glow Worm being a little cheaper so more popular, however he told me that they had increased the price so that there was next to no difference in costs and he recommends Worcester. He then told me why he did this, it was because he had NEVER had a Worcester boiler fail so far and had never had to go to repair one but he had to go a few times to Glow Worm. I asked him if he had a C.O. alarm and he told me he had. When he finished the service he went to his van and told me that I had the last one it is a good make Honeywell. He then told me where it should be fitted so I just told him to fit it where he liked. It looks perfect and it was free, mind you the service costs are enough. It took him about 90 minutes to complete his work. He had a call and I suggested that it would be another call out, he concurred and told me it was a long way away. He said he had to go to Grantham next. I just said it was 60 miles, well to be precise 58. He then entered it on his hand held and showed me it said 58.1 miles. He was impressed.
 Finally for now, I am beginning to download Windows 10 with the knowledge that my mate will be calling in the not too distant future so if all is not good he will probably uninstall it for me. more soon.
Latest. 7% of Windows 10 downloaded.

Marrow

 

Yesterday I had to go to the Dentist for my 6 monthly check, all was satisfactory but I did notice that the price had increased a little. I was a little early and sat next to an old guy and I just said good morning to him. After about 3 minutes he told me he was 74 and always had butterflies in his stomach when he came to a dentist. I started to tell him that this place was great when I was called in. By the time I left it was just about time for my appointment so I can't knock the system there.
 It turned out to be a dull rain at times day so I didn't do a lot but the young man from next door came and asked me if I would go round for a drink. So off we went but he told me that I would have to take my shoes off as she had just had a solid oak floor laid.
 I stayed for an hour or so and when the other 2 came in it was not good for me. They had for about a week or more an additional guy who was not great. All he wanted to do was watch the washing machine working. He would stand there for ages. Young Tim tried to show mw more of his Farm Simulator but with those 2 extra people around it was hard going. Eventually I made my excuses and before I left asked if they would like a little salad gear, with the answer being positive I reminded Tim to come round today to help me pick the produce. He did tell me something though, I may have lost my chicken duty as her Son, according to Tim will look after the chickens while they are away on holiday. My guess is that she will ask him to sleep there because she thought there was an intruder a couple of weeks ago and the Police were called. Anyway we will wait and see.
 This morning turned out to be sunny so I went and checked my produce, to my surprise I noticed the marrow which is pictured. I was so disappointed with the germination of the marrow and courgette plants that I had given up on having a marrow at all. This turned out to be a beauty, weighing in at almost 7 lb.
 The other photo is of the hedge which has been substantially reduced in size. Originally it was not to be but the guy had informed me as to what was happening and his plan was to dig down so far so that he could then fit the kick boards and cement in concrete post and then slide fence panels in. However when he tried to dig down deep enough he hit the roots of the shrubs so told me that he would have to remove them. together we reduced the size of the shrubs down to a size where he hopes his Step-Son will dig out the roots. He did tell me that after today he would not be doing anymore work until Monday next week at the earliest. I did tell him that it wouldn't bother me at all. To be honest I will be happy to see the back of the shrubs as I have to keep trimming them my side for they don't just grow one side. He did say that eventually he will get the complete side done. Heaven knows when that will be. More soon.

Fruit & Veg

 

  

Yesterday morning I went into the garden after heavy overnight rain and strong winds. Much to my surprise I noticed quite a number of apples had fallen off my Sunset eating apple tree so I thought I would see if they were ripe enough to pick. You do this by lifting the apple upwards against the way they hang and if they come off in your hand then they are ready. This happened to be so. I then decided to get a bucket and start to pick some apples. The photos show how many I picked and how many are still on the tree. I must admit though that they are a little on the small side but after the last 2 years I am happy. I did manage to pick over 200 apples. I then went into the garage and put them on racks to hopefully store them for later in the winter. I didn't realise just how tired I felt and was too tired to write on my

 blog so today I have made a big effort to rectify that.                                 

With the weather turning cooler, incidentally yesterday morning was very cool, I decided to check on my marrow and courgettes. I do have 1 marrow on my plant but have managed 2 courgettes, this one is by far the best. The colour is what I would expect, the other courgette is more of a yellow plant, one would expect the looks to think that they were old. This marrow, for that is what I will call it weighed just 5lb. most welcome indeed.

I showed the young man his photo which I posted on my blog, he was impressed and said it was a very good photo. A lot of luck in my case.

 I am still getting a few runner beans but I think it will be an early Autumn this year.  More soon                                                                           

Not a lot

 

The first photo shows the young man with his onion, also in his right hand is a cucumber which I gave to the Postman today, more on that in a minute.
 The second photo is of a cucumber which my mate must have all the credit due to him as he did save the seeds from a cucumber I gave him last year. Although they were a decent size, nothing like the ones that have been produced this year. My mate had one 20" long and the one photographed is around 18" long. I think we were both surprised at the size and length of these cucumbers.
 Now more about the cucumber I gave to the Postman.
 I saw him going to deliver mail to next door so I went to my fridge and got out the cucumber that had been there. I thought I would let him have it to see if he liked the taste as he had asked me if my mate would give him a plant next year. While we were talking a small van pulled up and this middle aged gentleman got out and asked the Postman where he could get something to which the Postman told him he had passed the place where he should have turned off. Now what happened next is something I didn't hear or notice. All of a sudden the van man let out an expletive and I saw him pick something up from the roadside. He then said. "Look at that lorry, he has just knocked off my wing mirror". The Postman told him that he thought he had heard a noise and suggested that he go after the lorry and confront the driver. If anyone had asked me what had happened I could not help them at all. I may has well been blind and deaf as I didn't even notice what sort of vehicle knocked off his wing mirror to be  honest I didn't notice any vehicle and as for the noise I heard nothing.
 Finally as we parted the Postman said to me that we had saw and heard nothing at all. Perfectly true in my case.
 I wonder whether I'm going a little senile? I definitely live in a world of my own.
 Finally for now, the weather lately has been dull, wet, windy and cool. Not good for my runner beans, but I must not grumble as they have served me well, they did produce enough for me to make some runner bean chutney the other day which I gave a jar to the young man and his carer. More soon.

Chain saw

The other day I looked out of my window and noticed that some more of the hedge at the rear of the garden had been cot down. I had asked my neighbour who had a chain saw if he could cut a couple of thick branches down for me. Not only did he cut them down he also cut a few more down. Unfortunately the neighbour the other side complained so we decided to stop.
 The next morning the neighbours Son came to complain but after we discussed it for a while he left reasonably happy but requested that I do not have any more branches removed. I did remind him that he was now responsible for the upkeep of the ditch which I think is called a watercourse on the title deeds.
 This morning I saw the neighbour who started it all, I just bid him good morning. He was different again and when I explained all he told me that he had sorted it all with his Son and that all was fine. I did inform him that as I had originally planted the Hawthorn trees as small saplings, I felt somewhat responsible for any blockage that may occur because of the amount of falling leaves in the Autumn. I did tell him though that nobody but I had done anything to keep the ditch clear, it was now up to them to make sure that it was kept free. He agreed with me and we parted as we usually do with a friendly retort to each other.

 

These 2 photos show the difference between what was done before the chain saw activity and after. He also wants to cut some of his trees down but informs me that until he has a bonfire he will not have sufficient room to put the branches on top of the huge pile ready to burn. More soon. 

New ISP.

Yesterday I had a man from my new ISP contact me early and again late in the day. At one stage he asked me to turn on my computer. When I turned  it on the pop up invited me to install Windows 10 so I just mentioned it to him and then he told me that he had installed Windows 10 but had gone back to Windows 8. I was somewhat bemused until he gave me the reason why he had gone back to his original Windows. He told me that he had several games on Windows 8 and they were not compatible with Windows 10 and that was the reason why he had done it. He then informed me that one had a month to decide if Windows 10 was for you. After the 30 days if you hadn't gone back to your old Windows then you had to keep Windows 10.
 As for me and the new ISP  although things are not 100% I told him that we would keep the issue open and if ever I decided to open it then I could. He was so helpful, first telling me that he was going on Holiday as soon as we finished conversing and secondly giving me his full name and his personal e-mail address. I certainly can't fault them at all.

 

 

 

The photos above show just how much my young assistant and I cut down on Saturday. He was a great help but stamina wise he kept saying he wanted to rest a minute. I did though very much appreciate his help and we both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The weather was kind to us, far better than this week. On Sunday it was reasonable till late but Monday was a complete washout. Now it has turned much colder with heavy rain forecast later and to be honest it looks as if the forecast will be correct. More soon.                 

A little rude

Seeing onions always reminds me of my younger days when a group of us always went to the same Public House and this man who was about 7 years older than us lodged. He was in the process of getting a divorce. He was a bit of a wag and his favourite saying was. "Don't go down the coalmine Daddy, there's plenty of slack in your trousers." Slack was an offshoot of the coal that was supplied to almost all the houses in those days. Nutty slack as it was called was generally used to stop the lumps of coal to burn so swiftly a dustpan full of slack was put on the fire when the lumps of coal was burning swiftly.
 Now to the onions. Harold as he was known helped out behind the bar at times and was popular. Well this man who had an allotment was always bragging about what he had produced on his plot. This night he walked in and Harold was behind the bar and asked the guy if he wanted his usual. He did and Harold that asked him this. "Is that right George that someone asked you to sell him a lb. of onions? And you said to him that you was not going to cut one in half for anyone." Needless to say the place was in uproar with laughter. It did however stop the man from talking about the size of his produce that he grew on his allotment.
 If one can recall, I set my seeds in January and didn't know if I would ever get anything from them as the seeds were about 10 years old. I managed to get about 10 to grow and these 3 were the largest. The largest one weighed around 2 .5 lbs. the smallest weighed just under 2.lb. I guess if one rounded the weight they would be about 1 kilogramme each. I am very pleased at the weight and surprisingly enough they are very tasty. The plus is that they don't make your eyes run when peeling them. Naturally I have given most of them away.

With the heavy rain recently my runner beans have produced many large beans and I am able to give plenty away. Not that it is good news for everyone for I think about the local Businesses who rely on the sunny weather to make a decent living. Bank Holiday Monday was a dreadful day with a strong northerly breeze with constant rain for most of the day. It was also cool with my Central Heating being used, hope this is not a sign of things to come although the week ahead is supposed to be cool showery and windy. We will see.  More soon.