Difference

What a difference a few days make. Last week we were freezing and the Central heating on but these last few days the weather has improved so that today is HOT, in fact too hot for me. As one gets older I personally can't stand the extremes. When it is cold at least I can put the heating on but when it is hot there is nothing I can do about it.
 This morning around 10.00.am. the door bell rang, it was the lad from next door, he had overslept so missed the bus to work. I was pleased he came round for two reasons. The first was that I had a few more strawberries ripe in the polytunnel. The second was that my water butt on the greenhouse was beginning to drip from the joint where the tap is, also the water just trickled out instead of a full flow.
I had a good look and began to empty it and noticed the water was not as clean as I would like it to be, mind you it has been there for at least 20 years. I showed the lad and told him what I intended to do, that was to empty the butt take the barrel to the cold water tap and clean it, also try to tighten up the tap fittings. To be honest it didn't take long to do, I guess less than 30 minutes. All I can hope for is that the tap doesn't leak any longer. For this to be checked it has to rain a considerable amount.
 We then had a cold drink. unfortunately for us I didn't have any lemonade so port and lemon was off the list but I did have some sugar free orange juice which went down well.
  Incidentally he had come round with his scooter and was on about washing it with the waterless fluid which he had seen on the Television. I told him that we would use the waterless fluid on my car and then on his scooter. He readily agreed and out we went, firstly getting the car out of the garage then gave him some microfibre cloths and started to spray on the fluid. What it entails is that you apply the fluid, rub the dirt off the vehicle than buff the paintwork and glass. With my car being rather clean it took about 15 minutes to give the car a good do. I showed him how smooth the paintwork was after a quick buff with the microfibre cloth. He could see the difference. Then it was his scooter. I sprayed it all over but especially on the rubber where his feet go. As we went along he was so impressed that he told me he was going to put it straight away so that it didn't get dirty.
 After a few more minutes round mine it was off to his place. He had told me that his cabbage had been eaten but on looking I told him that it was not the slugs or snails but they had been eaten by wood pigeons, they had made a mess of them. We then did a bit of weeding and when I saw his Carer I told her that soon I would bring a few lee plants round and a broccoli plant. She smiled and told me she liked broccoli. I suppose when I go round I will have to take my garden fork with me to dig up a piece of ground when we sort a piece out. I looked at his broad beans which look good, I also looked at his tomatoes which are good too. I found a side shoot a week or so ago and told him to stick it in the ground, keep it well watered and it would grow. A few days ago he told me the plant had died but today I saw he had kept watering it and it was growing.
 Finally I looked in the greenhouse earlier at mine and noticed a couple of small cucumbers on them. They are a variety called burpless. My mate told me that they would probably be all female but they are not, however they are very easy to see.
 I suppose that the hot weather will not last for this week end it is the Spring Bank Holiday so I expect it to turn cooler with perhaps some rain. More soon.