Fun and games

Yesterday I rung my Sister up to see if all was well. Unfortunately my Neice is not so good. She has been losing blood since having her child. She did tell me though that she was losing less than she was after ringing the NHS help line.
 I then asked her about the excitement on Friday. She told me that she had known nothing about it and went into town early in the morning to go to the bank. he told me that some roads were closed completely and there were police all over the place. A Fire Engine and an Ambulance were in attendance. No businesses were allowed to open at all that day, those of course whos businesses were in the roads closed She told me that as far as she knew, 4 men had burgled at least one premises and had been seen on CCTV. I presume that this was hooked up to the Police Station. Anyway the men climed on the the roofs and refused to come down. They had the cheek to ask for water which was duly sent up to them. The trouble was still going on when she walked back home. Later it was on Central T.V. Her husband saw it all and told her that when they asked for water, he would have sent it up by water cannon. His final retort was that he expected them to be foreigners. When I find out I will let you know.
  I don't know about you but I am a lttle fed up of the coverage of the Olympic Games already and it has only just started. Thank goodness I have Sky to go to. More soon.

Olympics

Today has been nothing but the Olympic Games. I am sure there are plenty who are fed up already, especially those people who rely on getting around in London. For the next few weeks it will be terrible. Thank goodness I live in the country and so are not immediately involved.
 I went this afternoon and took these photos of my tomatoes and also one of my bunches of grapes. As you can see, the grapes are beginning to turn but are nowhere near ready yet. In fact the longer the bunches are left on the vine, the sweeter they become. The tomatoes are very late this year. I try to have some ready by the end of June but it will be well into August this year. The tomatoes in the foreground and Shirley F1.
  The weather today has been somewhat better than yesterday. It started very dull but by 11.30am it brightened up and before noon the sun managed to shine. It was generally sunny until around 5.00pm then the clouds rolled in again.
 My neighbour gave me a few more strawberries, just enough for me to make 6 strawberries in jelly. As before they were beautiful. I told her to tell her Mum to cut the strawberries right down, give them a feed and with a bit of luck she will have a few strawberries in late September. By the way, she did tell me that they had more or less finished fruiting.
 Still managing to pick enough runner beans daily for a meal so I am happy, mind you I am watering them regularly. More soon.

Back to normal

I don't know what weather map Paul Hudson was getting his information from but tonight he stated that Lincolnshire had had a lovely afternoon. I can assure him that here and I am between Mablethorpe and Skegness, it has been a dull day. About 6.50pm. there was a glimpse of the sun but only for a few seconds. It was a pity because yesterday afternoon turned cloudy and there was a cool wind. However the preceeding days was a huge improvement on what we have been having. It did bring out a few cabbage white butterflies. I have noticed that the wasps are conspicuous by their absence. I don't suppose anyone will be complaining.
 This afternoon I had a delivery of my medication. To be honest, I generally go and put my repeat prescription the same day I get my State Pension. This week I forgot so it was yesterday morning I put my repeat in.
 Dave, who is the delivery man told me that he had bought a couple of cherry trees from Lidl earlier this year. One was doing well but the other was not so good. He also told me that the cherry trees that he had noticed had little or no fruit on them. I told him that I had 3 cherry trees and 2 of them had a total of 6 cherries on. The other one had some fruit on but to be honest, they were a little disappointing. I did remind him that he must get protection for his trees as the blackbirds will eat all of the fruit before they are really ripe.  We discussed gardening in general. He did tell me that the strawberries were about done so I was very lucky to have that wonderful punnet given me. I still have  a couple of strawberries in jelly left. They really are magnificent. I do have to be careful though with strawberries as they don't suit me.  I told him that my grapes were beginning to turn. I am still a little disappointed at the size of them. He then remarked that a relative had bought him and his wife  a bunch last year  but they were bitter. I reminded him that if they stayed on the vine for a while, they would get much sweeter. I hope to give him a few, but not for another month or so at least.
My french beans, the climbing variety have gone mad during the hot weather. I gave again another couple of feeds to my postman. I gave him and my mate a couple of plants each. I know that they will be rewarded if they give them lots of water. I have been watering them each morning early, again around lunchtime and lastly late in the evening.
 I, once agin picked a few more runner beans. They don't like it too hot though, they are particular as they don't like windy weather either. What they do like is plenty of moisture. I have watered them each day. When I have finished here I will water them again tonight. More soon.

Postman

These pictures are of the road just after the markings were done. No cats eyes were not put in at that time but since then they have.
 As you will notice the pull in has been left as it was . My new neighbour thought they would resurface  the pull in. I told him there was no traffic to speak of using the pull in. I also  told him that we had to get the pull in surfaced to the Highways specification before we could get permission to build our properties. Mind you, the finish is not as good as I would like it to be  as the road does stand a little proud of the pull in.
 I saw the Postman today, the first time for about a week. No wonder, he told me he was on holiday last week. He has the builders in so didn't go anywhere. I told him that I had dug some potatoes up and a few had been rotten. I then told him about the fruit trees. He was pleased I told him because he had noticed that  on some of his fruit trees the leaves had begun to dry and shrivel. He then told me he had dug his potatoes up and bagged them. A few days later he went into the garage and could smell the rotting potatoes. They do smell awful. He said that he managed to get a couple of meals saved but has discarded the remainder. It is a shame because we put so much effort into hopefully reaping some rewards but this year the weather has beaten us.
  I am managing to get a few runner beans each day, just about enough for a meal  and it looks  promising. What they don't like is hot weather. I guess we can't have the perfect weather and we have to accept what we get but it has been very hot today. More soon.

Nice surprise.

What a lovely surprise this was. On Saturday I asked my neighbour if she would like a few broad beans. She told me she would like them very much as they had none set this year. I duly gave her around 3lb. of them freshly picked. To my surprise she then asked me if I would like a few strawberries. I told her that I would appreciate that very much. Later in the afternoon the doorbell rang and it was her with a large carton of strawberries. As you can see, they are fantastic. She told me that her Mother had gone away for a few days and she could help herself to strawberries. They were certainly as fresh as one could expect. The taste was as great as the looks. I had 3 lots of strawberries with Ice cream and then I made 6 strawberry in jellies. I had one tonight, excellent.
 I was watching T.V the other night, not really taking notice but all of a sudden I heard the interviewer talk of a woman near where I live talking of the devastation of her apple orchard. I looked up and saw that her fruit trees were just like mine. To be honest, I thought my trees had suddenly caught a disease. The fruits are split and marked. Also many are deformed, some of the leaves had just been going dry and falling  as if it was Autumn.
  I had drastically pruned severely a lot of my trees, just hoping that the trees will improve. Now I have a little more confidence that next year will improve. So I hope that I may after all get some fruit on my trees.
 The weather today has been sunny and hot although it has been windy. Tomorrow will be less windy and even hotter. We must not complain though.
  My best Pal called today, he told me that there were plenty of people around, that is great news for the local Tradesmen who have had it awful so far this year. More soon.

Re. T.V.

My mate called today, unfortunately the HDMI cable did not arrive in time but we had a nice talk. and he told me about the T.V programme I wrote about on  my blog. He told me he knew a lady who had worked at the sweet factory. I think he told me it was called Beeches. It sold quality chocolates. Anyway he rung her up and asked her how it all went. She told him that the Television crew were filming for a solid fortnight. Perhaps now we can understand just how much programmes cost. As one would expect. BBC would want everything to be as near perfect as possible. Remember that at most the film shots only lasted for 25 minutes in the two programmes.
 We then got on to the solar production. With the poor weather we both agreed that this last 6 weeks have been very poor. Mind you, the weather men suggest that better weather is on the way. Hard not to be worse. Once again today, no sun whatsoever. Yesterday in Skegness torrential rain, here we had the very dark skies, much thunder but thank goodness not too much rain. Better days ahead. More soon.

Eggs

This afternoon I went to put a few things in the recycle bin. On returning I noticed that the next door neighbour had left me 6 eggs. It was last week when I asked if she wanted some more french beans that I asked her for some eggs this week. I don't use many eggs. 6 will generally last me at least 2 months. Anyway, she first told me that once again they had come first in the pigeon racing. That was 3 weeks on the trot. That, I told both of them was great. In the next breath she told me that they were down to 6 chickens. That surprised me as the last time I counted them, there were 13. She told me that they were old and they also wanted to get new and improved chicken  roosts. I certainly agree that the ones they have now are not of the best in quality and size. Still she told me that morning she had collected 4 eggs, so they are still laying well enough.
 I was surprised when I went into my greenhouse, I noticed that some of the grapes are beginning to slightly ripen. I am a little disappointed as they still seem to be rather small. Next year I will only have 12 bunches as a maximum.
 I dug a few more potatoes up today, for two reasons, first I think they have blight and the second is I am still finding some of the potatoes rotting in the ground. I only have about 6 tubors to dig up now.
 My mate is calling tomorrow so I have been picking broad beans, although they have a little chocolate spot and black fly, I am pleased with the amont of beans on them. More soon.