Two water butts arrived at Damson Cottage this week, making us a 7 water butt household. There are three between the garden shed and the compost bins at the top of the garden, two in the courtyard collecting rainwater from the cottage roof, and now there is one attached to the greenhouse and another to the laundry. It’s all strategic, you know, to cut down on hefting watering cans back and forth across the homelands. Some might call it laziness, I call it efficiency. Anyway, 7 butts - Drippy, Sloshy, Soggy, Drench, Puddle, Mozzy and Fred. I am NOT Snow White. Heaven forfend...
(I should like to point out that they are standard green water butts and not water butts shaped like bottoms as in the photo I’ve chosen to illustrate today’s blogpost. The photo is for comic effect only - I would NEVER install such a monstrosity in my garden. I have way too much class. Arse-shaped water butts? No thank you.)
It’s been a busy week, not quite sure how because I wasn’t expecting it to be. I’ve been at work. At the beginning of the week I got drowned and half frozen to death in a thunderstorm and yesterday I got sunburnt on my shoulders and sustained a large insect bite to my neck. I’ve been in various meetings but none of them have caused me to be so bored that I’ve felt the need to doodle on the accompanying paperwork or draft an idea for a novel in the guise of ‘making important footnotes.’ So that was good. Treated myself to a couple of books, some Soap and Glory goodies, and a packet of chocolate buttons.
His Lordship Malarkey has turned the dining room into a mini-EBay hub because he has decided the time is right to sell off some of his Doctor Who/ science fiction collection. Perhaps it’s because he is now 50 and feels the need to ‘put away childish things’? I don’t know; I kept asking him if he was sure because I know how he has treasured these things for decades. However, he has buried himself beneath swathes of brown paper and sticky tape, and his offerings have been flying from the EBay shelves for often quite ridiculous sums. Two books went for over £50 each!
‘Is the buyer MAD?’ said I.
‘Yes,’ said Himself.
Thus, he seems resolved to sell and has earned himself a considerable sum in doing so. And, quietly, I am happy because you know how I feel about extraneous ‘stuff.’
Because a lot of this extraneous ‘stuff’ was living in the back bedroom it has ignited, once more, my interest in decorating the room. It’s the only room we haven’t renovated since moving here, and it was on my project list for last year. But, well, you know, global turmoil stopped play. However, I’ve been having a tentative look at carpet samples, bed frames and paint colours, and it might just happen this year. Need to work myself into a bit more of an interior design frenzy first, though.
Lots of fledgling activity happening. Baby blackbirds, sparrows, robins, pheasant and assorted tits and finches all hanging around and learning The Ways of Bird. Mummy Swallow still sitting on her eggs. One of our bantams was sitting on an egg too - a single egg - until I wrangled her off it. Honestly, don’t keep bantam hens. They are insistently broody and will cling onto a nest like a toddler dropping to the ground in a tantrum. Mollie had a broody patch last month and now May is having a go. May is virtually menopausal, for heavens’ sake. And when they go broody, they stop laying. Seriously, I’ve never had a gang of chickens be so rubbish at earning their keep...
And that’s it, I think. Time to toddle off and do something useful. Happy Bank Holiday Weekend, everyone! It might not rain...
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KJ
KJ