Author Archives: essiep

Berberis

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17°C, clear.

Dawn soon, warm humid sleepless night. Trying to order new road tax but the site is down. Damn, it’s overdue now.
This is such a fine time of day, birdsong has reached its crescendo & the sun will appear in 20 mins.

Planted: the pot said it wanted a hold twice its size to go in along with fresh soil/compost, please. That would be easy if it were not for the usual problem in my garden. First swing of the spade clanged on a slab 6" beneath the surface. Getting that out took ages but did explain the large dry barren patch . There were two large slabs in all- so they propagate like tubers?
Have I got a pest crop of Pavis Slabula?

Here is the Berberis, the leaves are similar to Mahonia’s in shape, don’t you think?
Things escalated- the soil was full of gravel, but I have a sieve. I got more than three wheel-barrows full of gravel out of that. Okay, the patch I dug did grow in size somewhat so now there is a decent empty patch to plant up.

muggy

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27°C, muggy & large spots of rain after a hot week.

Back from camping. Had to get away after a week worth escaping from. Mountains are such a good way to clean out such feelings.

Photo taken just after I’d swam in there. Climbing it hot work on days like this, going up is hottest. At the summit, I found a nice soft heathery patch between rocks and slept for an hour. Purple is the season- purple foxgloves in big munches; purple flowers on some heather and towering thistle with purple heads just opening. Give them another week.

Rushmore

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14°C, sun & wind & clouds scudding

Rushmore: Didn’t make it through this one.

Easily one of the finest comedies since THE GRADUATE, RUSHMORE is a
monument to brilliant filmmaking (said ilovefilm)

I gave it 40 mins, but I felt nothing: I’d expect a comedy to have some funny bits, this has none in my experience. This is the second film in a row that left me feeling bored. We switched off and put BBC’s Springwatch on instead.
So instead, here are some summer ducklings, this morning:

earlies

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23°C,Sun


 Up early for about a month now. Wake at 04.00 and get up ½ hour later. Such a fine time of day: all’s quiet and the dogs get an outing before work; hence these photos.

Tilting butt

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22°C, Sun. Light NE.

It filled up fast: the water butt filled to the brim in only 1 day of rain. Problem now is that it’s tilting, the slab it stands on has given a little under the half-tonne weight. I may have to empty it and make the foundation stronger.

Hornbeam: is now planted. I raise a glass to its good fortune.

The Road

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16+°C, NW winds, getting easing

First Orchid: (think it’s an orchid anyway). Seen in Woodland Trust land.

Even it it’s not, still a nicely light picture I’d say.
Getting ready to plant that Hornbeam tree. It’s quite an effort because I want it near the Eucalyptus stump- so lots of hacking away at roots to dig the hole.

Film: The Road. post apocalyptic road film + father/son film. I can’t quite put a finger on why I was largely unmoved by this film The slow storyline isn’t a problem for me, it’s just that something was missing. Perhaps it’s the director, it just needs a bit more Tarkovsky. In other words it needed some magic that would lift it above the predictable.

Eucalyptus is down

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14°C, grey all day, NE winds.

The Eucalyptus tree is now sawn logs. Some are huge, storage might be slightly awkward.

They’re gorgeous though, such nice wood. I may polish up a few and have them in the house.

Vulpes Vitreol

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18°C, grey, rain overdue

Incredible: Having trouble believing this story: BBC. A fox attacks two sleeping children in London. The response is as difficult to believe as the original story. Apparently they trapped a fox in the garden later in the day and shot it. Is this supposed to be some kind of justice, or are they taking revenge out on a whole species?
Imagine- someone burgles your house, so the police will stop the next bloke passing your front door and imprison him awaiting the firing squad in the morning. Doesn’t matter that there is no known connection between the perpetrator and the suspect, why bother finding evidence beyond the location, let’s just kill something. That’ll appease the locals, they’ll be baying for blood. Perhaps it’s a Tory ward, they’ve always liked killing foxes, no matter how cruelly.