Christmas Trees



We've been 'darn sarf' (as some of the locals up here like to pronounce it, in Mockney accents) over Christmas, and with all due respect to the dear friends and family who welcomed us over the Festive Season, I shall think twice before I plan anything similar again.

It's not just that I've got used to a quiet Christmas for two in the Potteries, usually with at least an attempt at snow if not a decent covering of the real thing for us to walk through between dinner and dessert (except last year, when we were on the narrowboat - and that was a brilliant Christmas with a difference!).  It's all the anxiety of how the house/garden/greenhouse/boat will cope with the winter weather while we're away for a week or more.  Previously, the risk has been of a 'Big Freeze' - indeed I seem to recall the usual hysterical headlines in the doom-and-gloom tabloids warning of just that a few months ago (before the weather turned unusually mild, and they got on with hating Romanians and Bulgarians), but this year it was more a case of hoping we still had a roof when we got home.

We shouldn't have worried - in fact, by a quirky twist of fate we managed to travel into the areas most under attack from the Yuletide weather - the South Coast and Home Counties, which got thoroughly battered by gales and drenched with rain a couple of days before Christmas, and not for the first time this month - while Staffordshire took considerably less of a pounding.  But I still think in future we'll plan for shorter visits away from the peak holiday times and aim to miss both the seasonal rush and any foul weather.

Under the circumstances, walking about under trees might seem an ill-advised way to spend some of our free time, but our first walk in the woods came about as a result of crossed wires with my Dad, who had made a mental note of our planned visit for lunch with him and step-mum Pat on 23rd December, despite me arranging it for the 22nd.  Sadly, this left us less time to catch up with them as that storm was building and we needed to get to our hosts in rural West Sussex while the roads were still passable (in fact the A29 through Pulborough was closed quite soon after we traversed it, after not so much driving as tacking along the M27), but gave us an unexpected free day with some very dear friends (and innocent growers of narcotics - see 'Pot Luck' from August 2012).

Sunday 22nd December was bright, though with a chilly wind, and a perfect day for a walk, so we all wandered around the Hillier Arboretum at Braishfield, near Romsey in Hampshire.  Despite having lived quite nearby before moving north, I hadn't visited since childhood and found it quite an inspiration.  Home to a collection of trees and shrubs from all over the world, it also has an area of Himalayan-themed planting and a small, tasteful memorial to the Gurkha regiments and a glorious Winter Garden established long before they got to be trendy.  The best of the photos are on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30634865@N03/sets/72157639205560426/

By contrast, my Boxing Day woodland walk was a solo expedition through, depending on your point of view, a woefully mis-managed patch of forestry or a romantic sylvan glade.  After the rain of previous days it was certainly squelchy underfoot but most of the fallen trees seemed to have been down for years, with one spectacular exception.

With indistinct paths disappearing into thickets or over sudden combes, had it not been a sunny morning I might have felt uncomfortable without an elven sword in case of giant spiders (plus the Hobbit to wield it), but the Hobbit was safely indoors waiting for his baby grandson to visit again, and I just had my trusty, battered Nikon D40 (New Years Resolution check - buy new lens for camera!).  Consequently, there is again a set on Flickr if you would like to see more, including some shots of the older fallen trees which look more like the skeletons of prehistoric animals (or dragons?).
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30634865@N03/sets/72157639209873765/

I'm effectively grounded for the next couple of days while I try to shift the Christmas cold picked up somewhere on our travels (another good reason to go into quarantine next year, rather than socialising - bah humbug!) but if it isn't too windy I'll prune the apple trees and give them a quick blast of Bordeaux Mixture (contains no alcohol) and I have some writing projects to get on with too, which should keep me off the mince pies for a little while.  Actually, I don't think we've got any mince pies, though we did buy next years Christmas pudding in the sales at Sainsburys yesterday!

And a very Happy New Year to you all!

Whatever next?

RHS Level 2 Diploma

I've been putting together this year's Christmas letter today.  I know some people - notably 'Guardian' columnist Simon Hoggart - are distainful of 'round robins', but I generally enjoy those we receive from our friends, which are generally witty and not at all smug.  I would much rather receive a printed newsletter than no news at all, and have binned out of hand a card which contains only a sticky label to say who it's from and arrived in a sticky-labelled envelope for the second year running! 

I have to confess to some fear of getting nominated for a 'Hoggart' this year, though.  If I've managed to tell my friends about my husband's MBE and cute grandson, narrowboating to London and back, completing my RHS Diploma and self-publishing two novels without crossing the smugness line, I'll be pleasantly surprised.  I fear that Jon being asked to cut the ribbon to formally re-open our local B&Q store may be the final straw - but there aren't that many celebrities in this part of North Staffordshire, and with Robbie busy promoting his new album...

They're a friendly lot at B&Q and, as you might guess, Jon and I are regular customers for gardening supplies and bits and bobs for little DIY projects and the model railway, though our most recent purchase has been some replacement fence panels after another spell of stormy weather. 

It is odd looking back on this year's achievements, especially finishing the RHS course without any plans to sign up for another.  I would love to tackle the Level 3 theory course, and the practical too for that matter, but my CAB job really needs me to be quite flexible about the days I can work and the capacity to do some evenings, and while I could do the theory as an evening course, I don't think I would have the concentration for it after a busy day training or talking.  And I still have a handful of loyal customers who need their plots tended, before I think of taking on another patch at Reaseheath.  But it felt strange not starting back in September.

Snow in November

The other recent achievement was completing the task I set myself of polishing the second draft of 'Limited Capability', sequel Social Security saga to the earlier books, into a finished text and publishing it as a serial with an episode (roughly two chapters) available for free download by Friday every week - for fourteen consecutive weeks.  Only one - appropriately, episode 13 - was one day late: the rest came out on time, though a re-read has shown up some proof-reading errors which I can quietly correct, and a calculation error which I have uncharitably blamed on the character in the story responsible for the sum, rather than his careless author.  The next stage is to re-divide back into chapters and typeset for publication as a paperback, and then see if I can manage something slightly more akin to a proper 'launch' for the book than my previous efforts received. 

I have read a couple of 'how to...' articles on book launches which seem to involve i) being in London, ii) inviting large numbers of influential people and iii) plying critics and journalists with generous quantities of free food and champagne.  There seems to be no model based on being in Stoke-on-Trent, inviting a modest number of friends and work-mates and plying them with tea and oatcakes, which is about as far as my budget stretches!  Having said that, one generous colleague has splashed a recommendation for the whole series all over the front page of a CAB internal online magazine - doubtless the reason for a small spike in 'Severe Discomfort' sales at the end of last week - and while the ambition of shifting enough books to keep us all in tea and coffee at Stoke CAB has yet to be realised, there is now a respectable little fund which will provide the gang with a few Christmas treats and some goodies afterwards for those stressful months as we approach the end of the financial year, and the end of some financial support...

It will be a good time to take a break and take stock, and I certainly plan to do some gardening over Christmas - in fact I have promised a serious pruning session to one of our prospective hosts during the Festive Season - and with a clear week after Christmas before I'm back to work I ought to be able to catch up on some clients' work too, but I'll make sure I have my notebook to hand as I already have some notes for a new story taking one existing character and several new ones in a subtly different and quirky direction, before hopefully returning to the Solent Welfare Rights Project at some point in the not too distant future.  There will be politics, humour and suspense.

And yes, there will probably be kissing too...

In a Vicarage Garden

As God intended?  The front border before work began.

I can recall my parents taking a very dim view when a new headmaster was appointed at my Comprehensive school who openly stated that he was an atheist.  I have never figured out why this troubled them, since we never went to church - except for 'hatches, matches and dispatches' related services - never said 'grace' at meals or did anything else vaguely religious, but Mr Wilson's appointment was seemingly an irrevocable step down the slippery slope to 'progressive' teaching methids, the triumph of the 'permissive society' and complete educational and moral collapse.

I don't remember much about how Mr Wilson filled his non-religious assemblies, as I spent a disproportionate number of them in the Medical Room recovering from faints and dizzy spells, since my teenage circulatory system seemed ill-equipped for coping with my rapidly increasing height, but I do remember the story he told the school when he 'came out' as a godless heathen, as I was reminded of it when I began my major project of the last gardening year. 

Mr Wilson's tale went like this.  A country vicar leans on the wall of a cottage near his home, admiring the garden bursting with colourful flowers in pretty beds and healthy vegetables in neat rows.  Seeing an elderly gent tending the plot, he remarks 'With the help of the Good Lord you've made a glorious garden, sir!'   To which the canny old gardener replies, 'I don't know about the help of the Good Lord, Reverend - you should have seen the bloody state He'd let it get into when he was managing it on His own!'

I was reminded of this story when I popped across the road from one of my favourite gardens to consider a request to tackle the front garden of the local vicarage.  Clearly, the Lord had been left to manage that alone for some time, and it truly was in a dreadful state.  So bad, in fact, that I very nearly said 'no thanks'.

But I do like a challenge...

I was warned that a lot of old holly trees and bushes had been taken out of it some time before, but it was impossible to assess how much root and stalk might still lurk in the plot since most was smothered in meadow grasses practically my own height.  However, there were bluebells and foxgloves making a bright, brave display to one side and the prospect of half-decent soil under the scrub (on the basis of the well-loved garden across the road), so I set to work.

The grasses pulled out surprisingly easily, with some encouragement from my big stainless steel fork, and after a couple of gardening sessions a truly mighty compost heap had appeared in the far corner of the border.  Luckily they keep some chickens at the back, so there's no shortage of compost-accelerator, and the original 'Great Pyramid' has subsided well.  I won't try and turn it until the spring now, in case it's in use for hibernation.

There is still a lot to do but I have to say that, having transplanted a lot of my favourite spring and early summer perennials into the border, I really am looking forward to the next growing season.  The front border is almost clear of weeds and fully replanted, so the next task is to start working through the border at the side of the property which contains some lovely shrubs in dire need of pruning.  And then there's a bed under the front window which needs ridding of horsetail.

If I can manage that, it will indeed be a miracle!