supermouse

So, for the past several years, I have been Outside barely at all, and by barely I mean literally once or twice a year, and by Outside, I mean past the confines of the garden. My main loss with lockdown was other people going Outside and posting about it. Nott'm police posting pictures of empty places was my jam last summer.

Anyway, that's just to set the expectations. I went Outside! I walked around six hundred steps, which is... not much, at all, on Normal scales, but I'm really glad of it.

My feet not so much. I've ordered shoes that should be good for walking and not setting off plantar fasciitis.

One of my oldest, dearest friends has been cheerleading me on and it does make an enormouse difference. Then I got a text reminding me I post about birds, so...update.

The sparrows went away when we cut down the buddleia, but that's shot back up and now gives adequate shelter again. They are not interested, at all, in egg-friendly calcium-enriched pink suet, it gets eaten only when other suet runs out, and they are overall eating a lot less. They went through a phase of eating some pink stuff, and now it's all mealworms all the time, so I assume that was eggs->chicks.

Regarding mealworms, Demanding Great-Tit has also gone with the loss of shelter. By July it will be very bird-friendly again and not destroying the house... There is a lot, a *lot* of shelter all around this area, that's why we have wood pigeons and owls.

The blackbird and magpies are absolutely fine, although the mad singing has settled down and birds aren't strutting their stuff really at all. I assume they're busy being parents, since they are around.

The garden is, in the original sense of the word, retarded, as in all the growth has been very slow and many common plants are actually etoliated, that is, stretched out long and thin to try to reach light. This is how it was in Aquilegia Year up in Leigh, when I managed to grow those flowers, rhubarb and unusually large rampant slugs. Here, now, dry warm weather has arrived and with it a mass of flowers, but a lot of plants are very, very behind, the fuchsia so much so that I had to check it wasn't actually dead. It's really gone green this last week.


Some plants, noteably the shade-tolerant ones, are doing fine, and I will be displaying my enormous peonies later in the year. When I look at my enormous peonies, everything seems okay.

Paperwork wise, my sibling and accountant are handling absolutely everything because I Cannot. I am trying to get at least some income, and to avoid running into trouble later for ignoring things and putting my head in the sand. I did, however, Do The Things (with help) and even, get this, cancelled my Sky subscription! I had an amazingly clear-headed morning, which happens around once a month or so and got all the paperwork done that I could.

Thanks, largely, to daily (and mutual) cheerleading, I'm even somewhat presentable. Definitely less awful than I was.

I am loving the warm weather very, very much.

I still write every day, it's still absolute rubbish, it's still absorbing and engaging and rather like eating lots of biscuits. Writing about people doing normal things, like playing The Sims games, is something of a prompt to do normal things. Of course I always add magic because wish-fulfillment... I haven't written fanfic in a while though. It's as if posting two stories scratched the itch, or I've just thoroughly plumbed every idea I could possibly have and moved on. I'm a Pantser, so the first draft is, usually, several hundred thousand words of a main character or characters stumbling around a new-to-me world doing the most mundane, boring activities until, more by accident than design, they stumble into a badly-sprawling Plot which will cover closer to ninety thousand words than the half-a-million or so it takes for me to deal with not wanting to actually give my characters serious setbacks because it makes me feel bad.

Editing is done by my going through and cutting out every part that makes my eyes glaze over, which is... a lot. I also have lots of sentences which made sense at the time, and sometimes there's actual word salad from migraines where I have to read before and after and entirely rewrite, but I was having fun, so...

Second drafts are slow. Very. Those are actual work. I don't have a full novel in second draft yet. The writing is always moving forward though. I have two complete novels in terrible first-draft set in the near future as I conceived it before the Pandemic was even a series of odd rumours on Twitter about events in Wuhan. I was revising them when lockdown happened and the world changed so much that it was clear I'd have to do a huge rewrite to take all these new events into account.

So, anyway, I'm feeling comfortable now about incorporating the whole thing, since there's much more of a shape to what 'the whole thing' is. Revising isn't happening yet, but the violent distaste for the whole idea has gone and it keeps coming to mind, which is usually the first stage before a real editing binge, it's just this time it's not fanfiction.

Mentally then, I'm in... a much better place. It's light all day, I'm not SAD, although I am sad. Pol and I weren't in one another's lives that much, but it was nearly every single day and I would think he'll like this, he'll like that and occasionally we'd get to chat. I did work out, too late, that a big problem between us was that he liked to fix things and there's no fixing migraines. I feel very, very sad that he was stuck being miserable and waiting until he could come home, it's just a crying shame. He did have a whole different life up in the North Wet, one he was definitely engaged in more than he was with me, but he was always very, very firm about being married and staying married within our very severe limits of mutual tolerance - I literally can't handle being around people for more than a couple of hours at most, and that occasionally. Even Pol. Even talking to one of my closest and dearest friends on the phone... it's good for a little while then it isn't and I just want to go and lay down in the dark and quiet.

Other than feeling very sad sometimes, though, I'm mostly fine, since other people are handling the things that were turning me into a poorly mess. I try to concentrate on one thing at a time, and, moment to moment, I really am fine and okay. So.

Birds! Yay! Tell me about birds where you are!

Plants! Yay! Tell me about plants you have noticed! Even the annoying ones!

Outside! Have you been?

Vaccines, how are those going? I am past my two weeks on the second and much less fearful, still masking around people, mainly delivery people.

Gosh this got long. Hugs to all, you're all lovely, and I truly do hope you have the best possible day.

Taking two weeks off of, well, pretty much everything seems to have actually done me some good, despite the depression (which is now lifting again). I'm having a very middle class Sunday, listening to the Archers omnibus. Tomorrow I try going back to the voluntary work.

Pol's sent me a graphics tablet, which should arrive this week, *and* I've found my camera charging cable, so I can get creative again. I do actually like creating art, however dreadful, but depression made me not want to. I've also had some lovely phone conversations, which is something I really enjoy. Time was, I couldn't cope with phone calls because of the migraines, but my pain management is just so good these days that I can cope, even if sometimes I'm a bit scatty. Anyway, everyone I talked to has been delightful and I loved hearing about what people have been doing.

I have garlic sprouting well, but no sign of peas or potatoes. It's been quite dry and I have no watering can. I've got an Amazon voucher for kitchenware (again from Pol)... perhaps if I kept it in the kitchen?

I might have energy this afternoon for calligraphy. I hope I do - I have a half-finished letter for Pol that has been sitting there literally for weeks. I have no idea why letter-writing seems so very hard to me right now, but it does.

I have finally, finally uploaded and labelled the pictures of my garden I took some weeks ago. Here they are in an imgur album. Just click and visit. There is no need to sign in or anything. The images are fairly large. These pictures were taken just before summer turned to autumn proper.

Before I get onto gardening, I liked this letter to a girl.

The part of the house inspection I am given to get ready for is the garden. So, today, I:

Sawed out neat squares from the blown-down trellises to make smaller frames for the winter squash.

Took the rest of them apart and stacked the pieces.

Cleaned the masonry to repaint, only to find we're out of masonry paint.

Took out about fifty dead canes from last year's bushes.

Mowed the lawn, filling our not-small mower's basket up twice.

Edged same.

Stained the decking rails, fence and bird feeder. (You can't even see where I stained the decking rails in November - the weather has scoured it all back to bare wood).

Weeded, although only enough to appease the house agent.

I'm going to see if the local nursery will deliver me a bulk amount of bedding compost for all the May sowing, and the delayed late-April sowing. I basically need enough to cover the vast bulk of a twenty-foot-long, four-foot-deep bed six inches deep.

I've just discovered a new plant in the garden, growing very vigorously. Japanese Knotweed. Well, fucknuggets. I'm going to treat it with glyphosate, not a substance I was expecting to be buying but leaving it alone to grow is very much not an option.

Edit: had long, long chat with local council bod and will be painting it lovingly with Roundup, then waiting a few months, then painting it again, then waiting until it starts dying back in the autumn, and painting it again. And waiting until it's *really* dead and burning what is left in a very hot fire until there are just ashes. For three years.

I've finally started trimming all the bushes around the garden. It's a bit of a hack job on some for now, and I'll wait a couple of weeks and do them again before the house inspection on the 9th May. The new metal garden burner works beautifully. I've green binning some and composting a lot, but it's nice to have a third way to get rid of all this excess growth.

I've emptied one of the water butts EW, so that it can be scrubbed out and used as a source of clean(ish) water over the summer. There's another one I have to do, with about a million, million snails clustered around the top, but today I had enough to do.

I've planted out Watercress around the pond, although it won't actually contact the water for ages and will need frequent watering until it gets something over the lip of the tiny little plastic pond (which is about two feet by eighteen inches). I've tidied up the little show pond, killing off the Pyracantha shrub and seedlings, and cutting back other plants. The pond has been dredged and wasn't as nasty as I feared. No sulphurous smell of rotting nastiness, just mud and water. I've swept out that part of the driveway and gathered all the rubbish, so it looks a lot nicer now. Pebbles and decorative glazed beads have been taken away, washed and put back again on top of the new compost. There's a 'Welcome to My Garden' frog-and-flower statuette, which I shall scrub and paint with acrylics, before putting back. It's not something I'd choose, but I can take care of it. Every bit of this newly cleaned and trimmed pond is hidden behind Pol's Delica, but it will be a nice surprise for House Inspection Number Two.

Campanula is rife everywhere in the North (South-facing) shrubbery bed. I should have an amazing show of flowers, and then I can find out what sort of Campanula is actually is. They're bell-flowers, so I should end up with something pretty. Or the identification could be completely wrong - I just don't know! So exciting! The tree above all this maybe-Campanula has budded with very, very many potential deep pink flowers which are slow to actually come out.

Foxglove and Red Poppy have been sown to make insects happy. I already have established Foxglove plants and some sort of Poppy, but more would be nice. The 'wildflowers for bees' and Cornflowers are coming through. Next to that bit, I've put in a rosemary bush and sown stock all around it. I'll be adding another try of Morning Glories next month after the Hawthorns have blossomed. The bit of 'wildflower meadow' where the bird table used to be is alive but apparently with only grass. At least the square hole in the lawn has been filled.

I've cut back the Hellebores, which, far from succumbing to the Hellebore Black Death I thought they had, are now vigorous and green with new (unmottled) leaf. Hellebores can apparently foster a great many snails in their old, dying leaves - these treats have been saved and given to the rats. The snails seem to be doing no harm at all to the new leaves.

I should have sowed seed last Friday, but was away, so today I got on with it. I've sacrificed the excess Sugar Snap Peas, instead of umming and awwing endlessly about what to do with them. The actual Asparagus Peas (as opposed to the sugar snaps that somehow climbed into their modules) are now planted out and will take their chances. I've sown Borage everywhere, and French Marigold in tidy lines which I make by getting a long box, putting in compost to the recommended sowing depth, adding seeds, filling the rest of the box with damp compost and then making a seed-castle on a bit of ground I've roughly weeded but haven't actually dug. Quite a lot of my seeds are in face sown this way, and this makes it easy to find them.

Planting out 'Red Baron' red onions, I found out that the allium/brassica bed of compost which was four inches deep is now half an inch deep - soil fauna has been very busy, clearly. This bodes well for my plants, I think. Little baby Arcoat turnips are now everywhere. There are three leeks left. Something ate one of my comfrey plants, so I replaced it with two bigger comfrey plants. I couldn't find the culprit, but having more and bigger plants may let them outgrow whatever is eating them. If not, I've learned something. The sweet peas are still mostly not dead, but aren't thriving either. Then again, they haven't been thriving since I sowed them. I'll outdoor sow the rest of the packet later on and then give up.

The Leaf Beet is showing nicely everywhere I put it, and the sugar snap peas are mostly fine although one has been thoroughly eaten. I put out supermarket fennel and excess baby leeks out to die, and they are getting on with that but rather slowly. The fennel is in a concrete planter, which is full of tiny, tiny Pansy plants all flowering busily. The leeks are stuck into the allium bed and have been there for well over a week. There is no sign of even a single Nasturtium, not in any of the many beds I've planted it in. I don't know what's happening there.

The 'dead' apple tree is very green suddenly, having been black when I left for Eastercon. All those new leaves are thumbing their noses at me. I don't mind at all, as I want cooking apples later. Blackberry is showing itself on the very overgrown bit, and will be encouraged where possible in order to shade out the Winter Jasmine. I have so many more uses for excess Blackberry Bush than I do for Winter Jasmine - the shoots are edible as a vegetable, the fruits obviously so and the canes can be used (once worked to suppleness) as tying wires.

All in all, a very productive day.

So, the frost did *not* kill the tomatoes (!) but it did kill very nearly all the morning glories. However, since they take a massive two weeks to get from sown to ready-to-plant, I'll just do those once the last danger of frost is gone.

I have planted out all but five of the sugar snap peas. I only have three mange tout, but tons and tons of sugar snap - thirty plants I think. Heaven only knows what happened there. I do know some of the asparagus peas turned into sugar snaps, despite the seeds being totally and utterly different in appearance and size.

Spice is having a mad episode just now. I've played with her, but mostly she wants to run madly about the house, making tribble noises and with her fur all on end. I've learned that her fur being all on end often means excitement rather than terror - her whiskers are forward and she's easy to approach. Just... brushy. There are lots of insects around, so she's been kept happy and occupied. She hates the rain, but will come out into it anyway if I am there. Hatter doesn't care, as long as he can come back to me later and warm and dry his feet on my neck.

There are now twice as many turnip plants as there were - there are now two. I planted out some comfrey and managed to drive a thorn deep into my thumb. I got the splinter out eventually and it bled freely, so it should be okay.

I've run out of compost, again.

Today I was outside before dawn. The radio had forecast a week ahead of scorching hot days, so I watered all the plants before the sun could hit them. Last thing at night would be better, but I am always so very tired by then. By the time I was done, there was a thin skin of ice on the bird bath, by that magical process that uses a black, shallow dish, morning sunlight and some weird trick of radiation. It allows people in hot countries to make ice in above-zero temperatures and I have no idea how it works. The outside was chill enough to see my breath, but the greenhouse was nice and cosy already. Thank goodness for the automatic vent. I foresee myself having to put blinds in as well later on.

I've planted out lots of strong young morning glory "Grandpa Otis" plants, which were sown less than two weeks ago. After only three days, they were strong seedlings with two leaves each, and now they're starting with their true leaves. They're poisonous as anything, so they're safe from slugs.

My sweet peas I wanted to cover the ivy have been eaten, so I planted out more. Learning from last night, I strewed the ground about them with dandelion leaves, but then I got nervous and gave each one a plastic bottle greenhouse as protection. They only get morning sunlight unless they get a lot taller, so they should be fine.

I had the idea of watering the holes into which I was planting my sugar snap peas before planting the peas themselves. I have no idea why I thought to do that, but doing so revealed that one of the holes had a major drainage problem and would have drowned my poor pea. I solved the problem by poking holes down through the clay pan with a knife-sharpening steel (one of my favourite gardening tools) until decent drainage was achieved. I put a comfrey plant in next to that pea, so it can drill down with its massive tap root and break through the pan of clay. It isn't quite ready to go out, really, so it got a little bottle greenhouse too.

My turnip seeds I think got baked to death in all the hot dry weather, so I planted out more under square clear plastic tubs. That particular bed (brassicas, carrots, alliums and helpful herbs and flowers) is a no-dig bed - a four-inch deep layer of rough compost on top of the existing layer of dead leaves. One dandelion has so far managed to work its way through even that layer, but its single long, blanched yellow leaf was simply plucked out and left for the slugs. Six leeks still survive, poor things. I actually plant leeks 'for real' next month with decent hopes that *those* ones will make it. I've learned more since the January sowing, and the future leeks will sit in plastic cups until a decent size, then go out. I'm not sure how many leeks I should sow for myself, anyone got an idea?

Not everything I plant out is dead or dying! The sugar snap peas I planted out a while ago are absolutely fine, thriving even. The raspberry, loganberry and redcurrants are fine. My calendula pot marigolds, by the blackcurrant bush, are starting to sprout. The potted nettles have already provided a meal. I have three living parsley plants and one coriander (I drowned the other one, which is very, very easy to do). I think some outdoor-sown asparagus peas are sprouting.

There are dandelion leaves everywhere now. I am starting to run out of dandelion plants. This is a new and refreshing situation.

It was beautifully warm and sunny again today. This spring has been remarkably clement. I mowed the lawn, which is quite the undertaking, especially as the lawnmower has to have its electrics taken apart and put back together again every time.

I've had another harvest - the same foods again, but more of them. Rhubarb, chives, nettles and rocket salad, in case anyone is wondering. Fifteen rocket plants yield enough leaves for a one-person bowl of salad a week. One rhubarb plant will yield five stems in a week (there are a good number of stems ready to replace what I've just cut very soon). The nettles are perennial so counting the number of plants is problematic, and the chives are in clumps.

The massively-yielding apple tree over the east (west-facing) wall looks very dead. I'd expect some sign of life by now. That means *all* the trees along that wall are very, very dead, and died last year some time, although the other plants are alive and well. Anyone got any idea what could have happened?

Bumble bees are busy looking for nest sites and the honey bees are out. There are butterflies around too. The food I am putting out for the birds is apparently especially attractive to reed buntings, as I had at least four and I think a half-dozen in my garden today. The robin was active where I had been planting out parsley. I'd like to have put out more pea plants but was unable to stand the crouching needed to do so, and was also too clumsy to really handle seedlings today. Perhaps tomorrow. Anyway, the lawn was a great big job and I am glad it's over.

On another note, I had an idea that it would be nice to *just* cook hickory smoked sausages, slice them up and put them in a muffin tin with corn muffin mix on top. It's going to be a regular treat, I think, served with baked beans.

It did rain during the night, so I haven't suddenly moved to the continent. Spice, the autumnal-coloured rescue cat, has hurt her leg, having been bitten by probably another cat. She's on antibiotics. It remains to be seen how easy it is to put pills down her throat. Hatter's a champion - if you can get them onto the back of his tongue, you're done. Just as well, really.

I'm eating a really, really nice burger from the local coffee shop, after some gardening. I've put wood ash on the brassica bed, to ward off club root, and nematodes *everywhere* to kill slugs (they can come back in the summer, but right now I have too many tender delicious things sprouting). I've also sown some leaf beet, also known as perpetual spinach. I'll sow lots of other things later, when I have more energy and less hunger. The 120 litres of compost I had the day before yesterday is already down to about 40 litres. Most seeds get dumped on top of a few handfuls of compost to make an improvised miniature 'bed' on top of the real bed.

If you cut dandelions off at soil level and spread the leaves out to die on the soil, slugs will apparently go for the wilting leaves first in preference to your living plants. They also dump a lot of nutrients into your soil from right down where the tap root goes to, making them available to shallow-rooted plants. Suddenly, these pernicious and ever-spreading weeds have become green mulches and quite valuable. I'm glad, as they're a massive pain to try to get rid of. Now I can just cut them off with scissors and make sure they don't overgrow the cultivated stuff. (You can eat the leaves too, but personally I think they taste foul).

It remains to be seen whether, after all the companion planting and green mulches and 'working with nature', I actually end up with any vegetables outside at all.