Well shiver my timbers, so it is and I haven't written or posted a word for ages. Been too busy twittering with the birds in the blackberry bushes - no that's too silly, and anyway Spring watch in our garden will reveal that the blackberry against the fence is coming along nicely, but seems to be lagging behind the tayberry and loganberry bushes. No room to hide tweety-birds in the foliage yet.
Of course all this rubbish is a bit of 'window' as a diversion from the fact that 'twittering' is all that I been bothered with lately. A qwerty keyboard is fine when using typewriter sized machines, but on a telephone you should use little thimbles equipped with little prods that that punch each micro-key on the character. Never mind, I've got a decoder-spell check in my phone that decides which of the four letters and numbers I've pressed sort out the most relevant letter for the report/email or whatever.
Now, back to boating, roving and gardening.
Yes a little bit dull, but not half as much as the rubbish that I've read on Twitter. Never mind; a little news on the Mariner front. First.
The interior below decks now looks absolutely smashing - which is fantastic, but 'Oh dear,' says Jeeves, 'look at that manky paintwork.'
So, it is brushes and roller time; after a lot of preparation work. Bit like that awful stuff we had to do after school, but with swadges of sandpaper, electric drills with wire brushes etc.
Luckily Wooster is not trusted with brush or roller, so is relegated to stay at home on gardening leave and other little chores like bringing in the clothes and mending the cold frame.
Lots of good stuff on Radio 4 though, Whilst doing the garden and digging the weed s(remember the song?), I'm not quite that old yet anyway.
This spring has been fantastic! Down to short shorts both trousers and sleeves on the 1st of April. Looked a right fool mucking about in the vegetable garden, but if this continues, there will be a bumper crop this season.
Jeeves has done a marvellous job on the mid-section of the garden - aft of the shed, and there is a delightful show of spring flowers and bulbs. We now have only to look forward to more and to summer.
The big question will be how we divide our time between garden boat and other planned activities. For example we mean to pootle off to France and then Lithuania.
I expect that we shall see....
Anyway we're off to a good start with the vegetable patch this year - though there will be no doubt many many railway trips back home to ensure that all is well, watered and planted out in time. Uour boating trips last year featured such interludes to make sure that everything was ship-shape at home.
The issue here of course is that when the cost of the railway journey from wherever is factored in, one cna't claim that vegetable growing on one's own plot is entirely economical, but there are othe resons for getting back to the house as well.
Most importantly though, the enjoyment of eating vegetables grown fresh in your own garden is hardly measurable in economic terms.
We thought that we
might relax about the place for a bit and watch all the vegetables and herbs mature. . . .well of course we will a little bit, but (despite the fact that we have already mown it twice), we can't let the grass grow under our feet; therefore a trip around the Oxford ring is planned.
This will mean the usual jaunt to Braunston and a right turn down the South Oxford Canal which will take us all the way to the Thames. A right hand turn will then take us down stream to London where we will join the Grand Union Canal - after a good many stops on the way, of course.
One highlight we hope will be meeting up with Derek and Sheila (and of course Lexie) on Clarence. All of which is a lot to look forward to.
