Gardener Dave came today and immediately noticed the new fence. I didn’t see him but Mirinda reckoned he looked a bit miffed that he’d not been asked to do it. Either that or he wanted to wire up the jasmine.
Instead of fence building the gardeners made short work of turning the compost and moving the pots back. The pots had been moved to one end of the terrace on Saturday when the tree guys turned up to trim the beech and the hazel. We thought it was all one tree but it turns out there’s two.
This is not like Mirinda at all. I depend on her for the horticultural advice. Still, they just amended the quote upwards and set about trimming everything and opening up the whole terrace. Of course it now looks incredibly dirty. I’ll have to get the cleaner out.
I don’t think Dave was too upset about us not asking him to cut the trees back. And he did a splendid job with the re-positioning of the pots in their new spring configuration.
In the meanwhilst I was at the gym then in town shopping. Sadly, having had some glorious weather over the last few days (particularly in Yorkshire) the day was drizzly and damp. That awful type of rain that soaks you with stealth. It’s like thick mist with deceptively big drops.
Even so, the Lion and Lamb looked quite lovely as I walked down it on the way to buy Mirinda the wrong kind of shower cap from Boots then the correct kind of bulldog clips from Smith’s.
Back at home I set about my normal housekeeping while the boys slaved away in the rain. They didn’t stop for a coffee this morning because, Dave said, it would mean stripping off all their wet weather gear and, worse still, put it all back on again. It didn’t seem to occur to Mirinda that she could have made it and given it to them outside.
We won’t be seeing Dave next fortnight because he’ll be painting and decorating his house. Andy will be coming instead. We’ll have to watch him around the ivy and wisteria.
After they’d gone, the garden had it’s usual post-gardener glow and the terrace was back to looking better potted.
As well as the general pot distribution, they also placed a few pots in the rat run – the small alley between the terrace and the fence where the tree grows and the rats run – sitting them on brick platforms. Apart from anything else, this will make it a lot easier to clean the terrace. And give the rats an obstacle course to use.
Today marks the beginning of half term. While it will be awful at the Dockyard (and the Science Museum) it was bliss in Farnham. Possibly my favourite week so far this year.
