Telstales

Tag: writing

  • Gardening day 15th January 2025

    At this time of year there’s not so much to do in my customer’s gardens, it’s a quieter time. There are a few maintenance tasks to get involved in though.

    Today needed to cut back first year’s growth on a native hedgerow I planted in March 2024.

    Keeping the plants well watered through the year and keeping weeds at bay at the base of each plant has resulted in a good start in their growth.

    So it was now necessary to cut back all growth with the customer asking for each to be 3 feet high which I did. Obviously they will probably grow to be about 5 feet high by mid summer and can then be clipped back again to the required height asked for.

    Cutting back stimulates side ( and vertical) growth and allows each plant to thicken out when they burst into life in Spring!

    The Caravan in distance is not mine!

    The native hedgerow included Thorn plants and yes those ‘ thorns ‘ pierce fingers easily…I can (v)ouch for that!

  • 2pm snooze..my body chose it

    There’s nothing really wrong in just snoozing for fifteen minutes in the afternoon is there?

    I mean, tomorrow I’m going out to play working in folk’s gardens so I’m entitled to charge up my batteries before hand!…

    Well, that’s my excuse anyways.

    Now for some biscuits and cups of T!

  • And 13th January…let there be light…

    I always tell folk here in the UK when they are plunged into Wintertime short days and long dark evenings that 13th January is a marker point to say ” hey, you will notice it just a bit lighter in later afternoon from 13th January onwards.”

    And so, even on this heavily grey toned cloudy afternoon its just past 16.30 or 4.30pm and it’s still light although daylight is now slowly fading away (twas dark a 16.00 or 4pm. only a couple of weeks ago.)

    And as each day dawns it will be just noticibily lighter each afternoon!

    Bring on Spring!

  • January’s date is wrong way round surely?

    Today is Monday 13 the January apparently…feels more like 31st January or even the 131st January…. It’s like that old saying:-

    30 days have September, April, June and November.

    All the rest have 31 apart from February which has 28 and 29 each leap year.

    Oh and not forgetting January, which has 10042!

    Time for some biscuits and a cup of T

  • What?…. The flu jab doesn’t work?….

    So each year I trundle off to my GP to get my annual flu jab, and each year I usually get a mild dose of flu soon after receiving the jab. I can cope with that.

    Well, this time round from November 2024 January 2025, I haven’t had any effects from my flu jabs whatsoever…. Until…now!

    I’ve caught it..flu….Not making it up…totally zonked out with aching joints, crazy temperature fluctuations like overheating one minute, freezing cold and shivering the next ( adding clothes then taking them off almost just as fast), coughing, tickly cough, sore throat, headaches, and runny nose pipes….I mean…I thought that having a flu jab was really to prevent such a concentrated dose getting to me….

    So next year, need to think again.. What’s the point, and reading up on flu jabs, lots of articles say they don’t work, or more accurately, they don’t protect against every strain of flu doing the rounds. Now I thought flu was flu and I guess you can’t get protected against every type of flu going, but me, just as usual… presumed wrongly, that having my flu jab would provide total cover from me catching it and being like I am currently.

    Now where’s the biscuits and cups of T!

  • Yippee..back to gardening work..but..noooo….

    After the total frenzy of Christmas past, my planning to start work in customer’s gardens again has just been put on hold a while.

    Following a bombardment of snow on Sunday 5th January 2025, providing a good ‘deep’ covering of about 2 inches here, (that’s quite deep for us here really🤣)

    Then as rain took over during Sunday afternoon into the evening and through Monday 6th created a total aesthetically pleasing mis match of melting snow linked between puddles of rain.

    Obviously as all professional gardeners know…. “Keep of the grass,” and stay away from sodden gardens until it all dries up. Needless to say that the overnight temperatures of minus 2 real feel minus 7 have now left all gardens here sparkly white with frost.

    So, gardening in customer’s gardens can wait a bit longer. Oooh now where’s my bookkeeping to update with cups of T, bikkies and warmth…plenty of time for gardening soon!

  • January the what?…5th?

    Well, we are well into January already, going so…..what?…… it’s only the 5th today….so there’s 26 days left to go?… Eh?… How can that be…..feels like we are already in the third week and Christmas just past seems so long ago!

    It’s going to be a long month…I can tell that already!

    What?….. You sure it’s still only the 5th?

  • Blending the days

    A Christmas break from the regularity of the usual Monday to Friday working week, I found (as I usually do find and no doubt will continue to find in the future) that the days all just seem to be as one.

    As I previously wrote, I really lose track of which day we are on and what the date is (yes the usual Christmas, Boxing and New Year’s days dates and the month I know) yet it’s as if it doesn’t really matter over the Christmas break period.

    I don’t really find the same issue if on a holiday for a week or two..I know the day and date as I trundle along with my holiday daily journey, it’s just a different feeling over the Christmas break. I just don’t know why and really, I guess it doesn’t really matter. It’s as if ‘me’ has stopped, to sit on the Christmas break and then afterwards…. click…. Back to it… the regularity of daily life.

    So I feel that over the Christmas break, certainly for the one at the end of 2024, my new day (which covers the whole of my Christmas break period) I proudly named:-

    “MonTuesWednesThursFriSaturSunMonTuesWednesThursFriSaturSun”…day

    At 66 years old, at some point I will give up work, then maybe then all my days will be blended together as life will become one long break and and one long blended day..month..year!

    After 51 years of working (as at the end of 2024) I will at some point look forward to it… But not just yet as I journey through 2025!

  • Look around… it’s far too early…

    It’s getting worse…today it’s 364 days til Christmas Day and folk already have their Christmas lights up….so early for Christmas 2025!

  • December birthday… pah

    It’s my parents fault!…. Why so close to Christmas?…. It’s like having two birthdays in one month then nothing through the rest of the year. Not that I ever expect anything in my life, yet my bro n sis have their birthdays in the Summer months! Although must say I guess it’s probably worse for a birthday on 25th December or even 29th February or even 1st April, so I just be thankful and greatful for being here in the first place to experience my journey on ‘my’ conveyor belt of life!