Our Ginger caught a squirrel this morning. He came stomping around the side of the house with the body in his jaws, looking as if he had captured the squirrel himself, rather than nicking it from the big tabby. I put a box in front of the cat door so that he couldn't take it into the house, and he ate the head outside the front door. He'll never lose weight if he goes eating squirrels between meals.
I did a garden talk last night, up in the Suffolk Sandlings. The Orwell Bridge and A12 were clear, and the instructions on how to find the hall, which looked on the map as though it might be going to be difficult, turned out to be accurate and helpful, corresponding to the sort of detail on the ground that you can spot when driving by yourself at main road speeds, so it was an easy trip up there, and I had time to run through my talk in my head sitting in the car park, and look at the swallows perching on the telephone wires. It is lovely countryside up beyond Woodbridge, and it was a fine evening, the light having the sort of fierce clarity that you get as you approach the North Sea on a sunny day. Among the conifer plantations are little patches of broadleaf woodland, at this time of the year vivid with bluebells.
The audience seemed to like the talk, although what some of the ladies really wanted to know was where I got my sweater. They were a little disappointed to learn that it was at least twelve years old, though the company I bought it from is still going, so they could have one if they wanted to, albeit not to the same design. My vintage one is in a cheerful pattern of smallish squares in rich earth colours, which reminds me of a small Paul Klee painting I once saw, but might remind some other people of a Channel 4 garden show presenter circa 1998. It is made out of alpaca, an excellent and hard wearing wool that doesn't pill and is a much better bargain than cashmere, looking nicely worn in after twelve years.
The instructions on how to find the hall warned me sternly to beware of deer in the forest, and I saw one on the way home, lurking in the verge. Despite having read The Yearling at an impressionable age I'm not a great fan of deer. I don't wish them individual suffering, and I know that in the right numbers they have their place in England's ecosystem, but I can't shake off their associations as destroyers of trees and gardens. I can't perceive grey squirrels as cute for the same reason, hence my instant reaction on seeing Our Ginger this morning was not 'poor squirrel' but 'bother, the cat's found something to eat'.
In theory I now have the rest of the week to get on with working in the garden. I don't have anything booked, and the forecast is for it to remain dry. I spent today weeding the island bed, where great patches of weeds ran away from me in the wet weather before I could tackle them small and get the Strulch down. After two late nights on the trot I felt slightly tired, and conscious that I must take particular care not to poke myself in the eye on the low branches of the Judas tree. Fatigue breeds clumsiness, and pessimism, and I had a vague conviction all day that it couldn't last, and that presently it would start to rain, or I would stab myself on a plant and spend half tomorrow morning at the walk-in medical centre, or the phone would ring and I would have to leave the garden and go and do something else instead, but none of these things happened.
Supposed that office carpet cleaning service doesn’t exist this day and you have hectic schedule would you want to file a leave or find person and pay wages just to do this now that we are all professionals.
ReplyDelete