my turn to make the tea

Somebody rang in sick, so we were down to two staff in the plant centre, just the manager and me.  That's not unworkable for a quiet Monday, though not ideal.  It doesn't leave much scope to have a visible staff presence scooting around among the plants.  A couple of customers who made it as far as the tills did say plaintively that there was nobody outside to help or answer questions, and one professional gardener shopping on behalf of the garden he manages said that some customers had even tried to ask him for help (though he may just have been winding the manager up).

Worse was that neither of us knows how to operate the tea room.  Obviously, we know how to make a cup of tea, but not in which cupboards and drawers to look to find the tea pots, cups, milk jugs and cake tongs.  Luckily my first customer for tea had been before, and was able to tell me the previous tea room operative had got a tea pot out of the cupboard by the dishwasher.  Then she had to remind me that I'd forgotten to give her any milk, though she was very nice about it.  (Sometimes in the plant centre we do raise the late and much lamented Linda Smith's concept of hand-knitted out of tofu to whole new levels).  I had no idea which size milk jugs I was supposed to use for what numbers of people, or how much milk to put in them, so portion control went out of the window, and neither of us knew how the dishwasher worked either, though when the owner appeared late on in the afternoon it turned out that the reason why it wouldn't go is that it wasn't switched on.  Apparently last week the hot water dispenser threw a wobbly half an hour before a coach load of 51 people was due to arrive, who had been promised tea and biscuits before their garden tour, but the new young member of the sales staff fixed that by dint of switching it off and switching it on again at the wall.

We are terribly short of plants for dry shade.  The people who have dry shade and need to ask for advice on what to do with it do tend to have rather unrealistic expectations, wanting evergreens that will flower prolifically over a long season, while the more experienced gardeners have generally learnt to be grateful for anything that will grow.  However, telling customers that Mahonia aquifolium should do it, that Ruscus aculeatus or butcher's broom certainly will, and that Sarcococca confusa is worth a try if it isn't too, too dry, while Euphorbia amygdaloides var. robbiae is practically indestructible, is not helpful when none of them are in stock.

Driving home I passed a white van parked near the far end of our road, and a man standing next to it playing the bagpipes.  I presume he was practising.  Bagpipes can't be an easy instrument to learn or practice, if you live anywhere with any near neighbours at all, so a country lane might be one of the only places you can find. I was once visiting a poultry feed supplier based in one of the Colchester trading estates, and was amused as I got out of the car to hear the sound of bagpipes, somebody presumably deciding that playing in an industrial unit sandwiched between the main railway line and the inner by-pass was better than enraging family and neighbours by practising at home.