Men, Mice, and Girls

Now then.... Down on The Funny Farm, this is a particularly Spesh Moment, captured for you this end of April, to show you that this is what A Private Dick looks like..... By that I mean, blokes what go 'detecting' in the privacy of their own backyard (don't go making your own story up Jim?!)

I'm not making 'light' of what's going on here, because I am so hugely thrilled that Trousers has started to do this once again after a gap of 10 years or so, and it has also brought him back into contact with some of his Best Mates, and that makes me smile Big Stylie. It's brought a huge smile back to HIS face also, where one was seriously missing, and nowadays, he can disappear for days, only returning when he's starving hungry. Him Tarzan, Me Jane?!




It's not always possible to harvest fresh vegetables from your garden or allotment to feed yourselves. The Savoy Cabbages and Curly Kale are starting to Bolt/Run to Seed now, and I've got a billy-no-mates Leek left (that I'm keeping to collect seed from), and that's why I grow quite so many herbs. I kind of take Sarah Raven's 'Grow what's expensive to Buy'. Fresh Herbs are expensive to buy, and you can make the yummiest of Risotto with handfuls of stuff from the garden, a little Arborio Rice and some excellent Vegetable or Chicken Stock, a this, or that growing in your own space, and you've got yourself a meal to be proud of for next to no money.

Let me explain this next photo: it's my class reminders for the up-coming local Village Produce Show, so that I can see exactly where I am, what I'm doing, and 'sod it, I've forgotten to sow the Victoria Sponge seedlings' ... Disaster!
To be perfectly honest, for a small village show, there's a serious amount of classes. And these aren't all of them. These are only the ones I feel able to enter on a personal level..

Normally, I fly by the seat of my pants, and I'm having to concentrate a little more, and that's proving difficult for me.

Do they not know that peoples actually work by day and sleep by night, and that the fairies are way too busy doing my housework to find time to do my garden as well?!

(Wellie is beginning to feel a touch of 'mad cow' disease setting in: see photo)

Last year, the immature fig fruitlets were getting 'pinched/nicked' and I was suitably informed that it would be birds, so this year, I thought I'd be clever, and protect them from the birds, but I hadn't thought this Cunning Plan Baldrick through at all. As the immature figlets swell, you then can't get the protective cloches off the stems without damaging the figlets;. DOH!

Wellie Wonker, and no mistake! Still.... I'm never too precious to learn by my mistakes, and today, I've rigged up an all-enclosing fleece tent over it instead.

If the figgy-fruitlets continue to disappear, I'll swap my verdict for mice. Simples.

Oh, and talking of mice... most of these babies have been rescued from the draughty dutch greenhouse because of exactly that, and are now safely growing rather well under my protective nose, and that of my cat(!) Baldrick Cunning Plan Mark II, I think you'll find?

I must just mention that I've recently re-made my acquaintances with two GORGEOUS Girlies, where we'd lost touch - namely Gloria, and Lorna, who are both coming to The Funny Farm next week for the very first time. Girls, we are going to have SUCH fun over the coming months and years. Thank you so much for your friendships. you're both incredibly special friends, in case you didn't already know that.X

And, naturally, I'm having to courtsey on a weekly basis, to say a big thank you to our newest follower to our Funny Farm Blog. You're most welcome.X, and I hope I'm continuing to do what's written on the tin for you all in terms of entertainment.

I must say, you're all incredibly quiet at the moment!!

But I do know that you're there, and so I don't feel entirely stupid talking to myself every week!Love You, Squeeze You til next time.X