AN HOUR TO SPARE

Photo: Coming out with flippant remarks on a forum site could get you bitten.

What do you do when have a spare hour, but it’s too wet to go outside and do some work in the garden? One job I tend to do in the wet is sorting out the shed. Have you ever noticed that any space you have is soon taken up with stuff…when I say stuff I mean old packaging for recycling, newspapers, old clothes, furniture, machinery. In fact anything your imagination will stretch to usually gets dumped in the garage, shed, or any other corner of the house. You might have experienced the phenomenon if you ever tried to keep a spare room clear for any length of time.

CHECK OUT THE WEB
This can get a bit tedious though, moving rubbish from one shelf to another, so if its really bad outside I’ll check out the web. For a fleeting moment I got hooked on the social networking sites like facebook. Trouble is I’m not really that sociable and got a bit tired of all of the interacting. My lads use this method of contact far more effectively than me; it’s easier for them, probably because they have loads of friends from school to chat to.

GARDENING FORUMS
I do occasionally get involved with a couple of gardening forums from time to time and occasionally contribute something. I tend to be a bit flippant with the answers though and don’t take things too seriously, which doesn’t always go down very well. I have had my wrists virtually slapped a few times when I am asked how to sort out weeds in a garden and I suggest concrete.
Odd quirky remarks are best kept to a minimum when giving advice to total strangers.
For every gardening question posted onto the forum sites, there are as many answers as there are people reading it. I think that’s why I tend to hesitate when anyone asks me what is the best way to grow vegetables or cut a hedge, it can be very much down to the individual or circumstances.

IT’S NEVER TOO WET FOR WEBSITES
I also like checking out e-bay when it gets too wet to be outside in the garden. I don’t buy much but there’s no harm in looking and occasionally offering silly money for something…well, you never know, the seller might just say yes even though my dad used to say that a bargain isn’t a bargain if you don’t want it…..

GETTING READY FOR WINTER.
I like checking out the gardening equipment but with the way the economy is, it is probably better to take care of the metal tools that I have. I use WD40 to spray over the metal as I find dipping the lawnmower into a bucket of sand mixed with old oil a bit cumbersome (see what I mean about getting into trouble with being flippant). I would recommend running the mower out of petrol or emptying the tank and pipes totally before parking it up, so that the petrol doesn’t get the chance to go gloopy in the machine. I never seem to actually stop cutting the grass though, it was done last week and is already long enough to cut again. I’ll be out on St Stephen’s day – I just know it….maybe even Christmas day if it gets too noisy in the house.

SLIPPERY
Check your footwear has good grip. I say this because I went outside in my slippers the other day (yes I have started to wear slippers) and went over on the concrete slabs outside. They didn’t look slippery but they were like glass in the wet. I will be cleaning them with a stiff brush (the concrete that is, not the slippers) and some natural cleaning fluid, or even better, I might get a bargain pressure washer off of e-bay and clean all of the outside areas including the decking. There’s no point putting up with dangerous surfaces until spring, especially if I keep wearing inappropriate footwear. Clearing the area will also give the opportunity to tidy away all of the frost sensitive pots you have around the outside of the house. Take out the summer bedding in the hardy containers and get some winter colour such as pansies, polyanthus and heathers. Maybe you can pick some up cheap on e-bay….I’ll just go and have a check…..