Sunday and Monday

We took both Stella and Jim to Hill House for lunch on Sunday. Unbeknownst to Stella, Simon and Jacob were also planning to come. Stella was very pleased (and surprised) to see Simon. He speaks to her by phone often, but this is the first time he's been to Ballarat since she moved up here. I don't think I've seen Simon since Christmas. I've seen Jacob. He was at the Great Clear Out at Mount Martha.

Jim enjoyed his outing. He particularly enjoyed the food, and especially the roast potatoes. Stella also enjoyed the roast potatoes. She is very fond of roast potatoes and they don't do them in the care facility; mostly they do mashed potatoes and she isn't particularly keen on mashed potatoes. She was also pleased to have roast lamb, rather than chicken. They get a lot of chicken in her dining room. It's served quite often in my dining room too, but I get a choice about what's served in my dining room.

Yesterday I made a start on clearing out the garage. I moved the desk that has been in there since we moved in, doing not very much, out into the long narrow "garden" at the back of the house. I thought it could sit by the garage door, near the compost bins and the plastic cold frame and I could use it as a potting table. All the utilitarian stuff in one place. So I dragged it out of the garage and shoved it up against the wall of the garage and the back fence.

Then I shoved one of the metal shelves to the back wall of the garage, where the desk had been. I sorted out the garden stuff and the tools and the pots. I even swept the garage floor, which was covered in soil and leaves and stuff. Then, I glanced out the garage door window into the backyard - and saw Whiskey pottering around on the desk and making his way onto the wooden seed boxes I had shoved into the (small) space between the garage and the back fence to stop the cats wandering along the space. From there he could easily jump down into the garden over the back fence and I am not sure he would be able to get back again. I am also not sure that their terrier would be entirely delighted to find a Whiskey Cat in his back garden!

I hadn't expected Whiskey to get onto the desk. He's not much of a jumper and he doesn't jump onto the dining table unless he goes via a chair. I have dragged the desk back into the garage, by the garage door. I might have to have another think about where to put the desk. It would work as a potting table where it is, except that the garage door doesn't open fully. Easily enough room for me to go in and out, but not for the wheelbarrow.

I am also going to have to have a rethink about what to do about the asparagus bed. I had intended to move the asparagus from its square, metal bed by the side fence to a new, oblong wooden bed running parallel to the back fence and the fruit bed. I knew I had left it a bit late to move the asparagus. I hadn't realised quite how vigorous it is this year. Tall, well formed spears are emerging. I could, possibly, even harvest a small number this year, and definitely next, as long as the plants are left undisturbed. I have decided not to move them and to run another fruit bed parallel with the side fence. It's also too late to move the rhubarb and blueberry bushes this year. I've planted potatoes in the spaces I was going to put them. I'll move them in the autumn, after the potatoes have finished.

A small redesign of the planned new vegetable/fruit garden is underway. It might even be better!