New grass for the garden

No, we haven't re-turfed the lawn. We went to B&Q last weekend to buy some green sticks for propping up our sunflower seedlings. £53 later we had sticks, we had shears, we had mastic and filler and, best of all, we had a selection of grassy plants.

We've an idea to create a grassy corner of the garden with the kind of plants that like a bit of light and a bit of shade. They'll be bushy little things, a perfect hiding place for wildlife in the garden.

All in all it'll add another area of contrast to a garden of contrasts and should look very good in a few months when the grasses have established themselves.

The garden is really starting to come together now, and we can't wait for the summer to arrive in earnest and all our plants to grow like they're enjoying themselves!

A sunflower year in the garden

We were rather over-zealous in planting sunflower seeds recently and now we've more than 60 little seedlings at the stage where they needed re-potting before they grow too big for their small pots. Last night we spent a fair bit of time separating clumps of 8 or 10 seedlings into 1's and 2's and potting them into new pots. The only thing we didn't have is something to put those pots on to stop water leaking all over the kitchen surfaces. However we found inspiration in our recycling bin and now our pots are sitting on a varied assortment of plastic food trays from chickens, sausages and a range of tasty meaty products.

In a couple of weeks, after some hardening off, I think the sunflowers will be ready to brave the garden. With the amount we've got it will be quite some display and we'll certainly have plenty of seeds left for next year!!!

Another busy weekend in the garden

Following our successes in the garden last weekend we decided to get back out there this weekend and continue with the garden make-over. We spent a few hours digging over our borders in preparation for planting out the seeds that are rapidly germinating in the kitchen, the decided to do a bit of tidying of the lawn. To this effect we purchased 10 meters of half-log border fencing and have enclosed the lawn with that (as you can see on the photo).

Elsewhere in the garden everything we planted last weekend still seems to be doing well, we've even harvested a bit of parsley to go with a salmon dinner - very tasty it was too. In the kitchen our seeds are germinating like mad. The sunflowers started to come through only 2 days after planting and are already a couple of inches high. Tomatos, chives, and sweetpeas are all on their way, the only no-show so far are the chillis - hopefully they're on their way!

Next up we need to install our water-butt so we've plenty of healthy rain water for the garden, do a bit more preparation in the borders and take a look at the lawn - it needs mowing and feeding. It's all good fun!!!

Spring time for Ian and Ana in Sturry

Spring has sprung in our garden and so this weekend we headed for the garden centre to buy some green things. We have inherited quite a few large pots from the previous owners and decided to buy some established plants to put in these, the idea being that we could move these around the garden to fill in spaces until we decide just what we want to put there permanently.

We loaded our trolley with a selection at shrubs, herbs, flowers and ferns plus a few packets of seeds. We also picked up several different types of compost for our new friends. The rest of the weekend was spent re-potting camelias, azaleas, cordylines, box, ferns, lavender, parsley and rosemary. We've also planted seeds for tomatos, chillis, sunflowers, chives and sweetpeas. We've also got cucumbers and runner-beans waiting for sowing later in the season.

Our garden, which was rather empty, is now looking much better. As the season goes on we should be adding more and more and are looking forward to a good collection of flowers and our first harvest of vegetables. I should also mention the we've had some lovely looking bulbs flowering for the last few weeks - daffodils in the borders and crocuses in the lawn, mostly in the front garden.

We're discovering gardening to be a relaxing and rewarding activity. It's been a little expensive so far but that's the route we've decided to follow and for me it has been worth every penny. I'll let you know how we get on :o)

A Night at the Opera

No... this posting isn't about the classic Marx Brothers film, or the equally classic Queen album. On Valentines night Ana and I spent a very enjoyable night at the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury watching the marvellous Chişinău National Opera's production of Verdi's "Aida".

This was the second opera that we have attended together, the first being Puccini's "Madama Butterfly". The stage production was very impressive, the set was lavish, the singers loud and very professional sounding. Ancient Egypt was certainly brought to life and quite realistically as well. In my humble opinion it was money well spent, even if we were at the very back of the theatre.

Now I wouldn't say that I am an opera convert as I don't think I would put on a CD of this particular opera, but to see it performed live is an experience that everyone can and probably should enjoy. "Aida" doesn't have many of the popular opera pieces that you often hear on the classical radio stations or CD compilations, but the story is nevertheless operatic and yes, you've guessed it, ends with... well, I won't give it away but there isn't a big twist at the end. The story of slave princess Aida follows the standard opera theme of lovers divided by society, jealousy, betrayal and the inevitable demise of the protaganists; Sophocles couldn't have written a better tragedic outcome.

So all in all I'd say if you get the chance to see a production of "Aida" then you'd be foolish to turn it down - you never know, you might actually enjoy yourself just as I did.

The 2007 Quiz Season has started again

First of all let me give a big greeting to anyone who has been keeping an eye on my blog and wondered if I had been abducted by aliens. I have to say that I haven't, but I also haven't felt much in the way of inspiration for writing recently; all that is about to change.

So let's kick things off with a posting about quizzes, as Ana and I seem to be lined up to go to a few in the next couple of months, culminating in the KM Big Quiz in which our team, "The Quizlings", came a respectable 11th out of 60 odd teams last year.

Last weekend we went to a "warm-up" quiz at Graveney Village Hall. The teams comprised of mainly the over 50s, with questions to match. Mostly the questions were fairly easy with the odd brain bender in there, but all teams generally scored 9 or 10 on each round. Consequently it was a close fought contest but our knowledge of 1940s and 1950s acronyms and shopkeeper phrases let us down. Who knows what a costamonger is? I just couldn't remember it's the old word for a fruit seller! We managed a reasonably respectable 4th(ish) place our of 9 and went away happy with our performance. I don't think we could have done any better; we certainly weren't kicking ourselves over the answers we missed.

The highlight of the evening eventually turned out to be our good friend Neil winning not 1 but 4 prizes in the cheesey raffle. None of the prizes were cheese in the literal sense of the word, that would have been preferable. He went away happy though with a good stock of presents to give at future christmases and birthdays.

The next quiz event is in a week. The great Canterbury Christ Church University Staff Association Wine and Wisdom evening. We've put together a crack team and will hopefully get a top 3 finish, maybe even first if we play our joker right. Adding to the interest of the evening is getting to meet the new girlfriend of that perennial layabout Chris. How he managed to land himself a girlfriend in the first place is beyond me, and perhaps I'm not too interested to find out.

I'll be sure to let everyone know how we perform on the night. I predict at least a top 5 place, which will be an improvememt on last year. The only real dilemma we have at the moment is what to call our team!

Is there life on Mars?

Captain's log, Stardate 13112006.2128

David Bowie once pondered on this, and I have too. Or more specifically I've been wondering about sentient and intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe. Current thinking puts our Universe at 80 billion light years across so in the countless galaxies, solar systems and planets it is hard to believe that life has not evolved in the 18 billion years since the "Big Bang" kicked everything off.

One question that interests me more than most is what form might this life take, and I suppose that very much depends on the conditions in which it is to survive. On our own planet life takes many different forms, although the dominant ones are land-based and the superior one is bipedal leaving two limbs free to manipulate its environment. On other worlds is life structured in much the same way that we are, all muscles and tendons stretched over a supporting skeleton, or may it have evolved in the air or in liquid? What might it look like, how might it communicate, reproduce, eat, sleep and move? These are all questions that we are unlikely to ever know, since the distances required to travel find out are so vast that, I suspect, nothing has been able to cross it yet.

Is there life on Mars? If there is it is probably nothing more than primitive bacteria or other single celled creatures but proof of its existence would be a key milestone in man's evolution. Is there life in the Universe? How can there not be. I don't believe human kind could be arrogant enough to believe that the happy coincidences that have led to our existence cannot have occurred elsewhere in the vast and mysterious Universe that we inhabit.