Oh Brother

My brother Mike came to England. Cheap tickets and extra unpaid vacation (courtesy of the economic slowdown) made a spontaneous trip materialize out of nowhere. I had to find stuff for us to do for 10 days. We covered a lot of ground: most of Herefordshire, a big chunk of Wales, and even a journey into Ireland. Nearly 3 tanks of gas in the Volvo -- at a range of over 400 miles each, about 10 trains, a tram, and two ferries, and a handful of buses were used in the making of this trip.

I've been promising Mum some photos so this is part 1 of several covering the past two weeks adventures.

The Weir Garden is a site just outside of Hereford city in Swainshill. Rach and I had driven by it often enough on our way out to Oak Church, a relatively upscale food store and the first place we found Frank's Redhot for sale. We had never went in to the Garden.

The Garden is managed by the National Trust, an extensive charity that preserves hundreds of sites in the UK and makes them available to folks everywhere. The garden was built back in the 1920's by a guy by the name of Roger Parr. No idea who he was -- but he picked quite a spot. A steep and terraced hillside with tall trees sits on the edge of winding spot of the River Wye. Each season brings out a different set of flowers. The pictures say it best:




Cheers!

Something Is Rotten

We had high hopes for our English garden but time and shite weather wore us down.

The horseradish plant was gigantic and we expected to find one big root like a human leg underneath it. Instead we found some skinny toes. Nevertheless, it has some kick and has found good use.

The tomatoes are all but a complete loss. Whilst I was away in Oregon, the plants attacked each other in a smothering war. By the time we broke it up, rot had set in and the weather went to hell. We might get one or two but almost all have went very funky. The eggplant and peppers we had near the tomatoes appear to be following a similar course and have started to go bad.

The potted Dwarf Apache (is that doubly offensive?) pepper plant has been a surprise. It has produced a very bright and red selection of peppers that vary from tame and tangy to some that are sure to provide a solid case of the ol' HH. Trust me on this.

Another surprise has been the zucchini (courgette over here) and pumpkin plant. One of each plant has grown to impressive size and we have more zucchini than we know what to do with. The pumpkins are still green babies but doing fine.

We recently found out we have what we think is a yucca plant growing in the yard. This was one of our least favorite plants: it has leaves like spears that destroy Boo's balls on a regular basis and can do some damage if you get too close. That was until it has popped out what appear to be some impressive flowers waiting to do their thing.

So, any way, I mentioned my Dwarf Apache peppers up top and I just can't think the word 'Apache' without having to watch a Tommy Seebach video. You never know where a blog is going to end up. If you have never seen the original, you should find it and watch it in full. Here it is folks: Tommy Seebach's Apache attacked by Disturbed. This is what happens when you drink and blog.

Better Blogs

Folks -- England hasn't provided much blog fodder this past week. The weather still sucks. Hedge trimming is overrated. And both the wife and I have been putting in lots of hours at the mill.

I could tell you about how I had to fix the fence since Boo has escaped twice and found that the field next door is invested with some mutant horde of fleas. Seriously.

Or about how hedge trimming is a crap job. The trimming part is fun but you wouldn't believe how quickly those hedge trimmings can add up. I have no idea what to do with them.

We could talk about how we finally have a car and that shifting with your left hand feels like someone else is doing it and that the wife says I still get a constipated look on my face when I change gears. Hmm.

Or we could talk about how we totally lost control of the garden. I actually used the hedge trimmer to cut down the lettuce and it took us 2 hours yesterday to untangle the two giant tomato trees that had waged a smothering war on each other (but - oh! - the fried green tomatoes made from the fallout boys were awesome!)

But there is hope. We have confirmed a quick break-out of England this Friday as we make our way to Paris to meet with some travelling cousins. Alright, alright. Good food, good drink, a room right next to the Eiffel-ma-bob, and lots of blog-tastic adventures.

Follow that up with a possible trip to the home of goulash (Budapest!) later in September and the arrival of our very first and most special American visitors, His Lord and Ladyship the Duke and Duchess of Westmont (Pez and Payne), and you have a hot month of blogging. Better than a hot lunch, I'll say, unless you are in to that sort of thing.

Cheers!

Pull Not Down Thy Hedge

We have hedges. And despite the cute Ron Jeremy fantasy perception of hedges and their inhabitants, hedges take some work.

In the tradition of naming my household and garden implements after Tolkien references, behold Narsil, the Hedge Trimmer. Narsil, a Bosch AHS 52 Accu, was brought in to handle our unruly hedges. Fifty-two centimeters of laser cut blades and two 14.4 volt batteries, providing 55 minutes of hedge trimming fervor each, have brought my abilities up to Edward Scissorhands status. I went with the cordless variety with the hopes that if we ever leave the Land of Rain, we can simply get a different charger to keep using it (unlike the appliances we bought.) I also had a crippling fear of slicing through the cord of a corded variety.

The first hedge pic is a naughty hedge. It is growing every which way with no regard for the aesthetics of our garden. It taunts me and makes a mockery of the well kept grass. It must be tamed.

The procedure is simple. Insert battery in Narsil, lay blanket under hedge (saves on clean up time), and attack with hedge trimmer. Narsil makes short work of hedge branches up to 15mm thick. It can also quickly chop through a bob wire fence when one gets ones Narsil too close to it (oops!) Unfortunately, I am alone in my blogging today so I am unable to provide an action shot.

Now, here we have nice tidy hedge that has been taken down a notch. If a branch had some desire to stick out from the pack, it was chopped off. We have no room for individuality in this yard. Everything is right again.

In a few days of sporadic on and off trimming -- it has rained on and off for going on 2.5 years here now -- I have accumulated mountains of hedge trimmings. The trimmings apparently are like crack for slugs, which have moved in to the pile in droves. I need to call on the neighbors to see if I can add my slug nest to their burn pile. I suppose this is a detail I should have worked out ahead of time but once I had the Narsil, "reason" took a brief holiday.

Callow Lilies

The Lilacs has more surprises. A calla lily popped out of a plain-looking plant. Right behind it, what I thought was just a gnarly tree is apparently a giant rose -- uh -- tree.

Field Guide To Mushrooms

I once had a book that tried to explain to me which wild mushrooms were safe to eat. It involved doing stuff like picking unknown mushrooms and then letting them sit on white paper over night. During the night, the mushrooms would spew forth their spores onto the white paper. Then, in the morning, you could examine the spores. Trouble was, color was a key factor in determining whether not eating said mushroom would be just tasty or tasty and deadly, too. You may recall I am color-blind.... so I gave up on that hobby.

I've figured out which mushrooms are safe to eat in Hereford. Those would be the ones that we grow in our pantry. Awesome. We harvested our first crop of 'shrooms this week and we can barely keep up. The experience was so rewarding we then went on a hunt to farm and garden stores across all Herefordshire looking for more mushroom kits. We found one -- just one -- on closeout. My dream of having fresh homegrown mushrooms year round might be in jeapordy. Are you listening, Señor Unwin? Show ... me ... the ... mushrooms ...

Thanks to Rachel on this one: check out the Vanna White-style technique on the mushroom presentation. Nice!