Post 1

So it's been raining quite a bit. Most of August. Monkey comes back from volleyball training in the park a bit grubby. It feels like a long time since I posted, and the pile of unreviewed books ... (you know the drill). But we are not beating ourselves up about that. Nor the fact that I ordered something on ebay yesterday and didn't notice that it was being sent from China. I am usually very careful. I mean I know all the crap gets made in China but if I buy from someone in this country it has at least probably arrived by ship rather than being flown here. Monkey pointed out I had a hole in my backpack, and Tish pointed out that said backpack had been bought for her when she was in primary school, and having already mended it several times I finally felt justified in replacing it. This is not the thing being sent from China, this will be a beautiful fair trade hemp backpack made in Nepal. The lady from Ipso Mori did not want my opinions yesterday evening because she had filled her quota of people in my age bracket with my education level. She said such people were more than willing to answer questions compared to other groups. 

We went to visit the northerners again, finally meeting Kerri and Aisla (Jacob's family) and had another day passing our little potato around (Tish's name for her). I spent ages showing her the trees outside the bedroom window because she seems to mainly sleep whenever she is taken out for a walk so has barely experienced the outside:

I have rearranged (oh fuck, forgot to pour my tea) part of the garden. I realised that the compost bin was hogging part of the sunny space so moved it by the back door and shifted the Julians in the worm bin next to the water buttts. It works quite satisfactorily. Still just about room to get past:

Compare it to this from 2020, I feel like I have made good progress:

While some things are dying off a bit the sunflowers are going strong and giving me joy:

Tomatoes it seems thrive on neglect. The ones on the ground that have been lovingly tended are tiny and tomato-less; this one was probably a seed in the worm compost and grew in the hanging basket with one of the heucheras, and was frequently left to dry out:

I planted more borage a month or so ago. They are lovely:

Have just started a well-earned 17 day break from work so am determined to review all the pile, since I will read a load more in the coming weeks.

Stay safe. Be kind. Don't beat yourself up about stuff.