Absolutely nothing to do with smallholdings...

...but you've got to do something on a rainy weekend, and we need to tidy things up a bit!

Cheap (ish) crap pine + wobby workmate and 150 year old tenon saw + bent double for days on end sawing and cursing = something you could have got in IKEA days ago.  I don't want to see another mortise and tenon joint as long as I live.  Apart from all the other jobs on the list that need them...

I give it two days before the cats murder something on it.

A tenner well spent.

Rescue one rusty, dirty ol' saw from a brocante.  Clean off the rust with wet & dry, sand the handle clean and smooth and coat liberally with linseed oil.  Next day, wipe excess oil off hand, sharpen and set teeth with a pair of pliers and a file.

Then do the equivalent of 100 one-arm pressups and slice your log up.  This keeps you warm and gives you a perfect excuse to eat two lunches at once.

Take your surprisingly heavy slices and split 'em up.  Take the time to see where the grain runs to avoid hammering the axe down and getting nowhere and nothing but injury.  Should take little effort (kind of): like everything else done properly with hand tools, keep them super-sharp and use the tool's weight as the driving force.  Also, swing it well and the log just pops open (kind of) to reveal wonderfully-smelling beautiful wood.  Kind of.

Job done!  Off to eat a lot of food.

Last of the Gite-hicans.

Finally, absolutely finished!  Anyone fancy a visit?

Belters.  Now I can get on with the smallholding and waffle about food and stuff!

Cold and wet.

We have got gite bookings rolling in so I have been spending all week in the absolutely freezing hangar making a cupboard to hide the gas bottle for the gite cooker out of crappy scrap I had lying around and a splendid bronze plane.  Absolutely no gardening this week due to howling winds, torrential rain and freezing mud coating everything.  Still a bit to do out there though:

Finish digging (only a metre left but need a dry half hour for it!)
Mulch the beds with horse poo and compost depending on what's going where next year
Dig out a new bigger holding bed
Dig up all the ash and oak trees in the driveway and plant out in the field (have to wait for the Boys to vacate it now)
Cut and trim hedges and boundaries
Cut poles for trellis, beanpoles and pea-sticks
Prune trees and fruit bushes
Take cuttings of trees and bushes
Etc...

Thankfully, I have 5 crates of beer to get me through it - half the usual light fizzy ("mesle yellow") and a new one: a strong, dark, 7%(maybe) battle pop.  Tastes great and I no longer miss the Gardener's (nearly).  Need a name for it: maybe "Bad Santa"...

I'll post some piccies later.

Earthling study final report.

They're all doomed.  Worldwide financial crisis brought on by banking debts and massive consumer debt, so why not turn to bankers and economists to sort it out then.

Bit like a police force manned by burglars.

Hmm, hmm, yes - that is a worry.  Less than 1% growth.  Gosh.  Could be a recession.  Golly.  Nobody's spending any money.  Hmm.  Euro's going tits up.  Shucks.

Venus is scorched with a surface temperature of about 482° C (900° F). This high temperature is primarily due to a runaway greenhouse effect caused by the heavy atmosphere of carbon dioxide. 

Probably some trouble getting seeds to germinate there, and here as well in a few short years...

Proper jobs for November.

 Hedge done!  Proper job, that was!

 Double digging started!  Proper job, this is!

 Stones from hedge line and 1m of spud bed - doing a proper job of it!

 Trees being planted!  A right proper job!

Christmas ale brewing!  Should be a p- oh ok, I'll shut up.

The long view for good stuff.

Rant alert!

We're going to plant a hedge for a windbreak between the veg plot and the field (soon to be woodland).  This involves taking a spade and banging away at the "turf", an aggregate of rubble and woody roots, and carting it down the bottom of the field, a staggeringly heavy wheelbarrow load.  Then a fork is taken and the strip is then broken up (using all my body weight to get the fork in) for K to then come and dig up all the dandelion roots and stones (a barrow full every 3 feet or so).  Then we go over it again, digging in some fertiliser (organic, people), then we plant up the hedge.

Seem like a lot of hard work?  Too bloody right it is, but as with everything here, it seems that the more effort you put in, the better the result is.  And there's no instant satisfaction either: everything is always next year at the shortest.  Going to plant some walnut and mulberry trees so I can have nuts and berries when I'm 60.  Digging this almost unbelievably hard, stony soil now so we can plant tiny saplings in 6 weeks so we can have a hedge in 4 year's time.  We cart manure off the field (thanks Harvey and Gedion) so we can then dig it into the spud beds the year after next.  Etc.  The result is that our place is becoming more fertile and beautiful every day and we are getting very fit!

Compare this to Mr Normal's day: instant everything.  Instant coffee and cereal for breakfast, on the train with his (or her, the mad cow) I-phone type trinket, getting instant messaging, downloads, email, etc.  Then fast food (not really food - ask to see the Long Egg in Subway and you'll get it), then maybe on the computer games in the evening to wind down a bit, where everything is instant, failure is impossible (pause and save), and maybe some sort of short-term instant gratification at the weekend with some new trainers on the credit card.  No long-term view about anything (except pensions of course, which are one of the biggest rip-offs of all time), which is lucky because the long-term result of all this is...

...a world of shit.

Use your hands.
Create for those who come after you.
Always think 'is this better, or just quicker?'

Off to eat more vegetables we planted ages ago.