loonyfeminist

Right. Today went into Shirley, as planned, to collect new underwear from M&S Simply Food. Hmm. Shirley was gridlocked, and an ambulance was trying, loudly but in vain, to get through. Multiple stupid white van men were studiously ignoring him – how can people do that? and it took me 20 minutes to travel two miles and park. Interestingly, there were plenty of parking places. I guess because everybody was driving their car, not parking it.

Simply Food is not an ideal place to collect orders on a Saturday. Everybody is fraught and much too busy. But I got the stuff. Then discovered when I finally got to Sainsbury’s (mercifully on the way home, not further into the hell that was the Stratford Road this morning), they don’t have any avocados or goat yoghurt. Damn and blast.

Ah well. Got everything else. But got home fraught and wet (it had started to rain). Lunch helped.

After lunch spoke to my friend, at length, who has been having a horrible time. Then a short sleep, then Phase 1 of the gardening. Emptied several grotty pots (that involves separating out the gravel on the top, getting out the dead plants, then putting the compost on the garden, then sorting out the expanded polystyrene. Much better and tidier now. Green wheelie bin full! Also dug up almost everything (except the perennial poppy) in a bed where everything else was just dead. Next phase involves moving two plants (currently in pots) into a different flower bed, and repotting another one. Eventually will be able to dump all the pots with annuals in, and finally, dig up the oblong bed which needs replanting in the spring. Some of the plants I will keep in pots over the winter, but not many. Very satisfying. Needed hubby’s muscle with the biggest pot. Now they all need washing, but that’s for another day.

Post had arrived – some photos of elder daughter’s 30th, see below. Lovely.