Marsworth on sunny Sunday afternoon...

It has to be said that we who live in Tring and the surrounding area are somewhat blessed with nice places to visit. One such area is that at and about Marsworth Reservoir. It is situated by the loveliness that is the Grand Union canal and wwe went for a walk there after lunch at the Bluebell Cafe.

The view across the reservoir to the beginning of the Chiltern Hills

Canal left; reservoir, right

Grand Union canal - I have to say that this stretch is one of the loveliest...

Alison and Sophie in the distance

Aren't swans just so... swan-like

I would live here at the drop of a hat - and about £1.5million

The above is where the house in the previous picture presides. It's a
convergence of two bits of the canal at Bulbourne, just down the road
from where we live.

This was meant to show a frenzy of tadpoles, but having been taken on a mobile it's not very clear. They are the little blob of black just to the right of centre

Just looking back along the reservoir, couldn't resist that nice cloud formation

Back to gardening tomorrow, just wanted to share this lovely little afternoon...


Happy walking!

Hong Kong Garden

OK, spurious link alert, I made the title of this load of bloggox "Hong Kong Garden" because I've been watching Punk Britannia and Siouxsie and the Banshees were a favourite of mine back in the day. My tenuous link to Punk? I was once at a party and the four original members of the Sex Pistols were there. This was in the winter of 1975/6 I think and John Lydon was sitting all by himself in an armchair nursing a glass of something looking bored to tears.


 I was told who he was and what the band were called and said, "Who?" waddya know, hindsight is a wonderful thing. This was a little while before the Summer of '76 kicked in, you know that drought that didn't have any rain, unlike the recent just ended drought... In that summer I disappeared for 10 days - bit like Agatha Christie, only she was a writer and I'm not - on my famed (in our family) "Lost Weekend".


I went to Liverpool for a long weekend and didn't return for the aforementioned allotted time. I didn't ring work and I didn't ring home. I think it was the first time my dad truly worried about me - we had an awkward teen-year-thing going on. I was 19, the teen-year-thing had started six years before!


Anyhoo, enough of that stuff, gardens, that's what it's all about. Recently I have bloggocksed about the weather and how rather restricting it has been for me on the work front. Suffice to say, not a lot has changed, but I did work on every day this week which is a first for three weeks or so.


Here are some pictures and I think I will add longer captions than usual, just to speed things up a bit.

This is nice... At Pat's place in Berko Robins have decided her
post box is the perfect home. Sweet!

Pat's grass hadn't been cut for a couple of weeks and she gets mildly
paranoid at that fact. I think this Wem-ber-lee look is pretty damn good.
 I usually cut it with curves through it but last week I decided to give it
 a formal look. Standard stripes across and down the length of the lawn.
I, for one, think it looks fine...

The brown at the bottom of this Hebe is from "someone" using the dreaded weed killer without thinking about the plants. Disappointing, it's not my garden but I don't like the use of chemicals for this very reason. You have to be sooooo careful when applying them. A lot of the plants have been affected. Shame.

The following are from Rebecca's place in Bucks and I have to say it was an eventful day there this Tuesday 19th June 2012 (so sue me Locog!) if only for the fact that my trimmer's engine basically fell off mid-trim. It got so hot the plastic melted and the whole back of the trimmer, petrol driven, just fell to the ground all aflame and obviously feeling a bit sorry for itself. A sad demise seeing how it was well less than a year old. On to the warranty then, but in the mean time I had to buy a new one.


Tring garden centre is OK, don't get me wrong, but this Wednesday - obviously the 20th - it was nothing short of, well, inCompRehensibly APpaling. The servers had crashed - perhaps linked to the RBS/NatWest debacle this week, whatever! - and there were no staff to help anyone, anywhere.


I asked for a Ryobi In-line trimmer, petrol driven. Firstly, no one was available to see if they had one in stock, "We never keep that many in stock sir." 15 minutes later the member of staff cajoled into "helping me" came back with a Flymo hover mower and electric trimmer. Another member of staff said, as I sent the first one back to get what I asked for, "Sorry, he's the Plantarian Manager." What's that got to do with me, I thought. It was like a line from Fawlty Towers. "He's from, Bar-cell-owner."


Next the Plantarian - a Dr Who character if ever there was one - returned with a Ryobi Brushcutter. Twice the price and NOT the item I asked for. Problem was I only spotted it when the Plantarian asked for more money. "If I didn't need it urgently, I work as a gardener, I would be walking away from here mate! I want a Ryobi In-line trimmer," as he walked away with the brushcutter I added, "Petrol driven."


At this point the original assistant, a woman who looks like Sonia from Eastenders, caught my eye - thankfully she didn't drop it - and, I kid you not, tutted. "I know," I said, "he's a Plantarian."


He came back with the correct product. I paid and took a double pack of gardening gloves for my trouble - this episode took 40 minutes. 


Oh yeah, the original Flymo hover mower (returned to the stock room) was actually wanted by another customer who had wandered off and "...lost all sense of time..." I kid you not, she said that after being away from the till for over 30 minutes.


Likesay, pix from Rebecca's:

A lovely Delphinium

I love a pond... And I love lily pads

The driveway - I so should take "before" pictures, this is a truly remarkable transformation!

Oh dear! Work in progress I believe. Each week seems to bring more problems with the drains - bit like the Coalition Government.

So, there you have it, that was the week that was. More rain than you can shake a stick at (sic) and the thought that I should have at least shaken said stick at the Plantarian.


Happy Shaking...

A momentous decision

I am well and truly off Facebook - and by "off", I mean no longer do I have a page. I won't be a pompous arse and say all the crass things about it, but I have a real problem with the access situation. I'm sure I've done enough cyber walking for "them" to know a lot about me - as is the case for anyone who has surfed the Tinterweb - BUT I really don't like a big company like Facebook passing on the fact that I once liked Didier Drogba's Facebook page and that I might like to buy a condo in the Ivory Coast. In the long run it really doesn't matter I know, but hey that's me and my discomfort has made up my mind for me. NO MORE FACEBOOK!


I have a lovely website - designed by the lovely Karen Cooper of KC Graphics - and really don't feel the need to show off anywhere else but here in bloggocks-land and leave the website to do the job of drumming up business for my gardening skills (sic). 

http://www.simonmurraygardenservices.co.uk/


What I might do is add a few more aspects of the Murray life and blog on a few  subjects (hooray say you, Mr Deluded). So, on Saturday had a visit down to London to meet up with a few of the ex-picketers from outside South Africa House. It was hugely disappointing on the numbers front, eight as against about 40 last year, but we were a perfectly formed gathering of immense political- and radical-ness, despite what some misguided communists might think.


The only reason I think it was so badly attended was probably because last year was the 25th anniversary of the Non-Stop Picket for the Release of Nelson Mandela and All Political Prisoners in Apartheid South Africa, run by the awesome City of London Anti-Apartheid Group - City AA, City Group, The Non-Stop Picket or as the lovely Boys in Blue from Cannon Row cop shop used to call us, The Claags! This is a link to a superb on-going documentation of the picket by Gavin Brown, an ex-picketer himself:

http://nonstopagainstapartheid.wordpress.com/


However, I did meet up with Deirdre, Gavin and Patrick for lunch and a trip to The Tate Modern in the afternoon to see Damien Hirst's exhibition. 

I'm no fan, but have a very slight regard for Mr Hirst, if only because he takes the piss out of the middle classes and above and basically steals from them. Crazy stuff. The exploitation of animals is repulsive. Killing sharks to order, especially endangered ones would be pathetic if it wasn't so ignorant, arrogant and full of bullshit.

Below we have thousands of cigarette butts on mirrored shelves...

...I confess I never read the blurb because it's always so pretentious and full of bullshit, so what this represents, other than many hours work for the staff of the Tate Modern, I have no idea - don't wanna know either...



One thing though, here's a few nice shots of London...

SA House... Nearly 20 years since we left it alone...

Countdown continues to some sporting event

in the East End - 74 days to go

This is from the roof of the Tate Modern, the Members bar, fabulous

Once again when I arrived in town, the first bus I saw was this:

They've gone back to a double decker, very sensible!


And finally, a new garden to look after...

...not a lot to do at the front, but a massive lawn to cut every two weeks round the back.


So, there you have it, a little bit of gardening news at the end, so I don't feel too bad. Thinking of starting a new radio station, anyone got any ideas as to how to go about it?


Happy twiddling...

None for sooo long then 3 come along at once...

What am I like eh? 


I came up with a new word the other day, bloggocks or bloggox if you want to be cool. It's a mix of bollocks and blog - did you spot that? Anyway, it's what this is all about innit?


Here is a most gorgeous picture from Womad a few years back. I post it because it's beautiful, sent to me by a beautiful person:

The ceiling of the Siam tent Womad 2006, courtesy of my best friend - wish I could make it this year the 30th anniversary, but well, y'know...

Today, Tuesday 12th June 2012, I was at Rebecca's place in Quainton and the building work has taken on a whole new tenor. Like great big ugly tracks all over the grass and great big ugly holes in places where there shouldn't be but ah well, there we go...


I was going to take pictures of the work, but it depressed me a bit, so I re-strimmed the little pathways I cut through the meadow area a few weeks back. I love it down there and at some point later in the year we are going to add a little seating area by the brook that runs at the bottom of the meadow. Can't wait!


Here are the new pictures:

This is a newly cut path, across the top of the re-sown area I did in April

Doesn't really look it here, but this is a quite steep hill up to the main lawn area

Looking along the bottom back to the re-sown area

And this is where the tennis court will be next year.
At the top of the drive

It's a garden I could work on all week and still struggle to keep on top of it at this time of year, so the 10 hours I do every Tuesday merely scratches the surface. Very enjoyable work and very lovely people!*


Happy strimming, if you can!


*And I'm not just saying that...

I promise not to mention the weather... Part Deux

Two posts in a day - sounds like a song a la Crowded House's Four Seasons in One Day, love 'em. Now I've mentioned them I am listening to Weather With You, class. Neil Finn has to be one of the nicest blokes - I know it's not possible to know that for sure, but he was one of the blessed Linda McCartney's favourites, so he must be good.


On my way to Quainton every Tuesday morning I pass through a new housing estate and I laugh a lot. And this is why I laugh a lot:

This place is about 30 seconds from the edge of Aylesbury and, all due respect to the people of Aylesbury, but it's not the most scenic of places and has a bit of a reputation for drugs and suchlike. And I do not judge here, not by any stretch of anyone's imagination. These signs are for a pile of crap estate called Kingsfield Park and they say (just in case you can't read them):


1 Kingsfield Park  - Air to Breathe


2 Kingsfield Park  - Space to Think


3 Kingsfield Park  - Space to Think (again)


4 Kingsfield Park  - Room to Grow


It's a shockingly misleading bit of marketing. Most of the houses are back to back and cramped up into little cul-de-sacs that could not give you space to swing the proverbial marketing exec, let alone to think, breathe and grow. I guess I'm just a house snob, I like old houses, at least turn of last century and new estates just seem such anodyne little boxes with gardens the size of a stamp. All too pretty and possibly not that well built. Here's a couple of the house styles from their website:

Gimme Victorian streets any day!


This is the top of the driveway at Rebecca's in Quainton, about five minutes drive from Kingsfield:

And here are some flowers from the top of the drive too:

Nice!


Happy house hunting - if you're doing it!

I promise not to mention the weather...

OK, I feel a bit lost. I am one of those sad individuals who has to do something. And by something, I mean work. I have this innate feeling that I must earn to justify my existence. When I think logically about that obvious psychotic behaviour I should tell myself, "Chill, if you can't work it's not your fault", but I feel like I'm letting people down. All those nice people with their lovely gardens... Ho hum.


Anyhoo, I have a backlog of pictures to upload and will basically make a selection from the past month or so. It's probably a good thing as I have quite a lot and so I must edit out the worst ones. (Can't believe I haven't blogged for over a month, still can't get the hang of this!)

First time in my life I actually love a car - not in the fruity sense of the word obviously, that would be berserk. The "Belgrano" (big and grey and never been anywhere near the Falklands) is a beauty and now I have discovered boxes it's actually quite neat!

Here are some little jobs I have done, not insignificant of course just some nice tidying up, something I actually enjoy - slightly gay?

Before...

...after. A nice little cottage in Tring

Before...

...after. The greenhouse area at Rebecca's place in Quainton - why is this soooo enjoyable?

Before...

...after. A little bit of topiary at Julie's place in Buckland. I sometimes feel cutting hair may have been a good career, but then I think hair is such a bad idea...

Some flowers:

"Bellis perennis is a common European species of Daisy, of the aster family, often considered the archetypal species of that name. Many related plants also share the name "daisy", so to distinguish this species from other daisies it is sometimes qualified as common daisy, lawn daisy or English daisy."
Many thanks to Wikipedia! I love daisies, such a shame I spend so much of my time mowing them up. I think they are so quintessentially British and we should adopt the little beauty as our national flower, sod the rose!

And here are some pretty pictures (I think) sort of at random. Yeah, that's the sun in the top one - damn! does that constitute mentioning the weather?

This is a painting in waiting isn't it? Love those shadows, but seeing as my current painting has been sitting in the dining room untouched for about 3 months, it ain't gonna happen some time soon

The previously flowerless wisteria at Pat's.
I'm hoping next year will see it awash!

Lunch time at Pat's - gotta get those feet up some time!

OK! That's it for this post, I'm going to have to write another to include the remainder of the pictures. They have a bit of an irreverent feel, so I think it would be out of place in a blog with such nice pictures.


Back in a mo...


Happy days!