The 'slash and burn' approach to gardening.

After my enforced lay-off last year, I realised the garden could cope without micro-management and besides, natural wildlife havens are all the rage these days. But now it is looking extremely ragged around the edges, as ivy and laurel continue to rival Japanese knotweed as my most successful plants. So it's out with the secateurs and loppers before the avian estate agents advertise my garden on Twitter!

Marmalade Days

It's that time of year again when the kitchen rings with the sound of knives sharpening and the house is suffused with the smell of oranges. Fortuitous too because the central heating has been on the blink so at least the kitchen has been warm and cosy as the cauldron bubbles away. Apologies for that rather tortuous sentence construction - there is something wrong with it but I can't for the life of me see what. The low temperatures are rendering my thought processes sluggish. Hopefully they'll have a similar effect on the reproduction rate of the garden pests ( see previous posting).

I've seen various questions posed, over the years, about the best gadget for slicing citrus peel. No doubt big business has the appropriate gizmo but I find a sharp knife does the best job. Try it, and you too can seize up with assorted aches and pains!