Horseradish

My blog is at risk of being hijacked by the allotment.  It seems to be all that we do these days and I still have so many other observations I want transcribed: snow, stag beetles, children (small humans), wood-carving, the loft, camping …….

Last weekend, we spent both afternoons down at the allotment.  I know it was weekend, both my motorbikes were back in my garage (where they belong) and F was taking up my space on the bed upstairs.

Sunshine makes such a difference, the dirt is still too sticky for my preferences, but at least it was dry enough on top to roll on.  I like rolling in dusty stuff.  F must have been there when I wasn’t looking because quite a bit more of it had been dug up, and there is an even bigger pile of weeds in that box made out of old pallets.  Every allotment seems to have one of those; some of them are compost heaps, and some are just rubbish heaps with stinging nettles and blackberries growing out of them.  There is a big sheet of black plastic over a mound of ‘rubbish’ on the allotment next to ours, and a rusty old drum lying on its side.  I spent ages sitting on the plastic waiting for something to move underneath, but I eventually had to retire to the shade and comfort of the drum when the sun reached its zenith.

Lyn, the lady working on a garden we pass on the way in, complimented my stripes.  I like her.  I went to chat her up and find out more about these mice she complained of.  She says they eat her pea plants.

On the other side two young men were bending their backs over a whole garden covered in blackberry and tall stinging nettles.  F says she’s pleased now that ours has only got thistles, docks, and buttercups.

By Sunday afternoon we had 6 mounded up rows.  I watched F make trenches and hide things in them before she scratched the mounds up.  She says I will be able to sleep in the shade of potato leaves before too long…… we’ll see.  I bury things under mounds of earth and they don’t come up potato leaves.

Newly dug bits of earth attracted a robin; pecking about.  Whenever I go into ‘sneaking up’ mode F makes a loud whistle – she learned to do that growing up on a sheep farm in New Zealand.  I wish she hadn’t learned it.  My life would be happier without that noise.  It scares robins away.  Mind you she also uses it at home to let me know it’s meal time, and I can hear it from miles away (even if I don’t want to), so it has its uses sometimes.



At the end of the day Mr B came to chauffeur my sports car home.  F collected up most of the long rooted things she had dug out and put them in a huge bag of rubbish, but she left some out.  I went to point out that she’d missed some, and before she put them in a bucket, she let me sniff them.  Phew!  And then she loaded that into my car!  There was no way I was riding home with that.  Mr B called it horseradish and says it’s great with beef.  Not with my beef thank you very much – that stuff makes your eyes water and the inside of your nose go on fire.



That's horseradish in tht black bag....