Allotment gardening

I have a couple of spare hours this morning to begin catching up on the work that needs doing on the plot. The first job to tackle is the tomato plants. In two weeks they have grown to Frankenstein proportions with side shoots all over the place. I can't walk between the rows because the plants are so bushy. I begin cutting off side shoots and tying up the main stems. A couple of the plants are more-or-less growing along the ground. I chop away, sacrificing a few budding tomatoes so that the main trusses can grow properly. I am joined after a bit by my wife, Cath, and youngest son, Nathan. Cath cracks on with some weeding - the worst of it around the lettuces and strawberries. Nathan busies himself by picking off some nicely-developed plum tomatoes when neither of us is looking. Cath finally notices by which time the little angel has picked about 20. "Look daddy, bean," he says smiling up at me. I control my anger admirably and send him off to play in another part of the plot. I trim and tie up about half the plants. They'll still take a bit of sorting out tomorrow.