Allotment gardening

I persuade my dad to come down and help me to continue clearing the last two badly overgrown bits of the plot. I turn my attention to clearing the bed where the onions used to be. It is now a mass of thistles, brambles, stinging nettles and chickweed. It is quite hard going as round the edges there are lots of brambles that seem to go very deep. Dad turns his attention to turning over the bed where the lettuce used to be. He digs it over and then works it to a fine enough tilth for me to be able to sow some more green manure. By rights it should be too cold for it to grow but we are going through quite a mild spell of weather so you never know. As dad says, it's better in the ground than in the shed. By the time we finish the plot is looking neater still.



Dad bags up three bags of rubbish. On the way out, I dig up a few parsnips for him to say thanks for the help. Fairly generous I feel.
In the evening I pop along to my first ever Annual General Meeting of the allotment association. It is pretty mundane stuff but I ask if we can have more regular skips. They only cost £45 and so it is agreed that we can have another one in February. The association is fairly well off - with £8,000 in the bank. The committee members mull over spending some of it on a nice play and picnic area on one of the plots. I agree it would be nice to have somewhere to sit down. But I get the impression it won't happen any time soon.