Understand one thing before we commence, today's blog has nothing to do with my recent illness. No the Big Prune does not refer, or have any direct connection other than the way it is spelt, to that rather queer little brown shrivelled, dry (and yet still with a hint of moistness) wrinkled fruit oft eaten by the older generation to keep them more regular than Big Ben itself. But then even Big Ben relies on the small pile of penny coins on it's pendulum to keep it regular and.... where am I going with this?
Oh yeah, it has nothing to do with those funny little things in juice (or syrup) in a tin, neither the 250ml or the 440ml cans. Far, far, far too long working in the Grocery trade!
Nor, is it The Big Prune as in The Big Society, although they do seem to both rely on cuts being an integral part of the plan. No,no. No, this is the the big Prune as in snippity snip, snip. Wait a bit, that could be misconstrued too, no not The Snips, I mean pruning...... In the Garden..... you know?...... WITH SHEERS!
God, you're all hard work today!
What happened was Captain Oates as I have taken to naming our Great Exploring "I am just going outside and may be some time" cat, Scribble wanted to go out and play, admittedly her intentions were to 'play' with the birds. She has, however, lost all her prisoner privileges and can only go into the exercise yard when accompanied by an adult or failing that, me :) This is to both protect the birds and simultaneously me, from the further embarrassment of having to walk around the entire village like Wee Willy Winkie shouting out the ludicrous word that is her name if she goes walk about again. I really couldn't handle that a third time. Now I have found she is capable of a far more heinous crime in that she can shin up a small shrub, get on to the garden wall and then a small leap and she is on to our Annex roof. From there she would have absolutely no obstructions and having set up base camp on the Office roof she would easily be able to climb up the shingles to the Solar Panel escarpment then she would make short work of the great East West Ridge and before you could say :- "Come back down here you little....." She'd be totally stuck on next doors roof and I'd have to call the Fire-brigade!
Now I'm sure that my Daughter would be more than happy to entertain the Firemen when they arrived but no she is not here and all we have is just her darling of a cat. So when she goes into the garden I have to babysit her to make sure she doesn't eat any birds or climb out of the garden and get lost. By 'she' of course I mean the Cat and NOT Claire whom, in all fairness to her, I have never ever seen even look at a Chaffinch with a mind to eating one.
So whilst I was on forced yard duty and as it was sunny I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone, oops, perhaps not the best turn of phrase eh? So I started The Big Prune, understand now? Starting with some Roses then the buddleia and then the rest of the garden. After an hour Captain Oats went in doors but I had got all the paraphernalia out and was by this time up to my wheelbarrows axles in clippings, so I struggled onwards. Some six hours later, four hours after the sun went in and 2 hours after the Arctic wind had joined me I decided to follow her in to the house. Only then to be told by her it was now time for her supper and could I hurry along a bit as some of us have got a bit peckish whilst you've been larking around in the garden all day! Grrrrrrrrrrr!
But the plants all look a lot better for their hair cut and I took extra special pleasure in severely cutting the roses back as I had a grudge against them. Some fifteen years back I was merely walking through an arbour in our old property's garden, well I say an arbour, it was actually the frame to the children's old swing which I had never taken to the dump and happened to have two roses growing next to it. And... as I innocently walked through it one of the mean old roses took a swipe at me. Well it missed my face and hit me in the side of the head, right in the ear 'ole and I felt this warm liquidy, glupey goo trickle down my neck. Now the last time I felt that sort of warm liquid against my skin was on the way home from junior school when, frankly, I was just never going to make it home in time! But this was too high up for that and so I assumed it was blood and instinctively slapped a hand on to the ear from whence it seemed to emanate. Well that didn't stop it and as I was on day off I had to drive to the hospital with one hand desperately trying to hold a chunk of my ear to the main body of the rest of the ear whilst it bled at a rather unhelpful rate.
At the hospital they have, of course, seen it all and this serious and major trauma did not seem to phase the young triage nurse who simply said, oh nasty, OK I'll just get the glue. GLUE! Surely he was having a laugh! "You're going to glue that bit of ear back on?" I checked. He confirmed that indeed this was the course of action that he intended to take. I looked around but could see no candid cameras and so had to assume he was barking mad. Just then a Doctor popped in checked with the nurse nodded in agreement and slipped off to appease some other mad people in the next cubicle. And so my ear was glued back on and that was that. BUT I have never forgiven the evil Floribunda and when pruning time comes I take my vengeance on the sons, sons and sons of the father of the little bastard that chopped off half my ear.
And do you know what really riles me? That despite cutting them down to the very core, they just seem to grow back bigger, stronger and very much more meaner (the roses that is, Not my Ears!).
The fight goes on......
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