From Bath to Cork with Baby Grace

In case you want to plan your visit to the southern part of Kerry, John O’Donoghue territory

Photograph of Office of Public Works (OPW) map on site… 

Gardening in Glanmire has resumed… I’ll be posting thoughts & feelings about it from now on.  The last chapter was written ages ago, during last season.

Peter Dowdall of Dunsland Garden Centre striding across the Farmers’ Market last Sunday.

Focussed I’d say.  He twitters @Downsland

Peter’s my greatest gardening consultant, thought he doesn’t know it.   As a result of his advice I bought grass for the two new pots.  If it was up to me, I’d never have chosen grass.  When a surprise comes to you from the universe, I find it’s good to grasp it.

Grace came with me.  She spent plenty of time on the statue of the horse,  riding it with all the enthusiasm of someone who knew what she was doing.  She’s had practice riding real ponies.

She liked playing with the barley.

She can now (almost 4 years) recognise & name hydrangeas, Hebe, rosemary…

Back to pots & grass:

Japanese Forest Grass - in case you’re stumped…

(to be continued…)

Some of the latest fashion…

There are a few things I’ve let slip, and they are haunting me.

(1) The gym: I resolved to go regularly - it’s ages since I’ve worked up a sweat.

(2) The Moleskine:  I resolved to write a daily note at start of day - that too is ages.

(3) The garden: I resolved to learning how to garden - I’ve only cut grass.

This is a public admonishment of self.

Get real man.  Get back into the game, off the sideline.

There is a life to be won.

I leave on the morning of 27 May and will be in Listowel for all the festival.

That’s where you can find me.  Grace will be well looked after in my absence.  A lot of thought has gone into ensuring that.

I’m getting away from NAMA.

Away from Batt O’Keefe and his disgraced department of education.

Out of Cork, over the border into Kerry.

Fair weather has been promised…

Grass will grow…

I hope I remember to book a table at Aloe’s …

This will be good for my health…

Nothing like a change of scenery and service…

This will be a trip down memory lane…

I hope to write while there.

After a prolonged adjournment, the show’s back on the road.

Today, I bought a Bosch electric lawnmower, which came with a strimmer thrown in, for 116 euros.

I put it together and cursed the writer of instructions.

And got it to work…

About two hours double-cutting the two grass patches in front of the house.

The big innovation is the start of one of those piles within which grass cuttings and vegetable peelings break down into rich loam which can be spread on the beds. 

I think lots of creepy crawly things get in to the heat and process it.  But I have plenty to learn.

Rain is promised, so the main grass may not be cut for a while yet. 

This is continued from a recent post.  Over the past few days, I’ve been distracted by all the banking stuff.

Extract from Marcin’s (Polish) journal...

- he’s writing about his new year resolutions…

" (3) Who else do I owe an apology to?  Who else have I self-righteously cast off, dismissed?  Promised more to and then failed to deliver

- Gill & Tony perhaps

- Lorna & Roger perhaps

Anyone from schooldays?

Ah… Pa Walenska

I think there is no need to disturb the gulf there is between us.  There are some gaps that deserve to be because they make it easier for people to live in their own orbit.  His galaxy and mine don’t meet.  There are no stepping stars in between us, that if lit up, would enable a crossing over to be made.

I can let Pa alone: he has no need of me on his radar, and I have no need to think of him.

KL would be more difficult but we never passed a friendly word between us.

Joe H. in China:  I think I’ll contact him.  As if I were curious fascinated since I have often, on and off, wondered what happened to him?

Donal OB too, maybe more so.  Patricia K., Don B. - the University crowd.  They are a set of people I would like to link into.  Maybe I can use Facebook to reach them?

Resolution No.4

Use Facebook to revive old university contacts and maybe even old recent ones

like WS, JD, even BN, and certainly DFG, but also MC, DT, DA

A wealth of people.  I’ll be discriminating.  Careful how I put myself into Facebook, but I am not in control of the relations that will form.

It takes 2 to Tango.

What will be will be.

More importantly…

Resolution No. 5   Relapse Prevention.  I’ll finish off the action plan and share it with E. and the others.  This is an important resolution.

Resolution No.6   Do not try to do everything.  Live within your ambitions and impulses.

Restraint, Restraint, Restraint  (echoes of accept, accept, accept)

Keep a grip on the important matter of sleeping well.

Do less than you can

Make less mean more

Mantra for 2009  =   forever

Poetry, painting, singing, publishing, cooking, gardening, photography, blogging, travelling, loving, playing, suffering, earning, mending, golfing, gyming, networking, fixing, growing, planning, rearing, fathering, neighbouring, writing, drama-ing, stand-up comedy-ing, loving, sexing, eroticing, listening, pitching, collaborating

do less

mean more

I mean more

through less

less

less

less

The vanishing point… the vanishing points… 

the end of the beginning.

 Amen. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop

No 

More 

Now

Less

less

less

less

"

There are perks that come with the job.

Sometimes it’s free tea.  Sometimes it’s great company.  Best if those two go together. But there are some perks that come when least expected.

Today I phoned Highgrove Shop in Tetbury as part of my job. 

I found myself talking about where I used to live in London Fields (on the border of Hackney and Islington), Bradford on Avon and Bath.  (The English Market in Cork featured as well.) In conversation about those places.  Imagine someone paying me to converse about those places that are loaded with wonderful memories for me…

And, while I was on the phone, I realised that I’m going to go into that shop next week, as part of my job.

I call that a fabulous perk.