Gardening

I'm sorry I haven't posted much of late.  I've been very, very busy.  Like, not just regular old busy.  Really, really crazy busy.  Working all day and then some in the evening busy.

Also, I decided to dig up my garden.  This is all part of a vastly overambitious and, undoubtedly, ultimately doomed (but what is the blog for if not to tell you about things going hilariously wrong?) plan to landscape my garden.  After spending quite some time digging up the grass (with my sister saying things like 'Why are you doing it yourself?  Should we not get someone in?  What if you do it wrong?' - to which I responded 'Because it's about 2 ft sq of grass, and if we got someone in they'd laugh at us for being pathetic, and then charge us, like, £400, and anyway, how hard can it be, and what's the worst that can happen?') the plan has been slightly scaled down, and is now more of the order of making a place for the bins to sit.

I initially had a mind to put up a new fence as well (the old one is going to just fall over some day soon), but this was roundly decried by the naysayers who don't think I could construct a fence, so we're getting someone in to do it instead (of course, when they said I'd never be able to do it, I wanted to try even more, but then I realised the materials would be quite expensive and I don't want to go wrong with expensive things).  Our current options for the Fence Constructor are as follows:

1) A man who did my aunt's fence.  Having been quoted £600 from everyone else, this guy charged about £100 (these figures may not be literally correct, but they give an idea of the relative gulf between the quotes).  Now, ordinarily, this would worry me (you will recollect that The Builder wasn't the most expensive guy in the... um... place where builders are), but my dad was already leaning towards hiring him, and then heard that he works hard all day and doesn't accept any offers of cups of tea, and this seemed to clinch it.  You may recollect that The Builder didn't accept offers of cups of tea either, and look how that turned out.  Also, there was the guy who did the windows a few years ago.  He was cheap and didn't drink tea, and is now in jail, which may have invalidated my warranty.

2) Sister's friend Lucy's cousin who is a gardener.  This was going well until I pointed out that what we really need is not so much a gardener as someone to build a fence.  Anyway, he's coming round on Monday to give us a quote.

In any case, I'm perfectly certain it will be a merry disaster, as these things always are, but you will, of course, be kept informed.