Each week I’ll try and post quick links to things that I’ve seen, read, inspired me or just sparked my interest in the previous week, with a little background and my thoughts and other things that I’ve been up to in the previous week. Mostly gardening, cooking and environmental stuff but not always.

Life In General. – I started this week taking Ruby to the vets, she’d been a little lethargic and off colour and we suspected that maybe she had a urinary tract infection. The vet confirmed this, and prescribed antibiotics and anti-inflammatories. Her response to treatment was pretty miraculous, to the point of me asking if I could have what she was taking. She seems to be fully on the mend now.

Also been doing a few things at my Mum’s place in the garden, some weeding on her raised beds and some general tidying to get ready for planting out a few things when the weather warms up a bit more.

Work – I’ve had a relatively quiet week, mostly been tucked up in my home office working on things, with no meetings outside, and with it being a Bank Holiday week I gave Monday a miss. I find working for myself, I work the hours that I want to and they don’t necessarily follow a rigid Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm. I find it more effective to work when it’s appropriate and sometimes this will be early mornings, evenings and weekends. I guess I probably work the same amount of hours overall, just not in a set pattern, but to be honest I’ve never actually counted them (except when a client wants me to for billing).

Allotment. – The leeks mostly seem to have taken, although it’s still a little early to be certain. I’ve also been sowing some more seed. More radish (we had our first two harvests from the first sowing, so I wanted to get more in), a second sowing of lettuce, because the first doesn’t seem to have germinated. Also got some spinach in. Germination this year seems to have been a little patchy, sweetcorn in particular hasn’t been great, so I’ve got some more seed to get in.

Currently Reading

I’ve still be working my way through Wendell Berry, but have started reading some of Bernard Cornwell’s “Sharpe” series, I’m currently reading Sharpe’s Triumph[GoodReads], which is the second in the series.

Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King [GoodReads] – which I am reading for an online group.

The Week In Wildlife – In Pictures

Roger Deakin – Cigarette on the Waveney – Roger Deakin died in 2006, but he wrote some of my all time favourite nature books; Waterlog, Wildwood & Notes from Walnut Tree Farm (the latter posthumously). I was pleased to see that the BBC have made his trip down the River Waveney in a cigarette canoe available again. Not sure how long this will be available for, or if you can access it outside of the UK but it is well worth spending half-an-hour on.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04hh8vb/player

Carrot Clarinet – Although it looks as though this has been around for a few years, I don’t remember seeing it before, so thought I’d share it here:

Morocco to Timbuktu – I think I might end up watching this:

High Line Problems –  Interesting piece about disused rail lines and other similar habitats on the Last Word on Nothing Blog [LINK]

The Dark Tower Trailer – In addition to reading the Dark Tower series at the moment, the movie is also in production and now there has been a trailer released. Looks good!