The Great British Drought

*sneeze* Excuse me, my planks have got a cold. The drought has got me, with all its heavy showers and the wind. The sun doesn't come out for long enough to help me get dry again. Sometimes I wish my FH would invest in a bench cover. To save me from the worst of the weather. But then again, I wouldn't be able to watch what's going on in my garden. *sneeze* Oh dear, oh dear, I am really not a healthy bench right now. And the next few days will bring even more rain. The plants and the snails love it, but I think we've had enough for now. Give me a break!

Last night one of the small humans had a shower and suddenly there was no more water. The drought again, you might think. But no, it was a meltdown in the fuse box. Seems like the cowboy builders who installed the thing, didn't insulate a cable properly, and so it eventually set the whole box on fire. Luckily the fire went out quickly, but now my humans won't have a working shower until at least Monday. They are not allowed to use a hosepipe, so no shower in the garden, either. Unless they stand in the rain, of course. But that might scare the neighbours. They'll have to stay dirty, I guess. Or use a jug in the bathtub.

That's one good thing about the drought: I get several showers daily, so I am a rather clean bench. Snotty and sneezy, but clean. That baby robin's poo has no chance against the rain. And the wasps stay away, too. And the free radicals, those invisible but oh so dangerous little devils.

Ninja squirrel has been looking quite soggy lately. I bet it doesn't like the drought very much. Digging in wet soil can't be fun. Sometimes it sits on the trunk of the big tree, head down, and holds out one of its paws, as if it was testing for rain or waving at someone. Very odd. Might be Ninja code for "no one in this garden, you can come and dig".

The Squirrel Terrorist

Almost forgot to mention the latest "squirrel incident". Just look at the photo below and you'll understand what I mean. Good old digging isn't good enough any more. Now the little criminal has discovered explosives as a faster way to get to its storage. In this case it was a whole fat ball (intended for birds), hidden deep down in one of our flower pots.

Open Gardens

Last weekend some of the houses in our village opened their gardens to the public, and my FH and her OH (which means "other half", not "old human") couldn't resist having a look. I wish I could have come along and visited some of my bench mates, but I think it would have looked a bit silly, if my humans had carried me through all those gardens. So I just have to make do with what my FH and the bird messengers told me.
One of the gardens belonged to a house which stood empty. It's in a lovely quiet street, and the house and the garden would be ideal for my humans. But it is not for sale, and even if it was, the price would be shocking.

Talking about shocking, my FH told me about a bench which is for sale at our local garden shop. It's one of those terribly uncomfortable metal things without a soul, and it's in a disgraceful state. The paint is flaking off everywhere, it's rusty and it just looks really sad. And guess what? They want £485 for it. That's five times as much as I cost when I was brand new and even more beautiful than I am now. And the worrying thing is that there are people who are willing to pay this price. First they have some posh food at the garden shop's restaurant, where half of the menu is in French or Italian, and then they look at all the rusty clutter from some French or Italian skip. Maybe they put something into the food to make people want to part with their money more easily.

This is the empty house my FH likes, from the front and from the garden. And below is a photo of that hideous thing that dares to call itself a bench.

April showers

Ok, ok, I know.....I have been lazy again. But time is passing so quickly at the moment, and I am afraid to miss something if I sit down and think about what to write. I don't even dare to nod off, just in case the pond robber returns. We lost another fish, and I failed to see who took it. It may have been one of the many neighbourhood cats, or one of those greedy magpies. All I know is that my FH found the poor fish in the middle of the lawn. The rest of the fish have been very nervous and shy ever since. The loss of their friend must have been very traumatic.

The tadpoles seem to be doing fine, and I keep seeing plenty of frogs and a few newts. There was toad spawn in the pond, but I am not sure if that managed to avoid being eaten by the fish. The plants are all doing really well. A few of them got damaged by late frost, but they will recover. The tree peonie has several healthy looking buds, and the iris by the pond is enjoying its new sunnier aspect.

The BAD last month went very well. I felt that I got plenty of attention, and that I was very useful. Of course I will never be able to compete with the fluffy bunnies. The guests seemed to have had a good time, anyway. Hopefully we can repeat this in the summer.

My FH told me about the drought that England is supposedly going through. And that she's not allowed to use the hosepipe to water her plants and give me a cheeky splash once in a while. April hasn't felt particularly dry so far, but apparently it'll take a lot of rain to refill the lakes and rivers. People are just too wasteful with water. They should try and live without running water for a while and see how that feels. My FH says that her parents and grandparents never had a shower every day, and hardly ever a bath, but they still didn't smell bad. Why is everyone so obsessed with hygiene nowadays? Imagine how much laundry needs washing, if people change their clothes every single day. And then all those golf courses that need watering. Isn't there a better way to make use of that land? Britain has more land wasted on golf courses than it has protected wildlife areas. That's just wrong. Golf courses are so boring and not wildlife friendly at all. And they don't seem to have any benches. How very sad. :(

That Google Earth treasure hunt my FH was so obsessed with, has now finished. Apparently some guy in Germany won the grand prize. Hopefully he put as much effort into the puzzle as my FH, and wasn't just a lucky lurker. Now everyone is waiting for another book. My FH would be really good at coming up with some tricky puzzles, but she doesn't believe in herself and is too scared to start any big project. But if she writes a puzzle, than she won't be able to take part in solving it, so maybe that's why she's not so motivated. She still tortures her friends with all sorts of photo quizzes. I think she should create a book with photos of benches from all over the world. I would buy that.