Sunday 1st May

Six thirty start, no where to go but plenty to do and I was walking the garden, washed and dressed by seven thirty weighing up the state of play as to how wet the grass was. I realised that I wouldn't be attacking it until nine or just after so I set to repairing the cable on the extension lead. The cable had pulled apart from the plug so all I had to do was to reconnect the cable and it was all set to go.  Second job was to weed some of the pots that had come out of winter storage and top them up with potting compost, give some of them a good watering if that sun was anything to go by.  As it was, the sun was out but the wind was cold again but as I struck up the mower, it didn't bother me at all as I worked up a reasonable head of steam.  

I popped over to see Avatar to ask if she wanted anything from Kardjali tomorrow and I came back with a list.  I'm pleased to see that her workman came back and finished off the job, more or less and all it requires now is a coat of paint.  I noticed that Avatar has now relegated the woodburner to the garage while I'm still burning logs at night.  Her room looked quite empty.  We had a delivery of fluffy pancakes while I was there and I brought mine home and had them with pine tip syrup and that was after my two poached eggs on toast but it did keep me going all day.  More pancakes arrive during the day, and I had some eggs given to me as a present from my neighbour from the next door garden.  Another visit from my friend down the road and she brought me some pasta and another one delivered a crispy pancake and a croissant.  Tomorrow it's supposed to be their day for guests...so Kardjali should be quiet.

I finished the grass at two twenty, didn't get to work on the garden, it was a stop and start morning with the visitors.  Stripped off and everything in the washing machine and I took off as much grass as I could before it put it in the machine.  I'd used the little electric without the grass box but the big one came out to do the main house terrace grass and the grave garden grass and now it's down to clearing flower beds from clover, sticky willy and the likes.

Quick shower and I had a front row seat or sofa for the snooker and Ronnie finished the first session in the lead but it was soured by an altercation with the referee.  No one seemed to know what it was about but Ronnie had steam coming out of his ears and thank goodness it was the last frame of the session.  No supper for me, I'm stuffed to the gills with pancakes, just had a ten minute cat nap but feel utterly whacked after this morning's effort but at least it's done for another week or so.  As I said Kardjali tomorrow....I have Avatar's list and my list.  LN.....Let's hope I can go in and get out quickly and back to the garden.....LN

Monday 2nd May

Well after a very exciting evening of snooker  we have the final tonight and I've had a disappointing afternoon but at least the fire didn't give me any problems getting it going.  I was out of bed at six thirty, washed and dressed for Kardjali by seven thirty.  I walked the garden and saw no shell or peeping nose of any of the tortoise, it was a little nippy so probably too early for them.   It's the Muslim 'Christmas', the village is very busy and lots of visitors over from Turkey.  My ladies were out in force so I wished them all 'Chestit Byram', checked with Avatar as to how much cheese she wanted me to buy for her, received sweets from some of them and ended up taking one of the daughter-in-laws into Djebel when I mentioned that I was going into Kardjali.  She was waiting for the bus but obviously, the Nipper is quicker and she was so excited to be seeing her daughter and grand-children and tomorrow she is off to Kardjali to visit her mother.

I carried on and approaching Kardjali by nine, the traffic was building as I approached the town but generally the roads were pretty quiet.  I was in and out of Kaufland very quickly with a small bill but I did buy a cheese and filo pasty ring and some of it turned into breakfast on the car-park.  I toyed with going into the centre but decided against it, round the island and into Lidl, topped up sticking mainly to my list and managed to buy the window cleaning machine that was advertised.  I thought hard about it and then thought 'what the heck'.....but the excitement to 'open the box' when I got home didn't kick-in so I'll leave it for another day.  I stopped off in Djebel's little supermarket and that was heaving...it's a little gold-mine.  

Back home and unpacked the shopping, assembled Avatar's and took it over for her along with her bill and she's always surprised how much she gets for her money.  I found everything that she wanted including one item that I only had the Bulgarian name for and had never come across it.  Fortunately a very kind gentleman helped me out and even found me again to tell me he'd found it in other flavours not just chocolate.....so I got her a lemon one.....as a gift.  I came home and walked the garden again and found Blue and Rosy at different ends of the garden....the sun was out but the wind cold so they weren't moving far from the remaining long grass under the short wall.  I lit the fire, made a coffee. settled down for an afternoon of snooker and didn't enjoy it at all.  I'm hoping that Ronnie comes out with more fire in his belly tonight or that Judd comes out with less.  I might even just check out the results on morning television and not bother watching tonight.  LN....Supper is still in the packet so better go and do something about it.....LN

Tuesday 3rd May

So after a few messenger interactions the upside was that my student's lesson today was being brought forward, he has a football training session at four in Kardjali and has a match tomorrow requiring that his dental appointment for two thirty tomorrow has also to be rearranged....boys and their sports.  I saw him at one this afternoon and ended the lesson just before three.

Cold, wet and miserable morning, not a glimmer of sun and such a change from the last few days.  So no doubt the swimming pools won't be opening up any time soon.  Six thirty start, there was a glimmer of fire from last night but with going out just before one I didn't think it was worth breathing life into it....but it's going well now with a thumping great log on it so it's in for the night.  I meandered around some what after an early start, didn't get washed and dressed until ten and remembered that I didn't have a reading text for my student this afternoon so got ready for the day and opened up the computer.  Found a text, sent it to the printer and a message came back that the printer was off-line.  I've always had Brother printers before and understood the cleaning process and everything about them...as for this HP, what a load of tosh.  I changed the colour cartridges last week and that only printed green despite the fact that it was a new cartridge but at least the black was still working.  So first step was to get it back on-line which I managed, sent a test page to the printer and the paper came out as clean as it went in so I decided to go through the printing cartridge dialogue from the computer.  More blank pages printed so I had a spare black to hand so I changed it, tried again and this time it fired up.  Meanwhile I'd lost the text that I wanted to print so back to the drawing board and came up with a couple of good ones with questions sheets included to job done...I had something to work through with the boy before we could play football in the lounge and all this while I'm seated on the sofa.  

Lesson over, I went down to the shop while he got changed for his football training.  His father was taking him in to Kardjali since his brother is able to work down the garage so at least someone is there during the afternoon, not that there's much trade today, most winter tyres are changed over to summer and still lots of visitors here from Turkey and people are busy with family.  I stayed at the shop chatting to his mother and was surprised when it was only four thirty when I decided to leave.  Normally with the lesson ending at about four thirty it soon gets round to six and I lighting a late fire and skimping on supper.

Home by five, set my schedule on the way home and it worked like clockwork,  First stop toilet, second step vegetables peeled and diced, supper in the oven with pork kebabs, lit the fire, boiled the kettle for a glass of hot water and my evening was about to start.  I've been at a loss since the end of the snooker. I'll have to find another focus and if the weather isn't good, it can't be the garden.  Nothing planned for tomorrow....I've got self-set seeds coming up all over the place which is good and I think I have wild bird seeds that have germinated that look remarkably like sweet peas.  I suppose they could just be peas so I might just collect them all together in the old veg garden and see what happens.  I'd put the tomatoes out this morning to get some rain on them and I've remembered to bring them in.  They are another experiment since they're the seeds that germinated inside the tomato...maybe hybrid....maybe horrid and only time will tell.  Nasty clouds coming in from the west and not much good happening from the north.  LN.....Not a good day for photos.....LN

Wednesday 4th May

Early to bed last night.  I was intending watching Life after Life but decided against it and hopefully it will be on Netflix or the likes pretty soon and I'll watch the full series from there.  So 'early to bed and early to rise', I woke up at six, played sudoku for an hour or se, felt very sleepy so got my head down again and woke up for the second time just after eight thirty and was on the go slow for most of the day.  I washed and dressed fortunately, washed up a few roasting tins that had been used last night and one that had sat in the fridge for a while with meat that eventually got thrown out and started to cook two rashers of bacon around ten.  Just ready to turn the bacon when I noticed that friends had arrived unexpectedly so turned the cooker off, kettle on, went out to greet them, cushions out of the chest and on to the outside furniture and back in to make the coffee.  

It was good to see them both, I'd only thought about them this morning and suddenly they arrive proving that the signals do get through.  We chewed the fat, had a catch-up and swapped films on Netflix, he made second cups of coffee for us all and at twelve I suggested that if they had nothing on for lunch that we headed into Djebel for a pizza.  It was such a lovely day after yesterday's shite weather that we should take advantage of it.  They said that they'd drop me off afterwards but I suggested that I took my car and they they were free to get on with things they needed to in Djebel.  And it worked...off they went, I changed my work shirt for another  casual top and met them in the restaurant. Very pleasant lunch, totally relaxed and we made friends with a puppy that had set up residence in a bush at the side of the steps to the top bar and he finished off the crusts that I couldn't manage.

Back home for around two thirty feeling, didn't want to get up to much so found a new series on Netflix, The White Queen, and watched three episodes and stayed awake through them all.  Lit the fire at six, it's not really necessary but cosy and certainly don't want any supper after a huge pizza for lunch.  We've made forward plans to go up to one of the highest peaks this side of the border and we'll need to go in the Beast up to the lodge and it's about an hours walk after that so it will be trainers at the ready.  Hopefully next week we'll have a few dry days so we don't run into problems driving up there and clear enough to be able to see the views from the top.  Apparently the coast of Greece is magnificent from up there and you can see over to Thassos and some other islands.  So all we need are a few dry days.  

Gardening tomorrow, I've got lots of seedlings to put in the flower beds and still more weeds to remove before they drop their seeds and I have even more to contend with.  Super day.  LN.....Thank goodness for good friends......LN

Thursday 5th May

Woke up at six thirty, made the bed but Eli just didn't want to face the world.  Every time I put the elephant upright it kept falling over, eventually bed was made and I was on to other things.  Washed and dressed and ready to face the day, put on Netflix and watched a couple of episodes of my new series and it was still only eight o'clock when I decided to walk the garden, collect the rubbish together and have a bonfire.  Firstly I made poached eggs with ham on toast for breakfast, watched or rather listened to morning television while I had my breakfast and then went out to walk the garden and see how many of the 'family' I could spot.  CS was down the bottom along with Green God and Blue was in the run of small wild plum bushes towards the bottom of the garden and it seems to have made a dried grass hideaway with entrance and exit.  

I took the rubbish down to the bottom of the garden, poked around in the burning barrel and removed the old tins and brought them up to the yard and into the container bin and I'll take them down later.  The fire went well. it was a fairly cloudless sky and there was some warmth in the sun which got better until it clouded over again and eventually this evening we had rain.  The afternoon was spent digging out weeds from the flower beds and my idea to do away with the annual beds seems to be gathering momentum.  I've just got to get more clumps of lilies, daises and flags so that they stand up for themselves in the grass between the shrubs and suppress the weeds.  Spotted Rosy at the other side of the garden, the poppies are about to flower along with the old fashioned iris, the garden is looking very pretty.  I repotted the fuchsia that I bought last week, I don't think it had settled in the pot that I bought it in, very newly potted so now it's in new compost and a much bigger pot and it's looking better already.

I popped over to see Avatar and sat with her for half an hour or so.  She'd mown the grass yesterday and said that she's run out of 'benzine' and it suddenly hit me that it was an electric mower....she personally had run out of steam.  Came home and fried off a couple of spicy sausages with sliced onions and had dipping mayonnaise and sweet chili sauce to go with them.,,,I'd offered Avatar supper but she' d got meat and veg left over from the previous day so declined my offer.  More of the same tomorrow, pulling weeds and tossing them over the wall for the cows.  LN.....I'll be happier when it's finished......LN

Friday 6th May

Early start, washed dressed and television, it was so foggy and the ground much too wet to get out in the garden.  I settled for toast for breakfast, grabbed my tools from the little house and headed for the grave garden determined to clear the bed underneath my downstairs bedroom window and plant it up with cornflowers that are growing too big for the pot.  It was a slow slog, not my favourite occupation but settled down and completed it by twelve.  Pulled up a lot more weeds covering the shrubs against the wall and uncovering a very healthy winter jasmine that was struggling under the weight of clover and sticky willy...it can now breath once more.  

I came in for a while and had a sour cherry yogurt to fill a gap and went out and walked the garden.  I found Rosy half way down the low wall sunbathing and sleeping and as I walked down towards the bottom wall I heard a clatter and suddenly saw Green God haring it towards the row of short bushes where it had set up a hidey hole.  I  had a thought, it had probably been harrying one of the others and there was Blue looking shell shocked though for a tortoise that's not too difficult and I reckoned that it had just come out of a 'not too brief encounter'.    I didn't see where Green God went but realising that Rosy was on the other side of the garden and fast asleep, she was quite safe .

I went back to my gardening and cleared more but two more beds are going to lose the surrounds especially the deep ones.  They're just too difficult to get on top of but I did clear the weeds from the Iris that are just budding now.  I've also got some of the new variety, one out and several to follow including the variegated ones near the steps up to the little house terrace.  I came in at about three, put Netflix on, watched an episode and then watched another one, maybe two, with my eyes closed and felt much better for it.  I did have a visitor during this time who returned a pot that I'd given him an oleander in yesterday and I only knew about it when I went out to chop some starter wood for the fire.  

So wood chopped, logs in, fire lit and though it's not cold, it's not warm either and it just feels more comfortable with the fire going,  More of the same tomorrow but more of strimming , removing garden surrounds, lawn mower in action and see how it pans out.  Several of the wooden surrounds need replacing anyway and for me it's a step in the right direction.  Where I've removed them and mowed underneath the overhanging bushes, the beds look fine and if I plant up day lilies when they've finished flowering at the end of the season, they will multiply and suppress the weeds.  I must admit I feel better at the end of the day than I did this morning.  LN...Switch off and relax......LN

Saturday 7th May

Another early start, walked the garden with my hot glass of water and no sightings of any of the tortoise...they must be sleeping in and not showing themselves until the weather warms up and the sun has some heat.  I pulled a few weeds but the grass was very wet and my gloves were still in the conservatory, well three of them are....the fourth is yet to be found.

Toast and another hot water for breakfast, I'm giving coffee a break for the time being again.  Washed and dressed and out to the garden by ten more or less and again on tortoise watch.  I found Rosy at the top of the garden just where I was about to strim and pull up weeds so that had to stop for a while and Blue was down the bottom of the garden, neither was moving, just enjoying the warmth of the sun.  I was at first but then realised that the wind was cold and whistling straight through the t-shirt I'd found out so I was inside for a sweat-shirt despite the fact the sun was out.  First job was to get one of the strimmers working.  I'd forgotten to put the battery one on charge, the head of the big one needed the cord replacing and that's temperamental at the best of times.  The other little one I didn't bother with and left that for another day.  Eventually the big electric one was sorted so had to get the long extension cable sorted to test it and everything seemed like hard work this morning.  I know we get these days when everything seems a chore and this was one of them......eventually I was strimming on electricity other than cooking on gas.....and everything was going OK.

I started off by pulling up fistfuls of long grass and sticky willy, Rosy had moved off to the other end of the bed and was now under the wild plum tree.  I approached her with a dandelion leaf and she didn't put her head inside the shell but started to eat it from my hand.  This hasn't happened before so I went in to get the camera to record the happy scene and blow me, the SD card in the camera was full so I went back inside the house, fired up the computer on the landing and saved the files to the hard drive, went back outside and Rosy was no where to be seen...photo opportunity wasted.  Back to the strimming and this time I found one of the smaller ones with purple nail varnish on her shell and she was obviously warming up so I had to find somewhere else to play.

Six o'clock and tools in.  It's a beautiful evening and I've achieved quite a lot but still more to do.  I chopped back the choisya that's been battered this winter and intend to take some cuttings from it tomorrow. I've been lucky before and hopefully I'll get two or three to take root, it's such a pretty shrub and normally stays with its leaves all winter but there were a few dead branches in the middle, and new growth on the inside but very little happening on the long straggly branches.  It has just put out some flowers and might be the wrong time to do it, it should be done when it's finished flowering but it is what it is and it's done now.  It's back to Mother Nature.

Fire going though again, not really necessary but I'll cosy up in front of it after my bath.  LN.....Boilers on, bones need soothing, supper needs sorting.......LN

Sunday 8th May

Another six thirty start and it was the same routine, take one glass, three quarters fill it with boiled water and top with bottled water and head to the garden.  Tortoise weren't out an about yet, too cold and they're lazy shells at first light.  I put a couple of cushions on the bench on the terrace, went in for more water and sat in the sun but didn't stay out there long.  Despite the sun the air felt cool and it was much warmer inside.  Washed and dressed, I couldn't spend all day in PJ's and went round opening windows and doors to get some air into the place and again settled for toast for breakfast.  The grass was too damp to do anything with it so settled on the sofa and saw that Netflix had new episodes of Blacklist or so I thought but it ended up being just the one.  It is a continuation of the last episode but it seemed very complicated and not so enjoyable as the original episodes...almost like scraping the barrel to put stuff together.  

So now it was time to face my demon weeds so I took the battery from it charger and attached it to the strimmer and put the hedge trimmer on charge for later,  I've got around thirty lupin plants that need to go into soil so I started to attack the bed against the top of the long wall near to the workshop terrace.  I strimmed between the bushes first to take away most of the weeds and then started pulling them up.  It was a slow old process but eventually I cleared them and all I have to do is tie up the bushes at the back of the bed to the wire netting on top of the breeze blocks and get the mower out to clear the path....but that's a job for tomorrow.  Having cleared the bed I managed to find that the choisya that I thought I'd lost has a few buds about to break so that was good news.  I filled up the empty space with around ten lupins and to patches of cornflowers and gave them all a good watering.  All being well, it should fill out nicely.  

Tortoise update...Rosy was sitting in the water bath that I'd renewed yesterday and Green God was around ten feet away.  Now whether he'd had his wicked way one more time or she was making it very difficult for his to even attempt it I'm not sure....it was all over by the time I got there.  Cracked Shell was in the garden I was clearing and hiding under the weeds so I moved it on to the grass and it soon scurried away and headed for the grass in front of the wood store terrace and not to be spotted again.  Avatar came round with some ice-cream that she'd been given, shared with the rest of the neighbours that afternoon and the rest was for me.  I'd checked out her house a couple of times but no little black shoes and stick were evident and I was hoping she was OK.  She's done lots of work in her garden and said that she was feeling tired and I do worry about her.    Off she went, tools away and store rooms locked, strimmer battery and hedge trimmer on charge for tomorrow.  I've somehow had more zest for it today and one bed completed and planted up....gives you more encouragement to finish the challenge.

No supper for me tonight, I made an half hearted attempt to light the fire using a log that was too big to catch and it didn't.  Need to go into Kardjali first thing, my phone cable doesn't seem to want to charge my Motorola or there's something wrong with the battery so either way it needs sorting.  It got up to nine percent and just didn't want to go more so if I get the cable first and try it in the car charger then I'll know if I need to take it to the man who understands these things.  I didn't realise how late it was, time I put the computer to bed for the night.  LN.....Time for bed said Zebedee....LN

Monday 9th May

Six start after a sleepless night....I didn't seem to get settled.  Of course I slept but it didn't seem as if I did.  I put my nose out and took photos of the early red sky before the sun came up, lots of birds singling and three cuckoos were competing vocally  with my hiccupping bird winning hands down or beak up.  The weather was cold so I came in and settled on the sofa, flashed around Netflix and watched one episode of something but didn't take to it so tried my luck outside and it had warmed up a little.  I didn't spot any of the gang but it was still too early for them, they don't get active until they've warmed up.  

I'd left the errant phone on charge overnight and still no joy so that was the main thing to sort out today so Kardjali was on the cards.  Toast for breakfast, I'm getting lazy in my old age, washing in the machine, I washed and dressed and tidied the hairbands and hairclips and put a new bowl in the bathroom to hold them.  The washing had finished so I pegged it out, still no sign of the troops, into the Nipper by nine and on the road soon after.  Djebel was heaving and I suppose it's time to say goodbye to the infiltrators from Turkey for the high days and holiday.  I carried on and first stop was to the dinky doo shop as I call it that seems to sell everything over five floors.  I took my old cable in with me and the lady helped me to find the one that was supposed to be the same and it probably is and only cost three leva.  I moved to the central car-park and I really miss my car-park attendant.....I now have to negotiate a machine since the app that I downloaded doesn't seem to work properly.  Eventually it delivered my ticket for the dashboard, you have to enter the car number and for some reason it had missed the K from the front of mine so I adjusted it with a pen when I got back to the car.  First stop was to my home phone provider to pay my outstanding phone bill but they were closed and only a notice on the outside door....I'll have to pay it over the internet.  Next door to this shop is a phone accessory shop so I went in and bought another cable, pricier but I'd tried the other one using the cigarette lighter USB and nothing seemed to happen, it was just too slow so now I feel the new one is going to be better.

Back to the Nipper and I walked on to my cheapy clothes store and low and behold they were waiting for me.  A pair of shoes, my size, leather, made in Spain and they're the same 'Frog' brand that I love.  They're the perfect colour for wearing with black or navy, a light tan.  Priced at three leva they were a bargain...same price as my cheapy cable.  Kaufland, Lidl for a few things, drove back to Djebel and tried to park up at my little supermarket but it was heaving so I carried on home getting there around two.  Firstly I had to move a bag of compost that my lovely lady from the next door garden had left for me after I spoke to her yesterday.  Unpacked the shopping, left a pack of beef burgers out of freezer and that's going to be supper, lay on the sofa with a soft drink and the eyelids went southwards.  Woke up about an hour later, washing in and put away, sweatshirt on, that wind was cold despite the sun.  Tomorrow morning I'm tempted to do the grass before I go to visit my student for his lesson at three, if I leave it much longer it will be a nightmare and I'll be emptying the grass box every two runs.  LN.....Time to cook supper......LN