Tea? (Part 2)

[Arch]

And now, I'm at Mordor Central. Or Birmingham New Street as some know it.

 

[Night Train]

I had to walk away from a little confrontation with my Dad earlier.

The subject of adding organic matter to improve soil for planting came up and he insisted that domestic composting doesn't work unless on an industrial scale. Also the the smell of the pig and cow muck is unbearable. And as for the horse muck, well that is the worst thing you can put on soil....

I could feel my blood pressure and stress levels rising so I had to walk away after a while and tend to the cows, pigs and horses we all apparently have in our domestic gardens.

I tinkered with the car and fitted a makeshift grease cap to one of the trailer hubs. It is an aerosol can lid jammed over the hub bearing and held on with duct tape.

 

[Arch]

I had to walk away from a little confrontation with my Dad earlier.

The subject of adding organic matter to improve soil for planting came up and he insisted that domestic composting doesn't work unless on an industrial scale. Also the the smell of the pig and cow muck is unbearable. And as for the horse muck, well that is the worst thing you can put on soil....

I could feel my blood pressure and stress levels rising so I had to walk away after a while and tend to the cows, pigs and horses we all apparently have in our domestic gardens.

I tinkered with the car and fitted a makeshift grease cap to one of the trailer hubs. It is an aerosol can lid jammed over the hub bearing and held on with duct tape.

Yay for tinkering!

I think you'll just have to go ahead with the composting regardless, prove him wrong.

 

[Night Train]

The thing is, I accept that domestic composting doesn't always work and requires proper care to make sure the balance is right but I can't see where the pigs and cows came into it.

Also, I guess, millions of rose growers must be wrong about horse muck.

 

[Speicher]

Domestic composting is, in my view, easy peasy. Chuck in torn up paper, shredded paper, vegetable peelings, etc etc, and garden waste like grass cuttings, stir. Add more of the above in layers, sort of stir it, ad infinitum. The relative quantities will be somewhere on the internet. I think it is half and half of "brown" and "green". About six to twelve months later, dig the stuff out from the bottom, and sieve. Lovely compost! No smell, and it should come out sort of crumbley and easy to handle. I also put in egg shells, but opinion seems divided on that.

Unfortunately I have no pigs, cows or horses in my garden*, so I cannot comment about that aspect of the process. I have repotted my plantlets (potentilla and buddleia) and they are doing well. I have not told them that they are not in John Innes compost etc, so they do not yet realise that.

* However, I have a lots of giraffes.

 

[Arch]

That's nothing. Yesterday I was arguing with Oli over the meaning of 'extinct' after he said there were still real living dinosaurs.

In Winchester. He said his friend said he saw one...

Of course, before this, he'd have been as quick as anything to explain that there really were no dinosaurs any more.

 

[Arch]

* However, I have a lots of giraffes.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

<backs away slowly>

 

[Arch]

Hee hee, just coming into Derby, and an East Midlands train was coming in from the next line, and our two trains curved closer and closer, until I thought we were trying to fit on the same track!

We weren't though, just running onto adjacent lines very close together.

 

[Night Train]

Hee hee, just coming into Derby, and an East Midlands train was coming in from the next line, and our two trains curved closer and closer, until I thought we were trying to fit on the same track!

We weren't though, just running onto adjacent lines very close together.

Do you think the drivers ever get that momentary panic and double check the signals and points while covering the brake?

 

[Arch]

Do you think the drivers ever get that momentary panic and double check the signals and points while covering the brake?

I reckon I would! I'm a terrible back seat driver, and the idea of trusting hundreds of different signallers along a line seems like too much!

And of course, given the momentum of a train, even at lower speeds, covering the brake probably doesn't help much....

(How do they brake, is it a lever or a pedal these days?)

 

[potsy]

Right, lunch.

Oooh, ooh! I'd forgotten. Thanks to my sister, I have a little bag of mini cheddars!

I am now fully aware of the 4 or 5 bags of Mini Cheddars in the cupboard, they have been there a while and were in no danger, until Arch had to post that. Twice!!

Talking of wild animals (not you Jo) did anyone see that programme last night on animal attacks?
Polar bear grabbing a womans leg thru the bars of it's cage, Lion getting a mouthful of it's trainner's leg, A'nelephant ramming a jeep in the jungle, and worst was a huge whale that 'playfully' dragged a scuba diving lady down into the depths of the ocean, just as she was out of breath it rushed her back up to the surface for air, very lucky.
Oh and a bull jumping into the crowd at a bullfight

Food time

 

[Arch]

Oh and a bull jumping into the crowd at a bullfight

I like to see that, gives you the idea the bull is getting a fighting chance.

I think they all end up as beef though.

 

[Archie_tect]

They definitely end up as beef otherwise they'd be chicken.

 

[potsy]

I like to see that, gives you the idea the bull is getting a fighting chance.

I think they all end up as beef though.

Me too tbh, despicable 'sport'
The Polar bear one was after a woman climbed over 2 fences to get 'a better look' think her view was closer than she reckoned on

 

[Night Train]

I must apologise to my little tractor. It is much much more powerful and strong then I though.

I went over a little while ago to pull out that log that broke the tractor's axle.
The car wouldn't touch it pulling, did even worse then the tractor did.

So I used my car's winch. Given the winch is a 1500kg line pull it first pulled the car backwards against the hand brake. I put the car into gear to lock the front wheels as well and the winch stalled.
I used a pulley block to get a 2:1 line pull and the log slowly relented and started to move.
Then the car moved backwards.
I took the car further up the tarmac to get a firmer grip and to reduce the cable on the winch drum.
The log eventually came out.

There are two, maybe three spars that are ploughing deeply into the dirt and a chisel shaped leading edge that is digging in. I gave up, having only moved it as far as the tractor did, to avoid ploughing up the tarmac.

I will have to cut it up into two or three lumps.

time.