Swimming, 27th September 2021

Woohoo! Today was actually my first really good session for some time. All my reps, both 50m and 25m were probably within 0.5s of where I know I’m capable of. That makes me feel so much better. Here’s hoping that it continues that way.

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No dig diary, 26th September 2021

Today I harvested all the remaining sweetcorn and froze the cobs. The stalks I twisted out of the ground and after hacking off the roots with a billhook (they obviously went straight into the compost) I shredded the stalks and put those in the compost as well.

The removal of the sweetcorn made it quite obvious that there wasn’t very much leaf left on the Uchiki Kuri squashes growing in the same area, so I decided to harvest those and bring them in to harden off in a window. There were only eight fruit which doesn’t seem much to show for three plants, but my cucurbits don’t really seem to have done very well at all this year. Not outdoor ones, at least. Anyhow, their removal left me with a little weeding to do where the plants had covered up weeds. The butternut squashes also growing around the sweetcorn are also pretty much near the end of their growing season I think. Quite possibly I’ll be harvesting those in the next week or so.

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Swimming, 24th September 2021

Ok, so today was a complete mess. The school session before our lane-swimming session didn’t even end until we were supposed to be in the water and then they had problems with the ropes and we were over ten minutes late getting in by the time it was all sorted, which isn’t great for a session that’s only fifty minutes to start with 🙁

As a result it was all a bit rushed and I couldn’t do as many reps as I’d planned. What I did was ok, but not what I’m used to so I’m not sure any measure is comparable with my normal sessions.

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Swimming, 23rd September 2021

Another slightly improved session today. If I can keep this up then I make be back to where I was a month ago some time next week.

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Extreme composting?

I saw this piece on the BBC website today. The comments from 2:20 to the end amused me, particularly as it’s something I’ve joked about with my daughter.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/science-environment-58587691

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No dig diary, 21st September 2021

I seem to have spent the last couple of weeks madly doing stuff and not feeling as though I have a huge amount to show for it. Not sure why. On a non-gardening front I do at least have a huge amount of honey bottled and I’ve made a few batches of beer, both of which took longer than anticipated. I’ve also been picking blackberries and raspberries as often as there’s ripe fruit.

It doesn’t actually feel as though there’s been much to do in the veggie plot however. I harvested lots of aubergines, some of which have been made into pickles, some eaten and some roasted with other veg and frozen for future meals and I’ve been picking sweetcorn regularly. I think this weekend I’ll harvest the remainder and get the stalks into the compost.

There are more aubergines to come. They’ve done really well this year, both in the polytunnel and greenhouse.

The weather here has been incredibly humid over the last couple of weeks and unfortunately that seems to have allowed some blight to take hold in the polytunnel, so on Sunday I removed all the foliage and stems that weren’t already bearing fruit from the tomatoes as well as clearing out the marigolds growing around their feet, the idea being to improve the air circulation as much as possible around the plants whilst the remaining fruit ripen.

The peppers (on the right in the second photo) seem to be producing lots of flower and fruit now, but it really does seem rather late. I’ll leave them on the plants as long as possible and we’ll see how it goes. Some have also grown very tall. The tallest near the end must be about 1.5m — the tops of the stakes are around 1m high.

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Swimming, September 21st 2021

Another no-so-bad session. They’re coming a bit more regularly now, so I hope I’m going to get back to where I was a few weeks back.

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Swimming, 20th September 2021

A bit of a drop back in performance from last week’s good sessions today, but not absolutely awful at least.

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Swimming, 17th September 2021

Something of a scrappy session today because we were late getting into the pool. For the first time in almost two years I think, schools have returned for lessons and they’re not leaving the pool (which then has to be reset with all the lane ropes etc.) until the time when we’re supposed to get in, so it’s all a bit of a rush 🙁

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Swimming, 16th September 2021

Another not-so-bad session today. Perhaps I’m on the road to recovery now.

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