Swimming, 14th December 2020

Posted on December 21, 2020 by james

After a fairly busy weekend I wasn’t really in the mood to push myself harder today, so I decided I’d swim the same set as last time. Perhaps just as well, as it turned out: the 50m reps were a good second off my pace on Friday, though the 25s were pretty much the same pace as I was managing last week. I’ll stick with this set for tomorrow and see how things go.

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Swimming, 11th December 2020

Posted on December 12, 2020 by james

I skipped Thursday as I wasn’t feeling great at all and as I didn’t really know how things were going to go I stuck with the same session plan as earlier in the week. It all went pretty well really. Most of my times for the 50s were between 47s and 49s (I think I only had one that was outside 48s) and the 25s were pretty much the same as they have been over the last few days.

There was some minor aggravation with a couple of the other swimmers though, one of whom tried to swim me into the oncoming lane when I overtook him (not that I was intending to, but sometimes it’s not always obvious that there’s someone else there). The other was clearly quite apprehensive about the risk of infection and freaked out a bit when she felt I got too close to her at the end of the lane (again, I wasn’t even aware she was there and I was busy trying to get out of someone else’s way). A few lengths later I tapped her foot (again unintentionally) as I caught up with her mid-length and she just got straight out of the pool and went to complain to the lifeguard. It’s a problem really, when the speed differentials are quite large. I’m not sure what a reasonable solution is.

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Veg plot 2020: Baby leaves only

Posted on December 10, 2020 by james

Nine days since my last pick of the winter salads and the growth rate has really dropped off a cliff. I went to pick what I could earlier today and got at most a couple of small leaves from each of the lettuces, no more than one leaf from each of the mustards and nothing at all from the salad rocket, which has actually been a bit of a disappointment so far. The coriander doesn’t seem to be growing much either, though the chervil still looks quite lush.

Anyhow, after taking pretty much everything I dared (I still want the plants to produce leaves for another four months at least, after all) I ended up with only 47g allowing for the container:

That’s half what I took last time I picked nine days ago. My inner geek is now suggesting that I should create a graph of time against weight for each time I pick 🙂 My inner geek might yet get its way 😀 I suspect part of the reason for the reduced harvest is just down to the lower light levels from the Sun at this time of year, but it also won’t help that we’ve had a long period of overcast weather

For the moment though that’s a total of 1081g since the first pick.

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Greenhouse reassembly progress

Posted on December 10, 2020 by james

I think I’ve worked out where most parts of the “new” greenhouse fit now, and I’m over halfway to having the frame reassembled. I’ve had to straighten out a couple of the frame members which had presumably been bent whilst it was stored in the barn, but it’s not looking too bad at all.

(You can see my existing greenhouse complete with trays of winter salads in the background.)

I’ve also worked out how the fanlight fits in, after noticing that the gutters have an unusual and apparently unnecessary rolled outer edge. As it happens it’s not unnecessary at all, because it receives the rounded top edge of the fanlight frame and holds in it place.

The weather forecast for tomorrow is looking fairly grim, but hopefully before the weekend I can get the remainder of the frame reassembled and perhaps make a start on fittings the door and windows.

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Swimming, 8th December 2020

Posted on December 9, 2020 by james

It was a bit of a shock when I got into the pool today. A touch cooler than normal. One of the swim teachers who was swimming told me it was 29C. I guess they’re not so worried about the temperature unless there are children swimming and there’s probably not much of that right now.

Anyhow, same session as yesterday, enlivened by an older woman who decided she’d swim breaststroke in the fast lane 🙁 After she’d been overtaken quite a few times (I could give her almost a length headstart and still easily overtake her on my return length), the lifeguards asked her to move into the medium lane.

The fifties went exceptionally well today. My times were generally around 48s with a few dropping to 50s when one of the other swimmers got in the way when I was turning. Happy enough with that, and I’ll try dropping the interval down to 1:25 next time. Perhaps as a result the 25s were a bit more of a struggle and I did drop into the 21s two or three times, but I managed thirteen reps before the session ended and I think I can live with that for the time being.

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Swimming, 7th December 2020

Posted on December 9, 2020 by james

To my shame, I skipped last Friday’s swimming session. I actually really wanted to go, but my body was still in shock from the day before so I decided to give it a rest.

Today however turned out to be pretty good. My plan was to do twenty 50m reps on a 1:30 interval trying to keep the times below 55s, followed by some recovery time and then to swim out the session doing 25m reps on 60s, trying to keep the times below 25s. That’s quite a relaxed pace still, but I do need a little time to allow my body to work out what is going on after a month without swimming.

The 50s went pretty well. I completed all twenty with times ranging between 48s and 51s which I was happy with. I had enough time left for twelve reps of the 25s which were all around the 20s mark, which I can live with for now.

If I can repeat the 50s set tomorrow without a failure then I’ll look at dropping the recovery time later in the week.

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Unusual fungus

Posted on December 9, 2020 by james

I found this fungus growing in the polytunnel a couple of days ago. I think it’s possibly growing on some of the wood chips, but I’m not sure. I’ve no idea what it is. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it before.

The largest is probably around 30mm to 40mm across.

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A greenhouse jigsaw

Posted on December 4, 2020 by james

Braving the rather chilly northerly wind today I sorted through all the bits of what I believed to be the 10×10 greenhouse and separated them out into similar parts. After that I could start to decide which pieces went where and lay them out. The ridge was fairly obvious, but deciding which of the straight lengths were roof members and which were the side walls was more tricky. As the roof lights are double width I was expecting to have fewer roof members than for the walls, but that turned out not to be the case. It seems as though the roof lights rest over the top of the roof members rather then sitting between them. Anyhow, I managed to match up marks on the metal to how they must have gone into position originally and I believe I have it the right way around now.

The uprights for the end walls weren’t too hard to identify, nor the rails that form the tops of the side walls and the gutters. After a while I had most of the pieces laid out:

At this point it was clear that it is indeed a 10’x10′ model, which certainly fits the bill very nicely for what I want. We can perhaps have some melons growing up strings and smaller plants growing between them.

There appear to be two sets of diagonal braces of different lengths, four of each. At the moment it’s really not clear where exactly those go. There’s also a long brace that appears to run horizontally across the end that doesn’t have the door in.

What I have left are eighteen (if I recall correctly) pieces that look as though they match the spacing between the uprights but have no fixings, a fanlight window and a few other bits that don’t look like they fit anywhere. I suspect the eighteen pieces may fit towards the bottom of the walls, with a short length of glass below them and the main large pieces of glass above. I looked at the website for the manufacturer (whose nameplate is still on the door: Robinsons) and they still use a similar design. Only I think if that is the case I should have nineteen pieces (five for each side wall, five for the back and four for the front because there’s no need for one in the door opening). I may have left a piece in the barn, perhaps.

The fanlight is an odd one, in that I can’t see anything that looks as though it will act as a hinge without the window falling out as soon as it is opened. That’s going to be something I need to look at when I find out what parts I have left over I think.

I also have a louvred vent, but that looks as though it could be fitted in pretty much anywhere as it is clearly intended to bolt into the frame. Opposite the door might be the obvious choice.

Tomorrow doesn’t exactly look like a great day weather-wise with rain forecast for most of the morning and cold northerly winds in the afternoon so I may well pass up on the opportunity to attempt some assembly, but it would be great if I could make a start this weekend.

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Veg plot 2021: How do you like them onions?

Posted on December 4, 2020 by james

Having posted yesterday about how the garlic was doing so well, a little update on the multi-sown onions that were planted out during the second week of October.

These are the (Red Baron) red onions, sown at the very end of August and planted out five weeks later:

And the brown onions (Bedfordshire Champion), sown and transplanted at the same time. In the foreground are some White Lisbon spring onions that were actually planted outdoors much earlier before I started moving to no dig. They were the only thing left in the way when I had the opportunity to compost another bed, so I transplanted them here. They seem to have survived the trauma well enough. (And even more in the foreground, the footprints of a deer that has been exploring the veg plot.)

And these are the White Lisbon spring onions, sown and planted out at the same time as the main crop ones above, ten seeds to a cell.

They’re all looking pretty good I think. The worst of the winter weather is till to come, I assume, but hopefully they’ll get through it ok.

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Swimming, 3rd December 2020

Posted on December 3, 2020 by james

Back to the pool after another enforced lay-off due to Covid restrictions, and I have to admit that it was tough. Not as bad as it was last time, exactly four months ago, but far from easy.

I think I need a week or so just to allow my body to get over the shock so I wasn’t really pushing to achieve times or anything like that today. I did however keep the form of the sets I was swimming before Lockdown Mark 2, so I swam twenty fifties followed by however many twenty-fives I could manage in the rest of the session.

The fifties went relatively well considering the circumstances, though I skipped one at around halfway because there were swimmers in the way when I wanted to leave the wall and I started with an interval of 90s. My times were around fifty to fifty-one seconds for all but the last couple. I even managed a forty-nine, but I suspect that was thanks to a tow from a teenage girl who passed me just before the turn. My lats were aching well before the twenty were up though. That’s not something that happens too often…

The twenty-fives I did with an interval of 60s and managed ten before the end of the session.

I’ve booked to go back tomorrow, but I’ll have to see how I feel in the morning. I was absolutely exhausted when I got home and in the end had to go and crash out for an hour or so because I was falling asleep at my desk!

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