Soilman

It’s the time of year when everything’s a-bloomin’ and a-fruitin’. Some nice raspberries, and the early spuds are at last producing.

Sadly, so are the weeds. But that’s life.

In other news, Mrs S has determined that for our holidays this year we’re going… nowhere. Instead, we’re having a ‘staycation’ and remaining firmly at home.

I could kiss her (and will, actually). Jaded as I am by the traditional Soilman holiday, I was getting very antsy at the prospect of an aeroplane trip – any aeroplane trip.

Knowing I don’t have to do it fills me with exquisite relief. No puce-faced child. No screaming blue murder in my ear. No ill-fitting nappies (diapers) leaking their contents on to my trouser leg. No need to spend half my salary at the osteopath on return.

Instead I’ll have a fortnight on the allotment – weather permitting. And how bloody marvellous will that be?

If you’re unlucky enough to have caught my rantings on Twitter, you’ll know we’ve had rain in south-eastern England.

A fair bit, I’m relieved to report: more than an inch on Sunday night and some good, strong, prolonged showers since.

But you won’t be surprised to hear that I’m not hanging out the bunting… yet. After four months of almost total drought, even the 3-4cm of rain we’ve had in the last few days is a piffling drop in the ocean.

I did a bit of digging on my vegetable plot last night, and the ground is still utterly dry below half a spade’s depth.

We need a LOT more rain where that lot came from.

PS One very good thing about the rain is that it’s arrived just in time to bulk up the early new potatoes. A heartfelt ‘thank you’, then, to the Higher Power.

The Planning Dept (aka Mrs Soilman) is slowly turning its attention towards the summer holidays, and I’m worried.

I used to look forward to holidays. That was before I’d taken many.

From a 42-year-old perspective, the 20-year-old’s optimism seems deranged. After climbing into your car, going on holiday is the biggest risk you ever take with your health and sanity.

I’m not even going to mention air travel (the folly of volunteering to cramp yourself into Stephen Hawking’s chair while a small, puce-faced child vomits and screams blue murder into your left ear – for 14 hours – defies rational explanation).

No, my principal beef is that places I can afford to visit (I definitely include my own nation’s offerings in this general judgement) are a bit shit.

Brief diarrhoea

Only in the lives of the super rich are the cabs plentiful and empty, the prices reasonable, the hotel rooms clean and well appointed, the dividing walls soundproofed, the satellite pornography peopled by cheerful and attractive actors, the sunblock effective, the lavatories pristine and unblocked, the maps accurate, the peace of night time uninterrupted by yelling drunks from Morecambe, the wi-fi dependable, the sewers invisible and odourless, the beaches unpolluted by dog shit and engine oil, the flash floods insufficiently violent to wash you off a mountain into the Dead Sea, the transgender prostitutes discreet and inoffensive, the pickpockets clumsy, the child beggars winsome and grateful, the waiters loquacious and amusing, the foreigners unexcitable and anglophone, the tourists indistinguishable from the natives, the local pack animals well fed and kindly treated, the swimming pools uncontaminated by Giardia, the food delicious and hygienically prepared by people who wash their fucking hands, the food poisoning confined to one lavish vomit followed by miraculous recovery, the diarrhoea brief and barely noticeable, the sandflies hypoallergenic, the mosquitoes vegetarian, the sea urchins and lethally poisonous Stonefish confined to the bay used by the other hotel, the hire cars well maintained with working brakes, the roads clearly signposted by somebody who actually wants to help you orientate, the service polite and attentive, the ‘attractions’ cheap and uncrowded, the lie-ins uninterrupted, the only-on-holiday marital sex agreeable to both parties.

In my world, at least half of the above will never be true – wherever we opt to go.

I realise, of course, that I should count myself fortunate to be able to take any kind of holiday. And – with reservations – I do.

But that doesn’t stop the gnawing tension creeping into my consciousness about this time of year.

Having Fun can be so fucking ghastly.

Forecast is outrageous (27C, unbroken sunshine, buzzing bees, tweeting birdies etc etc), so I’m donning my gayest pair of shades for a day of flouncing about on the plot. By close of play I will be puce red, shit-smeared, sweat-sodden and very, very happy.

Although…

Does anyone else find this weather a little… creepy? I mean, it’s April. FFS. We do not get 27C in April in this country. Most years, we never see 27C ALL YEAR.

I’m enjoying it – believe me, I really am – but at the same time I’m freaked out.

The last flowers of these lilies – an oriental/trumpet cross – always presage the end of summer for me. The final blooms usually drop off at the end of August; they’re early this year because of the extraordinary weather.

And wow, what a year it’s been. Can’t remember a summer like it since ’76. I’ve moaned continually on this blog about the lack of water, but this is kindergarten stuff compared with the nightmare they’re enduring in Russia. My Muscovite in-laws are choking on smog, smoke and 40ºC. People are dying from it.

If this is the future – ie if this is what global warming looks like – we’re all in for a very bumpy and painful ride. Hold on to your hats.

Well, it is if you live within the M25. Exceptionally dry.

I spent 80 minutes watering my allotment tonight. Barely reached the roots of anything. Like trying to heat St Paul’s cathedral with a cigarette lighter.

I have no further news.

Well it’s a funny old year when your best crop is parsnips. For me, this is a first.

Parsnips are always OK – you know, forgettably acceptable. I have germination issues most years, but that’s about the limit of the grief parsnips give. They grow, to a pretty standard size, and I eat them with barely a moment’s thought or gratitude.

All that’s changed in 2010, as the rest of my vegetable plot dies around me. Gone is my blithe indifference, replaced by quivering gratitude for the parsnips’ ploddy, undemanding, stolid performance.

They are the new love of my gardening life.

You know what? I feel like giving up.

Didn’t think I’d ever type that, but there it is. I’m like these poor fuschias, wilting and drooping in this sizzling heat.

Even with an hour or more’s watering every evening, I’m barely keeping the allotment alive. Some things – the brassicas, for one – are doomed now, whatever I do: the cauliflowers are already producing those crinkly inner leaves that presage the formation of a useless, tiny, button-headed floret.

It’s all deeply disheartening, and it’s ruining what should – for any average, normal Brit – be a thrilling time: proper summers are rare as rocking horse shit hereabouts.

Instead of lolling about soaking up the rays, though, I’m busting my arse carrying cans of water. And when I’m not actually doing it, I’m dreading it.

So I can see a time in the near future, if this carries on, when I’ll be saying: “Enough already. Fuck it. Que sera, sera.”

I’ll essentially be writing off the plot for 2010. But then, since the asparagus I’ve not harvested so much as a rat’s arse anyway. So what have I lost?

There’s a shitload more carrots where those came from, but the beetroot is all done for 2009. Ditto the dahlias. I picked the last ones this morning, and the frosts are on their way.

So summer’s definitely over, and you won’t hear me moan about weeds and lack of water for a while.

I’m not too sad. Too bloody busy, what with all the wretched digging.

Guess what I’ll be moaning about now?

Corn is outrageously good this year. I’ve had two good-sized ears on nearly every plant (average is 1.5 most seasons).

Wife and I are scoffing two cobs apiece every night. I swear I’ll turn yellow any minute.

I don’t mind gluts (exception: courgettes), because it helps me eat seasonally. When I’m thoroughly sick of a prolific vegetable it’s easier to go without in the ‘off’ seasons; the relief of not eating the bloody thing lasts for months.

So it’s OK if I DO go yellow, or start vomiting at the sight of corn.

This is What Eating Seasonally Is All About.