I thought the house might blow away at some points. There was definitely a lot of rattling coming from everywhere.
The morning dog walk was quite short this morning. I'm not sure if all the wind brings extra smells for Mr Woof or if it blows them all away, but he seems fairly unperturbed by the wind. Maybe because he's low to the ground it doesn't hit him as much. It does give him a very streamlined look instead of his normally fluffy cloud appearance.
I was thinking of doing noodles for an easy dinner tonight, but I think my noodles are still in a box somewhere. I'm not sure I have enough enthusiasm for anything else. Maybe cheese and crackers, I'm pretty sure I can find all the ingredients for that.
I'm going to take that as a no...
Guilty
Edit: meaning I was wrong with my hung jury prediction.
That's less traumatic at least, but a late dinner. Would you like to swap for my 7-7 shift? I have either am-pm or pm-am options available....
Is that 1130am to 730pm, or 1130pm to 730am?
Full English breakfast please, no beans.
I have succeeded in unloading everything from the van, but still need to move some of the stuff out of the way so that I can move the van out of the garage. I have one set of shelves up and a rough plan of where I want all of the shelves to go, it's just going to be a bit of a hassle moving everything out of the way so I can put the shelves up and then put the things I've moved onto them. Hopefully next weekend the weather will be ok and I can either move a bit of stuff temporarily outside or move the van out the front for a little while to give me room to work. I'll also need to make a trip to the tip to get rid of a few things like an old gas bottle and tin of petrol.
I have now collapsed and removed sticky tape from the boxes I am planning to use as a weed barrier in the garden. Unfortunately I also discovered some more polystyrene, so I've had to throw that in the bin instead of being able to recycle it. Fortunately I don't have much other rubbish as the bin is now almost full. The next step is to start on assembling shelves and trying to get a bit of order into the chaos in the garage.
Miss Meow came into the garage for a bit of an explore - she scaled the heights of the van, had a look around and then realised it was actually pretty boring in there and went back inside to the couch.
That is good to hear.
If you were not alive and still posting here that would actually be a bit alarming. I'm really not ready for a zombie apocalypse.
Clear and sunny with lots of wind = good drying weather. I am loving having some decent outdoor drying space in this place, everything smells better having been outdoors and the wind helps get rid of some of the excess pet hair and dust that's always around. I've already managed to do a load of clothes and a load of towels, I now have sheets on the line and another small load of clothes in the washing machine.
From Melbourne Zoo's Facebook page:
Melbourne Zoo is closing today due to high winds in the area.
Our priority is keeping our Zoo Members, visitors, staff and the animals in our care safe, so we will be closing for the remainder of today. If you have purchased a ticket online and had not entered the zoo before midday, you will be automatically refunded and you do not need to call us.
Werribee Open Range Zoo, Healesville Sanctuary and Kyabram Fauna Park all remain open today. Melbourne Zoo will reopen tomorrow morning at 9am. We look forward to seeing you then.
University of Tasmania currently have a Certificate and Diploma in Sustainable Living available with a HECS waiver - meaning that if you are eligible for a Commonwealth Supported Place you can enroll and they will waive the student contribution. The courses are fully online with no fixed times you need to be available, so are quite flexible to fit around other commitments.
Many of the courses are practical and the assignements relate you your own situation and local area. I am just finishing the Science of Gardening subjects, which has deepened my understanding of how plants grow and the interactions between different organisms in the garden. The assignments have included things like assessing the soil in my garden, and the final assignment is pulling together everything to create a comprehensive design plan for my own garden.
There are also subjects on sustainable housing and biodiversity, if you are interested in doing some study I highly recommend looking into this.
My zucchini produced a beautifully matched set of flowers yesterday morning.
The one on the left is female, the one on the right is male - you can tell the difference as the male has only a single stamen in the centre. You can also tell the difference if you look behind the flowers, the female has a tiny zucchini attaching it to the plant, the male has a normal stem.
If your baby zucchini are withering on the vine rather than growing you need to hand pollinate them. You can either pull off the male flower, remove the stamen and brush it onto the centre of the female flower or use a brush to transfer the pollen (the flowers wither soon anyway, so I just remove the flower).
I would like a place I can talk about the random happenings in my garden that don't justify a stand alone post. Exciting things like my tomato plant finally growing, or the sadness that my snow peas seem to be dying off prematurely.
Would anyone else like to share their gardening snippits? If there is enough interest I can set up a regularly weekly thread (@[email protected] I presume that will be ok?)
Pic is just for interest - this is the collection of gardening pictures I put together to illustrate my garden design goals for a recent assignment.
There is a package waiting for me at my front door. Now I just have to wait 9 hours until I can go home to get it!
Edit: now there are two packages!! What an exciting day.