BLOB BLOG AND BANTER

Having rabbited on about Nostoc Commune the other blog, R produced an article about slime moulds in a magazine called Aquila.
Is its plant?
Is it an animal?
Is it a fungus?
No a slime mould is a plasmodium - a single called thingy that can move and keeps its memory outside of it.
It does sound like an alien - the blob from outer space, something Professor Quatermass would have faced. (Now that is dating myself!)
But what we have is not a slime mould but a cyanobacterium (but looks equally revolting!)
  Anyway enough blob blogging - got desperate to mow the lawn as the grass grew and grew. So cut it a bit wet - endless mower clogging and tyre tread marks but got it done.
Eating our own carrots again tonight, chard last night, with some chicken sausages from Crakeside.

The seeds R sowed on the bare banking where the brachyglottis had been savagely pruned by yours truly have flourished - nasturtiums and eschscholzias.

But there are a plethora of yellows and oranges now, even the butterflies.

Weeding continues and now the damson trees are showing a good crop - so when to pick them - most suggestions are just when slightly soft as with other plums, so a few days yet. Then out with the sacking, tie it to the trunk, spread the tarpaulin (or equivalent) under the tree and wallop the trunk with a sledge hammer (or in my case a 14lb marl.) The fruit fall in droves.

The pond, after a hunk of plant extraction, is looking good.

  The pointing we had done on the paving is already showing us that it was done poorly so I am patching it best I can. R has been on to the man who did it so he is ringing Monday - in fact everyone is ringing Monday - the wall charger for the hybrid car is not working so they are calling too.
  R had some cream over from a do so we have dug out old rhubarb and gooseberries and made fools. (Something I seem to find easy to do!)

Now you might expect colour with the roses - however, now September is upon us leaves are colouring as well.

It is cold - only 13.5C yesterday at teatime - and August! In the south that are basking in 25C. 😕
  The house martins have been gathering and flying en masse up to the western gable nest, hanging on the wall etc. They did this once before and I wonder if they are casing the joint for next year?

Mystery plant? Flowering everywhere and really a bit out of control -
    

  
Nothing outrageous - just apple mint, the best of the mints if a bit hairy. It needs to be grown in a container or a pot sunk in the soil but, of course I have ignored my advice and it is now well spread by the cattle grid and on the banking near the veg beds. Mind you, where it hangs over the grass it gets mown and releases its aroma.

R got roses for her birthday, a climber, a hybrid tea and a smaller one so I have taken them with the Rosa mundi cuttings I struck and put them by the path to the writing shed with the addition of a load of old compost, trimmed overhanging trees and other roses.
I have also cleared under the red currants by the veg beds.

The nice man from the planning department came today and we have provisional go ahead for an extension (if we can afford it) so now to contact an architect (and have some fun.)
R wants a study and another bedroom. I thought we could just have a big greenhouse/orangery but . .  (joke).