Lorna Killer...

I remember the 'Lorna Killer' well. I guess like the hydrangea head lop, this was one of my first forays into utilising the garden I grew up in. Well, that and the DDT sprayed walnuts and the magic NEVER ripening figs from the old decrepit fig tree. I still can't take figs seriously because I didn't see a ripe fig for another 15 years until after leaving home. Up till that point my only experience with figs had been raking up tonnes of the bloody things for about ten years....And to my knowledge not a single member of my family ever ate a fig, cooked a fig, or did anything with figs other then scoop the things up by the tonne and get rid of the stupid things or throw them as hard as you could to see how many houses you could clear. They never ever ripened I swear. But I digress...

We had a tree....come to think of it I really should have researched this before I started writing because I have no idea what sort of tree it was...A rubber tree maybe? I mean later in life when 'L's and 'P's were earned and late night returns in green Mazda Cappelas and clapped out Rust coloured Renault 12's were the regular thing, it became the tree to avoid whilst parking on the lawn at high speed after a night at The Austral. But as a twelve year old it held a different purpose. It used to grow these branches....I mean they were foot long, sturdy yet flexible rubber branch. And heavy. Really heavy. They were perfect to sneak up on friends wearing stubbies or an unexpecting sister and and a nice short whip across a leg would sting for hours and raise a welt you could show all who cared to listen. Although I can't remember what sort of tree it was, we didn't know then either now I think about it. We didn't need to know. It was to become bearer of the Lorna Killers and years later that is still what it remains in my head. You see, Lorna was a lovely old Grandma that lived next door. Well before the Murray's had moved in which was to prompt my downhill slide into Heavy Metal, Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath....sorry, another digression. Lorna was interesting for several reason. The first being that she was at that time the last remaining Matriarch of the 'Balfours' family (on re-reading that I should have prefaced that the 'facts' contained in this writing were facts to a twelve year old in 1985 and therefore aren't actually facts at all). Yes, of the famous Balfours family, the very same Balfours pies, sausage rolls, apricot rolls, custard tarts....In the early 80's the Balfours name was unmatched in pastry and pies. Before the rise and rise of Villi's. When every deli (conerstore, dairy) flew proudly the Balfours name from blue and orange plastic flags and awnings. Many mornings were spent sitting on a BMX eating a Balfours sausage roll with tomato sauce punched into...the proper way...none of this packet sauce stuff. The Adelaide way. Bugger health and hygiene. Just jam the sauce nozzle into the sausage roll and squeeze for your life. God I miss the store in the Rundle Mall.

The other reason was that she had grandchildren that used to come and play with us, Will and Emma. The only thing I remember about Will was that whilst colouring in my 'Star Wars'  colouring in book (it wasn't called A New Hope then) he made C3PO green and brown...and that he didn't stay in the lines...I have never really forgiven him...My horror was not abated by him not really understanding what the problem was.....a blue chewbacca and a green and brown C3PO....still freaks me out. His sister Emma was my sister's age. She went on to become quite famous in her own right...and it wasn't by colouring in Star Wars figures the wrong colour....

Back to Grandma Balfour....Lorna was always loving and very kind every time we saw her. Never once do I remember her being anything but a smiling lovely Grandma....so I am not sure at what point the practice of launching the rubber branches over the fence became a standard practice of disposing of them. The discovery of the aerodynamic properties of 'rubber' branch was an exciting time, prompting all out wars throughout our backyard. As mentioned before the injuries inflicted by these things on contact were exciting enough to make this practice highly exhilarating and painful. One of the last places to be caught out in the open backyard was behind the shed next to the incinerator (remember those?)....Shit, I remember pouring the entire contents of our daily rubbish in and setting fire to it.....Foreign idea now but was completely normal then...Sorry I digressed again....I really should stop or I never finish this thing....

If caught in the open, it became a rubber branch shooting gallery for the unfortunately high stubbie wearing child....the only problem was that Lorna's washing line lay directly on the other side of our shooting gallery.....I think but can't be sure that the legend of the 'Lorna Killer' may have come about from a misguided branch striking over the fence into Lorna's area one day when she may or may not have been at the washing line. Those things were heavy...really really heavy. The sudden silence may have put a few twelve year old pulses racing when sudden silence was experienced on the other side of the fence where not just seconds before a lovely little lady called Lorna had been hanging out her washing.
'Shit! I think we killed Lorna!' And the Lorna Killer was born. For a decade or more later, it was not unusual to see someone who was old enough to know better pick up a rubber tree branch, glance to the fence on the other side of the yard, pull their arm back and launch the branch to the chorus of 'Lorna Killer!' years and years after Lorna had long since sold and left.

On the garden front for those that actually care and I am sure that is no one.....The bald patches on the lawn are now being taken over moss....Not a problem I care to deal with in the midst of a Wellington winter. The impatiens are leggy, naked and refuse to bloom. Apparently they hate the frost, and the wind and the rain. I have some bad news for them. I am about to go out and 'pinch' them....even though I am not entirely sure I know what pinching is. Apparently the pruned stem will re pot very well and very easily. So I am going to repot it along side my already re-potted hydrangea branch and rose branch and see which one heads into spring better....then cull the two losers and give the pot to the winner. I call it Gladiatorial Gardening. It's going to be all the rage next year. You watch. It'll be better then watching grass grow.

Next time I'll tell you about my magical disappearing garden.

Why We Garden?.....

I sat down to clean my desk. And yet whilst making the bed all I had in my head were direction of conversation I could lead this blog. I received an email from a family member last night questioning just what i thought I was doing with this blog. Truth is I have no idea. I guess I started it to share some of my new forays into gardening. Being in New Zealand and not having the company of either close family or friends either near by or at the end of a telephone as readily as normal, I keep having conversations with them in my head and wondering what their responses and advice would be. Particularly my Mother and Father. You see, they gardened for my entire childhood and teen years. Dad's inability to sit still or watch his favorite sporting teams lose again meant that he spent a majority of the weekend in the garden. Mum too. I, for almost 21 years managed to completely ignore this fact and I laugh about this every time I stand in the garden having absolutely NO IDEA what is going on around me. The most myself or my siblings cared about the garden was when Dad discovered fresh tyre tracks in the grass up the side of the driveway when one of his learner driver children had driven too fast and too recklessly up it. The tirade and the wielding of the rake was enough for us to promise we would never do it again. Having said that the tyre track never really disappeared or recovered until some years after all of us had long since chased our lives to other areas of the globe. The same was true of the gardenias, or was it the hydrangeas.....Yes the hydrangeas AND the agapanthus. Both these plants lined the before mentioned driveway and were the first casualties when one tried to squeeze their bike at speed between the parked car and the three foot of space on the other side. A space that unfortunately was shared with a collection of both flowers. If Mum was thinking strategically, she should have planted rose bushes there instead. That would have stopped us outright. There was another unfortunate plant that was involved in the madness but the name escapes me. I am sure Mum will refresh my memory. In my mind I see constantly projected images that span nearly two decades of Mum or Dad and sometimes both standing in the kitchen holding the sliced head of a hydrangea or an agapantha in their hands saying 'How many times must we tell you NOT to kill the HYDRANGEAS'. The truth is, and my brother will back me up, if you lined them up and hit them at just the right speed, the head would lop off in one clean move. A talent my parents never did truly appreciated, or knew about for that matter.
This blog is a poor substitute to exorcise the one sided conversations in my head that I have with my family members that aren't around as much as I would like them to be. Don't get me wrong, I love my gypsy life I have lead to this point with my partner and (although I am not keen on the word) fiance. Sorry don't know how to do a little accent over the e. We love our life in Wellington, New Zealand. We love the house we have somehow convinced a lovely couple to rent us and above all we love our inherited garden. Yes I wish I knew more about it...But that's just it. That's part of the education I hope to document here. In the last 48 hours I have learnt so much about lawn....But that is for another blog. I think the lawn is fighting back...for those that care.
I do have a fine collections of what will become my in-laws that have been fantastic in trying to get us up to speed with garden and lawn management. They are all blessed with living on beautiful rolling acres in Auckland and as a result are armed with a wealth of knowledge of how to look after it. I had a guided tour of my own garden by my Mother-in-law to be. I learned terms like 'leggy' and was informed how to stop a plant, or flower from wasting it's food and energy by cutting of the older bits. Yes, I am sure there are gardeners out there rolling eyes, but you have to remember these are new concepts for the gardening challenged. I am still amazed the stick she stuck in the empty flower pot has sprout a little green bulb on it over the last two days. I thought she was joking when she said it would grow. But there it is. And so I keep writing this blog.
Yes I, Mr dying grass man as my brother calls me, only have 5 followers, everyone single one of which I know very well. No, nothing on your 218 follow.
If I was looking for followers then maybe I would write a blog on my life in the film industry. About cuing De Niro to walk into a cafe, about standing shoulder to shoulder with Captain Dale Dye as we send 120 of his 'Marines' across an explosive laden set that will become Peleliu, about Lucas asking me where to put R2D2 when I absent mindedly stood next to him in Matmata, Tunisia. But I can't. I have signed so many confidentiality agreements in my life that I doubt I'll ever be able to write about my career. So instead, I'll write this. My gardening blog. And love doing it and maybe god forbid I'll learn something in the process.

Unmitigated Lawn Disaster....

un·mit·i·gat·ed/ˌənˈmitəˌgātid/

Adjective: Absolute; unqualified.

The lawn here has always bothered me. As much as it played a huge part in my falling in love with the place when we were inspecting, despite it's smallish stature, it's always been an area for concern. As mentioned in my previous blogs, it has taunted me since we moved in. It's perfect manicured edges were never going to be replicated under my watch. I knew that and the lawn knew that......but not even I could foresee the levels of despair this lawn has thrust upon me. My girlfriend accuses me of now being obsessed with lawn and especially other peoples' lawn. Admittedly, on our morning walk this morning she suddenly noticed that I was no longer walking beside her. She stopped turned around and found me standing in the street staring over a fence muttering a mantra 'How do they do that? How do keep it like that? How?' True story.

This is an example of what it used to look like. A 'Before' if you will.

Initially I was only concerned about the odd brownish patch that had started to appear throughout my smallish lawn...then the clover popped up...still no problem. Dad said this was quite normal for a lawn heading into winter. And so the time came that I realized I had to mow it. Again, no great problem...been there and down that path as an 11 Year old using Dad's two stroke mower. Actually I am amazed that I still have all my toes. I rarely put too much concentration into the activity. But still the weapon of choice I have inherited is a push mower. It really does look like it is from the 1950s. I was going to post a photo of it on here but the thought of going downstairs to wrestle the thing out of the cupboard it lives in diminished my enthusiasm. This particular mower doesn't start to cut the grass till after a metre or so of pushing. Problem with me is that I really only have a few metres across to mow so by the time the blades are up to speed I am half way across the lawn. An issue I am willing to work with. The run up technique really only works from the garden path side. If I try it on any of the other sides I must start at least a metre in the garden. That could work but the majority of the garden on those sides is dotted with well placed rose bushes so there is no where I can sneak in with out getting attacked by thorns. I am sure this garden is just messing with me. Everyday I step into it, it finds another way to defeat me, or at the very least humiliate me. That is where the impetus of this blog came from initially. I spent so much time swearing at certain plants / lawn / mower / hoses at different times I thought that no one would ever believe how much shit this garden actually gives me....And so here I am...It continues to taunt me. Even during something as simple as watering the garden on the way out to work. I will run the hose out put the sprinkler on the end and turn on the water. Simple right? Well as I walk forward the hose gets jagged, instantly tightening around my leg spinning me off balance and into the nearest bush. Annoyed I stomp back to the tap to turn it off so I can sort the twisted hose out and the bloody tap connection right at the moment of me standing there pops off dowsing me in water....so before I go to work I have to go upstairs and change. Seriously this garden has it in for me. 


The first mow goes ok. The edges are a bit sprouty (that word sounded fine in my head but unconvinced it translates to the page) and the random directions I was forced to manoeuvre the beast in means that there is no natural flow to the tracks of the mower. Again, I can live with that. I knew I would never reach those same awesome heights of the obvious lawn queen who owns the house so I had not so far to fall. I was a little disappointed. A little part of me had hoped that upon cutting the little blades would appreciate the gesture to such a degree that they would just naturally line themselves up and the lawn would maintain it's uniform and beautifully cultured manner. Sadly that did not happen. But a good first effort I believe.

I should cut to the chase. No pun intended. I mean I doubt anyone should persist this far into a story about cutting a lawn. I know I wouldn't and I commend anyone other then my Mum, my sister and my girlfriend who makes it this far. You are either incredibly bored OR really care about lawn. Either way, thanks for hanging in there.

I had left the lawn whilst away. So by the time I got back from an OS wedding and holiday to two countries who really know how to do a lawn (Tuscany, Italy and Dublin, Ireland) I was forced to confront my own. Even then I didn't address it straight away. I waited. And eventually it started raining. Oops. Should have mowed when it wasn't raining. It rained and rained from Wednesday to Saturday morning. Saturday, however started to fine up and by 10am I could see that this might be my only chance to get in and cut the now quite high lawn. It was I must say looking quite healthy, if only unkempt and a tad overgrown (not dissimilar to my own head). Roll your eyes now but HOW was I supposed to know that you should never ever mow a lawn right after it has been raining? The first thing I noticed was that the clippings due to the wetness of lawn stuck together and instead of being thrown back into the attached catcher, flew forward and covered anything in front of the mower in a blanket of wet green clippings. There are still plants in the garden that have the odd clipping stuck to their leaves. Not to mention the path. As if that wasn't bad enough it was too late when I noticed that the wheels were indenting the grass and leaving large tracks through the wet mess that had until several minutes ago been a lawn. This was like a annoyance delay technique as I was forced to watch over the following week whilst this grass began to stand back up creating lines of uncut grass. Yet another way for the grass to get at me. To add insult to injury, the colour of the newly cut grass was a yellow brown. Almost like I had peeled away the nice green blades and exposed the rotting mess of grass that hasn't seen the sun in a while. I was horrified, and pissed off. How could this grass do this to me. In fits of absolute disgust I finished the remainder of the lawn, hosed off the beast and hid it back in the cupboard. I pulled out the shears and started trimming the edges of a lawn that now resembled a three year old's dolls head once the hair has been cut of with nail scissors. It had become ridiculous. The only thing to be done was to hide the evidence and hope that a couple of dry days restored the lawn to something semi presentable. It didn't. The major damage done on that day was my own footprints. The exasperated steps I took to inspect the total damage done on that fated day have actually remained and the grass has failed to restore itself. This is not the end. This is the beginning.

And after my handiwork this is the current state.

NFI

I have no idea what I am doing here in Blogger world....Clueless about this Blogging thing as I am about a garden.

Suggestions? Although I guess that is ridiculous because that would actually insinuate that anyone would actually read this. I wouldn't read a blog about Gardening. Even if the author didn't know anything about Gardening.

Pagan Rituals on the Lawn of the Gods....

This blog may very well be a complete waste of time. Winter is coming.

The reason being, that Lou and I took this house over early April. The gardens were lush and manicured within an inch of their lives. The grass was so incredibly green. And soft. Like the take your shoes off and walk around it with eyes closed and the sounds of Scandanavian forests in your ears kinda soft. I was so happy to have a garden and a patch of grass so lush and soft. But in the back of my mind I had a nagging feeling. One that threatened to take away any enjoyment about my new acquisition of garden. How the HELL was I going to maintain it even partially what it was when it was handed to over to us? We discussed hiring a gardener...maybe once every few months. Sure that'd work for then. But what about now? Every morning I woke and looked out the kitchen window to a garden that almost as soon as we moved in started failing. The colours started to drain from day one. The leaves looked a little droopier. The plants just didn't feel as happy as they were. I started to panic.
I spent several morning down on one knee pushing a finger into the soil beneath the layer of grass. Not entirely sure why. I had a vague idea that this would tell me if the soil was moist and whether the grass needed watering. Since a few small patches of brown had started appearing, I started wondering if I had not watered it enough. Being in Wellington and having more then a few sporadic rain showers I simply couldn't see how this could be. 
I swear I have no idea how the owner of the property kept her lawn SO green and lush and soft, and weed free. Seriously. I have images of her lying on it whispering to it. Or performing a Pagan style ceremony whilst simultaneously playing Mozart throu speakers laid face down on the soil......
Why, after only days of us moving in did the clover start appearing, the bright green turn to a darker less welcoming shade?
I tell myself it is because winter is coming. But really I have no idea if that means anything.

Winter is coming.

You Want Us To What?

I have been living in Sydney on and off for the better part of fourteen years. I have not had, shared or been near anything that resembles a garden in that time. Not one of the properties I lived in had anything like a garden that one could, proudly or otherwise call 'a garden'. The last time I donned gumboots and a rake I was getting paid 20 cents an hour for the privilege. The last time I revved up Dad's old lawnmower, I was wearing thongs and Stubbies. The fact that a Father would allow his 12 year old son to mow the lawn in thongs places us straight away in the mid 80's...Glory days indeed....When not only were we allowed to go to the Dashwood dump in the very same thongs BUT were allowed to do it riding shotgun on top of a pile of rusted corrugated iron in the back of the Valiant Ute (Orange) as we wound up Waterfall Gully Road. I even vaguely remember the local cops form the Feathers Police Station waving to us as we drove past. Gold. Them the days, when kids were kids and parents didn't care as long as you were home for dinner. But this isn't a blog about my reminiscence of childhood, although that's not a bad idea but instead it is a blog about how I, at 37 years of age have inherited an immaculate Garden and a Lawn as part of a lease on beautiful house my partner and I have moved into. As part of the lease terms, we promised to maintain the surrounding garden and lawn. Apart from a few sideways glances behind the property managers back, we both thought 'How hard can it be?'.....That is exactly what I plan to write about. Just how clueless I am and the gradual education of my gardening knowledge and experience. Dumb thing to write about? Totally. Pointless? Yes. And so I begin.....