Jungle Fever

The long drive home from our holidays really zapped me. After spending so much time on the motorways we arrive home on Saturday the 2nd August in the evening. I needed to stretch my legs so thought I would pop over just for two minutes mind to the plot.
Bob was at the gates. He had offered to do a bit of watering while I was away and I thanked him. He told me that he'd helped himself to a few courgettes while I was away. No problem I said.

Michael's kids came running down the hill. "We've been watering your plot while you was away" Thanks kids. We had some courgettes said Grace.

I kept walking up and bumped into Shirley. Ooh she said. Ive been watering your plot for you, Its been really hot over here. By the way, I've had a few courgettes.

Although they were not all up the site I later found that Keith, Mick, James, Trevor, Eugine and Mark all said the same. They had all watered my plot and all of them had helped themselves to a few courgettes.

So as I walked the last 30 metres to my plot I thought I would be three foot under water and have several spent courgette plants.

I was wrong again. The place looked like a tropical Jungle. The corn had grown to six foot. The beans had twined around the cane supports and were nearly reaching the tops. Tomato plants were laden with fluorescent fruits, some of the sun golds where beginning to ripen but they had also got so heavy they they had snapped their support canes and I was going to have a job on in fixing them up. The beautiful potato plants had all fallen over - I thought this meant they were dying. The cabbages where perfect specimens the size of bowling balls. My eyes bulged with amazement.

Sadly half of my caulis had bolted, these we going to have to be composted.
At the back of the plot I could not really see much for all the weeds. I was going to have to sort this out asap.

The biggest surprise of all though was those damn courgette plants. I was wrong again about having none left. but these weren't courgettes - these were blinking marrows. Chris had been cutting them to keep the plants producing and they were layed out in a row. Twenty or so, huge! On every plant there was still more growing by the second.
I packed these up into a couple of builders bags I had from some split compost bags I had bought. They weighed a tonne. Well not quite but after nearly breaking my back dragging them back home I weighed them in at 42 kilos. That's about six stone I think.

The Adventure Begins

At the ripe old age of thirty three I have had more than a few ribbings from the city boys and girls at work when I tell them I recently took over an allotment.
You see I am a city boy too. Born, work, breathing in but now commuting from the Las Vegas of Essex - Sarfend on Sea.

You will never hear me put our great capital city down either. I love London with all its history, commerce, pace, wealth and energy which draws in its millions of young vibrant subjects from around the globe "and Essex" striving to succeed in the arts and commerce. I am extremely proud to be part of this.

So you may wonder why somebody like me would have wanted a patch of dirt not turned over since the days when Anglo Saxons of Prittlewell inhabited the lands. Covered in brambles and weeds with tree roots as thick as a Halfords customised exhaust pipe "Much loved by the local boy racers". The clay earth so caked from heavy machinery ripping through the overgrowth that it would give a pneumatic drill a run for its money. Full of half buried treasures like fence posts, barbed wire, mesh, glass fragments and London bricks.

My reasons where simple, with weight gain being right at the very top the pile. Working long hours staring at a screen, drinking beer on all the social nights out, watching too much of the idiot box on the evenings in and trying to be the best FIFA 2007 player in the world on the PS3 far too long all contributed to me becoming what is commonly known as a fat arse. I hate the Gym, I'm in the bottom half of below average at football. The swimming pool is always full of screaming oiks and you can never do lanes.

I do enjoy trying not to kill green things with some success in the garden. Apart from applying five years of grass feed in one go a couple of years back turning our lovely green garden into a scorched death patch for the rest of the year I have had many a happy day cutting, chopping and planting in our little garden. Having two sons though means they need their play space and cultivating anything in the garden short of the few borders and shrubs we have would take valuable playing space away from them which wasn't an option.

Spending time with the boys where you can really communicate with them and teach them to listen and learn is really important. So a combination of several reasons brought me to the romantic notion of contacting the local council and signing up for project Lotty in April 2008.
So on the Friday of May 11th 2008 when I got the calling to say I had a chance to take on an allotment it dawned on me that there would be blood. On Saturday I armed myself with a book on the subject at hand and bought half the seeds at Homebase. Sunday morning came I took my six year old over to the plot equipped with a wheelbarrow salvaged from a skip which went sideways. Loaded into the wonky wheelbarrow went the fork, spade, a rake, two cans of diet coke and a huge sheet of tarpaulin.

The adventure began.........