WIERD BUGS AND STRANGE BEASTIES

There has been very little time for the garden today except for a midge infested hour in the gooseberry patch to pick some of the fruit. The bushes are shade by a lovely bird cherry tree as they do like a little dappled shade, the problem is so do the midges, I still have the welts left by the little horrors after my last gooseberry picking session, today I had two and a half pounds of strawberries and needed to pick the same amount of gooseberries to make our favourite strawberry and gooseberry jam..

Strawberry jam can be difficult to set as the fruit is low in pectin. and tastes wonderful, it also keeps a good rich colour, so important in strawberry jam I think.

With the fruit washed and in the pan I anointed midge bites with Anthisan and swallowed an antihistamine tablet to be on the safe side then carried on regardless. Speed was vital as I had to have the kitchen cleared by five for the start of the birthday party, thankfully the jam reached setting point quickly and was soon safely poured into sterile jars, I cleared the kitchen and went for a bath.

Growing rather thickly up the rear wall of the house is a grape vine and accompanied by another rapidly growing plant which had begun to seriously obscure the view from the windows both upstairs and down. Yesterday our neighbour appeared with a long ladder and with the loan of my telescopic shears gave the offending plant a bit of a pruning. He was careful to leave the grape vine alone as we all enjoy being able to lean out of the upstairs windows to pick grapes while in the bath..very decadent .

I suspect that this pruning is the cause of the sudden influx of strange bugs and spiders which are currently rampaging around my bedroom, my God, last night was terrible, I barley got a wink of sleep, and the spiders, the spiders..........awful! Throughout the night I must have evicted more than twenty assorted bugs and spiders, but three in the morning I was a nervous wreck so I resorted to strong drink and helped myself to a large Brandy, a bracer you might say.

Dawn broke and found me totally shattered and with a rare and wonderful collection of critters lurking under tumblers and tooth mugs in a line across the bookshelf, These I disposed of at once and went down to breakfast feeling grim.

Half an hour later we were sitting down to toasted crumpets, a large bag of muffins had mysteriously vanished from the face of the kitchen so we filled up with toast and honey, The muffins are still missing? Apart from the occasional wasp in the jam pan the day went well and the party was a huge success. Twiggy who dislikes company camped out in the shed for a time and then arrived in the kitchen howling dismally, food was required, food was provided and the cat subsided amongst a heap of cushions with a blissful purring to show that she bore no grudge.

One of the beasties dislodged from the vine has taken a liking to my pet rose bush and has munched its way through several leaves already. I think that it is a Vapourer moth caterpillar, if any one knows better I should be glad to hear their opinion......see today's photograph.

The revellers are still carousing in the kitchen but upstairs all is quiet, the cat is still purring and the spiders are still stamping about in my room. I am too tired to care where they go, unless a tarantula appears on my bedside table ,I shall mind my own business and go to sleep....I hope!