Taking steps

A dull day today with odd flashes of sunlight. As often we chose a sunny flash to walk down to buy and paper, and as usual, it rained when we got down there! Oh well - that's the west coast of Scotland for you!

This afternoon I met with Andy who runs BID4Oban, the local Business Improvement District office. We were supposed to be joined at McCaig's Tower by the relevant council officer to discuss the garden improvements which I have proposed for the Tower, inside and out, but surprise surprise - he couldn't make it at the last minute. Does anyone really care?

My picture shows the planted areas on either side of the steps leading up towards the Tower. Many of these shrubs and trees were originally planted 18" from the steps; consequently they have to be trimmed frequently to allow people to pass. While he's at it the operative trims all the shrubs and trees with his hedge trimmer, creating a series of balls, a procedure which annoys me intensely, but is something which I've always associated with council 'gardeners'. My initial proposal has all of these tortured plants taken out and replaced with a better selection of interesting and floriferous shrubs, planted far enough apart and from the steps to avoid any pruning in future. The ground between them will be planted with evergreen ground cover perennials. There's a great deal more to it than that, of course, and that's only the outside! We'll see!

Limerick of the Day:

In spite of the moans of his spouse
Jack grew climbers all over the house.
In a burst of hysteria
She cut down his Wisteria
And gave him good reason to grouse.