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I had a no-no day today. No, I don't want that and No, I don't want this!! Wasted a lot of time doing nothing, trying to find this particular house that had the front porch design I wanted to imitate. My DH won't look at a map! I don't know why we bother to own one. My back was killing me and we did not find the house and to top it off it was cold and rainy. Ah well, (Lisa will tell me off for griping). At least I didn't have the tornadoes, or the floods and I'm still here. Sorry folks, I'll be alright in a minute and yes, I am very grateful for all my blessings!

Louisa, LOL! I would never tell you off for griping! I think everyone is entitled to a good 'griping' at least once a day! Lisa

Wow! Thanks Lisa - phew! I thought you would be disappointed in me!...LOL. I posted a site for you to use on 'calling England' for your mum regarding English newspapers. Hope it helps in some way.

Well, my back feels a little better and I have just posted a couple of photos of my garden back home on the photo forum. They are not the best photos - all the others are still packed and like everything else, waiting to be transported to their new home. Can't wait. I think I have just about 6 weeks to go. :-)

Alan - a question for you. Have you ever been to Blooms of Bressingham. I heard that they had sold out to someone else. What gives?

Louisa, go ahead let it out, we can take it, moan away all you like, we can just lofoff when we have had enough, lol, logoff, thats easier said than done, liked the photos, nice, you can post some more when you are settled, i dont think this place will be going anywhere, back still giving you grief then, sorry to hear that, i know what thats like, glad you didnt get your feet wet, i was a bit miffed that Lisa didnt land in my garden hanging on to her bath tub though, lol.

Alan.

Yea, yea, I bet Lisa is a real pretty gal, but she is taken remember! You didn't answer my question about Blooms of Bressingham. Who bought them out? I used to go there a lot, what wonderful stuff he had. The gardens are pretty too. He had a huge Dogwood (Cornus kousa chinensis) growing in front of his little bungalow and it was just lovely. What you doing tonight? Thought you might have a date - or is that reserved for Fridays and Saturday at the local country and western gig. Gosh I used to go to one near Norwich - can't remember the name now (see what I mean about memory)....lol

Louisa, my thoughts on pretty is this: It is far better to be pretty on the inside than the outside. Youth & beauty fade away all to fast! If you are pretty on the inside, you will never be ugly! LOL! As Forest Gump said "Pretty is as pretty does!" I am glad your back is feeling better and your photos are very nice. Lisa

Thanks Lisa, I'm off to bed early tonight and hope I wake up with no pain!! Alan's up late isn't he? Do you ever sleep Alan? I agree with you about pretty - it's what's inside that counts. God bless!

Louisa, no i dont sleep, i go to bed when i feel ready, and get up in the same way, i get along with a couple of hours sleep, used to it now, i havent answerd about Blooms yet, i am still trying to find out, i will let you know as soon as i do, i havent been out that way for 8-9 years.

Lisa, quite right,dont take this the wrong way ladies, but i have seen women that used to look great, now they have a couple of kids, there face has dropped along with the rest of thier body, and they have a personality to match, and the so called "ugly ducklings" have the looks and the personality, but they always had the inner beuaty to start with, so yes i agree, i would rather have a plain jane on my arm who possed the inner beauty, than a woman with model features who was a cow, and forrest gump said, "stupid is stupid does" and thats about right for me.

Alan

Louisa, Here you are, sorry to have kept you waiting, yes its still going, you can check out thier web site if you want a trip down memory lane, and the way yours has been playing up it might do some good, lol, heres the address www.blooms-online.com catch you later.

Alan.

Alan: LOL! Just goes to show you how much I watch/remember movies! I am laughing out loud! You are right...oh well, stupid is as stupid does!!!!ha ha ha...Lisa mooooo

oh boy i love this place, Lisa, we are two of a kind, lol.

Alan.

Alan are you flirting with someone other than me ? Tut Tut.

Jo

Yes he is Jo, can't you tell!! Thanks Alan for the Blooms site, I will look it up later. Foggy here this morning, but not bad. Bad fog only happens in Norwich!! Reminds me of the time I was actually in Norwich for the day and the fog really started to come down about 4pm. I was making my way home to North Walsham and it got really scary - couldn't see a thing. Now the road from Norwich to my home was pretty straight, no major bends or anything like that. I saw this car ahead of me and his rear lights were a comfort to me in all that gloom, so I decided I would just follow him all the way home. He made a left turn and I thought yes, we are just about in N. Walsham and this is my turn. Wrong!! I followed him into his driveway and he wasn't too pleased about that....lol. I couldn't stop laughing for days after that, but he did 'almost' bring me home safely!

Well as a Londoner I have to say that I always thought that really bad fog only happened there, especially before the clean air act (hang on, no no no, I don't remember that it's what my great great grandma told me) - I do remember being about 9 or 10 and having to take another child from school back to her house because I was older and therefore more reliable (!) and I got her home and then got lost. That was the kind of fog we don't get any more thank goodness, all mixed up with pollution and impossible to see anything further than yr outstretched hand. Can't imagine kids nowadays being sent out in that, we're all too paranoid about their safety. Also my dad was driving some sort of lorry (truck) in bad fog but the fog was only about 3 feet deep so he could see ok and when he got back to his depot he had a whole string of cars behind him following him into the yard. In a way I miss thick fogs - strange people us southerners.

Jo

I have never been called a flirt before, the cheek of it, of course i only have eyes for you jo, you know that, lol, whats it coming to.

Louisa, we still get them here, so thick you cant see your hand in front of your face, more often now they are freezing with it, gets a bit dangerouse on the roads, the idiots are still out in force of course, because it been so wet here this winter we have only had a few foggy days, and that was freezing fog too, sends everything white, nice to look at but bitterly cold, we still get the really thick low leval mists here too, the road dissapears, but you can see everything else clearly, they are the worst i think, they are about head light high, and you cannot see past the end of your car, wierd experience that is.
There is a Blooms of bressingham in the US too, did you know that ?.

Alan.

I knew Blooms send their plants to different nurseries etc but didn't know they actually operated here themselves. That's interesting!! Just got back from the doc. Apparently I am going to live...LOL!!!!

louisa, i am very pleased to here it, heres Blooms US web site, i dont know where they are though, www.bobna.com/

Alan.

Thanks Alan. What did you do today. Probably slept most of it I shouldn't wonder!! Managed to put 3 more pics on the photo forum with the help of hubbie. They are still not too clear though. Maybe we are making them too large. It's been drizzling all day - what I would call a typical grey English day. :-)

Hello Louisa, its freezing here again, its been raining too, winter just came back and kicked spring out, so its deffinately a typical cold grey day here, liked the pics, when i get my new pc hooked up i will post one of my misserable little plot of planet, i thought it looked ok, until i see other peoples, you know the grass is always greener, lol.

Alan.

Alan, everyone's space in the garden is beautiful. What do you grow?

Jo - I always wanted to live in Yorkshire. Never visited it I'm ashamed to say. As a girl I would go to Dorset for my school holidays. My uncle had a lovely farm there and it was so peaceful and quiet. Even at that young age I was so much in love with the countryside.

Hi Louisa! I hope you can visit Yorkshire one day. Middlesbrough is in part of the old Yorkshire. Our poloiticians have been busy changing boundaries for a number of years. Yorkshire is a lovely county, I'm not far from the Dales. I wish spring would come properly, it's bitterly cold here today.

Louisa, I have a variety of plants in my patch, i have tried to have a little tropical feel to it, i have a few cordyline Australis, bamboos, Gunnera, Rheum Palmatum, Rodgersia, hardy Palms, peaoneys,Clematis, bananas, cannas, a few dwarf conifers, and a host of annuals that are coming up from seeds, the area for planting is not that big, the garden is 70'x35' and i stuff it to capacity, i dont like to see a bit of soil without a plant in it, i had a good collection of Cannas and Bananas, but i had a misshap with the heating just as it turned really cold, so i lost most of them, i have just started to get some in again, i will take a picture for the photo thread, you can see for your self, but it doesnt come close to yours, living in the dry and cold area, plus the fact we are bellow sea level here, and trap frost for longer than anywhere else, it seems a bit daft to grow tropicals, but i got fed up with the normal stuff, i fancied a challenge, got one too, i decided at the end of 1999 to go tropical, started by getting a few palms and bananas, 2000 was the wettest year for 50 years, and its been the coldest winter for 30, so i havent done bad, it can only get better as they say, but i have high hopes of a good show in my garden this year, weather permitting of course.

what do you grow in yours.

Alan.

Evening All - Hi Alan, Diane, Mary and Jo. You have a good list of plants there Alan. I was not as brave as you, but I did grow Mediterranean plants and they did fine. You realize that I am talking about my garden back home, yes?
(I did have a garden in another part of Virginia before I moved here last year). I don't have a garden here in Charlottesville but I will. Now that I've explained that, back to England. I also grew plants from California in particular Ceanothus, Fremontedendron. Alan, if I listed all the plants I had it would take me all night. I really was a plant collector and like you, filled every nook and cranny. I almost had the whole collection of cranesbill, but now there are so many more new cultivars that I can't keep up with them. I think my garden was well protected and we had good soil because I used cocoa shell mulch - it did wonders! I hate to use peat because in 100 years time I guess that too will have disappeared. Diane, it must be lovely living near the moors. Do you get a lot of wind and if so, how do you protect your plants? Looking forward to seeing your pictures Alan, I put some more on the photo forum and still not getting it right.

Louisa, i just went back and had a look, i can see what you mean, but they still look good, it must have wrenched a bit haveing to leave that behind, a lot of hard work and TLC gone into that garden, your buyers got a good deal i think, i hope they didnt let all your hard work go to pot, i dont use peat, dont need to, the soil is perfect here, and i do mean perfect, i use the coco shells to mulch pots, its light wieght so doesnt make the pots heavy like bark chips,its good stuff, do you have any plans to come back here for a visit, check out your old haunts ?, was those web site any interest to you ?.

Alan.

Alan, We seem to be dodging the bullets you and me, going from one post to the other :-). I have not looked over the site yet, but I will. I have just posted a note to you over on "Precious Cargo". Read it and then come back here please.

louisa, hello.

Alan.

What's up mate? You seem to be down - are you? We've all been there you know and if you need to talk to anyone - I'm here!

Louisa, i am realistic about life, and mines [deleted], and getting worse, thats why i like this little oasis i think, i can escape reality for a minute or two.

Alan.

Like I said Alan, a lot of us have been there and done that. Sometimes, it's not easy to pull yourself up out of the mire, it took me about 7 years to pull through mine, but you have to and you must think of ways to do this. I know what you have been through recently and my guess is that you are pretty lonely. Night is always blackest before the dawn Alan. I think common sense has to prevail here. You are not doing yourself a favour, and you must start enjoying life again. It's early days yet, just give yourself a little time and you'll see how the transformation takes place. You have a lot of friends here and I'm sure the garden friends back home will encourage you as I am trying to do.

Louisa, no dont get me wrong, i not about to go and jump in front of a bus, besides the bugger might miss me, lol, i am fourty years old, and i have been retired for six and a half years already, illness, thats why i am awake most of the time, and long days full of pain make you wish it was nearly over somtimes, but i deffinately Dont want another sixty years.

Alan.

What's the matter with you Alan? I have had back trouble on and off for so many years and I know what pain is, believe me. If you would rather not say because this is very public then feel free to email me.

Louisa, i havent worked out how to do that from here yet, but i dont really want to post that if you dont mind, (for those lurking, its not contagiouse)so dont think that, and i know how you feel louisa, i really do.

Alan.

That's OK Alan. If you ever want a shoulder then just click on to my name in any thread and that will take you to my page. That will direct you to my private mail. But only if you feel comfortable doing it. A worry shared is a worry halved :-)

Louisa, check you inmail box, i will hang out here.

Alan.

OK - That's fine :-)

send to me, i will reply direct if you like.

Alan.

Done!

I havent used this one before, where does the email go to,my green address ?.

Alan.