What do you get if...

I hope the week is treating you well and by the time you read this I hope that I've won the triple Lottery rollover of £17,000,000. I will accept begging letters if I win to light my chiminea. How would you spend that sort of lolly - I bet I could make a lot of people happy?

I was given the Yorkshire Ridings Magazine the other day which had a section in it where you can submit a ghost story for a competition. Regular blog readers will perhaps remember I've published five on here over the last year and a bit, so I've decided to edit them properly, cut them down by a couple of hundred words each and submit them. Top prize for a published story? £200.

We've got a block paved drive at the front to replace a bit of a tatty garden in what is quite an awkward triangular shaped front garden. It's a lot easier to maintain except to say - and here's a word of warning if you intend to get one, you do get loads of weeds growing in the cracks between the bricks. Now, with a bit of effort, it takes an hour or so a couple of times a year just to go round with a sharp knife and scrape the weeds and a bit of moss. No problem.

Except my wife, who volunteers to do it as a cathartic exercise has now ruined two perfectly good gardening knives which I used to use for general gardening chores. One of the knives was a bone handled old thing which I've had since I was a teenager. That four inch blade is now worn to a one inch blunt piece of metal. The pruning knife which I bought a couple of years ago, nice and sharp with a flat end so you don't stab yourself with it - ruined.

One of these catalogues that has everything for the home and garden has come through the door today and for the princely sum of £12.95 (not including postage and packing no doubt) there's a long handled patio and path weeder. This comes with a free border weeder knife and a hand held weeder knife. For that amount of cash, it ain't going to be brilliant so prizes for guessing how long that will last. Three more implements she can ruin.

Whatever happened to spring? The days are longer but there are still frosts and there's cloud most of the day and in the breeze, it's bloody freezing.

I do try to be politically correct as you know (ahem), but I thought I'd try some riddles on you - some may not be pc, but hey!

What do you get if you cross a gorilla, a lion, an alligator and a parrot?
No idea, but if it talks, you listen!

What do you get if you cross Bambi with a ghost?
Bamboo.

What do you get if you cross a chicken with a zebra?
A four legged dinner with its own bar code.

What do you get if you cross the moon with a monk?
A nocturnal habit.

What do you get if you cross a rooster with an owl?
A cock that stays up all night.

What do you get if you cross a philosopher with a Mafia hit man?
You get an offer you can't understand.

Chat soon

Ta-ra
The picture is a chilly spring evening in a deserted Hornsea, East Yorkshire last week.

Oster-Monath

White Rabbit, white rabbit, white rabbit. Has spring sprung? Not if you're in Scotland or Northern Ireland. I hope they recover from the bad weather as soon as.

Some good news today was that after waiting for over a week for his interview result, he has got a job at last as an archivist of documents. He left Uni in June 2009 and has been looking ever since for a job, so well done son!

I haven't heard any good April Fools today, sadly. April, the fourth month of the Gregorian calendar was once the second month of the year in the Julian calendar before January and February were added. Unlike other months where the derivation of the name is fairly easy to remember, April is a little uncertain. Some say it's from the Latin aperiri, 'to open'. Interestingly, the Anglo Saxons called the month 'Oster-monath' which ancients say is the derivation of 'Easter.' Even if it's not true - it sounds good to me.

The birthstone of this month is the fabulous diamond and the birth flower is the humble but beautiful daisy.

There are lots of celebrations this month, not least of which is the traditional anniversary of the birth of Buddha, on the 8th. St. George's day is the 24th for the patriots among us and the London Marathon on the fourth Sunday. Bizarrely, in America is celebrated 'take sons and daughters to work day' on the fourth Thursday.

Well today marks the last working day for four days as we have a long weekend for Easter. I haven't had an egg for years and this year, I bought the three lads a chocolate Maltezer bunny. I've never had one, but my work colleagues say they are delicious. I might persuade one of them to let me have a nibble of the bunny's ear.

Some good news today was that after waiting for over a week for his interview result, he has got a job at last as an archivist of documents. He left Uni in June 2009 and has been looking ever since for a job, so well done son!

I've just had a local company, Green Thumb to come in and give me a quote for doing my grass four times a year for putting some powerful stuff down to make the grass green and kill the moss and weeds. The form which they popped in the post was very interesting and they told me what type of grass I have, what weeds are in it, what type of soil I have and what the drainage is like.

I have some standard weeds like daisy, dandelion, selfheal (image above), thistle (never seen that), mouse ear (what?) and the apparently difficult lesser calendine. Thank goodness I don't have other things on the list such as Hairy Bitter Cress and MYOB which I always thought stood for 'mind your own business!'

Looks not a bad price to me and I'm going to give it a year's trial.

Well I hope you all have a great Easter break.

Chat soon

Ta-ra
*Image of selfheal from here