Tayberries and Flip It!

Auntie Pollie delivered a tayberry bush today. It's one of hers that has gone crazy in her garden and as she's had enough of it, it is being rehomed here at the Manor.

I am very pleased about this newest edition to our cropping power. You may remember me having a rant last year about the old geezer up the allotment who insisted that our blackberry bush was, in fact, a tayberry, and got very shirty about it when I dared argue with him.

Well, I am now in a position to grow some tayberries and when I have grown some I shall take a sample of each fruit and point out the difference to him in no uncertain terms.

So there! Ha!

On a more cerebral, less juvenile note, I spent some more of my Christmas book vouchers this weekend. I bought four books - 'We Are All Made of Glue' by Marina Lewycka, 'Snobs' by Julian Fellowes, 'The Ministry of Food' by Jane Fearnley- Whittingstall, and 'Flip It' by Michael Heppell.

Now, 'Flip It' is a self- help book. I don't generally hold with self-help books because I think if I can't give myself a good talking to and a slap around the face to bring me to my senses, then no book is going to any more successful. Also, what are husbands and friends for? Still, I'd heard good things about this book and as it was a nice shade of graduated blue I thought I'd give it a slot of my time. Also, it has big writing, some pictures and diagrams AND I had a challenge for it.

The premise of Flip It is finding how to get the best out of every situation. The blurb says 'Flip It challenges you to get curious about how you interpret and handle every situation...' etc etc blah blah blah. It says instead of asking 'why?' about a situation, you should ask 'how?'

And I have a situation. The situation involves big road laying lorries parking on our residential street. Right outside our house. Blocking our view from the driveway so you take your life in your hands getting onto the main road. And parking on the pavement, and blocking the junction with the main road. And generally being an eyesore, and a noise nuisance at 5.30 in the morning when their drivers set off for whatever road laying job they've got on that day. This has been an on-going situation for several months now. The drivers do not live on our road. They park up and walk away, presumably to their houses that don't have bloody great lorries parked out the front.

A neighbour across the road reported the lorries to the police last November. The police eventually investigated and found out that one of the lorries had no insurance. The lorries disappeared for two months and the neighbourhood breathed a sigh of relief. But now the lorries are back. An even bigger one has joined the other two. The road is starting to look like Operation Stack on the M20.

I am not coping with the presence of these monstrosities parked right outside my living room window. I find them a depressing eye-sore. I believe them to be nuisance parking. And I also believe that such vehicles are not supposed to be parking in residential areas any way.

So, Flip It book, I said. What am I supposed to do? I asked not 'why is this happening to us?' but 'how can I cope better with this situation?'

Firstly, I e-mailed the borough council. I made a complaint about nuisance parking. I am now in fear that there will be reprisals, that one morning we will get up to find our car covered in tarmac. Andy has discovered from the VOSA website that such lorries need a special licence to be able to park in residential areas and that these licences are very rarely granted as 3.5 tonne lorries should be parking in specially designated holding bays. So tomorrow I shall be on the phone to VOSA to find out more of the whys and wherefores because if a licence has been granted (which I doubt because they can't even keep their vehicles insured properly) then none of us residents were notified (it's a bit like planning permission).

And then Auntie Pollie arrived with the tayberry. And Andy and I looked at our front garden, which is currently edged by a three foot high wall topped with stunning views of road laying lorries.
'We could put a fence on top of the wall,' I said. 'To hide the lorries from view.'
'Yes,' said Andy. 'We could plant the tayberry in the front garden, and it could ramble up the fence.'
'Also, ' I said, 'we could put more veg in the front garden, because the beds would be hidden from public view and so not prone to leek thiefs a la Tom 'n' Barbara in 'The Good Life.' '
'Yes,' said Andy. 'We could make a secluded veg plot.'
'AND,' I said, really getting into the swing of things,' if we make the front garden hidden from view, we could put a bee-hive out there! The fence would encourage the bees to fly straight up, so they wouldn't be smacking people in the face as they come and go. No-one would know they were there!'
'Indeed,' said Andy.

So that's what we might do if the borough council and VOSA can do nothing about the lorries. Build our own secret garden!

FLIPPED IT!!