Category: Hot.

They’re guessing we’ll get rain tomorrow.

June 17, 2023 · 2 Comments ·

It has been so hot this week that we haven’t been on walks at all. Nova is old and Albins fur isn’t good at regulating his temperature. Even Alma has been a bit off because of it. I’ve been working in my old department at work and it’s even hotter in there than standing in the sunshine outside 🙂 🙂 🙂

Nova doesn’t want to walk down this road if we comes from the cottage but she will gladely walk it if we comes from the other direction. Have no idea why but we almost always do as she wants 🙂

So mostly I’ve been watering my potato and vegetable patches after work. It might have been too hot because lots of seeds haven’t germinated and the ones that did have been struggling. The only things that seems to like it are the beans, peas and iceberg lettuce. It does however look like I’ve managed to save the almost dead Pawpaw tree, no Kat not the tropical one You’re thinking of but the north American one 🙂 🙂 I dug it up and noticed that when they once potted it they put a huge chunk of the fertilizer pellets that looks like slug eggs just beneath its roots.

So the tree has never felt the need to spread its roots and by not doing that it sort of doomed itself. I dug it up and put it in a bucket with soil and lots of peat since it likes lower pH. After that I put a see through plastic bag over it to help it with sucking up water. Yesterday I took a look at if and I can see the beginnings of three new stems (well perhaps it’s branches?) 🙂 I’ll let it stay in the cool cellar during winter so it can get a better start next year.

It will be another hot day today but the morning was quite cool and nice. We went down to the creek and even though the mosquitoes were just as annoying as always there were very few annoying forest flies and not a single horse fly. Also I could only find one tick when I went through the fur of the dogs. They really don’t like dry weather. We still have morning dew though so that shows the ground and vegetation isn’t totally dry yet. A cold front will pass here tomorrow so temperatures will drop a lot and they are guessing that we also will get rain. Sometimes they guess we’ll get lots and sometimes they guess we’ll barely get anything 🙂 🙂 🙂 They also guess we’ll get more rain during the week but temperatures will stray high. We all do know however how good they are at guessing the wetaher over here 🙂 🙂 🙂

There’s a little black and white dot at the bump of the road, that’s Sally the beekeepers cat 🙂

So far I haven’t heard a single person complain about the eventual coming rain 🙂 :-)The risk of forest fires are high all over the country and, there are a few going on, it is an especially high risk around here. So panic bag packed just in case we need to leave quickly. I’m not especially worried but it’s always best to be prepared just in case. It is time for a cup of tea and perhaps a little nap, we’ve been up since 4am and it is now 8:30. Better take a nap when it still is fairly cool, later on it’ll be too hot.

Can You see those tiny green dots? The life continues for the Pawpaw after all 🙂

From the root zone, I think You call these irises Yellow flag.

Iceland poppy. Seems they are now placing in lots of different poppies under that name that before had their own names. We used to call this one for Siberian poppy.

I’ve passed this rose several times a day for weeks and still didn’t notice that it was in bloom 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

Poor little cat.

June 9, 2023 · 2 Comments ·

I bought three Sarracena plants the previous weekend. This one had a too small pot so I planted it yesterday, the other two will be planted tomorrow. They are almost hardy enough to survive a winter here but these will be wintering in my cool cellar.

So yesterday when I came to work I noticed something fluffy and white lying in the middle of the road without moving. It didn’t take long before I saw that it was a cat. For some reason no one stopped to check on it and at that time there’s a lot of traffic. I parked my car, went out and stopped the traffic because I thought that it at least should be moved to the grass beside the road. I realized that it still was alive when I picked it up.

Yellow flowers towards a light green background doesn’t work in cameras 🙂

Rosa glauca, Red leafed rose, too. Pink flowers towards red leafs doesn’t work either 🙂 🙂

The poor little cat started to purr as soon as I held it, not because it liked it but because it was scared and injured. It didn’t have any visible injuries and was so clean it looked like it just had been washed. It did feel pain when I held my hand towards its ribs and the gum was totally white, so even if it hadn’t been run over the risk of really bad injuries inside it was most likely. I sat down on a park bench we have outside the entrance door and was just about to leave to go to the vet with the cat when the owner came out from their house (my work friend recognized the cat and knew it came from the rather big house beside the factory).

Nova decided that we should go the shorter walk today, so we went down to the bog. The gravel road was lined with Chamomiles.

I don’t know if the cat survived but I hope I’ll meet the owner again. I really can’t walk up and knock on the door and ask if the cat still lives, especially since their children love that cat. Today the summer vacation starts so it would be a terrible start of it if the cat didn’t survive. What I can’t understand is how all those cars just passed it. The one hitting it might not have noticed that they hit a cat since it wasn’t run over but everyone else that just passed it? The least one can do is to move it to the grass because lorries and tractors drive often on that road and they might not see it before it’s too late and no one want to find what’s left of their cat in the middle of the road just outside their home.

Otherwise it’s been a nice week with lots of sunshine and a bit too warm. My garden is usually the last place that dries out when we’re having a drought and now my garden is drying out. The grass doesn’t grow any more, which I don’t mind at all 🙂 So I water my vegetable and potato patches every day now and I also support watering all the trees I’ve planted this year. The rest must manage to survive anyway. It’s only three meters down to the ground water though so if we’ll get some rain in the coming ten days most plants will survive. 2018 was so bad that even bigger trees died and I do hope it won’t be that bad this year. I will however pack what I call a panic bag. Clothes and what ever I want to save if we would have a forest fire. I started doing that after we had a fire in the bog after a thunder storm.

z (8) — These are two examples of the same kind of cameras, Twin Lens Reflex cameras. Many using TWL cameras wanted to be able to use 135 film (the one we had in almost all cameras back then) so Agfa decided they would do a SLR sized one. One look down through the view finder in both cameras so the angle of the photo is a bit different from the SLR’s. The problem was that it is almost impossible to focus with the little Agfa Flexilette 🙂 🙂 🙂

A15660_010 — This was taken with the Rolleicord. I rarely use this camera since I prefer my Flexarets.

A15659_032A — This was taken with the Agfa Flexilette. The lens and camera is pretty good but the camera never became any hit and not many were made.

It is time for a cold drink of some kind and then see if there’s anything good on tv.

Have a great day!

Lots of thunder lately.

August 19, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

The photos are taken with either my phone or my little Sony so they can be taken any morning since last week.

We’ve had lots of thunder lately and today is no exception. It has stayed calm for a while but now it’s closing in again. I don’t mind since the heat will cool down for at least a while.

Yesterday and before noon today the weather guessings showed that we could possibly get up to two inches of rain today but has since then calmed down considerable, as most we’ll now get perhaps a tenth of that.

On Wednesday I found a notice about a registered letter that I could fetch in Falköping. I had absolutely no idea what it could be so I took a couple of hours off from work to go and get it. When I get there they check and says I’ve already have fetched it? I don’t know what they are doing at the Swedish postal service because it turns out that it was the parcel I already had fetched!! So it wasn’t a letter and I haven’t gotten a paper note in my mailbox about anything I can pick up at the post office in so many years that I actually can’t remember when it happened the last time 🙂 🙂 🙂 The girl I talked to felt so sorry for me going there unnecessarily that when I bought a soft ice cream she made it so big that I had huge problems eating it 🙂 🙂 🙂

Today I went to the grocery store in Gudhem and picked up another parcel, this time by another company thankfully, it was my new coffee maker 🙂 I haven’t tried it yet, it is too late for tea or coffee if I want to have any sleep tonight so I’ll do it first thing tomorrow morning 🙂

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I can hear the thunder closing in again, the lightning map says it’s still several km, miles, before it is here but thunder can move fast sometimes.

Have a great day!

Two aggressive thunderstorms.

August 16, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0004 (16) — This rather big spider lives in the big Rose bush.

We’ve had two incredibly aggressive thunderstorms passing by yesterday and today.The app the counts how many lightnings we had within thirty minutes jumped up to well over 1000 pretty quick. It also stayed there for well over two hours, both yesterday and today.

DSC_0005 (15) — The photos are as You can see not from today but Sunday morning.

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We didn’t get that much rain yesterday but nature fixed that pretty well today instead 🙂 🙂 🙂 We had three big power breaks today and one time the fire alarm started to shout, turns out the lightning hit the roof of the factory, No fire but the alarm was rather safe than sorry 🙂 🙂 🙂 I had a package waiting for me, for some reason they placed it in Falköping instead of Gudhem where it should have been. For the longest time I couldn’t decide whether I should pick it up today or tomorrow but it did look like the storm would move on so I decided to pick it up anyway.

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It is amazing how fast the weather can change 🙂 🙂 🙂 Suddenly I was at the center of it, lightnings in the air everywhere and suddenly it hit close to the road beside me. Besides the strong light I also could feel the pressure wave from the lightning hit the car and not forgetting the sound. The rain was pouring down so i barely could see the road and at one point if felt like the car was floating when I drove in to a big puddle I couldn’t see because of the rain 🙂 🙂 🙂 The storm has passed by but the Norwegian weather site, the one I trust more, says we’ll get more soon.

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Well I won’t need to water the vegetables today and that’s something 🙂 It is time for something to eat and after that watch the European Athletic championships 🙂

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Have a great day!

At least the morning was cool.

August 13, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

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Clear sky and 8C (46,4F) when we went out on our morning walk today. At 10:30 the sky was still clear and blue but the temperature had risen to 26C (78,8F). Still a clear and blue sky and now it’s 29C (84,2F) and I’m not sure if it stops there or will get even warmer. It is too warm for my taste as it is now so I do hope it starts to cool off now instead. They’re saying it will get warmer tomorrow.

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Alma decided that she would be a monster on our morning walk so I can’t say I enjoyed it especially much, even if it was just enough cool and no flies were flying around. Ok she had a lot of energy in her body since it was too hot to take walks the two previous days but she really can’t control herself. The second we were at home she changed to that wonderful nice and pleasant dog I rarely see outside my garden. My guess is that she either really doesn’t like to take walks or she loves it so much that she just can’t keep calm.

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The two sofas I’ve ordered will arrive here on Monday some time before noon so I had to break down the old corner sofa I’ve had for at least twelve? years. Ever since I got the recliner from my neighbors I’ve left the sofa to my dogs and it was almost sad to see how bad it had deteriorated since then 🙂 🙂 🙂 The seat cushions had holes in them and one is so bad that the stuffing fell out from it while I carried it to the wood shed (well I need to place it somewhere until I can get rid of it 🙂 🙂 ). The two for the back and the smaller one to sit on is now placed in the dog house. Normally I give my dogs my old sweaters and other warm and sort of fluffy things to have in there but every young dog I’ve had here them drags it out into the dog yard, I would really like to see Alma drag these huge cushions outside 🙂 🙂 🙂

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I did actually try to unscrew all screws in the sofa when I was picking it apart but It took just too much time, not that I was in a hurry until Monday morning but it did start to be a bit too warm to do any kind of job 🙂 So instead I just broke it down into smaller pieces, yes that was a bit more job but it was a faster way to get rid of it 🙂 🙂 🙂 It was impossible to clean the floor where the sofa was standing without having to place all other furnitures outside while I moved that sofa around to be able to vacuum there, so it wasn’t a nice sight when the sofa was gone 🙂 🙂 🙂

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I was pretty sure that Bertil and Teodor had done something there and yes they had plus that the dogs had pushed in lots of things too. So first I removed all bigger pieces, then I vacuumed the floor and after that I washed the floor with chlorine. Nothing says clean and bacteria free as good as chlorine does 🙂 🙂 🙂 I took all the dog blankets outside and cleaned them up as good as I could and placed them on the floor where the sofa had been standing, the dogs aren’t happy and they all tried to climb in my lap in the recliner 🙂 🙂 🙂 As soon as the new sofas are in place I’ll start looking after a “new” table and a couple “new” low book shelfs. I have some big oil paintings on that wall so they need to be low 🙂 I’ve looked at where the second had places are in Falköping and they all have odd opening hours, now I’ll see what the other towns around here has. I did see one table in one of the second hand stores in Falköping but I doubt I’ll manage to get it inside my car.

I’ve had the front door (towards north) open all morning but now the sun shines there so it’s time to open the kitchen door so the dogs can go in and out as they please. Ok it’s too hot for them to do anything but if they suddenly get a burst of energy and wants to go outside the kitchen door will be open 🙂

Have a great day!

I want a new coffee maker.

August 11, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0001 (12) — The photos are from our walk yesterday.

It is relatively hot here today so we didn’t take any walk after work. The dogs played some while I was watering the vegetables but as soon as they came indoors they just started to sleep where they were and they’ve only changed location because I went upstairs to the computer. It’ll be even hotter tomorrow and the weekend will be nasty.

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Work has been good, I haven’t had to be in my old work department today, it is horribly hot there. I had to paint there for an hour or so and that destroyed the entire day 🙂 🙂 🙂 We now have so much work that they’ve opened up a third shift, so we’ll be painting 24 hours a day for four days in a row and Fridays we’ll just be working during the day time shift. The ventilation is crap in there so I wouldn’t want to work there at the end of the week because no heat gets out and no cool air (during nights) can get in 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Tomorrow will be my last go home early Friday and I will miss it. I’ve also told the owners I’ll be missing it and that I really don’t like this but the things I do early on Friday mornings must now be done after work on Fridays. That’s not going to happen if I’m going to do it, it will be pure torture to go inside a hot washing machine when it also is hot outside it. Normally one can take the heat and humidity while working in the washing machine because one knows it will be cooler and nicer when one comes out from it. Now it might even be worse outside it 🙂 🙂 🙂

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It is time for something to eat and then most likely fall asleep in my recliner. First though I might buy a coffee maker called Don Pedro (well I’ll use it for tea) online. They are really hard to find in stores. It’s difficult to describe it so if You’re wondering what it looks like just search on google for Don Pedro Bodum. There are a few varieties of it so I’ll see which one I want.

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Have a great day!

Finally cooling down!

July 22, 2022 · 4 Comments ·

DSC_0002 (9) — The hot weather has not been kind to the flowers in the old wheel barrow 🙂 Not to self, don’t have too high flowers in it 🙂 🙂

Yesterday was horrible. We didn’t set a new heat record but it was still the hottest day in 73 years. Here in the village it reached 36C (96,8F) before it slowly, slowly started to get less hot. I really don’t want to go through that kind of heat again but most likely I will because of the climate change.

DSC_0004 (8) — The Creeping Bellflower is quite beautiful but seen as one of the worst weeds one can get in the garden. The roots grows so tight and it becomes too dense for anything else to survive with it. The roots are edible though so why not eat it to death 🙂

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One hot summer isn’t any proof of the climate change but when this happens frequently year after year, when it perhaps happened once every tenth year before it is one of the evidence of that the climate is changing. There were areas of rain and thunder all around this area but none reached us, the same today and I really wish it would come to us as well because the flies are soo annoying as they always are when thunder is about to arrive (well or at least it’s nearby). It is much cooler today though, 18C (64,4F) and hopefully dropping. This village is more or less in the eye of a low pressure so the rain just keep circling around us but it does at least cool us down.

DSC_0006 (9) — Potato flowers are quite beautiful. I hope that these gives fruit, looks like small green tomatoes (rather poisonous so don’t eat them). One can sow those seeds and get all kinds of different potatoes from those seeds. Be aware of that those new potatoes might get all kinds of diseases they’ve managed to get rid of on those one took the seeds from. Best to grow in a big bucket if one tries.

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Nova was the one taking the heat best of us all. She didn’t seem to care especially much and even slept in the sunshine on the kitchen stairs 🙂 🙂 Albin can’t take any heat at all, then again he can’t take any cold weather at all either, he truly is a lukewarm weather guy 🙂 🙂 🙂 Alma and I took it in much the same way, not as well as Nova but lots better than Albin. The night was horrible, the fan worked at maximum speed but I can’t say it felt much better. Also a fly had found my bedroom and did its best to annoy the heck out of us. The sticky fly paper has been full of flies so that was another thing I really needed to buy today. They didn’t have it in the big store I went to and the one I asked said Do You have flies? We all working here were just discussing about the lack of them! I said they all could come home to me but none seemed too interested to be honest 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0019 (7) — Finally big buds on the rose planted on Teodors resting place.

DSC_0020 (7) — It’ll look like this when opening up.

DSC_0022 (4) — Some “weeds” are quite beautiful and since they are easy to grow I’ve always wondered why they don’t try to grow these to give bigger flowers so we can have them in flower beds? Well I have them everywhere but I was thinking of those who are more meticulous about their flower beds than I am 🙂 🙂 🙂

I was out watering the vegetables and a few other plants and small trees already at 5 am 🙂 I went to the store quite early too since I wasn’t sure if it actually would calm down or not, one never knows with our weather services 🙂 🙂 🙂 I had almost nothing left to eat for breakfast and I also needed to renew my lottery tickets. I know the chances of winning the big lottery winning (today around 1,265 billion swedish kronor (around 126,5 million US dollars) is slim to none but it is a bigger chance to have a couple of tickets than to have none at all 🙂 🙂 🙂 I wonder if I would go insane if I won that much money, it’s so much that I really can’t understand how much it really is 🙂 🙂 🙂 I would never tell You if I did win but then again You would most likely notice that I had taken an early retirement 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0001 (7) — The Chinese Catalpa really need some rain now.

The coming ten days they’re guessing that it’ll stay around 20C (68F), give or take a degree up or down and also some rain. I will not believe it until it happens but I do sure hope it’s right and that we’ll get even more rain than they are guessing 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

I’ve finally found out what she’s good at!

July 21, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0002 (8) — Not much walking in this heat but I did go up the the mail box yesterday morning.

I’m writing this early today because yesterday was so hot here that my computer had a slight heatstroke 🙂 🙂 Suddenly the fan inside it worked insanely hard, have never heard it working that hard before and then the computer froze and the fan stopped working at all. I quickly went down to the freezer and brought two cooling pads, placed one beneath the computer and one on top of it. I checked if it would start after a while and have had no problems at all after that.

DSC_0004 (9) — Lots of chicory growing in the field outside my cottage. I think we all know that it can be used as lettuce but back in the days it’s root was roasted and used as a coffee surrogate. One can still buy that but I haven’t tried it.

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Today will be even hotter than yesterday and we might break our heat record if we’re unlucky. I think we had one of those rather rare tropical nights here, it was 20C (68F) outside when I went up at 4:25 this morning. Inside the cottage however it’s still 28C (82,4F). The fan worked all night and I like it but the dogs don’t seem to see the good with it 🙂 🙂 They actually avoid the bed when the fan works, can’t remember when I had that much space for myself 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0018 (8) — The last flower on the Dog rose.

DSC_0022 (7) — Still plenty on the big rose beside it.

I actually mowed the lawn yesterday morning when it still wasn’t that hot. Why You might ask? Well the grass on the north side has been growing fast so it was quite high and needed to be mowed before any rain will fall. Well we might not get that rain they had promised was on its way, still changes in their guessing about that but we do need it now. I also wanted to use that cut down grass to cover the ground in the potato and vegetable patches. The grass will keep the moisture in the ground for much longer at the same time grass is full of what plants need to grow so while it decomposes it’ll give that to the ground and plants growing there.

DSC_0032 (4) — My now three? year old date palm seedling. It takes quite some time until it finally starts growing those leafs we all know.

DSC_0039 (6) — My Chinese Catalpa is in bloom again 🙂

So the first thing I did after feeding the dogs was to water the vegetable and potato patches. Albin and Nova stayed indoors to sleep some more but Alma followed me outside. I’ve finally found out what she’s really good at (as long as Albin isn’t close though), she’s really good at fetch! She comes back with what ever it was I threw away and does so every time I throw it away!! If Albin’s close it’s just grab it and run away so that he will follow and chase her 🙂 🙂 🙂 Nova has never been good at it and now days she really doesn’t care at all 🙂 🙂 🙂 She prefers to mostly sleep on the sofa 🙂 🙂

DSC_0036 (6) — I still need more grass klippings to fill up the vegetable patch though.

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DSC_0029 (7) — Can’t remember the name of this flower but it should be growing in sunshine and fairly wet to like life, so I’m wondering why it thrives here when it grows really dry and mostly in the shadows 🙂 🙂

It is time to go downstairs and make another cup of tea and perhaps something to eat.

Have a great day!

The beginning of our three day heat wave.

July 19, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0002 (7) — We were supposed to have sunshine from the moment the sun rose but it tok quite some time before the clouds thinned out. It was so dark actually that I needed the camera to be set on ISO 1000 (One only need to use ISO 100 on a sunny day so it’s a big difference).

It has been hot here today, Scandinavian hot that is, 28C (82,4F) and it isn’t nice at all. No problem at the beginning of it though because we had a strong and cool wind blowing but when the wind died out so did our energy 🙂 Alma tried to be full of energy for as long as she could but even she had to give up in the end 🙂 🙂 🙂 Tomorrow we’ll most likely reach 34C (93,2F) so I’m not looking forward to that at all. It’ll only last for three days, on Friday it’ll get much cooler and we’ll have loads of rain if they are guessing it right.

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Like on me Novas joints don’t like the hot weather at all, she has problems walking up the stairs now, while she in the cool and early morning had no problems at all. She has been a bit spoiled now when she has been feeling bad because of her ear so I’ve added something she likes (well both the others likes it too), Tuna 🙂 Now she refuses to eat at all unless I put in tuna or something else she really likes 🙂 🙂 🙂 So this morning when there wasn’t anything extra in the food she just sniffed at it and walked away, she ate almost twice as much as she usually do when I had added tuna to the food this afternoon. Hot temperatures really didn’t affect her appetite for something she likes 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Fewer and fewer birds sing during the days now, they are doing what they can to secure the future for the younglings they have now rather than prepare for another batch of them, instead katydids have started playing, and loud as well especially in the evening. I do like to fall asleep to the sound of playing katydids. Especially hot days like this one can pretend that they are rather quiet cikadas 🙂 🙂 🙂 We don’t have cikadas here so it’s easy to let the imagination fly free 🙂 🙂

DSC_0026 (7) — This one used to belong to the Corydalis family but they split that family up. No idea what it is called now though. I think it is annual and really grows as much as the weed it is. It is a favorite of mine in my garden.

DSC_0029 (6) — Lots of blueberries in the one bush I still have left.

DSC_0033 (6) — The Sweet William grows here and there in my garden.

22 new species are added to the list of invasive and forbidden species here in the EU. From the previous forbidden species we already had around half of them growing in the wild but so I’m not sure if forbidding them actually will help anything. My guess is that since we have problem enough as it is, like the drought most likely will reduce the harvesting to around half of what they normally can harvest and the war in Ukraine will reduce that perhaps even more, the will of killing of plants and animals that shouldn’t be here might be a bit low. I was surprised that the The African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis) actually is seen as a threat here, our winters are after all still quite chilly in periods.

DSC_0037 (5) — It is hard to see any apples in my Aroma apple tree but it doesn’t look as a successful year for that tree.

DSC_0038 (5) — However it’s a totally different thing when it comes to the tree I once sowed from an Aroma apple kernel. The apples on this tree are delicious but they tend to be hit by rot and fungus easily.

DSC_0043 (3) — Lots of small fruits on my Japanese quince bush too. I’ve never made jelly or jam from these but I have from it’s relative the real Quince and it was delicious. It is said these will be just as good to use but they aren’t even a quarter of the size from the real quince.

Lots of garden plants are also forbidden now, even though we seems to be allowed to still have them in our gardens but they are not allowed to be sold or spread by humans. Last year they tried to have a “Kill all Lupins” day here in Sweden and I think zero people cared about it 🙂 🙂 🙂 We love our lupins and really don’t care what authorities says about them. Do You know why they are seen like a problem? It’s because they start growing in places where very few other plants will grow due to really bad soil. When they start to grow someplace they actually make the ground much better and plants that can’t compete with other plants where the ground is good will then die instead.

original_file_home — This is now the first thing I see when I start my mobile. He does look a bit grumpy, doesn’t he 🙂

I’ve baked another bread in the slow cooker and it turned out even better than the first one. I really can’t understand how people can fail baking bread in a slow cooker. Just do as always but instead of letting it rise the second time just put the dough in the cooker. The temperature is so low that it’ll have time enough to rise before it starts to being baked. For once I even took a photo of the bread. It is up side down so the top is pointing downwards and that paret is very light but the rest is just as brown and crispy as one wishes 🙂 the “folds” on the surface of it are prints from the baking paper (parchment paper).

Have a great day!

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I hope they’re guessing it right and that cool weather and rain is on the way :-)

July 1, 2022 · Leave a comment ·

No walk in this hot weather so only photos from my garden today.

32C (89,6F) again and I really don’t like it. They’re guessing however that we’ll get lots of rain tonight and most likely also thunder. The temperature will also fall down to more nice 20C (68F) and stay like that for at least ten more days (and more rain will fall). I’m already longing for the rain to arrive 🙂

I went to the physiotherapist for the last time today because even though my shoulder most likely never will go back to good it’s still so much better that if I just continue with the training I’ve learned it most likely won’t be worse either. I stopped at a garden center on my way back to work. I didn’t look for any plants but I did take a look anyway. Turns out that they now sell peach trees that gives those “Gold Peaches”. They also sold an almost totally white peach, called icy something. Both trees were however so small that I most likely would cut them down with my lawn mower but the price wasn’t small at all 🙂 🙂 🙂

If the Hardy Kiwi likes where it grows it grows like crazy.

I‘ll get flowers on my Chinese (or Yellow) Catalpa this year 🙂

What I was looking for was some kind of water tight semi big pot where I could put all my carnivorous plants I bought some time ago. It is time they move from the shadier north side of my cottage to a more sunny spot. I didn’t know if I wanted one big pot or perhaps two semi big ones but they were so expensive that I bought one bigger. Turns out that it didn’t really hold water 🙂 🙂 🙂 It is made out of a thin layer of metal but folded together instead of welded.

I’ve sealed it with textile glue, more or less just liquid rubber to be honest. When it has dried I’ll fill the pot with peat and water. It’ll take some time for the peat to suck up enough water before I can plant anything in it though. But if I leave it outside in the rain tonight it might be good enough tomorrow. I can already now however say that my little carnivorous plants don’t starve 🙂 🙂 The Venus fly traps I have are almost always closed 🙂 I don’t think they can over feed that way, I sure hope that anyway because I really need both plants and animals to eat as many flies as they can, we really don’t have too few flies in this area 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for a cup of tea, yes warm tea 🙂 I bought lots of things to make really nice sandwiches, like tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce and much more but it is just too hot to eat anything so tea it’ll be but I will also drink lots of cold milk 🙂 Did You know that a survey shows that the best one can drink to re hydrate the body on a hot day is to drink milk? Because even the fat in the milk contains water so it actually works even better than pure water! 🙂 I drink lots of milk 🙂

Have a great day!

I’ve tried to identify the huge rose that now is so high and heavy that it sort of collapses because of its own weight and because it can’t lean or grow towards anything else. It’s 4 meters high (much the same in yards) and the big difference (except its size) compared to the dog rose is that it has at least seven buds on the same twig. The dog roses I have only have five as most.

The heat is back.

June 30, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0017 (1) — Have You ever eaten Sea cale (Crambe maritima)? It grows wild in my old home town and now finally I have three seeds that has germinated. One eat anything from the flowers (like broccoli) to the leafs and the stem. Quite tasty. It’s a perennial as well.

Hot again today and I don’t like it. It has even been so hot that people at work who usually go outside during every break refused to do so today 🙂 🙂 🙂 I knew I would have to fetch a package today so I managed to go home a couple of hours early 🙂

It was the lens I bought at our EBay, called Tradera, that finally had arrived. Turned out that the seller were on vacation when I won it with my bid. I wouldn’t have cared if it just had said so in the add instead of getting to know it after I had bought it 🙂 🙂 🙂 Still I’ve tried it today and I really can’t complain. It is nice to once again have a tele-photo lens that works as it should. To be honest it has such a wide range that I don’t have to have any smaller lens as long as this one works.

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Earlier this week I bought two really big peaches called Golden Peach. Nasty expensive but I thought that I at least should try once. They were really delicious and evenly light orange all over. I’ll see if I can find any more in the store tomorrow. Later on I bought some nectarines and all were just slightly bigger than a big plum. They too are delicious but I must admit that I’ve never seen that small nectarines before. So I’ve saved the kernels and I’ll sow them next winter. There’s no guarantee that, if any of them germinates and grow to be big enough to give fruits, that the fruits will look the same but then again I do like to sow seeds and see what happens 🙂

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I’ll go to the physiotherapist for the last time tomorrow and I must say that my shoulders feels much better. They aren’t good in any way but I can work and didn’t need any surgery to get here and that’s a relief. After that I’ll only have to work one more week and then vacation starts 🙂 After this heat wave I’m really looking forward to it and I do hope that we’ll have temperatures around 20C (68F) and no higher than 25C (77F).

Nova’s eyes became better pretty quick after they had swollen up last week. Have no idea why this happened and I really wish I did know why because after the walk we had today I went to take a shower and when I came back from the bathroom one of her eyes were really swollen again. She doesn’t feel any pain and had a healthy apetite so I know it doesn’t disturb her but it does disturb me 🙂 🙂 🙂 She walked by herself most of the walk and I have no idea what she was doing while I took the shower but sometime around the walk and my shower she’s been in contact with something she can’t tolerate. I guess it’s some kind of grass pollen and I’ve ruled out insect bites because insect bites are irritating for a long time and she doesn’t even seem to know something is different 🙂

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It’s time to drink something cold and after that I’ll most likely fall asleep in front of the tv, I’ve already fallen asleep in front of it once today 🙂

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Have a great day!

It comes close but then turns westwards again.

June 26, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0001 (11) — I’ve sown this mock orange many years ago. It’s now almost three meters high (much the same in yards) and smells rather nice.

It’s just as warm today as yesterday and I can’t pretend to like it 🙂 It is raining (with thunder) to the west of us and every time it’s getting closer it stops and turns westwards again. I really would enjoy that lower temperature one always get with thunder.

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I’ve done very little today. We’ve taken one walk before it got too hot and thankfully we had a wind blowing as well. I would have loved to get out early in the morning when I woke up but there was no wind and the flies would have loved to eat suck us dry from our blood 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’m telling myself that the flies are good for all the birds and that they do good things for nature but on days like these I really wouldn’t mind if they went extinct 🙂 🙂 🙂

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I’m glad I have the fan and it had to work a lot last night. It is a bit noisy to be honest but I didn’t have any problems falling asleep. I did wake up at some time during the night and turned it off, It’s amazing how quiet it was after that 🙂 but I do remember that I heard some birds singing so I guess it wasn’t that long after I went up anyway.

DSC_0027 (7) — Another rose growing in the hedge 🙂

Tomorrow will be just as hot or perhaps hotter and guess if I’m happy I don’t work in my old department 🙂 Working beside a hot oven and hot washing machine at the same time it’s a heat wave is not a nice thing, or healthy either for that matter. Still it won’t be nice to work anywhere in the factory with these temperatures. They’re guessing the temperature will drop on Tuesday and rain will come as well. It might be hot again on Wednesday though, yay.

DSC_0003 (11) — My pink flowering and red leafed Elder.

DSC_0004 (13) — Another mock orange I bought long ago, has a weak but nice smell.

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Have a great day!