The Wall!

For days I have been psyching myself up to attack what is an annual task, the restoration of our white painted garden walls. The bulk of the area to be dealt with is Victorian, having been built at the same time as the house.

Back yard in Summer

I do tend to get a bit neurotic about it, because I'm conscious that it must be done before the climbing plants are in full bloom and of course in this country you can never be sure when the weather is going to be good enough to enable the job to be tackled. Another factor that increases the stress levels (it doesn't take much, my wife says!) is the fact that the sort of weather appropriate for the repair of the wall is just the sort of stuff that would tempt me to get the Morgan on the road!

Back gate and wall

Fortunately this winter has not been too severe and we have had no really severe frosts, unlike last year when the damp inside the old wall froze, expanded and great chunks of brick dropped off, necessitating repairing the damage with cement.

The window in the weather I was waiting for occurred last Friday and this triggered me into action with a scraper, getting rid of all the small areas of paint that had lifted since last year, then mixing and applying a sealer, to seal the surface prior to painting.

Today dawned with clear blue skies and a big sun, conditions that would normally have meant grabbing a couple of small bottles of  red, the preparation of a gastronomic extravaganza and escaping in the Morgan, up into the fells for a picnic. Not this time, the wall beckoned, bugger, bugger!

Donning my overalls and then beavering away with my paint brush in my haste to finish before the re-run of the Australian GP at 2pm, I tripped over the ladder, blinded by the reflection of the sun on the new paint and deposited much of it on to the newly awakening plants! Never mind, it will be quite a novelty to have roses and valerian with white leaves!

Due to cats these are the only birds we've got!!

Finished at 1.30pm., cleared up, got out of my overalls, with the kind assistance of my wife who made the usual caustic, hurtful comments when I suggested  that they must have shrunk, and then shot upstairs for a shower, positioning myself in front of the telly at precisely 1.59pm ready for the start. Good old Jensen!

From now on in, unless my dearly beloved gives me another task, it will be sunshine all the way in that little Morgan of ours.

PS  All photos taken in Summer of course.