AUTUMN TASKS

After an unusually wet summer, we had an unusually dry November. So I have not been able to complete my autumn tasks until now.

The biggest autumn tasks are sweeping the leaves from the yard, and clearing out the guttering. There is no point in doing this when it's dry, since the leaves simply blow around to a different place. But after a couple of days of rain, they are now nicely soggy, and can be easily swept, put in the wheelbarrow and carted away. I did the yard this morning, and my daughter will help me tomorrow morning with the guttering by holding the ladder so that it doesn't slip.

Leaf-clearing is cold, messy work. But I was comforted by a major breakthrough in my eternal battles with the Mole Army. I seem to have stumbled on a major supply route, since not only have I bagged three moles in the last four days, but all in exactly the same trap, in a bank near the new kitchen garden. Moles love banks, since they are inevitably above the water table, which they don't like. Anyway, the Mole Army high command has taken a big hit, since the three in question were all bigg'uns. A good start to the winter campaign.

Walter Blotscher