Mabon

Same here in west Harrow (HA1). Two over the road sold within a week of being on the market (mid-April 11). Why? Decent area. Good transport links. Good schools. The area is still (mostly) single family homes. Prices are seen as being reasonable. Approx 340 - 390 for a three/ four bed / late victorian/ early edwardian house with garden. Larger row houses suitable for 4/5 people. New crop of for sales have sprouted in the last month or so. However flats etc in the same area don't appear to be selling that well, currently. There's one (a 2 bedder) in the next street over that has been on the market about a year now. Quite a nice flat with a good garden too. However lots of other areas around here are seeing subsantial reductions, or 'realistic pricing'.

No doubt his funeral will be with all the trimmings....

I'd get them in to somewhere a tad warmer. Shed or something, just to stop the excess of winter. Else they might kark it. Good Luck.

Excellent. Boar's pretty tasty if cooked right. Wouldn't try the fox though. Good Luck.

Hey my strawberries still seem okay. They are sheltered by a wall at the moment. I knocked up a temporary coldframe, that I anchored well. Was going to put the strawberries under it. Unfortunately today it got ripped out the ground, by what I can only assume was a very strong gust of wind. And ended up in my neighbour's garden. Sorry neighbour. Meanwhile, some corn news. As I realised, I left them far too long. Anyway, I ate four of the cobs. 3 were pretty good. 1 was very starchy and a bit yuck. The birds got that after a couple of bites. Tomorrow I'll eat another 4 and see what's what. I also cooked half of my peppers, which are belaboured underneath a drafty and tatty cold frame covering. Best eat them before they rot. Well tasty! Will grill and peel some more tomorrow and make a pepper salad. I still have about 50 lbs of carrots, very densely packed in the bed. Have put another inch or so of top soil over their heads to keep any nippy weather off. And I still have my store of potatoes, still in their permaculture bags, until needed. Got no space left in the freezer. It's full of beans. Will have to have a clear up over the weekend and consult my allotment book for some seasonal advice and see what I can plant. Good Luck.

It's been kind to me yes. Especially with such a ltd amount of soil turned over. The Peppers love their sunny warm corner. Bear in mind also that I got them as seedlings from the market so they had a headstart. Still they will taste great. Hey no problemo. I know I've been slack on tis one. Should of had them off there ages ago. Better feed them to my cattle then...moooooo. I'll try em out on my missis on the weekend. lol. Och I have no greenhouse. No idea where to put my strawbs though. More knocking up of coldframe type tatt for me then. Good Luck.

Update: I have left the majority of my carrots in the ground. I did pull a couple of pound out and they are whoppers. Taste great too. I estimate I have about 20 pound of carrots still in the soil. I have covered the tops with a fresh batch of top soil, so they can keep warm and carry on growing. That way, I may have a constant supply of carrots til xmas, if the frosts don't slay them. My beans' leaves shrivellled the first real frsot we had about 2 weeks ago. Couple of nights of around freezing and the plant looks crippled. Still some beans on it and I'll have them off there this weekend and blanch+freeze the last couple of pound of beans. The bottom draw of our freezer is full of frozen veg now. Potatoes. I left some in the ground in the bed. The others in growbags are still in the soil. I figure I can have them out of there over the winter and they'll still be fresh and tasty. Peppers are still going strong. When the frost came, they did start to look a bit sorry for themselves, even though they are in the warm corner against a heat-retaining wall. So I sorted out the coldframe, which is a glorified piece of opaque plastic shunk over a metal frame. Still growing as they face the rising sun. Herbs. The fleshy rocket is now about a foot high and just wants to be ate. The American Cress has invaded the no man's land of the very large stone pot. Looking juicy too. A surprise couple of tomatoes popped up from one of the bucket plantings. Result, approx 1/2 a pound of cheeky toms, tasty. Still no beetroot. Whappen? Sweetcorn still on plants. Semi-sheltered position. Rats got the lowest one and obviously approved as I found the discarded cob gnawed clean. Neighbourhood tabby got adult rat and hunts everyday for the juvies. Little rat is living a charmed life. Is very clean though, but maybe dead soon. I wonder how much longer I can leave the cobs on the plants? They are 'toasted-haired' at the ends and have been for a month or so. Anybody know if they'll retain their juiceiness if left in situ for a while? Or will they dry out too much? Next year I will definitely plant the corn much earlier, under cloches if I have to. Ideally I want the cobs maturing in waves from July onwards. Strawberries have colonised any free space anywhere. They'll probably die off over winter. I wonder though I've they'll regenerate next year of their own accord. There's enough of them. I'll probably get a combination of normal and alpine strawbs for next season. Apparently alpines don't produce any trails and are 'invisible' to birds etc, allegedly. Good Luck.

In days of Yore, this is what the Gold Merchants who held Gold Deposits on behalf of the owners did. The Gold Merchants noticed no-one actually came to claim their Gold, just happy that it was 'safe' in the custody of said Gold Merchants. In time the Gold Merchants sniffed an opportunity. "Why can't we issue certificates based upon the value of the Gold holdings in our business? After all it would make both us and the Gold Owners wealthier in paper terms". They did. And they single handedly invented The Fractional Reserve Gold Banking System.... What works on Paper, stays on Paper.

Get a gun. And some free meals. Good Luck.

Apologies am I not allowed on your thread? But hey no matter, I will 'consider' your point of view in more detail. You'd better. You've run out of ideas.

Lol. Elitism over MumsNet. Maybe this will start a MumsNet vs GEI war. Maybe we'll pull. As MumsNet or The Sun etc represent the vast majority of the population (rightly or wrongly), I'll stick with their definitions of what is money. GEI definitions would well be regarded as esoteric knowledge by most folks and probably rejected as such (rightly or wrongly). Money is Money. You can use it to buy things - I can't currently do that with my Gold. I can however use my Gold as Payment. But Payment doesn't necessarily have to be in money. Payment can be anything that is agreed between two parties (a point Underling made nicely in another thread). I could offer to pay you for a year's shopping for my family, with a cheap house. If you accept the trade, that is payment. You can save it - Hmm can't really 'save' gold. Although you could save in in gold. You could also be saved by gold, although this isn't doing Portugal any favours right now. You can invest it to generate an income - nope Gold not generating any income as such, although it is gaining 'value' in comparison to other currencies. That may be subjcet to change. I can only guess at the future. And you can give it away. (I wouldn't advise this last course of action). A currency BTW is, to me, a 'marque' or a 'brand'. It's a commonly accepted way of each nation defining their idea of what money is within their defined territory, whether through imposition or routine acceptance. I tend to start getting very twitchy when people start mentioning 'accurately predict the difference'. Gold is a bet, like anything else. It could be the wrong bet. Good luck with buying eggs then. Yes and? What happens if we are not in deflationary environment? Then what?

I didn't say 'think' - that is your word, not mine. I said they are not money (within this defined territory). Exactly. Each nation of people regards their own money as 'real' (to them). And thinks in those terms. Hence when you are trying to work out what something is in dollars to pounds, you think in terms of your local money (currency). That's ononistic intellectualism - this sort of thing means nothing to most people, it's a circle jerk abstraction. If Gold is money - go into Tesco's now and offer to pay for your shopping with it. Will they accept it - No? Then it's not (currently regarded as) money (cash), here and now. Certainly gold is regarded as being valuable - but that's obviously different. Most people think of money as cash. "What can I buy with it?" "What's it cost?" etc. What you or I think (or whether we think that is fair or natural), is irrelevant. It is what is, that is most important now and not what could or may be.

They are not money within this defined territory (the UK). US Dollars are money in the US and wherever you can readily exchange them for goods in a 'routine' transaction. If someone gave me some US Dollars, I'd get shot of them sharpish and turn them into something I could spend or invest. Gold to me is Insurance against meddling, crises etc and a store of wealth. Sometime in the future it may be accepted as money in the non-intellectual 'man in the street' sense. Until that time....

I'm not trying to win. I just have a point of view and that can and is subject to change. For countries like the UK, at present Gold is not money. Even though UK gold coins are legal tender, no established retail type business (at least to my current knowledge) would accept them, because of many issues, some legit, some less so. Maybe that will change soon - who knows the future? Good Luck.

Says me. It's just my opinion. Apologies if I am tipping ove a few sacred cows here, I just like to be realistic about the here and now (as in here and now). When someone starts yakking about a 'universal fact' I tend to start heading fro the exits (It's the new paradigm!! This time it's different!!). Mostly this kind of debate about gold being money or not is intellectual ononism in abstraction. Most folks understand 'money' on a gutteral level not on an intellectual one. 'What's my money worth. What can I buy with it? How much?' I don't live in the third world. I live in the UK - the world's 6th largest economy and 5th largest by purchasing power parity. Gold is not accepted as 'money' here (De facto! - The Irony). I cannot (right now) walk into just about any supermarket for example and buy something with my gold. Therefore by my definition of money, it isn't. What's the big deal about saying this? It's just how it is right now - but as ever, everything is subject to change. Besides I thought you guys were never gonna part with your gold anyway? Why would you be giving it to third world shop keepers and the like???

Not Yet.

Update: Well my corn is reaching for the sky now. I'm just wondering whether if I'll get enough cobs to mature before the weather turns sharp? Peppers still growing, will eat them starting at the end of the month. I've had about 2 pound of beans off plant A (more growing). I've trailed (with the help of the beans) them over the entire frame. So I have beans in various stages of development. Will be getting beans til November or so from this one. Had a couple of pound of potatoes last week from Sack A. Very tasty, especially as I thought they were shot. Am amazed at the aggression of Strawberry Plants. They have colonised the entire left hand bottom corner of the garden and have sent out runners all over the shop, having rooted behind the shed and in many hard to reach places. Still getting leafs for my salad from the big stone pot and I had chives and basil for a salad from the other big herb pot early this week. Also have not bought any mint tea for the last 2 months as I have loads of it growing out of that big pot. Will pull the first of my carrots this weekend and start tidying my corn bed. Good Luck.

Housing Benefit??

Local Property Rag to me Homes-Harrow.co.uk (north-west London) has many reductions. A quick estimate would be that 20% of properties have either 'new instruction' or 'price reduction' on them. Of course 'New Instruction' could be someone bumping the price up on their salubrious semi...but I doubt it. Also a few 'cash buyers only' Ads appearing. Interesting times (again), just like early 2009.

Probably. Although my Dad gets a better yield from the same amount of cultivated and he's out in the west of Wales. Does get more sunshine than the south-east of England and more rain too. My garden in north-west London faces west, so gets a decent amount of sun. Not too shabby for a limited patch. My mistake was to put too many chits in the first growsack (I notice on the Ventnor link they only planted two potatoes per sack - me I went berserk). Hence why when I had a test empty of the first sack a few weeks back, the spuds were quite small (about 3 weeks after they'd flowered). So I just took the biggest ones out (new potato size). Ate them, about 1 pound of three different varieties of spud - tasted lovely. Then I put everything back in the sack and have let the others carry on. Now that I've done that I may get 10-15 pound of spuds from that sack, but as I say, could have got a lot more if I'd put in less chits. Will probably leave them in there for a few months more and see what I get. I'll make a decision come mid-August. The second sack, I planted with less chits. This one is still upright and tall. It flowered about 2 weeks ago and I will leave them in the soil for another 2 months. Reckon I'll get 15 pound of spuds from that sack as it's very heavy (a guesstimate I know and could be an exaggeration). Taste wise they are lovely. I'm growing 3 different types - one's a purple spud that I kept the chits from when I bought a sack of eaters in Waitrose's. The second are long beige type twisty spuds that my missus bought for me from a DIY place. Can't remember their name, just that I have hundreds of them sat on my chitting rack in the garden, ready to be planted. The third type are your bog standard King Henry type spud. Definitely worth it. Firstly 2 different lots of spuds and spare chits were free as by products of spuds already grown. Secondly I have hundreds of spare chits left to plant over the next month or so. Timewise - was nothing. To grow in sacks just stick about 3 to 5 inches of quality soil in the bottom. Lay the chits in shoots facing upwards. Cover with a couple inches of earth so they are just under the loose surface. Wait for them to pop their heads up to about 2 to 3 inch shoots and then repeat. Overall I repeated that about 3 times per bag. Bit of wastewater most days and voila one crop. 1 less thing to buy and they grow anywhere, hence how they've established themselves on some waste ground under a bush. Like I say no idea how they got there, but free food is now growing where once there was only cack. Did have a crack at using tyres a few years ago. Sited in an open warm spot, got monster amounts from a 6 tyre high blob. Shared them with a few friends -very tasty. Well worth doing. Think I have a freak of a Pepper plant there - I was led to believe average yield was about 12 large per mature plant. That plant is a juvie only about 2 ft 6 if that. Gonna start scoffing those from mid-August on. I think they are Padron peppers that the Spanish love, so some of them might be very hot. Plant cost me 75p in the local market, about 15p worth of soil, a tad tigerworm pee, plonk in large pot and wastewater occassionally mixed with some rain. Decided months back to only use sink wastewater (from my sink now being stored in big enamelled Ikea bin by other back door) and whatever rain comes, to water the garden. 23 peppers at approx 1.50 per pack of 3? About 11.70 at a conservative estimate. Very pleasing for sure. Will let you know what they taste like. Isn't that the 'french trio' - squash sweetcorn and beans? My sweetcorn grows biggest at both ends of the bed, although the others are catching up. Bizarrely I saw this morning that a couple of other sweetcorn seedlings had popped their heads out. Not sure if they'll have enough growing time to bear corn, but nice try anyway. Herbs are going great guns too - mint parsley and chives in a huge pot. And last night we scoffed a load of rocket that I'd let flower and some american cress in a salad which tasted great (planted in a massive earthenware pot by the back door). I'm now hankering to get myself some land proper and grow more stuff. I don't do that much but the rewards far outstrip the effort. Good Luck.

Update: Beans have flowered a lovely vibrant red and are growing at a pace. More sweetcorn has come up and are growing fast. A couple of them are going to be monsters and have the startings of a cob on. I counted how many Peppers one of my pepper plants has on it. 23. Strewth off one plant. The other big Pepper plant has just one pepper on it (different variety) that is a glossy black. Every time I see it I want to grill it, let it cool and take the burnt skin off and chuck it in a salad. Yum. Still got Pepper seedlings (about 50) growing in three other pots that I shall have to put under some kind of coldframe (note to self, knock up a coldframe). Carrots are growing very high too and there a lot of them. I'll probably leave most of them in the ground for a couple of months, gradually thinning them out over time. Must remember to flood the ground when pulling up the carrots or else I'll get carrotfly infesting the rest. All the strawberries are now ate. Something with sharp incissor teeth scoffed the last very juicy batch when I went for a weekend away a week or so ago. I might have a go at vertical growing next year, as I begrudge those damn varmints. Still no sign of my beetroot - maybe they'll pop up next year? Tomatoes in an old Ikea bucketbin are going great guns and I will have to thin them out and plant them in seperate containers. Potatoes - have tons of them. They are growing in my plantbed, they are growing crazy in the permaculture sacks and now they have rooted on a waste spot under one of the bushes. No idea how they got there, I didn't plant them. Looking forward to putting more veg and the like on the table with this lot. Good Luck.

I live in north-west London now, so yes they are planted in the ground and are going great guns. My cousin abides in mid-Wales, has a farm in the mountains and he planted his corn out from late march under cloches (covers) and then from May onwards has removed covers. Takes a bit longer to grow in those conditions. Silent Reader's advice was very useful: Good Luck.

My cunning plan has worked and we have now agreed to do the following; - Give over another corner of the lawn to growing food (about 4 x 4 foot where I'm gonna plant a cherry tree). This is a balding bit of grass anyway, so it'd be much better to dig it over, put some quality soil in it and grow something useful instead. - We're also going to plant some wildflowers in a bank of earth behind my veggie bed. I want to put some clover, bergamot and more lavender there. My sweetcorn are just sproinging out of the ground now, a few stragglers have come up now too. So I have 12 or so now, most of which are 3 feet high and rising. I did cut away a few of the lower branches of the overhanging bay tree so the corn at the far end get more light on their heads. I may have a crack at planting a few more corn seeds this week, as they could grow quite quick over the rest of the summer and maybe, just maybe they won't mind giving a bit of food in October time. Temps should still be okay then. So far I'm doing pretty well, it takes hardly no time. A few minutes per day to give it all a bit of wastewater and grub about a bit. I would be out in the garden anyway for a bit, so mayswell do something useful. The soil has mostly been kind to me though - touch wood. Financially for me the effort to reward ratio is currently running very high. In fact for a smallish space, we have a burgeoning abundance. Most of the 'work' in the garden comes from doing cosmetic stuff. Like yesterday evening I shifted a two foot high, six foot long overgrown bank of earth from behind the veggie bed and dumped it five foot away in a big pile. But like I say, that was cosmtic more than anything. I reckon the skills we are learning here will stand us in good stead for the years ahead (whatever happens). The more I discover, the more I admire my Dad, who has also grown at least 20 percent of his own food, even when he had plenty of money (he was born in the south Wales valleys in 1932 and they literally had nothing). What I love about it, is being able to consume the products of my own labour and also creating an oasis. This is only a small 30 foot by 15 or so foot garden, but it really is a piece of paradise.

My Dad says he is inundated with blackcurrants this year (out in the west of Wales where they do get a lot of sunshine and decent rain). He has about six very large bushes in the garden and I reckon gets about 50 lb of fruit plus per year off them. Says you have to cut back oldest stems by 1/3rd. You also, apparently have to 'dress' them with manure (at the base), annually to get best results, because they are greedy plants.

The trick for convincing them, I've found is 1) to grow mostly items that are higher cost, example your courgettes or peppers, aubergines etc. So the effort is 'worth it' in pure financial terms 2) once they taste how good it all tastes, they're sold Had more strawberries yesterday, they really do taste gorgeous. Since we've been feasting on welltasty homegrown produce, my missus is much more into the idea of using more of the garden to grow grub and has stopped taking the mickey. The strawberries swayed her, but my first crop of new potatoes with our tea tonight will be the killer blow in establishing my evil plan for garden domination.