It's a sellers market for the garden centres right now

Brendan O'Connor

'I explained to the child that she was now in charge of watering and feeding the tomatoes and chillies'

May 10 2020 02:30 AM

Every other day can feel like a bank holiday and a bank holiday can feel like every other day but just a bit longer, so we need to make a special effort today to do something different. Just to set it apart from the other days. The problem is, when you can't really go anywhere, most things you can do take about an hour at most. So you need a lot of things to do.

After lunch I decide we'll kick off the programme of afternoon activities by shaving my head. I say 'we'. How it works is I start doing it, and I begin with something dramatic, like shaving a straight line through the middle of my head.

Then my wife gets alarmed and relents and says she'll do it.

Then she takes over and I bicker and carp at her about her poor technique and all the things she's doing wrong until eventually she walks away.

Then I'm left to finish it off myself, which involves a lot of contortions and a fairly severe haircut.

The beauty is there are no real consequences. It's not as if I'm going to a party at the ambassador's residence or anything. Also, not to be rubbing anyone's nose in it, but my hair grows back fairly fast so I just wear a hat for a few days until it loses the very raw look and then I'm back in business.

That takes all of half an hour.

So what to do next? I decide to hit the garden.

I should tell you that this is not as big a task as it sounds - 99pc of my garden doesn't contain a living thing. Much to the chagrin of my wife, who would be more green-fingered than me, even the grass is fake. I already gave the grass a hoover right at the beginning of all this and I'm not going to wreck everyone's bank holiday by getting out the leaf blower/grass hoover again so soon.

On a decibel level it sounds roughly like I have Harrier jump jets taking off from the garden, so I feel the neighbours tolerate it about three times a year max. Any more would be pushing my luck.

However, I do have planting to do. I say planting, what I actually need to do is cut holes in a compost bag and place some tomato plants and the chilli plants into the compost. The Enable Ireland garden centre is running a bootleg operation in plants.

First you need to make contact with them, which is not easy.

I had been ringing and texting last week, but then my wife met one of the guys out delivering and he said email was best. I emailed them, all full of sucking up and gratitude and apologies for bothering them and they so busy, and then I waited. Maybe they'd get back and maybe they wouldn't. They have all the power here.

I missed the call when it came. It was a strange number so I didn't answer. I thought I might have missed my chance then. Why would they bother ringing back? They had plenty others to buy their plants. It's a sellers market for the garden centres right now.

But they rang back Friday morning and I grovelled suitably and scored some plants.

They didn't have courgettes. They might have them again. They couldn't say when. I'd just have to keep an eye on their Facebook. I gave my card details and they told me I'd hear from them. Someone would come when they could. They probably wouldn't get to me before the weekend.

I thanked them effusively. No rush, I assured them. I tried not to think about it any further. It would come when it came.

Later on a van screeched up outside. Well, maybe not screeched, but let's indulge in a bit of drama. A masked woman got out and left plants at the door, a bottle of tomato feed and the compost. And I could barely thank her before she was gone. Not all heroes wear capes.

So on Monday I enlisted the older child, and we got out the hose, mixed up some food in the watering can, wet up the compost and squished it between our fingers and set the plants into it. My wife got in on it then and used the spare compost to plant some herbs she had.

I got the child to weed around the perimeter of the fake grass where nature tries to break through. We cleaned up, inspected our handiwork, and I think we were pretty pleased with ourselves and our mini-gardening session. I explained to the child that she was now in charge of watering and feeding the tomatoes and chillies.

It was late afternoon now and I was still concerned about making it feel like a bank holiday.

I had a few beers on Sunday and I'm generally trying not to drink two days in a row right now, but I look at the corner of the garden that gets the last bit of sunlight, and I think, 'f**k it, beer me'.

So I put on Ed O'Brien's album and open a can of Wicklow Wolf Gluten Free and wallop most of it down in one go. And I kind of think. It wasn't a bad bank holiday. And really, we're very lucky.

I start warming up the barbecue.