21 March 2010 (Sunday) - Fences and Ponds

I woke early and thought I’d visit the loo before I might go back to bed for a lie in. Having got up I decided that if I shaved, it might save time later. I then changed the dressing on my tattoo, and put the telly on whilst I was doing it. Having seen the start of an episode of SpongeBob, I had to watch it to its conclusion. I then wanted to see how the pond was doing, and noticed that the filter was beginning to overflow. Having chucked in something to get rid of all the green algae last week I’d overlooked the fact that the dead algae had to go somewhere. Namely into the filter. So I then spent an hour cleaning out the filter, before reactivating the filtration system and pouring in yesterday’s bottle of flocculant.

Whilst having a spot of brekky I realised that it was getting on for 10am, and was probably a tad late to go back to bed for a lie-in. Lie-ins only give me back ache anyway. So I decided to crack on in the garden and get the gravel boards into place on the fence. Whilst getting my fence ingredients out of the shed I found a bottle of flocculant left over from last year. So yesterday I’d wasted twelve quid. Ho hum…

To the fence, where I raked up loads of gravel, put the membranes in place, screwed a board over the top of the membrane, painted the board and replaced the gravel. Easy enough to type, but rather physical work to do. Mind you, it only took an hour and the result didn’t look too bad, and it will add a few years life to the fence. By the time I’d done the third fence panel I was a bit cold, aching rather badly and the rain had started, so I decided that with the job half done I’d give up and come back later. Using the electric drill in the rain isn’t a good idea.

I then took a handful of fish food to the pond and tried to get the Koi to take the food from my hand. They did – I got nibbled and sucked by several of the larger fish.

I then had a sarnie for lunch and fell asleep. I got my lie-in eventually, and was dozing contentedly until ‘er indoors ^TM kicked me awake and we went on the now obligatory Sunday afternoon trip to Lidl. I quite like Lidl – the food is cheap, and they have a selection of tat for sale. Binoculars, screwdrivers, tents, something different every week. All sorts of cheap stuff of varying quality.

We then visited Heather and Andy who were getting rid of some books, and had offered us anything we fancied. The book “I am Legend” is one I’ve been meaning to read for many years, but have never got round to. Now I have my chance; I hope I won’t be disappointed.

Back home to carry on training the fish. In the past we’ve been rather sporadic in trying to get them to eat from our hands, and they’ve usually been too frightened to do so. Bearing in mind they have only just started eating after the winter, the theory is that they should be hungry enough to take food regardless of me being so close. The theory seems to be working so far…