Anyone Want A Yellow Courgette?

Yep, an unsettling couple of weeks, that culminated in some rather sad news, and the mother board on the laptop also decided to croak. Techo chaps over at Rapid Pcs have informed me that the hard drive is fine, which is just as well, as I had a whole year of accounts that I had just finished, and yes, not backed up. They are going to transfer everything to our new and shiny laptop tomorrow, and convert the old hard drive into an external hard drive for me to use, so all is not lost I suppose. The new one has Windows 8, and not sure if I like it, as there appears to be more stuff than anyone should actually need, and things keep popping up and getting in the way (behave John!). So, as I have been a bit of a mental case these last few weeks, I'm going to cherry pick an evening that we spent on the allotment about a week ago to talk about.

As my grandma used to say, 'You can't have too many yellow courgettes'

As most people know, the UK is suffering from lack of rain very badly. Well, this particular evening there was heavy rain and lightning forecast for late evening, and so after work we took the small barbecue down, along with some food and a bottle of our home made elderberry wine, with a view to chilling out a little after the work was done. It was very warm, and there was that stillness in the air that comes before a storm. The allotment was quiet, and a few others were pottering about watering or harvesting along with us.

It was a lovely feeling, all of us there seeming to feel the same sense of peace and community.

The sweet corn is looking good, with both the male and female flowers now out. Neither of us have grown this before, and were pleasantly surprised how easy it is.

We fired up the little barbecue at around 9pm. There were black clouds looming, and lightning flashing in the distance. But we were hungry, and some others still waiting for the storm had decided to just 'crash out' on grassy areas here and there. Some had champagne, others wine, and all with nibbly bits. I think allotmenters are a cranky bunch, but we are quite harmless. We cooked what we grew, very vegetarian, and that darned elderberry wine was good. Who cared if the storm broke?

 We all stayed there until about 10.30pm, quietly talking, passing comments and waves to one another, united by the common love of not only growing things, but enjoying being in that type of place together.
The bats came out, lightning continued, and it was probably raining somewhere, just not here. Darkness fell, and the glow of several fires died, and we all headed home. Then it rained, and RAINED!

The few of us had shared one of those special moments.

As for the yellow courgettes....the bloody things are rampant....help!