Mother-in-law is wholly reliant on us for shopping and general care but I do get a certain resistance from SWMBO when I drop the roof to do the 30 mile round trip. It got worse when we pulled up at the chemist for her prescription and I stayed with the car only for her to return empty handed because they’d decided to deliver without telling anyone !
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I am sure hemp “users” and “smackheads” are two totaly different things ! The first is used much as alcohol…with much less agression…the second is a very destructive drug that causes much pain to many inc death !. Some may say that it is gateway drug ( canabis )…but I guess we have all had a drink tonight but are not classifing ourselves as alcoholics ???
The point I was making is the the “smackheads” thought that the industrial hemp (a readily available product) growing in the fields was in fact marijuana (a banned substance). They’d soon realise the the difference when their “joint” was about as “interesting” as smoking garden rubbish!, They obviously didn’t realise that the two plants whilst similar to look at because they are from the same plant family, are totally different.
The theory is that that someone with an addictive personality who may try a hemp related product is more likely to move on to harder drugs. That and the fact that the source of softer and harder products often is the same illegal route is implicated too.
There’s also the unfortunate fact that habitual users of hemp related products have a statistically higher incidence of long term psychological issues.
Of course alcohol has its own well known set of problems…
I think the fact that more countries and US states are changing attitudes to opening up the legal availability of hemp related products puts it in a similar space to alcohol.
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Hemp products such as the seed, oil, and meal (protein) are readily and legally available in this country.
Sorry! Well off topic now.
I must say Roger you’ve always given the impression of being a very respectable old school gentleman. A thoroughly good egg. However some of the subjects that you are very knowledgable about make me wonder about your past.
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There is a saying Paul - “If you remember the '60’s you weren’t there!”. 
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I was never even tempted to try. If I had ever been caught taking anything illegal my chosen career path would have ended very shortly afterwards and by the time I was 20 I’d worked damned hard to even get on the bottom rung of what was a very big ladder.
Window cleaner in a very high tower block? 
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“Stairway to heaven” .
An appropriate little item on the BBC News page about the Apollo13 astronauts, some enhanced photos. Seeing how they coped with an immediate life and death situation puts our lockdown problems into perspective.
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Yes, just watched it. Truly amazing how calm they were, the tension and stress in that tiny vehicle for those three men for all that time must have been horrendous! If just one of them had “cracked”, disaster.
Excellent training and “the right stuff” = heroes.
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Can we really get out now?
New guidelines during this Corona virus lockdown.
Exercise - What is allowed:
- Going for a run or cycle, practising yoga, walking in the countryside or in cities or attending an allotment
- Driving to countryside and walking (where far more time is spent walking than driving)
- Stopping to rest or to eat lunch while on a long walk
I love nothing more than driving to one of our favourite locations in the Peak district for a long hike, it certainly would be more walking than driving time.
BTW I won’t be doing it, mixed messages here. It says Yorkshire live but this shows on Derbyshire live too.
Well no worry for me, a nice 40 mile commute to work for my shift as a firefighter. It is weird driving to and from work hardly seeing anyone else.
A lot of places were like that all the time years ago.
I was born and grew up in West London, I got my first motorbike in 76, ( a Suzuki 250A ) along with some friends, and come about 9pm onwards we could all race from one set of lights to the other as the roads were really quiet, and even during the day, once you got right out of London, even the A roads could be really quiet, but now in London the cars are parked bumper to bumper and its busy 24/7, glad I’m the hell out of it.
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now I can’t see the “short drive for a longer walk” thing anywhere in the official government advise at all. Is it just a local interpretation by some police forces? If so its not helpful and is blurring the rules.
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It was also on the Sky news and BBC sites too on Friday.
thanks Ian, that looks about as official as its going to get. So perhaps I need to take a copy of that document with me when I go out for my 20 minute drive for my 1 hour walk later.
Today it was a toss-up between going upstairs to fix the leak on the bidet (working with a mirror very tricky, so now the Plusgas is soaking in until tomorrow), or outside to enjoy the garden. The garden won, again.
The James Grieve is sending up a leader in exactly the right place for the main trunk to the third and final level of the espalier. I’ve been snipping off redundant leaders, ie stems in the wrong places and without flowers, but this one is just perfect. We’ll only let a couple of apples mature on the trees this year, mostly to check on flavour, but next year (C-19 allowing) we should have a bumper crop
And having removed a nearly prone Kilmarnock willow that had been leaning on the red acer’s bald patch, this bed is now opening up for the two acers and other things. Sweet peas and their canes to go in tomorrow just off to the right of this pic.
Now all I need is some petrol for the mower…