The old man and the pot

There once was an old man who had too many trees. He had them in pots, so all was not lost, but he had dug two pots into the ground. He said because they were falling over. That would indicate that the pots were too small for the type of tree. Anyway, he was asked to remove the trees and he said he would. He didn't, so he got a letter. The letter gave im 14 days. He then stormed about and asked if the chair's signature had been forged. It hadn't. He then stropped off and a few days later removed from the ground one of the trees in pots. There was a huge hole in the side of the pot where the roots were coming out.

Allotment weather

The Allotment is mostly out of bounds for me when it's raining. I don't like getting soaked to the skin. I have however done two site inspections in the pissing down rain. Because they needed to be done and people had turned out especially.

I don't like getting wet and don't think walking on the wet soil is a good idea. I do pay more attention to the weather forecast since having an allotment, and even more attention since getting bees.

Countdown to the committee meeting

Only mildly stressed about dealing with people who think they're right.

But who in their right mind would think that as chair and treasurer of a group they'd be given exclusive private use of a piece of land on an allotment? It'd be tyranny and despottery at its very worse!

Waiting..

We're waiting for someone to bring keys back. He's moving away so won't be able to keep on with his plot. He's always worked away so he's made the plot low maintenance.
I've offered it to the new people on our site who wanted a plot on the sunnier side. They love it. Although they might not love it as much as when he's finished moving all his stuff. He's had his brother drive about 60 miles with a trailer to get some of his soil. It's only well rotted muck and compost with coffee grounds in. It looks good but I wouldn't be driving all those miles and bagging it up and driving it home. Much less effort to actually order a huge bag full and have it delivered if you want nice stuff. I spose apart from 120 miles worth of petrol the cost is free. Assuming they like gardening it's not that much of a chore.

Anyway he should be back about in the next few days and hopefully I can buy his IBC off him so we can use it on the communal shed for water collection. Have rung the barrel place but they didn't have any in.

And ..

The plotter who decided to be events coordinator and then said she'd spoken to someone at the council who insisted we have 2 toilets on site before we could have an event.
She resigned after us sitting through a meeting with her volunteering herself and her family for everything at the event.
The council didn't want us to have loos before organising an event - a short event advertised only locally doesn't need any.

And the chair and the bloke who does things putting a shed base on someone's plot for them - not where they'd asked for it, but near enough another plot to cause shade.

The plot holders I like are ones who I have conversations with about growing things.

Is it me?

Is it my fault?

Maybe I've been a crap site secretary and not taken the right action when dealing with the problems?

Rather than trying to be nice to people and sort of issues I have just taken all the verbal abuse.

I've been verbally abused by someone whose son and friend and friend's dog was running over allotment plots.
I've been verbally abused for asking the same lads not to climb over the fence.
I've had the police at the door after the same plot holder had been sleeping in his shed for a couple of nights (And he's done it since!) because his wife wanted to know he was ok.
The same plotholder's wife who tried to burn his shed down in frustration.

They're related to another person who does what they want: He's cut a tree down and left it in the carpark until the rest of the mugs on site cleared it away.
He's put a gate through to the site without asking the permission of the committee or his landlord.

I've let the chair get away with bullying someone at a meeting - the person bullied didn't want it taking further so the chair ended up being elected back in.
The same chair who told someone they could have a 9x13 greenhouse when the rules and lease state clearly a 8x6 is as big as they can have. That caused all sorts of trouble.
The same chair who has left a pile of broken glass on the carpark.
The same chair who thinks the apiary is not-communal but just his and another plotholders. (And guess who she lives with!)

I've been verbally abused by one man who has taken things off communal areas for his own personal use without asking. He's also tried to swap boards off a pile needed for a community project. He could have asked me - I was on site at the time actually talking to the crime prevention officer - we'd got back to the main gate after doing a site survey to spot him rooting through and taking boards.

And I'm still doing this why?

Imagine a nice allotment site

Imagine a nice quiet allotment site situated in the north of England.
A place where butterflies flutter past, where birds sing in the trees around the site. Where plot holders tend their crops and get on in joyous harmony.
Well it doesn't exist.

I think all allotment sites have huge unsettling discontent growing as strongly as the weeds.

And often there are committee members behind the problems.

I nominate our chair as most annoying person of the weekend.

He's abandoned a greenhouse. Removed it off his plot and just dumped it. He's got a trailer and could have carted it off to the tip but no, he's just dumped it.

He's been asked three times now to move it. And hasn't.
But then he didn't manage to make it to the site inspection either. He claims he was told 'afternoon'. Now no one would ever set an inspection time as 'afternoon' because it means so much to different people. Some people think it means early and some people think it means late, and some people think it means tea time!
He was given a specific time and didn't turn up.

Anyway the upshot is that he's failed to clear the hazard.