In the 70s we lived in a penthouse flat in Marble Arch and the Daily Express featured a picture of my tomato plant which they captioned as the "278 feet tomato plant" because we lived on the 21st floor. It was a joke but after that I got hooked on growing things in containers. When we moved to a garden flat, with a piece of scrub land, I transformed it into a wild life wonderland in central london and the flat sold for having a stunning garden. I had no experience in gardening but my green fingers have worked their magic and now that I have a house with a big garden, it is the envy of my neighbours for being like a country garden in the middle of central london. Its opened every year for the Open Gardens Scheme and I sell cuttings of the more unusual plants to raise money for local charities. I gardened all day yesterday, then I went around to a neighbour and helped them with theirs, mainly because he was about to spray poison on all the weeds. I explained that at this time of the year the baby birds eat what mum gives them and if the insects are full of poison, and that gets transferred to the chicks. He is of the concrete/deck it all over school of gardening with very little of interest in his garden. "I loathe gardening" he said. "Shame!" I thought. "You have no idea how much pleasure it gives watching things pop up and blossom." Gardeners, like dog owners, are a special breed!
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