Just a quick job

In an attempt to beat the rain which had been forecast for 10am, I went out early today to cut the lawn. While I was out there I thought I'd finish trimming the edge of the grass. There was still a big "peninsula" of grass sticking out into the border where the pond had been, and in her marvellously non-nagging way, Nikki's been gently suggesting I get rid of it for the past few weekends.

An hour and a half later, sweating profusely and with my breath coming in huge panting gulps, I came in for breakfast having finally succeeded in removing that patch of grass, which couldn't have covered more than a couple of square feet.

Only it wasn't just grass, was it? It was full of bloody bamboo roots left behind from the patch beside the pond. Snaking their way inexorably along the edge of the grass, held in check only by the lethally sharp pieces of slate tile with which the previous owner had edged his lawn, and occasionally breaking through the slate and heading off across the grass for a new life on the other side of the lawn.

One patch of roots was easily as thick as my arm. A tangled mass of eight individual rhizomes travelling together for a foot or more and then taking off in different directions. I'm beginning to wonder if we'll ever be rid of this stuff!