Pinterest an "online pinboard".

A while ago a friend of mine asked me if I'd heard of "Pinterest". I hadn't. Though I can see why she thought I might have. The concept is simple. You share ideas and interests with "like minded people". 

I decided to go and have a look around to see what all the fuss was about.

Request an Invite. 

Pinterest homepage

Pardon? I’m more familiar with a self registration sort of social media. I need inviting? Who invites me? That implies some sort of elitism. Does the thin, pretty and devastatingly clever popular girl of the Internet pick people based on their sporting ability? In that case I'll go and write a furious diary entry pretending I never wanted to play Pinterest anyway.

Oh, no, hang on, it would seem that the only qualifying criteria I need is a valid email address. So is this "invite" stuff really any different to registering the regular way? Beyond not capturing my postcode, gender or age demographic? No.

While I sit and wait for my "requested invitation" - like the guest you invited only because you felt sorry for them - I think about the name. Pinterest. A pin board of your interests. Published for everyone to see. Everyone invited, that is. Admittedly there is a vague echo of "internet" in the name but it isn't catchy. It is clumsy. It is also more than a little resonant, to my mind, of Bing. No-one uses Bing. Apart from Chandler in Friends. And Friends is so old that it isn't internet interested. Joey still buys porn. Which, according to my partner and his brother in law, is no longer about videos/DVDs and magazines but *all* about the internet. They'd know I suppose. I have no desire to delve into their hard drives for evidence. Pardon the obvious yet unavoidable pun...

Er, yes, so I don't like the name. The cloak of mystery is about to be unveiled as my invite has arrived in my inbox. It welcomes me to their "little" community. Aw, that is nice. And provides me with a list of etiquette so that the socially inept can keep their noses clean. It is inviting me to create an account and wishes me a "happy pinning".

With that, I’m off to pin and explore this new environment.

My Garden. April Showers.

The fact that I can have a blog titled in this way is extraordinary. See my March blog: "Onions".


However, I now have a garden of my own. In fact, *smug*, I now have a red brick, family home with a garden and a garage. I have a view over fields, a tiny front lawn with a small picket fence and a patio. In short, I am a Privet Drive sort of dweller minus the wizard living in my understairs cupboard. Which, incidentally, contains the hoover (which is actually a vacuum cleaner), spare dulux (which is probably Homebase own) and a pair of 1960's stepladders with a myriad of paint splatters adorning it.


The onions, now in my veg plot, are in a good crowd with spuds and garlic as their bedfellows. I even have my own herb garden complete with mint, sage, thyme, lavender and a bay tree. In fact, with the nettles, rhubarb and dandelions on the lawn, my "Kitchen Garden" is coming together nicely*.


Since moving the April Showers have been doing their dance. While this has been annoying road users it has pleased the grasses and crops in the fields as they have responded by becoming greener and lush, the birds have been singing louder over the constant sound of the rain and a large female blackbird stuffed her beak with too many worms to carry. 


Yesterday the sun shone. I put laundry out to dry and explored. I met a catty friend, see pic, and found the smallest of "new" potatoes had fallen onto the patio in a bid for kamikaze self harvest. 


I now have my garden and the pressure is on to enjoy it, use it and attempt to feed myself and my partner from it. I hope for a clear May now that April is done with and look forward to sitting on my patio with a large glass of something cool with the fire pit burning and a good book waiting to be read. It would seem that my whinging was no bad thing, after all...

*Be under no illusions that I have done any of this work. My Ma is the one to thank.