Do You Look / Act Like A Gardener?

[Plot10]

I've never got the knack of looking well groomed even at the best of times (well, maybe my wedding day) but since getting an allotment I'm generally filthier than a 5 year old. I often go shopping on a Saturday afternoon straight from the plot and have grown oblivious to the funny looks I get in the supermarket plastered head to toe in mud. I must look like Pigpen from the Peanuts cartoons.

I have invested in a nail brush to keep in my desk drawer after seeing the look of horror on a client's face as I handed him a paper to sign after I'd been up the plot at lunchtime one day.

[Mikey]

I have invested in a nail brush to keep in my desk drawer after seeing the look of horror on a client's face as I handed him a paper to sign after I'd been up the plot at lunchtime one day.

I find its always so much more effective if you don't say why too.

[Bren In Pots]

Bren, you just reminded me of Susie, the lovely Piskieboots. Haven't seen her on here for an absolute age.

On subject of thread though, I reckon we'd get some funny looks if we wore our dinner suits or other finery whilst on the plot. Up market people dress down to go gardening. Now where's my video of Rosemary and Thyme?

In my old gardening book from 1937 they all seem to wear plus-fours

[Two_Sheds]

Do YOU look like a Gardener?

I bike to my lotty, wearing mucky old cords etc. A few years ago a half-blind driver knocked me off my bike, which was loaded with just-emptied plant pots & boxes.

When the paramedics treated me, they asked "have you got somewhere to go?" in a gentle, kind of patronising tone. It was only when I saw the state of me back home (messy hair, filthy clothes) that I realised: they thought I was homeless

[Bill HH]

When I was farming I loved wearing old clothes with holes in, I had a woolen jumper that was basicaly just sleeves, a huge hole in the front 10 inches across. My wife chucked it away often but i retrieved it from the bin to her horror. In the 60's my normal clothing was jeans full of holes, braces, doc martin boots and jumpers with holes galore. One day I suddenly realised I was the height of fashion being new wave punk or something. I also wore old trilby hats that had lost their shape. I remeber many old farmers wore leather leggings, I think it stopped varicose veins, I quite fancy getting a pair of those.
The sad thing is that men dont wear waistcoats anymore, an ideal garment when its too hot for a coat but too chilly just to wear a shirt. Here is a pic of my Great great Grandfather, he looks rather cowboyish I think. He is wearing a kneckerchief, you dont see them any more.

[Two_Sheds]

men dont wear waistcoats anymore

They do, but now they're called gilets (or if you're Norfolk, jill-etts)

[Bill HH]

I bike to my lotty, wearing mucky old cords etc. A few years ago a half-blind driver knocked me off my bike, which was loaded with just-emptied plant pots & boxes.

When the paramedics treated me, they asked "have you got somewhere to go?" in a gentle, kind of patronising tone. It was only when I saw the state of me back home (messy hair, filthy clothes) that I realised: they thought I was homeless

Snap, one Christmas my wife wanted me to pop her into Torquay to get some last minute gift, i didnt bother changing, so i sat out side M&S waiting for her. A woman came up to me and asked if i had somewhere to stay on Christmas day!!!!!!!!

[alldigging]

I loved wearing old clothes with holes in,

I was about 16 and one day my mum offered to wash my holey jeans.
It turned out she actually put them in the bin and then bin men took them away the next morning. I was a bit cross. They were my favourite jeans. And not that bad.
By the time I worked out they'd not come back from the wash she'd done it was too late.

(I did used to wash most of my own stuff by then so I should have sussed she was up to no good offering like that!)

[Genoese]

It's my fingernails that give me away!


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[Mikey]

I have a small patterned paisley t shirt which I have a picture of me wearing when I was 16. My OH has tried on numerous occasions to throw it away as its now covered in paint, tar, creosote, glue and a good deal more. I refuse point blankly as its the most comfortable t shirt to garden in I have ever owned, its stretches when needed and its a muddy brown/beige base colour so I blend in perfectly on the plot.

I would rather stitch and repair it than see it cast off, oh lovely T shirt I'll always protect you.

[arpoet]

Our lass says I look like a tramp most of the time, and the neighbours think im a junk man as I cant resist a furtle through skips.

[noviceveggrower]

I have a coat that is my allotment coat. It's that bad it has its own hook in the coat cupboard. I was running late one day to pick my daughter up and still had it on in the playground. The looks I got off other parents was so funny.
I never use to tuck my trousers into my socks I use to just turn them up until I found out several times how much dirt I use to collect in the turned up part.
Little boy is like me comes back from allotment or even down the garden totally covered. Have to strip him off in the kitchen and chuck him in the bath. Gardener in the making I think. He isn't bothered how mucky he gets.

[Aberdeenplotter]

In my old gardening book from 1937 they all seem to wear plus-fours

Of course, there weren't so many toilets in these days

[veggiechicken]

Is that why they tucked their trousers into their wellies?

While we're on the subject (sort-of) and without Gogggling, can anyone tell me why they were called plus-fours?

[Mr Gardener]

The only plus four I know of is the Commodore 16 + 4 which was the supercomputer of the 1980s (or so my parents told me when I wanted a ZX Spectrum...)