'Oh it is just too sunny to grow tomatoes here love'

This post might be a little bit ranty but for the benefit of those overseas in he cold Northern Hemisphere I included an old, gratuitously lush picture of tomatoes. Mine do not look like that now, they are wilted, brown and kind of crisp. To the uninitiated it looks like they have been barbecued by the hotter than hot Australian sun. To anyone with any knowlege, they are sick, dying due to a wilt, from the soil, NOT FROM THE SUN!

Now I had inspectors come visit this morning, to see the damage incurred from a water leak coming from the apartment above. It has caused mold to grow in our apartment and it needs to be fixed. Well aparently these 3 men thought I was about 17 years old, and thus spoke to be in the most condescending way. Not only am I a few months shy of 30, but I take offence, at any age, to being treated in an inferior way. They had a letter from my landlord father telling them to inform me of the problems and planned solutions just as they would him, but they seemed to deem it all beyond my head. Then they wandered out to the balcony garden and continued to patronise me in the most awful way. They did not ask me if I had covered any drainage holes with pots, they just assumed that I had because silly little girls with gardens do that sort of thing. No apologies when they realised that of course I hadn't done anything of the sort, that I was well aware that I had to sweep up the excess dirt lest it clog the drain, that it was scheduled as a weekend chore. And when they did talk directly with me they were supercilious and just plain rude.


Then, and this was the final straw, they dared to tell me about my gardening skills. A lush balcony full of greenery, complete with greens that wilt at the slightest hint of sun was set before them. And my tomatoes, the last of which still need to be pulled but with all my spare time taken up on thesis work they haven't quite managed to be ousted yet. Well these 3 men all had views on those. It was the sun, the aussie sun that was killing them. Never mind the lush green foliage at the top of each plant, the mostly unblemished tomatoes still ripening on the mostly defoliated branches below. Yes it was the sun, plain and simple. When I informed them that in no uncertain terms that the wilt was caused by a disease they told me I was wrong. I repeated that I had a perfectly good yield last year and it was only with the entrance of a disease that I could not erradicate that the wilt occured, they thought I was still wrong. One even dared say 'What are you some kind of botanist?'. To that I just smiled and realised there was no point in arguing. These guys would think what they liked, my views wouldn't change their minds, after all I was just a young girl. With that they left. Still don't know when the damage will be fixed or what they intend to do with it, because a young woman like me apparently doesn't need to trouble herself with such issues! I half expected them to smack me lightly on the bottom and send me to the kitchen to bake them a pie!!!


Bah. Sorry for the rant folks but really, it is 2010, who still treats women that way? I may call myself totally inept balcony gardener but I don't think I am that useless. I'd like to see them write a 100 000 word thesis integrating autobiographical studies with history, teach history to university students for less than $10 an hour, keep a balcony garden thriving and blog about it. And now for those who still are reading this, here is more tomato porn, which proves, without a doubt, that I can grow tomatoes on my balcony :)