Radion 4’s women magazine programme Woman’s hour is know for tackling issues dear to women’s heart from HRT in older women to various niches of dating for younger women. Woman’s hours seem to have been discussing dating issues especially dating that are now your usual man meet woman and they live happily ever after. Earlier this year there was a discussion about cougar dating, a term used to describe older women who prefer to date younger men. A few week ago, there was a discussion about married dating, also know as affairs dating. Today, Woman’s hour did yet another programme on dating, this time, its a very different kind of dating, one of the guest interviewed on the programme described it as Dating services for vegetables, it can also be called garden dating or gardening matchmaking services.

Garden Matchmaking is not what it appears to be. On hearing the name you probably have an image of a dating services introducing garden loving singles to one another but no, it is actually a service run by a group in Bristol which match people who has gardens but do not have time to look after it with people who would love to do some gardening but could not get an allotment nor have a garden of their own.

Garden Matchmaking is said to be working very well in Bristol where the group running the Garden Matchmaking services has been paring gardeners with garden owners. Both groups benefit, with the garden owner getting free gardening and the gardener getting to improve and get the fulfilment of having a garden to work on. The scheme is said not to be for garden owners who are very strict about what their garden must look like because the tenant gardener is given some creative freedom to do what he or she wants with the garden. The Garden Matchmaking services is said to have work very well, plans are in place to introduce it to other parts of England.

Countryside Blog dating services for gardeners, garden matchmaking, gardening matchmaking, online dating, soilmates, soulmates

The story below came from BBC website under the title “rural consumers less aware of money complaints process” but I prefer to call it “rural consumers do not moan as much as the city dwellers” its is an interesting article. The article focuses more on migrant workers who are usually temporary resident at rural areas, even if they are aware of how to complain, giving that the complaint process is very slow, most of them are probably back in their country before investigation into the complaint gets underway not to mention the language barrier which is a major issue for them:

People living in rural areas in the UK are less aware of their rights to complain about financial companies than those in towns, an ombudsman has said.

Those in urban areas have greater access to information about banking, insurance and investment complaints, the Financial Ombudsman said.

Rural residents were more likely to be low-paid or in seasonal work. Complaints include a Lithuanian farm worker who was offered translation by his bank – into Polish. Access to the internet was highlighted as a key reason why people might not be able to access consumer advice.

The new chief Financial Ombudsman, Natalie Ceeney, has been in the job for a month. The free ombudsman service is set up by law to settle complaints between consumers and financial businesses on anything from pawnbroking to mortgages.

As the service prepares an annual review, expected in May, it has highlighted groups who are less aware of what it does.

“People living in rural and more remote areas tend to know less about the ombudsman service – and their right to complain – than people living in urban areas,” it said in Ombudsman News.

“The nature of much of the rural economy – traditionally involving low-paid employment, seasonal jobs and less skilled work – can mean disproportionately more people in poverty and unemployment.”

Those in the lower income scale were less aware of their rights as consumers, the group added.

full story here: news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10093176.stm

Countryside Blog finance in countryside, rural money

Billed as one of the most exciting and most difficult horse trials in the world, the four star rated Badminton Horse Trials in Badminton, Gloucestershire is not just the oldest of the six horse trials events in the world but one of the most difficult to qualify for and certainly one of the most to take a trophy home from. More than 150 horse and rider from 15 countries entered the event.

The 3-day event sponsored by Mitsubishi motors puts bother horses and riders through their paces in three different events including cross country, dressage and show jumping. The event attracts eventers from allover the world. The 2010 Badminton horse trials expects participants such as two-time Olympic gold medallist and 3 times Badminton winner Mark Todd of New Zealand and his compatriot Andrew Nicholson.

Badminton horse trials starts with dressage, followed by cross country and concluded with showjumping.

You can find more information about the event at Badminton Horse Trials homepage.

Country Sports badminton horse trials, cross country, dressage, eventers, show jumping

The author of this article is not a fan of horse racing but it is quite interesting that Lib Dem are using horse racing analogy to target rural votes . Imbued with new confidence from the surge they enjoyed in opinion polls after the first TV debate where their leader Nick Clegg is said to have won, Lib Dems are now on the all out offensive to capture rural votes by targeting Labour members they think could easily be converted to voting for them at constituencies where they feel Labour voters can easily be persuaded to vote for them to keep the Conservatives out.

One thing that is true in the LibDems literature is the fact that most Labour support tends to be in the cities rather than the countryside as most rural constituencies tends to elect a Conservative or Liberal MP.

Horses conservatives, general election 2010, labour, libdem