a thorny issue

In my efforts to assist Rick with the build I recently undertook a clearing job for a neighbour in our valley in exchange for some chestnut trees for the roof shingles. Most of it was straightforward, until the end when I had a huge bank and river bed of brambles to clear. I managed the bank, which was too steep for the brush cutter, so I did it by hand with my Felco secateurs, I gave up with the river bed and got Rick in with a big choppy/slicy thing as I'd injured myself.







I am forever on the hunt for the ultimate gardening glove. I don't generally use gloves for most gardening jobs, only mucky ones (wet manure) or brambles. I like to get my hands dirty and feel the soil etc. I am not a sadist, I'm generally not doing anything that will cause me physical pain (other than the usual back ache etc.). Every year I have a sort out of all the gloves I've gone through, and I mean quite literally gone through. To be honest all gardening gloves are crap, the more expensive they are the more crap they are in my opinion. Heres a selection of my gloves



Lets start with these big boys,



was so chuffed when I found them in my local chain saw fixing shop and reduced from €20 to €10. They are soft and padded, they fit, they are lined, they've even got a velcro fastening bit on the wrist. They lasted 5 minutes

Next up some English gauntlets, was a big fan of these (have had at least 5 pairs) but they always go in the same place, tips of my fingers (whats with that), useless and expensive



These are cheapish, English ones, good for mucky wet jobs but not a lot else



I'm not sure what I have been doing with these but they are not looking good



These ones I call my spiderman gloves, they are great for climbing the scaffolding on cold, frosty mornings



Next, a selection of Portuguese gloves, all useless and all worn out at the finger tip, now I don't consider myself to have particularly big hands for a woman, but all the decent gloves here are for men i.e. too big for me







Today I tried these, soldering gloves



Again, useless but nice and long which is a plus

Next up I'm trying the blacksmith gloves (from the forge in Mount Doom), which are enormous but super super padded with armour or something



You may wonder why I'm bleating on about this, but it's an important issue, can't someone make some proper gloves/gauntlets that actually are thorn proo, fit my hands and last for more than a day. Because of all the badly made gloves I have (other than the blacksmith ones, which I haven't tried) I now have several thorns embedded in my left thumb which has rendered me useless. I have been in almost constant pain, I hit a post with the truck and had to spend a morning with my mechanic getting the back light cage and light fixed cause I can't drive properly (well thats my excuse anyway), I have given myself open thumb surgery and now an infection. I've bought a magnifying glass.



I've tried savlon, a portuguese anti-biotic cream, I've tried wrapping my thumb in an onion, I've tried soaking my petit pouce in a phial of apple cider vinegar, i've done the homepathic thing (silica), i've done hot soapy water, hot salty water. There are 3 remedies left that I haven't tried, one is soaking a bit of bread in water or milk and making a poulitice, another is making a poultice with a piece of potato and the other is baking soda.

I am now leaving it alone and have gone back to a tried and tested remedy, pine resin. It's anti-biotic, anti-septic, very soothing if a little sticky, but it seems to be working. If there are any glove manufacturers out there reading this, please help me out and design a proper gardening glove