Tilling the soil

I'm loath to call it a garden - I shouldn't sully the good name of a garden with the unkempt jungle that I keep. I've been working hard now that no gardener has been to my house for the past 10 months. 

I should be more careful with these shears.  You see how hard at work I was?  I cut so swiftly that you can hardly see the blades in this pic: 

 

Everything about me is falling into decay. I almost fell when this wooden step broke. I have to get it fixed. Maybe wood isn't such a safe structure in the tropics. And as you can see, it's almost totally covered with dead leaves. It's not been in use for a very long time. And I for the past few posts in this blog, I have been talking about ladder safety. I didn't think a fixed structure like this could pose a problem.