In the pond, the first water-lily has opened in the afternoon sun. The valerian is looking good – unusual, as by this time of the year it’s usually been reduced to a skeleton by sawfly larvae. The first couple of flowers on the Black Russian tomato, earlier than expected (the orange tomato is well behind).
My current mealtime reading is Colin Spencer’s “British Food – an extraordinary thousand years of history”, and I’ve been rather taken by some of the descriptions of mediaeval stuff. Last week, the Guardian published a recipe (https://www.theguardian.com/…/almond-lemon-spiced…) which was influenced by the food of that time, and I clearly had to try it. OK, I used the suggested golden syrup which I had in the cupboard, rather than honey, and omitted the pine nuts (horrid things!), and made half the recipe. Yes, that will easily do 4 portions, and at around 650 calories each it’s clearly not going to be a regular addition to my repertoire, but interesting and well worth doing.
I’ve had a fall alarm from Buddi for nearly three years. I felt I needed one as I live on my own and have osteoporosis – the risk of a fall breaking a serious bone is not to be ignored. My feelings on this got stronger this New Year, when my sister (who is five years younger) had a fall and broke bones, from which she is still suffering the fallout.
Sadly, Buddi informed me earlier this week that they are discontinuing the service. Bugger! I need an alarm that is GPS based and uses a mobile network (so it works out of the house), and on a wristband. I find bulky pendants impossible, both because of sensory issues with them (due to Asperger’s) and because having a lumpy thing with a big red button tends to make people think that one’s faculties are in decline along with physical ones.
All the (rather few) possible replacements are bulkier than Buddi, as they incorporate watches, “fitness” stuff, and suchlike. However, I’ve settled on one from Stride, which I will be getting to grips with over the next few days. Roughly £60 to buy, with about £20 a month subscription (including fall detection). The call centre actually seems better than Buddi, in that it will try to determine the best course of action – and has a note of my key lockbox number, in case I’m at home but incapable, so ambulance or whoever can get in.
The sound of the riso is heard in the air, heralding the spring local election season! Although we don’t have elections in Worcester this year, many of our neighbouring Green Party groups do, and we do our best to help out where we can. This is part of a batch of “blue letters” for the eight candidates for a Borough Council over in Gloucestershire.
It’s been a difficult few days. Good Friday is always a day I set aside for contemplation, anyway (I also set New Year’s Eve aside for the same reason), and this year it was on 3rd April, which was my mum’s birthday.
At the end of last week, brother Simon told me that he had minor but curable skin cancer. On Good Friday I had an email response to a card I’d sent from my sister Jane – she’s having enormous pain from the wrist she broke at New Year (it’s CPRS again), and is having to have paid assistance in the house.
Today – Easter Monday – is 6th April, which is the first anniversary of committing my mother’s ashes to the River Evenlode that she loved.
A bright spot was being invited to Clare and Ian’s last night. Roast beef, which was glorious, and good conversation: a welcome break.
The river Evenlode, after scattering mum’s ashes in 2025.
The lat few days have been a steep learning curve! I took over “routine updating” of the Worcester Green Party website some months ago, which was fine. However, we now needed to add a couple of new pages (“supporters newletter” and “press releases”), and it’s been a bit of a struggle. The site runs as part of the national Geen Party site, which has some pretty strict templates, so it’s not always easy to work out the best way of doing things … in some ways, the 1990s way of working in raw HTML was easier! However, all is now done.
A chilly night last night, with temperatures down to zero. Warm bright sunshine today, and the iberis sempervirens (perennial candytuft) that spills over the side of the steps up to the patio was positively glowing. However, it’s not really warm enough to encourage me to spend long in the garden, so it looks as though washing walls is the afternoon project. I’m planning a re-paint of the kitchen as the “replace gas cooker with electric” project happens: perhaps a wash and single coat before, then a touch up of areas previously hidden by sockets and stuff, followed by couple of finish coats.
I’m lucky that the sensory issues that being on the autistic spectrum presents me with are, in general, fairly easy to avoid. I can’t wear artificial fibres next to the skin, but cotton, silk, wool etc are widely available. Being Green, I buy second-hand when I can (underwear excluded!) on line. However, a couple of recent shirt purchases have not been great – the articles were good value and in excellent condition when they arrived, but had been doused in some vile fabric conditioner, I guess in an attempt to make them “smell fresh”. This kind of penetrating artifical odour is something I really can’t handle, and am particularly sensitive to, and it takes two or three full hot washes to properly remove the bloody stuff, as it gets absorbed into cotton fibres. I shall never understand why people have let themselves be conned into thinking that garments that are deliberately made to stink are in any meaningful sense “clean”.
Just loathesome.
For some reason, my repeated attempts to grow snowdrops (galanthus) here have failed. However, their larger relatives Snowflakes (leucojum) do well. Rather an untidy plant, with foot-high straplike leaves, but the green-tipped flowers have just started to open and are a sign that spring is on the way.
I’ve been too unwell for the past three weeks to stay on top of the courgettes. As a result, there were three large marrows, which I’ve now cut (hoping to encourage more actual courgettes to appear). I expect that two will have to be consigned to the compost bin, but the third one is supper tonight, with a portion for the freezer.
Not, of course, that I’d do a conventional stuffed marrow. Indeed, it’s a cross between a stuffed marrow and a lasagne, with the base layer being a bolognese-type red sauce (made with Quorn not mince, as I’m slightly behind my target of two veggie days a week, and livened by hits of lemon juice and smoked paprika). Then a layer of lasagne sheets, and topped with a lasagne-type white sauce. Finally covered in grated cheddar.
Yesterday was the annual trimming back of the ceanothus, as it has finished flowering. Dead patches are appearing, which is not surprising as it’s a short-lived shrub and has been in for eleven years. As always, the trimming allows the acanthus mollis to stand out in full glory. It does well here, sometimes reaching seven foot in height, though this year is a shade under six foot. In both my previous garden in London, and at my mother’s house in the Cotswolds, it struggles to reach four foot.
