Trolley 806

An  M&S food hall trolley, captured outside B&M, just by one of the High Street bus stops.

Returned to the stack at M&S, where, it being a DIY lunch day, I took the opportunity to buy some ham rolls, that is to say a packet of premium ham and some white rolls.

I managed to get in a muddle at the check-out, caused by the 'search for item' image not looking much like the 'petit pain' rolls I had selected, and was reduced to using a manned check-out. With one coming free at just the right moment.

Sadly, as it turned out, the white rolls were undercooked and taste-free. While the ham, although described as air dried and coming in decently thick slices, was damp and tasted rather strongly of pickling fluid - whatever that might have been. All in all, rather disappointing. But the brace of orange tomatoes from Morocco, left over from the day before, were fine.

Later in the day I was confused by a roadside cypress. I thought it had turned brown because it was ill or perhaps even dying - but it turned out that all the brown seen from a distance was the red tips - quite possibly something to do with reproduction - of the scaly needles seen up close and personal.

Working with Gemini and Google Images comes up with the suggestions of Port Orford cedar (Chamaecyparis lawsoniana) or Italian cypress (Cupressus Sempervirens), more probably a variety of the former. In any event, it seems that plenty of conifers with scale needles go in for coloured new growth in the Spring. 

However, Wikipedia has a very likely looking snap at reference 3, with the caption 'male cones in spring with diagnostic red colour' - so perhaps my first thought was right after all. Clearly a tree which I need to keep an eye on.

Interesting that Gemini, while not able to work directly with images, has a fair stab at it on the basis of a description. Clearly again, I shall have to read this interchange more carefully.

While a bit further on, the attention of my nose was caught by the flowers snapped above, probably some kind of viburnum. Very smelly it was too. I associated to the remarks of Freud in the essay at reference 2 - already the subject of reference 4 - about the changes to the use we make of smell resulting from our move to an erect posture - which took our noses well away from lots of smells which might otherwise have been of interest.

PS 1: it will be interesting to see if the US sticks to its new tariffs long enough to discover that imported cars are a lot cheaper than the home made ones because home workers want to be paid a lot more than foreign workers. The US, like the UK, has long taken the soft option of cheap goods from abroad on credit. Credit that is in the form of accumulating national debt, a lot of it held by oil rich, gas rich or just harder-working foreigners. Will the voters of the US be able to stomach breaking out of this bind?

PS 2: later still: BH rather liked the portion of the ham that fell to her. Maybe the difference is that she likes pickles more than I do?

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/03/trolley-805.html.

Reference 2: Civilization and its discontents – S. Freud – 1930.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamaecyparis_lawsoniana.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/03/interim-report-no1.html.

Group search key: trolleysk.