Down the garden

A fortnight ago, down the bottom of the garden, the yellow archangel, last noticed at reference 1, was in full flower, although you would hardly know from this snap looking west.

Nor from this one, looking north, with the telephone even managing to lose the two young yew trees in the bright morning sunlight.

Zooming in to the right of the yews is a little better.

A couple of days previously, pineapples had reappeared in Waitrose, and on this day we got to try it out. Rather pale, not very sweet - not in the same league as the Del Monte Honeyglow noticed at reference 2 at all. The young ladies present were not very impressed either, and who did not, as far as I can recall, sink their teeth into it at all.

In fairness to Waitrose, I should say that the next slices, perhaps a day or so later, were much better. Perhaps the problem was that we did not give it a change to ripen - not that I have any idea how one can know that from the outside.

The young ladies were not very impressed with the apple and pear juice noticed at reference 3 either. Didn't touch their lips, although I found that I was shifting the stuff fast enough, low fluid regime notwithstanding. I shall buy some more when opportunity arises.

I might also say that we have preserved the very substantial, clear glass bottle, wondering what proportion of the asking price it accounted for. In any event, a reminder that energy is still pretty cheap - considering that you must need quite a lot of it to convert sand into a bottle. Or even to convert an old bottle into a new bottle.

PS 1: young ladies being present means that we took mince for lunch. With the offering from Sainsbury's being fortified on this occasion with some frozen gravy left over from the beef noticed at reference 4. Which meant that the official day three of the chicken was held over until the day following. While some left over mince contributed to a cottage pie a few days after that.

PS 2: intrigued to read this (Monday) morning that POTUS has moved from government by executive order to government by leaked draft of executive order, this particular one being about dismantling large chunks of the State Department, what we call the Foreign Office. A flashy version of the way that our governments use leaks to float deniable policy proposals. 

Lots of media coverage, with a sample snapped above, but I have not been able to get hold of a copy of the leaked document itself. Maybe actually publishing the document would be a step too far, even for the proprietor of X - even if he is a bit piqued that he is no longer on the front burner.

And I dare say that the US embassy operation, conceived in an age when communications with far flung places were much more difficult than they are now, is a bit overblown - but I also dare say that where the US pulls back, the Russians or the Chinese will push in. We can't afford it anymore.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/03/trolley-804.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/01/pork-imperfect.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/to-market.html.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/more-beef-from-ben.html.