Booting up

From time to time, I have noticed a quirk of the human booting up process. That is to say, when I have tooth ache, I sometimes wake up free of symptoms - that is to say discomfort or pain - and have time enough to think: 'Great, the toothache has gone away' - which it sometimes has. Then, more usually, the symptoms kick back in again.

Clearly the brain is making stuff available to consciousness before it has finished bringing itself online. Rather in the same way that a computer might make itself available to the user before it has finished its booting up process in the morning (or whenever). I get occasional symptoms of this on my HP Envy laptop in the form of small black process windows, no doubt executing some antique code, making very fleeting appearances in front of me.

Then last night, I had an alimentary disturbance which involved some discomfort and faint nausea at the idea of eating anything. Eventually, I got properly back to sleep again, only waking at 09:00, which is hours later than I usually get up these days. To wake up feeling all bright and perky. Great, the stomach is back online again! Except that once again, a few seconds later, I was reminded that while things might be better, I had better take it easy for a bit.

Possibly something fairly mechanical, possibly something untoward picked up from the bottom of our leylandii hedge, behind the six feet of fox gate, in the course of its occasional pruning. No doubt home to all kinds of unsavoury livestock. Elementary failure of hygiene.

But full panoply of ladder, a variety of pruning implements, cricket pads and so forth.

PS 1: in the course of all this, I noticed that the dry weather has very much favoured one particular type of grass down the side. Gemini did quite well on 'I forgot to take a picture, but yesterday, down the side of our house, a spot where there is little sunlight and very little water, a particular sort of grass in doing well. Single rosettes of leaves, about half a metre long, spreading out in a crown formation. Pale yellow-green perhaps a centimeter wide at the widest point. Any ideas' - without our coming to a firm identification. He has given me some tips on what to look for in what is now left of them. Maybe more in due course.

PS 2: by the time that I got back there, the patch of grass concerned had been mowed. But I was able to salvage some bits and pieces, stalks, leaves and seed heads, from the compost heap. For which, Google Images, inter alia, turns up wood false brome (Brachypodium sylvaticum), an identification which Gemini goes along with. Bentham & Hooker supportive, but not conclusive. Ditto, reference 5. The plant (top middle) looks about right, particularly when enlarged, but I am not sure about the seed head (top left). Bottom left more like it. But I think wood false brome is going to have to do until the plants round the side grow back up again.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/10/errand.html. On the way to its first birthday.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/07/padded-beef.html. The pads. A bit sweaty to have on for any length of time, but they do work. Good value for money as far as I am concerned.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luzula_campestris. Having ruled out Carex pendula, this one was favoured by Gemini.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brachypodium_sylvaticum.

Reference 5: https://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:393196-1.