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For a change, the first trolley of the day was a Sainsbury's trolley captured in East Street, on the Jukes House side of the junction between that house and Defoe Court. Perhaps abandoned by a resident of one of these two establishments.
To find that the patch of bushes just beyond Middle Lane, where I had picked blackberries a few weeks previously had been mown. Will they be back again next year?
And a Lidl trolley by the side of Wickes, before you get to Halfords. A fair step to Lidl's, maybe a half hour with a trolley, so who on earth would have bothered to do that? Despite it being a bit late in the morning, I thought to take it back after I had deposited my Sainsbury's trolley to find that the front wheel was locked. And it was coming on to rain, so that was that. Sheltered for the few minutes that the rain lasted under the Wickes' front wall, by the fried-foodie caravan, and then pushed on back down Middle Lane.
Coming across this bicycle on the town side of the Screwfix underpass, presumably stolen from somewhere, from someone. The saddle looked as if it had been pointlessly scratched with some kind of sharp implement, although this does not show up in zoom today.
Investigating further, I now know that Pendleton is a range of bicycles sold by Halfords and a very successful cyclist who, after cycling, went onto horse racing and jousting. And that the saddle snapped from the Halfords website above is smooth, so something has happened to the one in the passage. See reference 2 and 3.
The rain was more or less over but the whitebeam looks oddly hazy in this snap.
I had bought some more Reeves plums from Gloucestershire from Waitrose, knocked down to £2.20 kilo. But I should have known better as they were well past their best, nothing like as good as the ones that I had bought previously. Probably the same batch, having resided in some cold room in the interval. But the courgettes from Sainsbury's, not very fresh either, visible right, were fine.
Out again later that day to start with a No.49 registration plate on a Ford Transit van, according to Carcheck, a 2020 Leader 300 DCIV. According to Bing, maybe £10,000 - with Transits appearing to lose their value with age rather quickly. Perhaps they tend to do lots of miles. I also clocked a No.28 and a No.44 - but No.39 remains missing. One day.
Followed by a medium small trolley from the M&S food hall, captured outside the T K Maxx front entrance, returned to an empty stack.
Opted for a short circuit via Hook Road, picking up this fine, late convolvulus flower on the way.
Having opted for a short circuit, not in the mood to retrace my steps, so left this one for another day - or another collector. Or perhaps I was already late for Scrabble.
Settled instead for this fine hollyhock.
PS 1: this afternoon, Microsoft News brings me notice of the piece in the Guardian at reference 4. This in the context of opening a new tab in Edge. With further reading at references 5 and 6. As ever, all much more complicated than it might at first appear, but the drift seems to be that it is reasonably likely that the north Atlantic overturning current (AMOC) will collapse before the end of the century and that this is likely to be a very bad thing for the climate here in the UK. Not to mention all kinds of other bad stuff elsewhere.
Previous outings for AMOC at reference 7 and 8 where very similar diagrams to those of today are to be found. Where I notice that an important element of the global thermohaline circulation, of which AMOC is part, is routed right through Indonesia. I have yet to find a more detailed map, but maybe the Indonesians could hold us to ransom by threatening to build some monster dam?
Next stop reference 9. From the horse's mouth.
According to Gemini. This one I will try to check up on later.
PS 2: this evening, I consulted OED (first edition), where there is a long entry for mouth and a very long entry for horse. In the former, there is talk of the mouth of a horse, in connection with a horse getting used to the bit and with a horse being sensitive to the bit, being responsive to the reins. In the latter, I can find nothing at all. In Longmans dictionary of 1984 the phrase is in, but only to be told what it means, not where it comes from. Webster's International of 1971, ditto. So not much further ahead.
Bing does rather better, turning up a website which says:
'The phrase originated around the turn of the 20th century. The earliest printed version I can find of it is from the London newspaper Reynolds Newspaper, June 1896: “As the great British nation takes far more interest in horse racing than in politics, the exchange of rulers would be delightful, because, look you, we’d get all our tips straight from the horse’s mouths, instead of being deluded and swindled every day by their lordly owners.” The colloquial use of the expression above suggests that the paper’s readers were expected to be familiar with it and earlier examples may well be found'.
From which I deduce that the phrase originated in racing circles, and sounded good without there being any very clear origin or meaning. And went on from there. Gemini was content to agree with me.
Unfortunately, while I could very probably find the piece in question at reference 10 to give the short quote above a bit of context, it might take a while and I may have to pay. Maybe tomorrow.
References
Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/08/trolleys-956-957-and-958.html.
Reference 2: https://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes/pendleton/.
Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Pendleton.
Reference 4: Collapse of critical Atlantic current is no longer low-likelihood, study finds: Scientists say ‘shocking’ discovery shows rapid cuts in carbon emissions are needed to avoid catastrophic fallout - Damian Carrington, Guardian - 2025.
Group search keys: trolleysk, 20250826.
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