Late yesterday afternoon, I was engaged in some weeding in our front garden when my next-door neighbour turned up and we finished up having quite a long chat over the garden fence. As well as collecting period juke boxes, my neighbour is incredibly well informed about the genre of singers that we had in the late 1950’s and early 1060’s (when we were both teenagers) So we were reminiscing about singers like Connie Francis (who had a PhD in Mathematics, incidentally), Johnny Mathis and Harry Belafonte. I think that Connie Francis died only recently and was in her 90’s. Harry Belafonte died two years ago but he did achieve the age of 96. Later In the evening, me neighbour called around with some potatoes freshly harvested from his allotment. Having consulted the web, I think that parboiling followed by some frying or roasting with herbs is the best way to enhance their flavour and enjoy theM to the utmost. Actually, when my neighbour called around, I was in the middle of a video call to my sister who is in a residential home in Knaresborough and we took the opportunity to discuss the arrangements we are going to make for some birthday celebrations at the end of the month. She has decided that she does not want a fuss in her residential home but will spend the day at one of her daughters when other family members can drop in as and when they are able. I think this arrangement can work quite well because it gives me a better opportunity to chat with family members and to pass on some articles of Meg’s jewellery. Last night, I was at a bit of a loss what to view on the TV but eventually chose a program on Pompeii and Herculaneum which was fascinating. I have seen programs of a similar type before but the theme of the program were the modern theories as to why some of the victims of the eruption of Vesuvius were found in a strange orientation with their arms outstretched. It had been thought for decades, if not centuries, that the inhabitants of Pompeii and Herculaneum may have been smothered to death in volcanic ash. It is now believed, according to the latest application of scientific evidence, that they may have perished as a result of a blast of super-heated air (up to 600 degrees) when the ash column ejected from Vesuvius descended some hours later and they would have died within a second. The outstretched arms are caused by an automatic contraction of the muscles and is known as a ‘pugilistic attitude’ but has been observed by other instances when victims have been caught in the middle of an explosion or huge fireball. I awoke this morning to one of those grey sorts of mornings but as I have not been beset by technical problems as I was yesterday, I may well be able to make a good early start on my shopping which I traditionally do on a Thursday (Fridays even busier and the weekends even more so).
By the morning post, I received the most pleasant surprise which was a refund by way of a cheque from BT. I was not really expecting this refund as initially I was told that it would be credited to my account but a cheque is always very welcome. After I done my routine weekly shopping, I made haste to my bank to get the cheque deposited. My bank has one of those automated ‘do everything’ sorts of machines and I cannot remember the last time I deposited a cheque certainly unaided. But this worked like clockwork, even showing you an image of the cheque you have just deposited and when I returned home, it was a welcome addition to my balance. I now have my attention turning to the next couple of days ahead to see if the right amount of (my own) Teachers’ Pension will be deposited. In the course of my shopping, I decided to buy some rosemary which is the only herb I did not appear to have in my little herb carousel. As my neighbour had very kindly supplied me with some of the potatoes that he had grown in his allotment and only harvested that day, I had looked up a good way to enjoy the flavour of potatoes when they are freshly harvested. I followed some advice I had read on the web and scrubbed the potatoes before cutting them into fairly quick slices. I then parboiled them until tender and then sprinkled them quite liberally with some good olive oil (also purchased today) and the rosemary. For the protein part of my meal, I fried an onion and then added some little cubes of ham, left over from the weekend joint, made a little cup of onion gravy and complemented the whole mixture with some petit-pois. The whole meal was very tasty and I shall repeat the experiment but having made too much for myself in the first instance, I now have the meal sorted out for two days ahead. Tonight I am going to try an experiment of anchovies on rice cakes which I may come to regret but Aldi are not very good in the tinned fish department as I would have preferred sild or brisling. In the early afternoon, I caught up on the BBC i-Player on the episode of ‘Human’ through which I slept last Monday evening although I am sure the narrative of the hour long programme could easily have been done within thirty minutes.
The Russia -Ukraine conflict may be approaching some kind of resolution although I am sure that Putin is playing for time as usual and thinks he is winning he ground war (although the figure of 1 million Russian soldiers has been mentioned but I am sure this is hard to verify) Trump is sanctioning India for buying Russian oil but I am not convinced this will be be enough to bring Putin to heel unless the policy were sustained for several months. And, in the last analysis, the Chinese will always buy up some Russian oil to cone to the assistance of a very old ally. So, we live in a world dominated by geo-politics at the moment and uncertainties face us each and every way that we look.