Monthly Archives: February 2021

Butterflies and Nettle Soup

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I’ve just been having a look through some old photos. It’s amazing how many I have kept over the years, though they are a  random, unsorted and generally useless bunch of images.

The one I used as a “featured image” is one of my favourites. When you consider how early a crocus blooms, it’s unusual to photograph a butterfly on one.  Strangely, it was very active, despite the time of year, and flew off after I’d managed to get just two shots. That is typical butterfly behaviour.

MY relationship with butterflies started when I was very young – it was the summer before my sister was born, which would make me just over two years old. In those days they were as big as my hand. Like so many other things, they became less impressive as I grew older. About eight years later, I became interested in them again, learnt more about them and pursued them with a net. It was not my finest hour but times were different then. After that, I didn’t pay them more than a passing interest until we started the Quercus project on the farm. Butterflies are easier to observe and photograph when you have a group of people behind you.

Nettle soup, as you may guess from the title, is also one of my favourites. I haven’t made it for a few years but, having cleared the back fence, I now have  a thriving nettle bed. This promises a good harvest, and a good food source for butterflies. I will have to manage it properly, as we don’t want masses of nettles when we com to sell the house, but I’m looking forward to several years of butterflies and nettle soup. Red admiral, peacock, small tortoiseshell and comma caterpillars all eat nettles. I’ve never seen a comma in the garden, but I have seen the other three so we could be on for a good year.

Nettle Soup

Nettle Soup is also, sometimes misleadingly, the name given to the solution that develops if you steep nettles in water .It’s also known as nettle tea. You can also put nettles in a cup, pour boiling water on them and drink them like a tea.

There are many recipes on the internet for nettle soup (some more complicated than others) and nearly as many for the fertiliser.  have a poke round and see what you can find. Fertiliser is easy – let nettles rot in water. Compost the nettles and dilute the resulting liquid a the rate of about 10:1 to water on a s a plant food. Warning: it may be a bit smelly. I’ve never been bothered by it but some people do bang on about it in their recipes.

My personal favourite recipe for the green (edible) soup is very simple – just onions, nettles, stock and a blender, as I recall – no potatoes, no rice. And definitely no carrot, celery or cream. One recipe even tells you that you can often find bunches of nettles on Farmers’ Markets in spring.

Buy nettles? Words fail me…

 

Another of those days…

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I’m struggling for things to say. When you finally come face to face with our Covid testing system, it’s not that good. Julia’s arrangements have now been altered so she will be provided with one of the kits that has to be sent off to the lab. You have to find a priority post box for that. Priority Post Box, you ask. Exactly. It took ten minutes on the internet with a selection of useless links before I found any.

There are 35,000 in the country. Or 15.000 if you are posting on Saturday or Sunday. And you have to post the sample at least an hour before the last collection time – so no later than 4pm, and in some cases earlier. Most people are still at work at that time.

It’s not my idea of “priority”.

As for getting a test, you have to have symptoms. If I had symptoms I wouldn’t bother driving down to a testing station and shoving a cotton wool bud up my nose, I’d just stay at home in bed with a Lemsip. If you are asymptomatic I would have thought that was when you needed the test.

I will be returning to work next week as the owner has thought of a new way of doing things and we will be rearranging stock. I am not terribly keen, as I was enjoying my time off, but I can’t keep sitting at home and being paid for doing nothing.

Meanwhile, the post arrived. That cheered me up. Or it would have done if it had been what I originally thought it was. Unfortunately, the miniature medals with paperwork didn’t have any paperwork with them and the copy of the poetry magazine with my poem in it turned out to be a copy of a different magazine.

It is going to be one of those days.

The Best Laid Plans…

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There’s a distinct possibility that Julia may be going down with Covid in the near future. Several co-workers have been diagnosed recently, including one who came into work to tell them that she had symptoms, and one who was called at work with the information that she was positive but asymptomatic and may have been spreading virus for some days.

It is a time for keeping fingers crossed.

As a result of this, head office have decided to send them some lateral flow tests for self testing and an exhortation to keep going, It seems that the residential homes have been getting the tests for some time now, but nobody thought to send any to Nottingham. The view from their ivory tower must be quite stunning at this time of year. Not sure where it is sited but it’s a long way from any practical, hands-on experience. Even though 90% of the staff have now deserted them and are refusing to come in to work (two more rang in this morning, one “ill” and one with “stress”) head office does not want them to shut down. The absent staff members are not prepared to work,  but are still  prepared to accept their wages and offer their views on Facebook.

The oldest member of staff, who is also at risk from health, weight and ethnicity, is Julia.  She’s still there. This is a bit of a shock as I normally just think of her as beautiful and a bit creaky. (But I am a bit creaky too, and, as you may guess, my eyes are not great). I am getting steadily less happy with the situation and have already discarded several versions of tonight’s blog due to intemperate use of language.

At times like this, I think of Sir Edmund Verney (1590-1642). He was personally loyal to the King but did not support his policies. He wrote a letter at the time expressing his thoughts –

“I have eaten his bread and served him near thirty years, and will not do so base a thing as to forsake him; and choose rather to lose my life (which I am sure to do) to preserve and defend those things which are against my conscience to preserve and defend”

Strangely, for a man of integrity, he was also an MP. Those of you who are sound on historical dates will, I am sure, already have deduced that he was also quite good at predicting the future.

So, from vaccination on Sunday to rats deserting a sinking ship on Tuesday. What a turn-round in outlook.

On a sadder note Tom Moore died in hospital today. He had an adventurous 12 months, with two World records, a Gold Blue Peter Badge, a Knighthood and 150,000  cards for his 100th birthday.

Haiku – Season’s End

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Hot drink on a cold day

 

coffees outnumber
ice cream orders
—season’s end

 

First Published Presence 68 November 2020

My second published haiku. I admit I didn’t try too hard, but two years between the two was possibly a bit leisurely.  I wasn’t entirely idle between the two things, as I had  ten haibun and a magazine article published in that time. And, of course, several hundred blog posts.

It’s illustrated with a cup of tea because I don’t drink a lot of coffee. I could have used the word “tea” instead of “coffee” but it seems to be a better rhythm with coffee.

The teas are from the Middleport Pottery café in Stoke on Trent, where the Great Pottery Throwdown in filmed. Well, most of it. Some of the shots are from the Gladstone Pottery Museum which has more bottle kilns to show.

Vaccination Stories and Haibun Stuff

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Just when you think that life isn’t silly enough, along comes a new story. The Mencap Facebook group was  pinging all afternoon yesterday. They have all been going for vaccinations. One of them nearly fainted when he saw the needle and had to have a lie down before they could vaccinate him. Another was vaccinated by a vet, who said she stayed still better than his usual clients.

Apart from that the big news of the day is that I have a new haibun out in Drifting Sands.  I’m not really happy with it, as I tried  a few new things and it isn’t really me.  I’ve been reading the work of too many experimental and modern poets.

This is a decision helped along by a bit of counting. I noticed a writer claiming in his biographical notes, that he has had “dozens” of poems published. Well, I had ten in my previous incarnation as a poet, around 15 years ago, and according to my recent count, I can add another 24. That’s dozens. Having seen someone else use the term I now feel like it’s a bona fide milestone, and I can now relax a bit.

It only seems like yesterday my writing seemed to have stalled and I worried about nobody accepting my 13th piece. It was actually, if you add the earlier ten, my 23rd piece, so no superstition should have been attached. It was also my 24th piece because it turned out that I had miscounted. It’s amazing what you can worry about.

I’m also in Failed Haiku this month. Page 179 – a senryu and a haibun.  It’s about  80% of the way through so it’s easier to start from the end if you want to scroll through looking. Originally it had a line about my debt to Larkin’s  Annus Mirabilis, but the editor has left it out. I wasn’t sure where allusion ends and plagiarism begins, but I think I’m on the right side of the line, even without the line in. It’s better without the acknowledgement anyway – it’s easy to start looking pretentious if you add explanation.

Oh dear, I’m in danger of sounding like I know what I’m doing…