I like elephants most of the big animals too, especially when their babies are following them.

I am raving today because my youngest son, living in Nottingham with his wife has acquired an allotment. They've been looking for a while but there weren't many available. But they found this one, about 5 minutes drive from where they live, when a couple in their 70s with two allotments decided one was enough. It is 400 square yards! Massive. Does have a glasshouse, a shed and some apple trees, but even so...I gather they are on the younger side of the usual age for having an allotments (by about 40 years, I think!).

We don't have allowments in New Zealand, generally. Some community gardens have sprung up in recent years but anyone can plant there and anyone can pick. The one set up in our little town didn't succeed, probably because too many people have their own gardens and don't want another one. And the teacher who set it up and took responsibility for it left the district.

It was yet another glorious day here yesterday and I was out for dinner with friends in a local restaurant. Since it was such a pleasant evening we decided to eat outside, any chance to do that here is welcome, but around 8, when the sun went down, it started to cool down quickly. Then out came the waiter with a bundle of lovely fleecy blankets and we tucked them round our knees and finished our meals as snug as bugs in rugs. How much better is that than those daft outdoor heaters which efficiently heat the column of air above themselves rather than you and how much more environmentally?

Rugby and its rules...... what joy to watch a debate on field about whether a move was about to break a chap's neck or not and if he have been let down gently enough ... and if his held leg was kept horizontal. Do any of that stuff in the street and you'd be in the chokey with pics in the local rag. But there, abroad there was similar going on in cricket - well,in the VIP box I was in it usually was, anyway. Worse happened in the cheap seats...... really good days out, they were. I miss them.

Priscilla wrote:

...in the VIP box I was in it usually was, anyway...

Alas, I was always in the NVIP box. In fact I am lying - I was never in a box at all, not even in a not very important one. But I have been to the Royal Opera House in the posh stalls - does that count?

I did the "How posh are you?" test in The Sunday Times yesterday, and, to my utter mortification, I came out as "nouveau posh". Is there anything worse?

But then we are all heading for the NVIP box - eventually. ( )

There is quiet family chat here about the best function of my new rockery.....apparently for me in due course - unboxed, suddenly and possibly quite soon.

A wet day,nowhere to go  and then Sky Arts shows a wonderful Bolshoi 'Spartacus.' Sometimes there is much to be said for a sofa slouch idling with the remote control - and a large bowl of chocolate trifle. There's no point in Michael Bourne doing his take on Spartacus - it's already filled with leaping blokes not wearing much....... I guess he just has to make do with fairy tales.

Apparently there are more words in Scots for snow than in Inuit;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-34323967

I was once told long ago by an Iranian scholar cleric that there were 325 words in Arabic for camel - this does not surprise me what does is what on earth could we have been talking about?

Errr ... dromedaries per chance?

Unless you'd got the hump with them and had gone all bactrian. So there you go: problem solved and alpaca'd away and without any need for an oversize needle-threader. And for any other camelid questions one can always consult his holiness the dally Llama, or perhaps Priscilla, the Queen (and ship) of the desert, or just myself, the Queen of the dessert.

PS : a bit disappointed that I couldn't immediately get a vicuña pun in there but ... I'm still working on it.

Meles meles wrote:

Errr ... dromedaries per chance?

Unless you'd got the hump with them and had gone all bactrian. So there you go: problem solved and alpaca'd away and without any need for an oversize needle-threader. And for any other camelid questions one can always consult his holiness the dally Llama, or perhaps Priscilla, the Queen (and ship) of the desert, or just myself, the Queen of the dessert.

PS : a bit disappointed that I couldn't immediately get a vicuña pun in there but ... I'm still working on it.

I didn't know what a vicuña was - when I googled it I ended up reading about alpacas. I always thought these woolly animals were pleasant creatures, but apparently not. They enjoy spitting at other alpacas and at humans. They bring up lumps of slimy green stuff - grass mixed with stomach acid - chew it a bit more, and then let fly - charming.


Not all alpacas spit, but all are capable of doing so. "Spit" is somewhat euphemistic; occasionally the projectile contains only air and a little saliva, although alpacas commonly bring up acidic stomach contents (generally a green, grassy mix) and project it onto their chosen targets. Spitting is mostly reserved for other alpacas, but an alpaca will occasionally spit at a human.

For alpacas, spitting results in what is called "sour mouth". Sour mouth is characterized by a loose-hanging lower lip and a gaping mouth. This is caused by the stomach acids and unpleasant taste of the contents as they pass out of the mouth.







I know camels are bad-tempered and can give a nasty bite, but do they also spit when annoyed?

There are times when the camera is in the perfect place at the perfect time;




http://pulptastic.com/50-perfectly-timed-photos/

Oh, can't we talk about camels, Trike?

Certainly, Temp. Here is a photo of another South American camelid, the Gaunaco;

Temperance wrote:

I know camels are bad-tempered and can give a nasty bite, but do they also spit when annoyed?

Camels also "spit", Temp, in exactly the same way as the alpacas;

http://animals.sandiegozoo.org/animals/camel

Strewth!!!!. feral camels in Australia;



the population of these animals was sufficient ( estimated 1 million in 2008, later revised to 600,000) that they were considered a pest, and a culling programme was introduced which has now reduced their numbers to around 300,000

"The Llama is a woolly sort of fleecy hairy goat,
With an indolent expression and an undulating throat;
Like an unsuccessful literary man."

Hillaire Belloc

... from, 'More Beasts for Worse Children', 1897.

MM quoting Hillaire Belloc wrote:

 


"The Llama is a woolly sort of fleecy hairy goat,
With an indolent expression and an undulating throat;
Like an unsuccessful literary man."

Or an unsuccessful literary woman?  

The llama isn't a goat, is it? Just googled - it is a camelid, which are apparently classified "in the order Artiodactyla, along with pigs, hippopotami, whales, deer, giraffes, cattle, goats, antelope, and many others".

Whales? Whales aren't a bit like llamas.

Llamas not like whales? Really? ... you might like to read, "Almost like a Whale - the Origin of Species Updated', by Steve Jones (2000).

But you mentioned hippopotamai ... so how about some more from from Hillaire Belloc:

"One shoots hippopotamus
With bullets made of platinum.
Because if we used leaden ones
His hide would surely flatten "em"

MM wrote:

Llamas not like whales? Really? ... you might like to read, "Almost like a Whale - the Origin of Species Updated', by Steve Jones (2000)

OK! I believe you.

Camels smell, groan horrendously when you get on and  uncomfortable to ride for more than a mile.  Jeeps and elephants are better. It seems that once dead, camels become a good barbecue meal being stuffed with a lamb which is stuffed with fancy rice and chickens and the whole thing probably takes a fortnight to cook. Might make a good show stopper for that Bake off programme - or would it have to wrapped in pastry/ bread for a Camel Wellington?

The Camel Corps in the desert;

Camel hair coats were considered to be very posh when I was young, although I never liked them: I always thought men in them looked really spivvy. They still seem to be trendy and ridiculously expensive though: this one (called "the Chesterfield" - sounds like a sofa) by Yves Saint Laurent will knock you back 2535 pounds (the pound sign on my keyboard isn't working - it's coming out as # - which is very annoying).





I believe the original camel hair coats were gentlemen's attire - the Victorian "covert coat" (see BBC link below). Somehow men like the UKIP leader and Del Boy appropriated them. Farage's coat isn't camel hair - just "tan-coloured ". But it is a covert coat. Looks awful.







http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-31962591

Pardon my ignorance,  but what's with the two pockets on the right-hand side of Nigel's camel coat? Is that normal ... especially considering that one of them is probably permanently sewn closed "to maintain the line", and so is just for show?

I have no idea, but the pockets don't look right at all. Whereas the Yves Saint Laurent coat - even though I don't like camel hair - is very classy - obviously beautifully cut. Mind you, at that price you would expect it to be!

Camel - pshhhh, it's only vicuna for the gent of taste and discernment. If you want to penny pinch, you can get a coat on ebay for a mere $13.500 and that's probably a cheap Chinese one. You do get free delivery though.

What about 'moleskin'? Is that still acceptable by so-called, 'Gentlemen of Taste'? And is it indeed actually made from moles' skins? (I confess that I really do not know, but I presume not, as one would need to have slaughtered a huge number of moles to make just one human-sized waistcoat). I guess real, or even fake, 'moleskin' is still not acceptable to moles themselves, should they actually ever get any say in these matters ... although didn't Mr Badger in 'Wind in the Willows' sport a fine moleskin waistcoat? And dear old Moley didn't seem to make any complaints about that. Mole revered Mr Badger .....  as indeed so should you all!

My understanding [not that I'm an  expert] is that moleskin in the textile sense is a sort of corduroy without the ridges. I think  before denim men [and women?] who  needed hardwearing work clothes wore moleskin.  I know in the folk song the 'dirty blackleg miner' wore moleskin pants. Don't think he was posh though.

Moleskin was certainly used in longish patchwork pieces in our rural areas. and I know someone - abroad - who had an otter skin coat and who wondered why I blanched as she wafted on about how it was waterproof and suitable for London. My daughter once led a demonstration group to Harrods  fur dept - making sure the others did not wear jeans to get in. They no longer have one there, I think.

There are recorded examples of Iron age  garments made from  tiny patchwork pieces of mouse skins. We ought get a few for the bar to hand out to posters trying to keep patience.

The finest pashmina is like a spider's web - shahthurl - or some such spelling - that floats in the air like gossimer. These are banned because they are made from a rare newly born goat. Of course they are still sold and cost many thousands of dollars in secret sales attended by bankers' wives from the Gulf States. I was once invited to one such sale and felt sickened by the entire affair.

This is a link I found on a tailoring blog in reference to moleskin [url=-http://blog.samuel-windsor.co.uk/what-is-moleskin-fabric]-http://blog.samuel-windsor.co.uk/what-is-moleskin-fabric[/url] and it would seem that the modern fabric is indeed cotton corduroy (now someone will probablly tell me that is tortologous because corduroy IS a type of cotton).  I suppose when times were hard people who lived in the country had to use what they could get - and I suppose if moles were considered pests and they were bumped off anyway they would deem the skin might as well be used.

Oh Priscilla, that's horrible about the pashminas.  One of my great-grandmothers (who died in the 1940s) who was something of a mater familias - though of course in Queen Victoria's time there was nothing rare about having circa 17 children [her children did not all live to adulthood - I'm not sure if there were any stillbirths on top of the 17] - had a sealskin coat my mother told me.  I did have a leather coat in my late teens - but my ideas have changed since then and I wouldn't be seen dead in one now.

I might be being sentimental but last night I had to switch off a David Attenborough programme about fishing leopards.  The not quite adult daughter cub had been driven off by Mum and she had to learn to hunt efficiently PDQ or it was chips.  The leopard was starving and trying to get a cute little zebra foal.  Cutie baby zebra survived this time but it was a reminder that nature is definitely all hearts and flowers and I had a horrible feeling the leopard would not make it so I just had to switch the programme off.

Supermoon and total lunar eclipse tonight  ... and the Apocalypse too if you believe all that guff.

I thought Marek Kukula, the public astronomer at the Greenwich Royal Observatory put it very poetically:

"The moon will not be blotted out, but will instead turn dark red. Though no sunlight will fall directly on the moon, its surface will be illuminated by light rays that refract through Earth’s atmosphere. Red light will bend around the Earth and light up the moon, but blue light will be scattered and lost in the atmosphere. The moon usually turns a beautiful copper colour in a lunar eclipse. The light that shines on the moon is effectively the light of all the sunsets and sunrises on Earth."

That is indeed beautiful, MM.

I have set my alarm clock for 3.00am which is (according to the BBC this morning) the time to watch this event (in England). I do hope I don't turn over and go back to sleep. The weather here is glorious at the moment - not a cloud in sight - so hopefully the supermoon will be clearly visible.

Astrologers call it a blood moon, which sounds grim. Jonathan Cainer says it's not grim at all and not to worry: the end of the world, which certain people are yet again predicting (October 7th), is unlikely.

I've got a couple of amateur astronomers staying here ... to take advantage of the lack of light pollution (they live in central Perpignan). They stayed a night a few months back and set up their telescopes in the garden. So if I wake up, or am still awake (we got through a couple of bottles last time!), I should have access to a cracking good telescope. The sky is a bit hazy at the moment but should clear by tomorrow (early) morning.

I hope I can stay awake to see it tooo, I've seen one before and it was pretty spectacular.

It's pretty much the end now of Scottish Archaeology Month so I hope to have more time to spend on the board, that plus an unusual amount of granny duty has made for some pretty tiring weeks. I have managed though to get involved in digging three hill forts, one medieval harbour, some impressive rock art and a vain search for an early church boundary ditch. We did find a sodding great pit though where the debris from the chiurch being blown to bits by a Jacobite ammunition store going sky high had been dumped. Also some lectures including one between an archaeologist and a psychiatrist talking about memory. That however got somewhat derailed by two psychotherapists having a very acrimonious disagreement. I had never heard of brainspotting before - I would have assumed it was like trainspotting but without the anoraks or the drugs.

And lo the heavens did split asunder and the moon became bathed in blood and fire fell from the skies .... well I saw a shooting star, but apart from that it was a clear mild night with not a single trumpet-wielding angel to be seen. The moon was good. And now back to bed.

A UK thing. If I read correctly, local councils will now have total control of the rate tax applied to shops. High streets have been in decline for years  and often caused by the heavy tax on small shops that could not be made from smaller sales. Local councils wailed that with centralised taxation they could do nothing - now we'll see if they help out the small trader. Retail parks -ie horrid huge sheds of superstore stuff  have edged out the small shops - and they were the ones selling the more quirky things that we want. Our nearest town has a living High Street......  I initiated a successful campaign against  pedestrianising it  many years ago. There are a few  empty shops - however small traders have been taking them for the 6 mths tax free period and then moving on to another - this musical chair approach has worked too. So here's hoping that councils will be fair in their taxation - or am flying in cloud pigland again?

Priscilla - did you see the quid pro quo? It seems that, to make up for £17,000,000,000 in reduced central grant the councils are getting the Business Rates. At the moment they get half - about £13,000,000,000 and the biscuit of the exchequer trousers the other half, so the councils still end up getting less money.

Aye, I had wondered about that. This house here thinks that the council will not  make any effort to save the small shops in the High Street but at least they can be lobbied and targeted. Before, the blame was always foist upon central govt policy.....' though they understood the problem and shared concern.' I bet that line gets tossed out. There is a chinese lady in charge of the district's planning and fund raising. .....it seems she cannot see the point of having a local and accredited Heritage Museum, especially in it's getting any funds to help it survive - and that the volunteers who run it entirely might serve teas in it's yard as well. Their only store room facility was in a  building now being removed to make a paying car park.

Sounds about right - I reckon it's more about making the councils responsible for as many services as possible, and for raising the funding to provide them, so that The Biscuit can turn round and say "It's not the government's fault it's your local council who have cut [insert name of service here]/[have raised your taxes].

I can't remember whether I mentioned it here before but there used to be a dry cleaning shop in town quite near to where I get on/off the bus.  The lady running it closed it over 2 years ago now because her landlord put the rent up and she couldn't afford the new rent.  That shop has been standing empty now for that 2+ years - what a waste!

Anyway, that's not what I came here to "rave" about.  My local bus service has improved - gone up from once an hour to half hourly.  Mind you whether that will continue when the two new housing estates (one of which is going up at present) have been completed and sold off I can't help wondering about.  My understanding is the building company said they would subsidise more buses - mind you if there will be six hundred more houses more buses will be needed.  But as it happened I just missed a bus by a few minutes so I caught a bus that goes along a road that goes not parallel to mine but in the same general direction. I had to walk across a hill to get home.  I had quite a heavy shopping bag - a lady that I occasionally talk to when I go that way saw me and said come in and have a cup of coffee.  I don't know whether I looked like a poor old soul but I thought that was a kind gesture.  Are are a few good 'uns left.

Probably had to do the bus thing to provide "planning gain" to get planning permission. Catch them while you can - they'll withdraw the subsidy as quick as boiled asparagus once the boxes are erected.

Saw Benedict Cumberbatch in Hamlet on Thursday night. 225,000 viewers worldwide. I bet our Willy Wobbleweapon would be amazed. Tickets for the live performance at the Barbican were exchanging hands for £1000 - I paid £15!


http://www.ctvnews.ca/entertainment/benedict-cumberbatch-s-hamlet-breaks-telecast-record-with-225-000-viewers-1.2614110




More than 225,000 viewers watched Cumberbatch tackle the melancholy prince of Denmark at movie theatres around the world on Thursday during a live -- or in some cases delayed -- telecast from London's Barbican Theatre. That's the largest global audience for a live broadcast of any title in National Theatre Live history.

The broadcast played on over 1,400 screens and in 25 countries.

Something came to mind upon reading about Temperance mentioning Benedict Cumberbatch in Hamlet (no sorry didn't see it - been a bit below par since I had my flu and pneumoccocus jabs though hopefully getting back to "normal" gradually.  I don't know whether I mentioned on another thread but I caught some old(ish) - though since the Millennium - Beeb radio "the Pillow Book" dramatisations on YouTube (of course they had absolutely nothing to do with the historical Lady Shonagon.  The first series featured Benedict Cumberbatch as a highly born courtier and Richard Madden (Robb Stark in the first three seasons of Game of Thrones) and more recently the gamekeeper who romanced Lady Chatterley (though that got poor reviews).  Sometimes it's surprising to stumble across programmes from a few years back and hear (or see if it's TV) actors/actresses who have since gone on to be well known.

How right you are, Lir - about finding performers in their early days. Some I do not recognise at all until their names come up as a surprise..... and sometimes the were rather awful in their first films. Henry Fonda in 'Drums along the Mohawk' or some such name, comes to mind. The one where Claudette Colbert is always immaculate whatever the situation and her eyebrows perfectly drawn. Why they had her faint every so often I have no idea but it got her out of the way which was a mercy. Women don't seem to faint as much as they used to in a crisis. That wouldn't half liven up some of the 'Soaps' - not that I ever watch any now but I might if they did that. We are so short of comedy.

Too many rants these days (plus assorted huffs and miffs) so I'll give you my rave of today:

My pomegranate "tree" ... actually it's more of a big bush, being barely 3m tall despite being planted at least 12 years ago ... has finally produced fruit. Last year it produced two small hard green lumps that it promptly dropped (probably from surprise), but this year I now have a single, almost-ripe pomegranate. And I'm so proud of it that that I've actually tied the fruit onto the branch with string, just so if the tree does finally give up on it the fruit won't fall to earth and get munched by boars, badgers or dogs.

And my second rave is that my crop of saffron ... ok it's only about 30 bulbs in a tub ... has started to flower. I've already harvested 21 stigma (each flower gives just three tiny inch-long threads) so I've at least already got enough for a celebratory paella. Saffron seems easy to grow and fairly undemanding: as I say mine were just planted in a tub about 18 months ago and then largely forgotten and abandoned. So I can only assume no-one around Saffron-Waldron can get the labour to harvest the crop these days. In Spain, Iran, Afghanistan etc it seems to be the patient, older ladies that are usually employed to delicately pluck the crop. Anyway I'm well chuffed ... my own tiny harvest so far (0.05g) has already saved me about 15€!

And since saffron propagates via bulblets (it's a sterile monoclonal plant that cannot set seed) if I carefully split the bulbs this winter, pot 'em up and treat 'em well, I should get even more plants next year.

I'm surprised you can even grow a pomegranate at your altitude MM as cool winters and hot, very dry summers are normally required. The trees grow like weeks here, I'm a bit tired of the fruit dropping everywhere and being squashed underfoot so it makes walking difficult every autumn it must be said.  But the trees are pretty when hanging with ripened fruit, not that attractive for the rest of the year though.

Interesting re the krokus lillies too, I've often thought of planting a tub but everyone insists that they grow in one part of Greece and one part only so it has put me off trying. What colour are your stamens, red or gold?

Kozani saffron
http://www.culinarybackstreets.com/athens/2014/cb-road-18/

I'm at 550m altitude, winters are generally cool/cold (snow is rare but with the wind!!!) and we can get hot, dry summers ... but this year, though fairly dry, wasn't particularly hot, at least not for very long. Pomegranates certainly grow well as garden plants, only 20km away and at a slightly lower altitude, around Ceret (they're not grown commercially, Ceret's big product is cherries).

My saffron has crimson-red stamens. You should give it a try as it seems fairly undemanding. Just make sure you get proper saffron bulbs Crocus sativus, as there are other species of autumn-flowering "crocus" like the colchicums, which have similar blue/mauve petals and yellow stamens. These plants are moderately toxic, though probably not seriously so if one only ate a few stamens worth, but you just wouldn't get the lovely saffron colour and taste.

I take back some of my remarks about the Black Friday (weekend) stuff. I have just picked up the Kindle version of Mary Beard's SPQR for £1.80 on Amazon!  http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B014T9HKN2?ref_=docs-os-doi_0

I like the Google Nessie.

Approaching that time of year when it's best to have a warm coat;

Which do you think I should choose?