h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

For the record.

Ash's first Produce Show in many years and first prize for largest pumpkin went to a pumpkin slightly bigger than a football.

Well, ok. It's not been a good growing year and two weeks was a bit short notice to give gardners for a Produce Show.

Second Prize Largest Pumpkin was 1.25 inches high, 1 inch across.

There's no need for further comment, except that it raised zero proceeds in the auction at the fete afterwards.

Otherwise than that this year's fete was AAA - the sun shone, there was bunting, there was live music (electric fiddles, guitar, flute... very cool) and I won a red velvet hat on the tombola which toned nicely with the bottle of red wine from the raffle.

Sounds like my kind of pumpkin show......I could enter my gourds.
May I ask? What is bunting?

little flags on a piece of string

http://shop.flagsandflagpoles.co.uk/category1030377.html?gclid=CISJk8v7pIcCFRYTQgod3Chs8Q


RJR

Bunting.......LOL. I thought it was some kind of activity.

We have bunting to hang on the Fourth of July, but it's a little more complex than little flags on a string.

You got me!

yeah we put ours out, for the releif of Maffiking..... strange init, what an empire holds, as dear and close to its heart!



RJR

http://www.scouting.org.za/mafikeng/history.html


as allways got the spelling wrong Mafikeng

also a feeling of Daja vue i think


http://www.bl.uk/collections/afghan/chronology1878to1880.html



RJR

Dear, Dear LLWaz,

Perhaps you should have had a prize for the littlest pumpkin on show!

I wonder where AsH is?

On Sunday I had a phone call from my 84 year old friend who lives in Shrewsbury. She had come with me to South africa in 1997, on my last visit to the country of my birth.

Margaret confessed that she had bben trying to remember my name for two months. She had lloked up all her address books - remembered that my surname began with an E and that was all.

and yet she sounded really with it.

At the moment I am just forgetting things like whom I should phone. Otherwise I think my folic acid is doing a good job!.
Darling K. had a blood sugar level of 26.2 this morning. His Psychiatric nurse came to see him - her usual visit - and when I asked her to take him to the GP said she would not force him to go. It was my job to do that!

I did at least get her to talk to the GP. She has said that she will phone me this afternoon. I hope all is well - though goodness knows what it does to his liver and kidneys to have sugar surges like that.Apart from what it does to his brain. I have got him drinking litres of Evian water at the moment!. Normally the BSL goes up to 20. the problem is that his anti0-biotic reacts with his anti psychotic and the BSL goes sky high.

How are you all. It has been an age since you posted. I even tried to look for you in the Under Guide.

Much affection to you,

Christiane Ar1

From Pumpkins to Mafikeng in 6 posts...

But dragging you back through the thread to bunting - how do you complicate yours Lady C? And then to veggies - I got the second placed mixed veg. display in the auction. And I've found a thing I don't know what is. A tuber, I reckon. Bit like a ginger root but thinner and browner. Anyone know what it is and what to do with it?

And what to do with 2.5 feet of marrow, and two green and one red chile?

Chillies in a home-grown veg exhibit in Shropshire - definitive proof of global warming.

Maybe complicated was the wrong choice of words. The bunting we hang is red, white, and blue and is a series of pleated half circles on rope. Each section is usually three or four feet wide and about 18 inches to two feet in depth. I just looked the term up in Webster's Dictionary and it says that "bunting is a loosely woven fabric used to make flags"...

When you posted, I wasn't even thinking. (I do that often.)
I was thinking of Hyp talking about punting when she was in England and I thought maybe bunting was an activity as well.

Any way, I think a smallest pumpkin award is in order. In my case it would have to be a "no pumpkin" award since I didn't raise any pumpkins this year.

Hey Christiane

You be careful going down that UnderGuide... there's all sorts in there... and some very good stuff coming up... you should keep an eye on the front page for new ones...

Ash - it's 20 miles, one Roman day march, north of Shrewsbury, just inside the Shropshire border with Cheshire and Wales. Luckily there's never been anything in Ash to attract the marauding Welsh here though. They just got as far as Whitchurch (site of our nearest Tesco) and settled for burning that.

So we're on the flatter part of Shropshire. Hawkestone, that you know, is probably the nearest 'hill' - more of an outcrop really - ten miles south.

I hope K's alright now. Bit rough on you for the nurse to leave you to do all the insisting .

I'm fine, Christiane, and family mostly are too - nothing drastic anyway. Good to cross threads again . You seemed to be missing for ages.
Waz

I think you chose the right word - that sounds complicated! Ours are just long strings of little flags.

Punting - never done it. I'm not good in small boats - dropped a picnic basket into the lake getting into one once. Kind of put a damper on things, that did.

Must warn you that in the 'No Pumpkin" category you're in competition with me. And I've got to tell you that my "No Pumpkin" is truly magnificent, having taken half a century in not growing and attained truly awesome non-proportions.

Hey, a bit of Sunday I forgot - the winning pumpkin was won by a small boy at the auction - heard his Dad telling him later 'No, you can't put it back in the ground.'

I'm also in the no pumpkin crowd. Actually the never pumpkin crowd. Perhaps I'll plant some pumpkins one day. Nah.

Hyp! Post 9 - any ideas on the tuber/root things?

I prefer squashes to pumpkins - more variety, better taste.

Pumpkins are really only for Halloween. I can't eat them, that sickly candle waxy smell comes back and, well, it just doesn't smell edible.

Hi Waz. I really don't know what your root would be. A Jerusalem artichoke, maybe? I've never had any, but know it's a root of some sort.

I like pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread, both with lots of spices. But I always use canned pumpkin.

Two different years I've even bought pumpkin seeds to grow some for fall decorations. Btu I didn't plant them either time. Talked myself out of it.

We've raised Jerusalem artichokes. They grow underground on a large sunflower-type plant. They are a smallish potato like tuber. Once you plant them, you can have them forever, if you wish. They are kind of crunchy to the taste and some diabetics eat them instead of potatoes.

Have you tried jicama? We like it in stir fry. It's really crunchy and has better flavor than water chestnuts.

Do they have much flavor or do they just crunch?

Jicama has a lightly sweet flavor. We think they have more flavor than water chestnuts. We've used them in soups too.

I meant the Jerusalem artichokes. Have you grown jicama, too?

We've only eaten Jerusalem artichokes raw and it's been so long since we had them, I don't really remember. They are kind of like a potato in texture, at least raw. Have a bit of an earthy taste as I recall.

We haven't grown Jicama. I don't know if it will grow in this area or not. I buy it at the Oriental market or at Dillon's when they have it.