Date: 09 June 2008 23:33:11
At the end of last week after the Great Adventures and Incredibly Sticky Kitchen all on account of making my annual batch of Holunderblütensirup (translation specially for truthsign who asked a few days ago), I thought that chapter of my life had closed for this year.
But since then, the weather has been infinitely better for collecting the flowers (to be done in full sunshine) and I am a little tempted to continue... except I have run out of bottles now.... should I raid everyone's recycling boxes under cover of darkness tonight in the hope that I find the right kind of bottles?
At the weekend, I left the village near the Ancient Roman City to travel by train to another village outside another Ancient Roman City (equally famous but not as well-known for its Roman connections. It's famous for other historical reasons). The journey there was delightful; the fields were lush and green - unsurprisingly after all the rain recently- and there were elderflowers every few yards, smiling in the sunshine.
I visited my old friends S+R. R's friend P was also visiting. I arrived around 4.30 pm and shortly afterwards, we decided to cycle to a nearby pub so off we pedalled down leafy lanes. R called on a friend (who has peacocks in his garden - but he wasn't in) and then decided that we should take in the scenic route which included a river, so we ploughed our way alongside the water through fields of cows, muscling our bikes over fences and stiles until we reached The Trout. After a swift drink there, we returned by a slightly more conventional route stopping off at The White Horse. Much of the route was along an ancient path called The Pilgrim's Way which runs from Winchester to Canterbury passing through some suitably named villages - King's Worthy, (bypassing Abbot's Worthy) and Martyr Worthy. On our return we had a lovely barbecue (my first of the season) in the garden at about 9.30 p.m. (S+R's teenage sons were less than impressed that their parents were late having promised to be back at 7.30!)
The next day, after a leisurely breakfast, S, R, P and I visited a kite festival. The weather was perfect: beautifully sunny with a warm wind. One of the organisers latched on to us to do a bit of PR and explain about the fascination of kites. He launched into an explanation of fighting kites and then elbowed me (rather hard) and asked if I was paying attention. I smiled as sweetly as possible (after nearly being knocked sideways) and told him I was hanging on to his every word (although I was also eyeing up some fine elderflower specimens which were just next to us and not surrounded by nettles...). I'm not sure he believed me - but I was listening as he was explaining a lot of useful background to The Kite Runner. To demonstrate my interest I interrupted him when he got to the part about what the strings were made of - "oh yes," I said, "they're made of string covered in glue and ground glass, aren't they?" I think he was a little surprised but he recovered admirably and continued. It was very interesting. Although I don't know if I could develop my interest levels to match his, though. He seemed to be a bit of a kite festival groupie - going to one every weekend in the summer months. Next weekend's is apparently the best - somewhere in Kent, if you're keen. We returned to base to have a drink in the garden - what else but a refreshing glass of elderflower cordial?
In education news, I've done 50 of the 116 pages.
Edit: PS. Hello to my Malaysian visitor looking for websites on "cordial production"!