Good morning Dear Readers and here in deepest Knightsbridge it IS a good morning. For old Mr Sun is out and about, the air is fresh and we have enjoyed a tall mug of our most favourite tea.
Lapsang Souchong is the 'amber nectar' that we drink first thing in the morning and always out of a blue and white mug. Food and tea are strange, are they not? Well, I think they are. You see I won't eat very hot food but I won't drink cold or even luke warm tea. No, it has to be hot.
Ah, the taste of hot Lappy-Sang slurping down my throat reinforces the fact that all is well in my life.
But what has tea got to do with tomatoes I can hear you wondering.. well, in the immortal words of Paul Daniels.. not a lot! But I am in the present and the last tomato is now sadly in the past.
It was Hurricane Gonzalez who brought about the demise of our Plum tomato plant. You see she grows the tomatoes at home, that way she can water and feed them every day if they need it and this year the yield from just five plants has been astonishing! She had already taken down the other four plants who had given up and were just producing growth but no more flowers or fruit.
Because we are in the centre of town miles away from other tomato or potato plants we never suffer from the dreaded blight and so our pretty Plum tomato was still growing and producing fruit.
But then that hurricane blew into town and with it, of course, just baths loads of water. That was it.
With great sadness she saw the dark marks on the stems and blotchy leaves, it was time to cut off the remaining fruit and take down the plant but mid October was pretty good for a tomato plant still to be fruiting, was it not?
That evil hurricane killed three people in the UK. One was Teresita who was one of her customers from the shop. Poor Teresita.. the tree had already been damaged but it had not been cordoned off and the next big wind caused it to fall and it hit her.
Poor family.. she was much beloved in the neighbourhood.
Vayo con Dios Teresita.
Back to Marylebone this morning, no, not in search of yumyum but she has to go to Ainsworths, the Homeopathic Pharmacy on New Cavendish Street. She needs Paramedic Rescue Rememdy and a bottle of Mimulus to give to dearest Leigh.
In order to get it to her quickly, she will jump on a District Line train to Kew to give them to her before heading back to join the team from the shop for a celebratory supper. (Their second!!)
Yes, they have come out tops again for enrolling Gift Aid supporters. Gift Aid allows a Charity to collect an extra 25% from the Government on items that have been donated by UK Tax Payers. The customers sign a form stating they are UK residents and tax payers and the shop gives them a small plastic fob and records their postal code.
Each time they donate something to the shop and show their fob or give their postal code to identify themselves, a special label is produced and attached to the item, this is then zapped by the bar code reader when it is sold. The customer does not have to show bank statements, the taxman does not breath down their neck, it is a way of increasing the donation from the Government.
So tonight, there will be much merriment when she recounts the story of being contacted by Penelope (?) asking her if she would like to do voluntary work for the charity.. for whom she has been working for five years.
And now, Dear Readers, we are off.. places to go, things to eat. Yes, for it is time to flapflap to the YumYum HQ for a late fast-breaking meal.. soft boiled egg and goaty curd is what I fancy with rye bread and sunflower seeds. I trust you eat a good breakfast every morning?
GeeGee Parrot.
October 27th, 2014.
Lapsang Souchong is the 'amber nectar' that we drink first thing in the morning and always out of a blue and white mug. Food and tea are strange, are they not? Well, I think they are. You see I won't eat very hot food but I won't drink cold or even luke warm tea. No, it has to be hot.
Ah, the taste of hot Lappy-Sang slurping down my throat reinforces the fact that all is well in my life.
But what has tea got to do with tomatoes I can hear you wondering.. well, in the immortal words of Paul Daniels.. not a lot! But I am in the present and the last tomato is now sadly in the past.
It was Hurricane Gonzalez who brought about the demise of our Plum tomato plant. You see she grows the tomatoes at home, that way she can water and feed them every day if they need it and this year the yield from just five plants has been astonishing! She had already taken down the other four plants who had given up and were just producing growth but no more flowers or fruit.
Because we are in the centre of town miles away from other tomato or potato plants we never suffer from the dreaded blight and so our pretty Plum tomato was still growing and producing fruit.
But then that hurricane blew into town and with it, of course, just baths loads of water. That was it.
With great sadness she saw the dark marks on the stems and blotchy leaves, it was time to cut off the remaining fruit and take down the plant but mid October was pretty good for a tomato plant still to be fruiting, was it not?
That evil hurricane killed three people in the UK. One was Teresita who was one of her customers from the shop. Poor Teresita.. the tree had already been damaged but it had not been cordoned off and the next big wind caused it to fall and it hit her.
Poor family.. she was much beloved in the neighbourhood.
Vayo con Dios Teresita.
Back to Marylebone this morning, no, not in search of yumyum but she has to go to Ainsworths, the Homeopathic Pharmacy on New Cavendish Street. She needs Paramedic Rescue Rememdy and a bottle of Mimulus to give to dearest Leigh.
In order to get it to her quickly, she will jump on a District Line train to Kew to give them to her before heading back to join the team from the shop for a celebratory supper. (Their second!!)
Yes, they have come out tops again for enrolling Gift Aid supporters. Gift Aid allows a Charity to collect an extra 25% from the Government on items that have been donated by UK Tax Payers. The customers sign a form stating they are UK residents and tax payers and the shop gives them a small plastic fob and records their postal code.
Each time they donate something to the shop and show their fob or give their postal code to identify themselves, a special label is produced and attached to the item, this is then zapped by the bar code reader when it is sold. The customer does not have to show bank statements, the taxman does not breath down their neck, it is a way of increasing the donation from the Government.
So tonight, there will be much merriment when she recounts the story of being contacted by Penelope (?) asking her if she would like to do voluntary work for the charity.. for whom she has been working for five years.
And now, Dear Readers, we are off.. places to go, things to eat. Yes, for it is time to flapflap to the YumYum HQ for a late fast-breaking meal.. soft boiled egg and goaty curd is what I fancy with rye bread and sunflower seeds. I trust you eat a good breakfast every morning?
GeeGee Parrot.
October 27th, 2014.
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