Sorry for not updating for so long. After the excitement of, you know, getting married and all the rest, posting about commuting to Reading really seemed like too much of a let-down. Not that I can complain about Reading. Reading's great. Going to Reading really makes me appreciate how great the other aspects of my non-Reading life are, in much the same way that hitting yourself repeatedly on the thumb with a hammer feels so great when you stop.
I should disclaim here that this reflects in no way on the hospital or the staff. This reflects solely on the fact that Reading, as a concept, exists. In Lonely Planet, England, the only paragraph describing Reading states, ''An industrial commuter town with little of interest, except a 3-day music festival which occurs on the August bank holiday each year. Expect traffic." And speaking from personal experience, the word "interesting" seems curiously lacking and inappropriate to describe Reading festival.
But there have been other aspects of non-Reading life that have occurred.
We've put an offer in for a house, which is wonderful because it turns out I can no longer house-share. My slovenliness and desire to walk around the house wearing minimal amounts precludes most housemates' comfort and mental stability. Naturally I have reigned in my natural proclivities but I really can't wait until I can leave the washing up in the sink for the next day or leave my shoes in a jumbled pile in the hallway for when I really can't be arsed to pick them up and stow them away in the cupboard upstairs.
We've also made some sloe gin, which is almost as exciting as a house, in a slightly different way. It's part of our slow descent into unbearable middle-classedness.
And this weekend we went to Batsford arboretum, which is part of the grounds of Batsford House, which is, I discovered, associated with the Lords Redesdale - and naturally with part of the lives of the Mitford family, with whom this whole country appears perennially obsessed with.
It is a lovely spot and I do find all the Mitfords and their chequered history very charming, but I also find it completely unbearable that any one family could own such a pile, down with the aristocracy etc.
Anyway we weren't there for politico/social/economical discourse but to hunt for mushrooms.
I've forgotten the name of this one but it wasn't edible. I think it was called a "sulphur cap" (lovely) and it grows at the roots of trees, especially trees that have been "going through a rough patch" (divorce? mid-life crisis?) and are particularly vulnerable. The fun thing about mushroom hunting of course is that once you see one then you start seeing them everywhere.
We were quite excited about the fungi foray because in Eastwoodhill Arboretum we'd seen so many very odd fungi - one that looked like a cage and indeed turned out to be called a cage fungus - surprise surprise - that we thought we'd like to identify some. Though some people turned up with a basket, obviously hoping to cart home some goodies. They were out of luck. On this foray we identified only disgusting mushrooms "technically edible, but really, don't" or deadly poisonous ones. Worryingly, one of the poisonous ones had been classed as edible for many centuries until recently someone found out that a spate of unusual deaths in Eastern Europe was in fact due to ingestion of these little beauties: below -
The brown rolled-cap. Apparently the reason no one discovered they were deadly for so long was because they have a cumulative effect - eating a few won't kill you, even eating quite a lot over many years won't kill you - until one fateful meal and your kidneys have had quite enough and make it clear to you once and for all.
I've never really had the urge to forage for mushrooms but really, that was enough to put me off for life. Even leaving out the dangers of incorrect identification (and there are many tremendously terrifying tales you can read about people dying/poisoning their nearest and dearest/conking out their kidneys with a charming little side dish of mushrooms fried in a little butter), the fact that you could identify a mushroom correctly but STILL DIE because the BOOKS WERE WRONG should surely strike fear into your mushroomy heart.
I remember distinctly once James and Maria brought back the biggest mushroom I'd ever seen - about the size of James' torso - they'd found on a tree, and they spent about a week cooking it, to very little effect. We did all eat some, and no one died, which was a relief. It turned out it was a bracket - a family of fungi growing on trees of which the tastiest is called "chicken of the woods" (bringing back worrying memories of Anchorman 2) and which "Americans would kill for" and the rest vary from "bland" to "wood-like and tough." The specimen PJ and M brought back was definitely of the latter category - apparently boiling for several hours would have been a better option than any of the cooking methods we tried. Still, it was pleasing to know that there aren't any deadly poisonous varieties of that one, and the only damage you're likely to sustain is wear and tear to your molars.
Anyway, Tim and I didn't eat any mushrooms but instead ate a substantial amount of jaffa cakes washed down with tea, which seemed much the safest option in the face of these revelations, and decided we would get all of our mushrooms from the supermarket forever and ever and ever.
xxx
Connie
