A View From (The Shed Just By) The Greenhouse; Murder Most Foul

Hello faithful reader! It’s that time of year again, when the whole community reaches a fever pitch of anticipation at the impending village show. Consequently, I’ve selected the onions, grown outside for the first time, from which I’ll choose three to represent me in (surprisingly) the “three red onions” class. I have something of a reputation to live up to, having taken first prize for the last several years but I’m a little trepidatious. All the rain seems to have arrested bulb growth and many of the plants themselves have gone to seed, leading to thickened stems, which won’t lend themselves easily to being “show” tied. I suppose everyone else will be in the same boat, we’ll know soon enough. For the absence of doubt, the Roundup is empty, I haven’t used anything of the kind for a good while now, I just haven’t got around to throwing it away.

Sticking with the show theme; Here we have my one and only runner bean. The plants (again outside for the first time) have been in the ground since the middle of April (or thereabouts) and they’ve struggled with the lack of sunshine and the copious rainfall. As with other things I was about to give up and possibly start again when a week of more balmy weather saw the plants put on a growth spurt and begin to flower. At the time of typing this missive I have six days to come up with enough pods to give me a viable entry into the “six pods of runner beans” class. My fingers remain resolutely crossed.

There are three “trusses” in the picture, although it may look like one, but the central one of the three is over two feet (60 centimeters for those born after 1960 or so) long. I’ve never measure a truss before, but it’s taken longer for this one to reach its full potential than that other famous Truss (Liz) spent in office. We can argue the merits (or otherwise) of the “she crashed the economy” trope on another day. But if the Tory party grandees hadn’t folded to EU/Globalist pressure and installed Sunak in what was, to all intents and purposes a coup, I doubt Labour would have an overall majority at all. Idiots!

At the request of “she who must be obeyed” I started off a couple of sprouts. They germinated well if slowly and within a week or so looked to be on the way to producing home grown brussels for the Christmas table, without the need for freezing. I’m usually inundated with cabbage whites from June onwards and I’ve spent far more time than any adult should, chasing them around the greenhouse with a cane, or trying to blast them out of the air with the hose gun set to jet, but this year I’d hardly seen a single one, even outside where there’s both broccoli and kohlrabi growing. Of course, the sun came out, the sprouts “sprouted” and the pests appeared. I got three yesterday, but not before they’d had a little feed. Triple net protection and more crossed fingers are the order of the day. Whether the plants will recover or not is now in the lap of the Gods.

I’ve got three pepper plants (out of six) now bearing decent sized fruit, which should, given time, ripen to a mix of red and yellow sweet peppers. I’ve removed the leaves below the lowest fruit on each plant to allow for air to circulate & easier access for water. Very optimistic for this particular crop.

Another crop I’d just about given up on, which has now decided to come to life, is this collection of five Habanero plants, which have just started to come into flower, better late than never. I’m pleased that, in my frustration, I didn’t dig them out a couple of weeks ago, as I almost did. The resulting fruits, should I get some, will hopefully add some piquancy to the chilli jam.

Pretty happy with the “finger” aubergines, which have responded well to the short spell of “summer” we’ve recently experienced, up here in the far northern hinterlands. Lots of colourful blossom, hopefully soon to transform into fruits for Baba Ganoush and Brinjal pickle. I’ve never really been able to get on with the big purple ones, I find them a bit slimy. I’ve only ever tried moussaka the once, that was plenty, thank you very much.

The first pan of soup of 2024, chard stalks, onion, courgette (sadly bought in), a couple of spuds to aid thickening and a couple of pounds of ripe tomatoes, seasoned with salt, pepper, a good pinch of smoked paprika and a teaspoon of sugar to balance the acidity. Expect more of this, as the many tomatoes continue to ripen. They’re like London buses, you wait ages for one, then about a hundred come along, all at the same time.

I briefly mentioned the saga of the peas last week. As my reader may remember, I used to grow a short pod variety inside the greenhouse, but they were short lived and didn’t ever survive much past the first couple of really hot days, even when shaded with fleeces. It’s early days, but my earlier misgivings seem to be without foundation. The plants are both prolific and mostly healthy looking and the pods are considerably longer than last years. All we’re waiting for is half a dozen to fatten out, ready for entry into the “six pods of peas” class.

Homicide is (thankfully) still quite a rare occurrence in England, although not as rare as it once was, or it should be. There were 583 murders prosecuted in 2023, 90 less than the previous year. The annual rate of murder, per million of population is just below ten percent. On the 29th of July this year 13 people, including 11 young children, were viciously attacked by a knife wielding maniac, leaving 3 of the children (6,7 and 9 years old) dead. The nation was told, almost immediately, that the attack wasn’t “terror related” and that people shouldn’t indulge in speculation, for fear of “inflaming” a situation that didn’t really need inflaming. A 17 year old man, since named as Axel Muganwa Rudakubana (who may yet get to play the “mental health incident” card)  has been charged with murder and attempted murder over what our government risibly refers to, as an “incident”. Although not always the case, unlawful killings in the UK are mostly the result of one of a small number of easily defined occurrences. Terrorism (predominantly Islamic and always ideologically driven), crimes of passion, gangland slayings/turf wars, domestic violence (as dreadful as that always is) and occasionally, but rarely, killings done in the commission of a crime to effect an escape from arrest. Occasionally murders take place which are deemed to be at the hands of someone suffering a “mental health” episode. This reason/excuse is often controversial, though not always false and has, on occasion (according to both opinion and speculation) been trotted out to divert the public from learning the whole truth surrounding said killing(s).

I don’t know all the facts about what happened in Southport, few people outside of the closed circle of the “authorities” will, and I don’t want to jump to rash conclusions but I’d contend that, given both the targets of this particularly brutal and heinous crime and the planning involved, we aren’t looking at a momentary mental aberration. Nor are we, unless I miss my guess, looking at a crime of passion, or even a grudge killing of some kind. What we have here, in my opinion, is an ideologically driven attack, carried out by a young man who may well have been “radicalised” by bad actors, intent on either striking a revenge blow for happenings in other parts of the world, stirring up civil unrest at home, or both. We certainly have civil unrest, in spades. I hope the whole truth will out, the parents of the murdered children deserve nothing less and my heart goes out to them, as it does to all the victims, but if this young man was on a “watch list” of any kind, heads should roll (although I doubt they will). Some say that capital punishment is uncivilised, barbaric and unjust. I don’t agree and believe it to be the very opposite, but that’s another argument. Murder’s murder and I firmly believe that murderers, who carry out such crimes with malice aforethought or in the commission of other crimes, should pay the ultimate price for their barbarity and disregard for human life, especially the taking of lives not yet really begun.
 

© Colin Cross 2024