Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Further woes, and a blue egg.

No no, I shall gripe no more.  I was resolved to make this a simple and joyful post to quash the impression that I am a miserable complainer.

However, I feel that disappointment is in order all the same.  My already quite short and rare trip to England, the principal element of which was to spend a few days with my sister, but which, it was reckoned could just be stretched to incorporate a trip in one direction to spend a day with my youngest brother and sister-in-law, who would give us the benefit of their extensive insiders' knowledge of Cambridge and join us in visiting an exhibition of Persian miniatures at the Fitzwilliam Museum, and another in the other direction to take advantage of my sister's membership of the V&A, finding time perhaps to enjoy a curry luncheon at the illustrious Bloggers' Retreat with the Brothers Hyam (this one and this one), has alas now been  delayed and drastically curtailed to a bare two nights, and neither of the above events will any longer be possible, at least not in the forms originally conceived.

Nothing of any value to say on the vagaries of French strike action or Ryanair's re-booking policies. I must simply grin and bear it, count my blessings in Pollyanna-ish fashion:  I will at least get the two nights chez my sister, I am comfortable at home not sleeping on an airport floor somewhere,  I am not missing a deathbed, a wedding or even a work-commitment, and only spending two nights means I can more or less go in the clothes I stand up in and fill my hand-baggage with treats and comestibles on the return voyage.  And I'm unequivocally insisting on a raincheck for the curry lunch.

~~~

So, in this spirit of only slightly recalcitrant gratitude, here is something I have been keeping in reserve as embodying a spirit of pure delight: a blue egg!  My friend A was minding her neighbour's hens a while back, and gave me some of the surplus production, including one from an Araucana.  I was so impressed with the beauty and novelty of this egg,  I simply cannot understand why poultry geneticists haven't been labouring night and day to breed strains of high-productivity-blue-egg-laying chickens to furnish supermarket shelves and create a market to titillate the jaded imaginations and appetites of the egg-buying public everywhere.   However, a quick dip into the history and background of the breed indicates that, on the contrary, the poultry fanciers have actually diluted and polluted the blue-egg-laying gene in the interests of making fancier-looking chickens, so that the eggs can be all kinds of muddy and unsatisfactory colours.  Ah well, it was altogether a lovely egg, and tasted good too, though in truth no different from the brown or white ones.











9 comments:

Unknown said...

Alas and alack and woe is Plutarch. The raincheck awaits.

the polish chick said...

i love the multi-hued eggs i get from the roadside stands and have come to resent the bland uniformity of all manner of items from the grocery store. hurray for blue eggs! hurray for misshapen but delicious tomatoes! hurray for lumpy artisanal bread!

Kelly said...

Nothing wrong with a good rant, especially when it's related to travel plans not working out as planned. The blue eggshell is pretty neat I haven't ever seen one like that.

Zhoen said...

Shell and cup, luminous. I occasionally get eggs from a work-friend with chickens, and they are slightly green, and quite pretty in their own way.

Roderick Robinson said...

Sorry about the snafu re. the Retreat. To mourn my own absence from this event I wrote a sonnet on absenteeism which I could lend to you if I didn't think you were eloquent enough not to need anyone else's coattails (Phew! Two negatives eventually making a positive.) If it's any consolation you have given me an idea for a post about the difficulties (and terrors) involved in crossing and re-crossing that little stretch of water.

In Tesco you can - or could - buy six eggs all different colours, one of them blue. The price reflects(ed) this rare symbolic gesture towards multiculturalism by an otherwise rapacious and uncaring giant of the retail trade.

Fire Bird said...

sorry to hear of the disruptions, but i have to say i quite admire the french spirit - practically rioting ove raising the retirement age to 62, while over here we just sit on our bums and grumble as it slowly edges towards 70!

WV - badhurro

Crafty Green Poet said...

sorry about your visit plans being spoiled like that.

Lovely blue egg though!

Avus said...

Your first egg image immediately hit me as the female form (Freud would have a field day with me!)

20th Century Woman said...

My ambition for my old, old, old age is to keep chickens that lay eggs of assorted colors. Lovely pictures.