Quasi-random photos

I'm not sure exactly what I thought the vine branch above looked like, but it was interesting. A seahorse?

Is this some kind of dandelion flower? Too bad I didn't get a shot of one that was open.

Another interesting vine branch — it looks almost like a narwhal. Or maybe some mythical creature.

White flower buds on hairy stems. Lawn daisies again?

Here's a more standard-looking vine trunk. Every year, a certain percentage of the grapevines die. Workers pull out the dead trunks and stack them up, mostly along the dirt road that runs through the vineyard. One year, I asked the vineyard owner if I could have some to burn in the fireplace or barbecue. He said I could take as many as I wanted, so I drove the little Peugeot out the road and filled up the trunk with them.

Cleaning in the corners

Two months ago we had the tree in the foreground of the photo on the right taken down. It was nearly dead, with needles on just a few of its upper branches. For years, it had been dropping needles on the gravel walkway that surrounds our house, especially in the corner you see here. Those needles turned into a rich compost that weeds took root in. We had a very wet winter that accelerated the process.

The crew that took down the tree left us with a stump, which will eventually rot away. For now, we've set a big plastic planter box on the stump to disguise it, if only superficially. We're likely to be the only people to see it actually, since we are under a confinement order that will probably remain in effect for the rest of 2020. We won't have any vistors, or any house guests. Anyway, that corner of the gravel walkway needed to be dealt with.

So I dealt with it. Among various pieces of what might be considered junk that we found around the yard, in the garage, and in the garden shed when we came to live here in 2003 was the square wire tray or basket that you can see sitting on the low wall that encloses the gravel walkway. I figure it's a soil sifter — that's what I used it for. I raked up as much gravel-filled dirt as I could and then sifted it to collect the gravel.

Once I had a good pile of gravel, and had put the sifted soil down to fill up the depression my digging had created,  I could rake the gravel I collected in the corner back over the soil. It's not perfect, but as wise-cracker might say, "it's better than it is, wasn't it?" Years ago, I had an ongoing battle trying to take control of another corner of the yard.

By the way, there's smaller planter box sitting on the low stone wall that has two or three cactus plants growing in it. CHM will recognize them. Close-up shot below.

New growth

The weather turned chilly again this week, but I don't think the morning temperatures have been low enough to damage the new growth on the grape vines. I took these photos of new growth on the vines last week but have just got around to examining them.

The dry, sunny weather has encouraged me to take my camera with me on walks with Tasha. I've always enjoyed taking close-up (macro) shots with my cameras. The Sony model I'm using is 7 or 8 years old — I bought it used and refurbished.

Yesterday I went to the supermarket to pick up a load of groceries. I don't go inside, but I noticed that there was no line of customers waiting to get into the store. It was only 9:30 when I got there. Some things I had ordered, like a couple of heads of broccoli, weren't available, and there were some substitutions made for other items I wanted. However, I did get a lot of the things I did want, including a couple of steaks for the grill and some pot au feu (stew) meat along with carrots and a head of cabbage, as well has three kinds of cheese.

My second stop was at the pharmacy to get my regular medications. All the clerks were wearing masks, but not wearing gloves. The man who filled my prescriptions picked up my health insurance card with a tissue, being careful not to touch it, and inserted it in the card reader. When he was done, he pushed the reader toward me and asked me to take the card out myself out so that mine was the only hand that came into contact with it. I paid with my bank card using a method that's called a sans contact transaction.

To pay this way, you just have to hold your card close to the bank card reader for it to detect the card's embedded chip. You don't have to enter a PIN (un code secret) or sign anything. The sans contact method works only for small amounts.

My last stop was a the bakery to get some fresh bread. I got several baguettes and other loaves for a total of just over five euros. Again, I paid using the sans contact method. I mentioned to the boulangère how practical the no-touch payment method has turned out to be, given the current medical crisis. She said she thought people were going to be doing sans contact payments a lot more in the future than ever before — before now, many people thought it wasn't secure and insisted on entering their PIN. Sans contact will be part of our new normal. Do they use that payment method in the U.S.?

Pissenlits

Dandelions are called pissenlits in French. That's strange, because the English term dandelion is based on the French phrase dent-de-lion — lion's teeth — which is what their leaves supposedly look like. Pissenlit means "pee in the bed" and the name has to do with the plants' diuretic effects. The name is actually applied to many different plants. There are many species and subspecies of pissenlits. I took these photos a week ago. The slide show runs for less that 1½ minutes.

It's easy to ignore or even disdain the poor pissenlit. It's invasive. It's ordinary. You don't want them to make your lawn unsightly. Around Saint-Aignan, there are pissenlits on the edges of the vineyards and even up and down the rows of vines. They are hosts to beetles and butterflies. All parts of the dandelion plant are edible by humans. The tender young leaves, picked before the flowers appear on the plant, make a good salad. The flower buds can be treated like capers. Dandelion wine is made with the flowers' petals. Dandelion roots can be eaten raw, boiled, or sautéed. The French expression il mange les pissenlits par les racines ("he's eating dandelion roots") describes a man who is dead and buried.