An uninvited guest . . .

We had an uninvited guest to supper last night. Yes, Nasonovia ribis-nigri (or, Nas, as we like to call him), turned up quite unexpectedly on number 1 son's plate half-way through our meal. The common lettuce aphid he may be but he's not common in our household, believe me.

As I was saying, half-way through our meal number 1 son suddenly commented, 'Hello, that's not supposed to be there!' Cool as a cucumber (whilst we're on a salad theme) - If Nas had made an appearance on my plate it would have been more a case of, 'scream, somebody get that thing off my plate!'

I must admit, I've got very lazy about washing bagged salad, especially as it says it's pre-washed.

It doesn't show very well in the picture but what I was trying to take a picture of was the label saying, 'washed and ready for dressing' I wonder, just what is the well-dressed lettuce aphid wearing this season?

Now we can eat eggs again ...

Don't you just love it when scientists come up with 'new' food stories? The latest one, in the news today, is that we can now eat eggs again.

A team of scientists at the University of Surrey say research shows that limiting egg consumption has little effect on cholesterol levels.

I remember back in December of last year another group of scientists, this time from Oxford University, said that chocolate and wine improve memory.

Well, if eggs are OK and chocolate, then are chocolate eggs good for us too?

Roll on Easter - after the fasting and abstinence of Lent, I'm already looking forward to my chocolate Easter egg and a nice glass of wine. I may even start the day with a boiled egg and soldiers!

Who's for ice cream?

Now, I'm sure you'll agree I just had to take a picture of this delicious-looking (and tasting, by the way) ice cream concoction! This is one of a selection of new treats on offer at our favourite stopping place on our usual little Sunday strolls. Now I expect you can understand how easy it is to persuade other members of the family to accompany me!

How anyone can walk anywhere after demolishing this single-handedly is beyond me but I can assure you for some people this presents absolutely no problem whatsoever.

All change ....

I feel a rant coming on so if you're of a nervous disposition please skip this post and come back when I've calmed down!!

Why oh why do some people think if a thing is working well, let's see if we can 'improve' it???

I know I'm not the only one to dislike the new Facebook profile. We all knew our way around the old style site and it felt like a comfortable old cardigan. It worked. I know we have to give these things time but I just find it intensely irritating.

Same thing with the new site meter. The old one was basic, did all that I needed it to - i.e. counted the number of visitors to my blog. Now I find not only am I having trouble sorting out the migration process to get to the new site; when I finally arrive the statistics are in the least user-friendly format possible. After searching all over the site for the total number of visitors I still haven't found the answer - I can see a pie chart or histogram of which page or how many pages or which countries visitors come from but a simple tally of daily visits - no, that's far too complicated!

Oh well, at least the rest of the day went well. We have a new manager in our local coffee shop near the pond and he has invested in a new ice-cream freezer with lots of yummy flavours. Between us we had strawberry, vanilla, chocolate, mint-chocolate, caramel and coffee liqueur. Are you feeling envious yet?

After a little walk I did another few hours of satisfying digging and weeding in the back garden, making the most of this unexpected spell of dry, mild weather after weeks of rain.