Native American Proverb

Last week one of the girls at work was commenting that the youngest member of our team will soon be turning 20. Then she went on to remark that she was old enough to be his mother and I was old enough to by his grandmother. I know I have joked in the past that I am old enough to be his mother (which I am) but the figures don’t add up to turn that into grandmother status. The comment about me caused a stunned silence all around the office. I am not sure if the comment was supposed to be humour or if it was just thoughtlessness (again).

This girl has always had a hang up about age and loves to comment on other people’s ages and point out who is ahead of her in years. This year she is having one of those ‘will life change?’ ‘0′ birthdays!

Later in the day she got onto her favourite topic I felt obliged to tell her that she couldn’t possibly do that sort of thing any more. She has been telling us all for years that you shouldn’t after a certain age because that was just disgusting :-O

In the early 1860s, he erected a hothouse alongside the green house in the kitchen garden to provide him with the specialized growing environment he needed for experimentation. The compartments adjoined one another; with interconnecting doors and wooden benches on either side running the length of them. Sloping glass roofs captured the sun’s rays and a boiler system kept the environment warm and well suited to delicate species. Darwin quickly filled his new hothouse laboratory with specimens from his friend Joseph Hooker at Kew, and was soon in the thrall of his new occupation. *

Today the greenhouses are still stocked with the same type of plant specimens that Darwin cultivated for his botanical research.  The species include;  Orchids, Carnivorous plants, Comet orchids, Climbing plants and Common Toadflax.

If you look closely at the first photograph you will see that one of the zombies I mentioned in my post yesterday has strayed from it’s horde. Perhaps it should keep well clear of those carnivorous plants!

*From the English Heritage guide book.

The experience was not as enjoyable as the other places I had been visiting and at first I couldn’t quite put my finger on what the problem was. But then it dawned on me, English Heritage do those audio tour guides rather than having real people in the rooms to talk too. The audio guides are very informative but you can get a bit of information overload.  Worst of all it means there are groups of zombie-like people all standing staring at the same thing for several minutes, it rather detracts from the experience.

You can probably tell from the photos that the sky was rather overcast although the rain did hold back until after we had finished our visit.