I feel good habits are slipping away from me somewhat already. But I ate my prunes for breakfast, and did my exercises. The hip has been very painful, and I couldn’t manage a circuit of the garden with Helen this morning. We sat on a bench for a while. The hip does surprisingly well at exercises such as lifting a knee towards the chest. The only one it doesn’t like is a standing abduction, which means standing there holding on to something and moving the leg out sideways. So that’s probably one I should concentrate on doing.

 

C. and I observed on our circuit of the garden yesterday that it is too late for wild garlic. I think I had one batch, early on. But the last of the British asparagus was still to be found at Waitrose yesterday, so all is not lost. I never suspected, in my American childhood and youth, that asparagus is a delicacy. My father’s mother had a big patch – I remember it in its grown state, a wonderful forest of fronds. My mother’s parents must have had it too, as they had a faithful servant who maintained a magnificent vegetable garden for them. But it arrived at any table I ever sat at as just a droopy, overcooked green vegetable , as far as I can remember. I was sorry to hear about your asparagus beetle, Mary Lou. In Greece I am told they have wild asparagus, sold by enterprising peasants in bunches by the roadside.

 

Knitting proceeds well. I am more than halfway through the first sleeve increases, every 6^th round. Soon there will be too many stitches for my dp’s unless I employ a fifth. I will hobble over to the cupboard tomorrow and see whether I have a short circular of the right gauge. I must often have told you that there was a Christmas long ago for which I knit everybody a hat. And the legacy of that enterprise is a good stock of short circulars.