I'm much better, and my husband somewhat so, but we're not going to attempt Mass this morning.

I'd better start with knitting as there's not going to be much of it here. I have just heard the radio say that Prince William was presented with a shawl yesterday “knitted by a woman in New Zealand”. That's got to be Margaret Stove, who of course designed and knitted one for him when he came to New Zealand aged nine months. I'll have to do some serious googling if the newspapers don't oblige.

Well, we had a grand week in Strathardle, in fine weather with many daffodils. My husband had a low blood sugar crisis on Tuesday as a result of going down the commonty to see our specimen trees, and in particular the Scots pine planted for his sister who died in 2011. It's doing splendidly, and he had never seen it.

It was getting back to the house that proved difficult. We managed that, just, but by then my husband was semi-conscious. We called in the Scottish Ambulance Service, who were brilliant.

I don't think there can be any question, in future, that we need someone else to be there with us. I couldn't have managed that alone. He'd still be down the commonty. This time the "someone else" was our niece, the daughter of the sister for whom the Scots pine was planted. She was brilliant throughout, and it was a good week.

We've engaged a man to look after the garden. Much of my dear vegetable plot has perished of neglect or marauders. He is going to put in a couple of rows of potatoes. Rhubarb is still there, and garlic both cultivated and wild, Welsh onions much eaten by deer but still hanging in there, Babington leeks I think – and Good King Henry.

Some may remember my history with this vegetable. I first heard of it in Dr Hessayon's “Be Your Own Vegetable and Herb Expert”, but the story is the same everywhere – a thoroughly satisfactory spinach substitute, grown for centuries in cottage gardens. Indeed, it has every virtue except one. It's perennial; very hardy; unliked by sheep, deer, and rabbits; doesn't creep underground like mint or seed itself all over the place like everybody else. (It's deep-rooted: stock can be increased by carefully digging up an established plant in the spring and cutting it into two or three with a sharp knife.)

The only trouble is, it tastes terrible.

After tenderly weeding my own little stock, I googled it yet again – and this time, I hit pay dirt: an article in the Guardian by a woman who has actually tasted the stuff and found it bitter. She says that the secret is to soak the leaves in salt water for half an hour before cooking-as-spinach. She also recommends it (presumably unsoaked?) in a salsa verde. I keenly look forward to trying both ideas.

And then it occurred to me, rather belatedly, that this is a classic instance of a common happening: someone authoritative asserts something, everybody else copies without question. The Royal Horticultural Society says it, so it must be true. (I'm guessing – I have no idea about the sequence of publication.) Cue Hessayon, Wikipedia, “Perennial Vegetables”.

As for knitting, I did little, although I have at least established the ribbing for the second sock. Back here, I am engaged on round 33 (of 136) of the borders of the Unst Bridal Shawl and will have more to say about that tomorrow, along with some pictures of daffodils, perhaps.