Barley and Biscuits and Jam

Beautiful Devon today -  at the top of the lane where my lovely family constellation healer lives - a field of barley near Cheriton Bishop.

I know it's barley because

I took this same field when it was green in May,

and I thought it was wheat. But a kind reader - thank you, Sage - told me how to tell the difference - 

"Wheat no whiskers.

Barley has the beard."

At the dentist's this morning I need to explain to Robin what gum recession is. And what flossing is. He's a new dentist who we haven't seen before. He has excellent English but a strong Eastern European accent. He says Robin's teeth are strong but he mustn't brush so vigorously or bite down on hard things. I think about all those Polo Mints that he likes to crunch now. I tell him about sucking them instead but I don't think he'll remember.

We have time before our next appointments so I suggest we go the the Museum and have a cup of tea in the cafe there. I'd have liked to wander the galleries and read about the exhibits but Robin can only do the whistle (not) stop version - including talking to the stuffed animals and telling any seated  museum guide that, "It's not bad....as we say in English."  Then calls himself all sorts of names afterwards and disappears to the loo.

He doesn't want a cup of tea in the cafe and I was going to suggest we go to The Exploding Bakery and have a coffee and one of their divine Chocolate Brownies....but he's much more interested in shopping at the 99p Store across the road. We wander the biscuit aisles and he chooses a large packet of fig rolls to buy. At least he won't break his teeth on them. And at least he saved me from any thought of a melt in the mouth/ to die for Chocolate Brownie which I'm not supposed to eat anyway on my sugar -free diet. Which I'm clearly not that committed to.

Impossible anyway as I'm still drowning in heaps of Victoria plums. I made another batch of jam this evening and hardly made a dent in the mountain.