Vegan Cook-Up....Snowdrops....Brexit - a blizzard of confusion

Yesterday in the narrow alleyway outside 

The Garden Cafe in Frome where we had

a fab vegan mezze lunch.

And the results my cook-up today... which all happen to be vegan... which I'm not because I don't want to give up eggs....and I do eat cheese sometimes.

 Left-over curried mushroom and aubergine soup which a dear friend and I had for lunch in my warm underfoot kitchen( I have a new Ikea rug on my quarry tiles now)  this afternoon accompanied by a vegetable samosa and apple chutney....

the makings of a thick soup...lots of root and green veggies in stock that need eating up after the Christmas excess....

and roasted beetroots - golden yellow as well as red which will keep me going me for several suppers.

New rug...it's called indoor/outdoor ie hard wearing and easy to clean ( even if I drop beetroot on it). 

The glorious sky .....late morning 

before the rain swept in.

And thank you to the lovely B for pointing out that my woodpecker is a female as she doesn't have a red cap on her head like the male.

It was so wonderful to see her again this morning 

swinging confidently, briefly  on the fat ball feeder.

I also spotted a clump of delicate snow drops which have pushed their way up and out into  

the  grassy bank of the stream.

This is what my Almanac  - A Seasonal Guide to 2019 by Lia Leendertz  - says about snow drops....

Latin Name - Galanthus nivalis.

Galathus from the Greek - gala meaning milk and anthos meaning flower, and Nivalis from the Latin meaning snowy or snow-covered or snow like.

But I like their common names...Mary's tapers, dingle -dangle or Candlemas bell. And my favourite - in France they are called perce-neige which means snow- piercer.

"They are symbols of purity, optimism and hope....and they will collapse if frozen but they quickly perk up again when temperatures rise, so don't worry: their leaves contain a sort of' anti-freeze' that prevents the cells being damaged by frost."

No snow today, just rain ...drenching the only primrose I've found in the garden so far,

 also nestled in the grass bank of the stream.

The sky this evening... as I was leaning out of the landing window as far as I could to take the photo, my neighbour's visitor was doing the same in her driveway and we both agreed how beautiful it was.

 Tonight the rain is a constant drumming on the garden.....the sky letting go of all that Brexit tension ....still at a weeping loss of what next.....the blizzard of confusion still not pierced through.