The British Motor Corporation "Mini-1000"

I have never been a car buff. Oh, I have admired the styling of some of them over the years and wished very much that I could afford those I liked the best, but that's about as far as it goes. I hate having to try to work on cars. I think that knowing a mechanic you can trust is one of the minor joys of life. 

So here too, every now and then I see a car that catches my eye. I showed you a photo of a Lamborghini not long ago and I recently spotted the Jaguar X16 that graces the header. Those two shout 'Money'. They're the machine equivalents of football or rock stars. 

My post today is about running across a different sort of car. This little car quietly mumurs 'Economy.' If the Mini-1000 was parked next to either of those showy 'star cars' I just mentioned, it might look rather silly to most people, but I have learned that this little car has had an impact on the automotive industry that you might not realize and that was greater than either of those two sports cars. 

It was made from 1959 to 2000. It's innovative transverse engine and front wheel drive influenced car designers everywhere. 

Let's look at some photos.

Definitely diminutive. It's got a 9 gallon gas tank.

A no nonsense look about it. I'm glad they gave it a classy looking hood ornament. Looks sort of Art Deco to me, but what do I know? Top speed of about 82 mph.

Mini-1000 fits it, don't you think? One source said it gets 60 miles to the gallon of petrol. I'd have guessed even higher. 

Looks real cozy in there. The leader of the 1959 design team, Leonard Lord, supposedly told his staff that the car they would build had to fit inside a wooden box, 10 feet by 4 feet by 4 feet.

Room for four, really good friends. 

I'll bet it's a snap to park.

Varrooomm, varrooom... It's ready to go...
It can do 0 to 60 mph in just 22.7 seconds! That's probably assuming a 100 lb. driver, and a tail wind, and a down hill grade. 

Okay, okay, I'm not really making fun of this car. Good things come in small packages is an old saying that apparently holds true here. This little unassuming car in 1999 was voted by the Global Automotive Elections Foundation, as the 2nd Most Influencial Car of the Century, behind the Model T and ahead of the Volkswagon Beetle. I'd say that means that this little car could and should hold it's head (or hood) up at any car show anywhere.  

In the human world. the large, the powerful, the affluent, and the good looking get most of the attention. The small, the humble, modest, and discrete often don't get the credit they deserve. 

Well, to those who have eyes to see, (and read), know that this humble little machine that you've been looking (and maybe smirking) at is not the least, but rather, one of the first. 'Good on ya, Mini-1000.'         -djf

Suburban foraging

Long, long ago, in a country far, far away, a young couple went on a foraging date one afternoon in the rain. They returned soggy but happy that they had 'harvested' a large supply of Labrador Tea. This pair had also harvested at various other times, clams, crayfish, and wintergreen berries from the area surrounding Marquette, Michigan.

Years later, they would add, among others, wild mushrooms, thistle stalks, young milkweed pods and maple sap to the list.  

Today, this couple and their daughter and grandsons continue with this tradition of living off the land, at least to some degree. 

This post will show you some of the riches that are there to be gathered, even in our suburban environs, here in NZ.

A George Ward Park wind row of 'hay.'

Here, the hay that Jeanne and Allie 'made' completes it's drying. It will be used for bedding, and for nibbling on, by the 5 guinea girls.

And here it is, in the barn, ready when needed during the winter. 

There's a pear tree over beyond the playground.

This is the only pear tree I know of in a public place and the pears are just beginning to ripen. 

These beauties were transformed into pear/rhubarb crumble. 

In the fore-ground is an apple tree whose branches are bending under it's load of not yet fully ripe fruit. In the back-ground is a bosk pear tree.  I noticed that the owners of the house didn't seem to be picking any of the fruit that had already fallen to the gound (or cut the grass either).
So, yesterday I went over to their house armed with a couple of denominations of paper money and a plastic bag. I introduced myself and asked if I could buy some pears. The very nice lady of the house told me to take whatever I wanted and went on to say that I could have some apples as well when they ripened up. My kind of people!

This is not my fig tree. But it Is the fig tree in Andy's yard that provided the branch that has now become my fig tree. As you see, a few branches on this tree hang over the fence into the side walk, making the figs that grow there fair game to pedestrians. The figs disappear as soon as they are even close to being ripe and since this tree is just over a kilometer from our house, I rarely get more than one or two per season. Hopefully next year I'll have my own supply in our back yard. 

Here is one of three olive trees that hang into other pedestrian lanes as well. I have never seen anyone else picking the olives from the trees, nor the ones that fall to the ground. I noticed that the best of  the trees has recently been pruned, so my supply this year has been 'negatively affected'. 

An English white oak, Quercus robur.  

There are no squirrels in New Zealand. Look at the bounty that would be available to them. 

There are hundreds of them, just begging to be collected.

So we did. 

Just look at these beauties.
I had always read that acorns are edible and given the size and availability of these, I could not resist the temptation to try them. To make them palatable, the tannins contained in them must be removed by soaking in many changes of water or by boiling in several stages. So far, and I write this a couple of weeks after I took this picture, the acorns have remained pretty tanic. The jury is still out on this. I'll report back.             -djf

Jeanne and I just got home from the first assembly of the new school year. This is a video they played for the kids. I thought you might like it. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh4dTLJ9q9o

Star gazing

Today's adventure is actually an evening adventure. Allie took us to Auckland's Stardome Observatory and Planetarium. It's located in Cornwall Park, adjacent to One Tree Hill Domain.

We arrived a little early to allow the boys to have a run in the park and some hands-on fun before we went inside to exercise our minds and imaginations. 

A couple of spiders on their web. The shadows are getting long.

Amiri says, "Hey Arram, come over, hop on and balance this thing out!"

We are in line. To the left you'll notice two girls on a platform in front of a control panel. Amiri and Arram spent quite some time there too. You can select a planet or a moon or several stars and the screen will show you how much, or little, you would weigh if you were standing on your choice. 

These seats don't recline. They are permanently set at the proper viewing angle.  I would have found it easy to nod off if the program hadn't started. 
We learned, among other things, that Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Venus and Mercury are lined up across the sky and will be visible before morning through February. 
The presenter also showed several well known constellations and explained that they were named by the Greeks. To us, in the southern hemisphere, these constellations appear upside down. He pointed out that compared to the Greeks, we're all standing on our heads.  

After the show, we all went outside to where the staff had set up three large telescopes. We all had a look at a Very bright full moon. 

The Begonia House

I know that I showed you this shot of the rose garden in the hills above Wellington in a recent post.  I'm showing it again because this time, I can point out the Begonia House that lies on the right side of this picture. The flowers that make up this post were found in the right wing of the House, as you face it from the center of the garden. 

I guess some of them are orchids. I show them today as a mid-winter morale booster for anyone battling white-out fatigue. ( and -10 temperatures)

As you look at them, imagine 90 degrees and 99% humidity. Imagine the air you inhale feeling thick as it flows down into your lungs. 

The day we were here, I didn't really want to linger in the tropics so I didn't stay long among the blooms. I snapped and ran, but I thought of you looking at them as I did. You can take more time than I to appreciate the patterns and colors. Enjoy.     -djf

A 'taste of summer.'

I was talking with our friend Dan once and made the comment that to me, the taste of summer was raspberries. I was remembering eating them right out of the patch at my friend Bill's house and getting yelled at by his mom when she discovered her year's supply of jam disappearing before her eyes. 

Dan replied that his taste of summer was passion fruit. 

This conversation took place probably two years ago and at the time, passion fruit was something we knew almost nothing about. 

Now, we have our very own vine, compliments of Jeanne's foresight (and green thumb) and they are starting to ripen. Our vine probably has about 45 fruits on it and I think they will disappear all too quickly. 

Dan tells me that a vine will bear for about three years and then die off. Jeanne has another vine already started so we should be in good shape for some years to come. 

Here are some photos of this unique fruit. 

When they start to turn purple start watching. They'll drop when they are ripe.

The wrinkled one is fully ripe and as sweet as they get, which is not too sweet. They remain fairly tart. 

We had a torrential downpour the other day and one of the more exposed fruits, the green one here, was knocked off by the wind before it was ready. I wondered if it would turn purple but see, it is wrinkling without changing color. Now we'll have to taste test it to see how it compares to the purple one. I love scientific research!

 Do you notice the lines on a couple of them? If you lightly scratch them when they are green, the mature fruit will have the lines on them. Smiley faces and so on. The skins are quite leathery and dry feeling. They do smell slightly of the fruit inside.

Here are the two wrinkled ones. Note that I must have cut the purple one first since there are traces of purple showing on one side of the green one. The purple was definetely sweeter than the green. The purple one was slightly tougher than the green to cut through.  

When I heft one in my hand, it never seems as heavy as it ought to be. I think that is because the seeds inside are very thin shelled and light. There also seems to be an air space inside the seed chamber. Finally, that white part seems to be spongy.

I bit into one right off the vine yesterday, just to see how hard it is to bite through them. The answer is not hard at all.
I also love how colorful they are. 

It is a somewhat odd consistancy. The black seeds are crunchy and easily eaten. Passion fruit without the seeds just wouldn't be the same.

There is not much in each little egg shaped fruit really. I wish we had many vines.

Here is Jeanne's breakfast the other day. Pancakes with whipped cream, apricots and a dollop of passion fruit. Very exotic to us Yooopers. 

Here is a description I found.

Fruit: The nearly round or ovoid fruit, 1-1/2 to 3 inches wide, has a tough rind that is smooth and waxy and ranging in hue from dark purple with faint, fine white specks, to light yellow or pumpkin-color. Within is a cavity more or less filled with an aromatic mass of double walled, membranous sacs containing orange-colored, pulpy juice and as many as 250 small, hard, dark brown or black, pitted seeds. The unique flavor is appealing, musky, guava-like and sweet/tart to tart. The yellow form has generally larger fruit than the purple, but the pulp of the purple is less acid, richer in aroma and flavor, and has a higher proportion of juice (35-38%).

The bottom line is that passion fruit, while cool and exotic, will never replace raspberries as my taste of summer. Next in line for me after raspberries after all, are chokecherries. -djf