I know I’m slow… maybe it’s because I don’t watch much TV, but at the weekend I discovered that Cadbury are making and selling creme eggs now and colouring them differently, using green… and marketing them as ‘Screme Eggs’ for the Halloween market.
(I really don’t like Halloween anyway: I am appalled by the amount of tat produced and don’t want anything to do with ‘trick or treating’ having seen what it can do to elderly frail nerves.)
Anyway ‘Screme Eggs’….? What? There’s even a Facebook page devoted to it.
All very daft. And clever marketing, maybe. But on Saturday Cycloman bought ‘Hot Cross Buns‘ – another item, supposedly (at one point in history) only available in the pre-Easter period.
Is this trend, to make everything available all year around a good thing, or a bit bonkers?
Personally I like the thought that I have to wait for my treat of asparagus, for example, which is available only for the brief season we have in UK. But asparagus is now available for many months of the year, after being transported around the globe. (I limit myself to buying British, in this case.) Satsumas used to be a Christmas treat… and talking of Christmas, the introduction of Christmas thoughts so early in the year is driving me mad. I had my first Christmas catalogue during the Summer holidays.(Thank you Diabetes UK… that’s three catalogues already this year….)
The ‘c’ word, in this household is banned until after October Half Term.
And the boys went back to school this morning – and there were a few fireworks: verbal ones, may I add. I hate that. Cross words before school.
Sorry I’m in a grump. But it is November tomorrow. It’s raining and dull. The garden is looking drab in this light.
November
by Thomas Hood
No sun–no moon!
No morn–no noon!
No dawn–no dusk–no proper time of day–
No sky–no earthly view–
No distance looking blue–
No road–no street–
No “t’other side the way”–
No end to any Row–
No indications where the Crescents go–
No top to any steeple–
No recognitions of familiar people–
No courtesies for showing ‘em–
No knowing ‘em!
No mail–no post–
No news from any foreign coast–
No park–no ring–no afternoon gentility–
No company–no nobility–
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member–
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
November!
Maybe we should leave Christmas talk until after Bonfire Night?
Boadicea's Chariot 
You’re right, Pseu. I was in a garden centre last week and it was so full of Christmas stuff I began to wonder if I ought to buy Christmas cards. Then I pulled myself together and remembered it was still October.
Yes please!
I went to Oxford Street just before we left the UK at the beginning of August – some of the shops were already selling Christmas decorations!
I received a Christmas card about two weeks ago from my aunt in Australia. She’s usually pretty quick off the mark but I consider October a tad early!
Well at least you all agree so far!
Agh, please do not mention the dreaded “C” Word, Nym, and I refuse to have anything to do with Halloween, or green creme eggs!
I wandered into Tesco in the summer in search of asparagus, and was horrified to discover that there were no seasonal English vegetables available at all. I really don’t count Peru or Kenya as local.
Cripes.
The site header has changed to Bonfire Night!
Fireworks!
Yup! It’s tomorrow here already. 😉
A message: To all our four legged friends, especially hedgehogs, please keep safe.
It’s odd, I haven’t yet heard one firework this year… normally we have them going off intermittently for a week or two before bonfire night. I went to buy some today (for Scout’s party at the end of the week) and the shop assistant said they had hardly sold any.
Oh, isn’t it the fifth of November when we celebrate, Bearsy? Life is moving too quickly. 😦
It is no longer Halloween, Araminta, so the banner had to change. With only four days to go, this seemed appropriate, although Guy Fawkes night is not celebrated in Australia, and private purchase of fireworks is illegal.
While I’m very pleased with my artwork for the banner – a photo I took and ‘played with’ – it does get a bit boring!
I love fireworks!
Ah, well no harm in thinking ahead, Bearsy. I wish private purchase of fireworks were illegal here, actually. My dogs hated all the noise.
I love big firework displays but I’m not a great fan of freezing around bonfires in November.
Whilst I have no objection to Samhain at all celebrated in the correct manner, the travesty it has become is truly appalling. Fat peasant brats menacing householders for various unsavoury chemical treats should be met with water cannon in my opinion.
Fortunately no one bothers us out here, turn off all the outside lights and hope they tear themselves to pieces in the rose bushes. Nothing like a bit of blood flowing!
I think your geriatrics should empty buckets from upstairs rooms shrieking garde loo!
Screme eggs, beyond description! (Too rude to print!!!)
We are lucky here the Christmas crap does not start that early, what with Halloween and then Thanksgiving it doesn’t really take off until the fourth week in November. Not that it matters to me in the slightest.
Only feasting festivities and church allowed. The puds are made and so is the mincemeat. (Suet a special order from the abattoir and they gave it me free!) Just the cake top go.
Sad thing, no fireworks night. Only the bloody 4th July, when they let off mortars, it sounds more like downtown Kabul than WA. Psycho neighbours, we stay home to see the place isn’t set on fire as it nearly was some years ago with dying rockets landing on us. The fireworks are much meaner and bigger here than in the UK.
I guess we all have our crosses to bear!
Pseu declare a non material Christmas and teach them a lesson they will never forget. Strangely the boy declared non material Christmases on me when he was a teenager, about 15, we had an imposed value limit on presents and he gave money to 3rd world water aid. I always gave mine to the dog’s home in preference.
They don’t ask for screme eggs..
thank you Christina!
Not quite sure for what?
But then I was a mean old mummie and took no prisoners! (Still don’t!)
Hallowe’en has almost gone and we’ve had only one “trick or treater” – a small sparkly cat accompanied by her mum. When I think back to the Hallowe’en of my childhood with turnip lanterns and homemade costumes, the obligation to sing or recite a poem or dance to earn one’s treat, the “dooking” for apples and other party games, it seems today’s children are missing a lot.
“Bobbing” in Sussex-speak. But I agree, Sheona, it was much more fun, then.
Nice post Pseu, though the less said about green screme eggs the better.
On the Hallowe’en front. My son’s football team had a party on Saturday and all the guests were to dress up. Poor management on the owner’s part had meant a rival team were also booked for the same venue. Predictably, as the night wore on tensions ran a bit high; you know what young men are like. An incident on the dance floor caused two opposing players to face off, shouting pleasantries at one another. Thankfully it all settled down. My son told me it was really funny as his friend dressed as Buzz Lightyear was arguing with an opponent costumed as Dracula.
As “Buzz” sat down, my son, trying to bring peace in this world, said.
“Calm down, Billy. That wasn’t the evil Emperor Zurg.”
We had a few trick or treaters here – my daughter and grandson were here so we took it in turns to get rid of them otherwise I’d have been seriously annoyed – especially after having an argument in the supermarket yesterday morning with some dippy mother who had left her young daughter to wander aimlessly around with a kiddy-sized (empty) trolley.
Grumpy – me? Yes, when parents expect me to put up with their children’s behaviour… :-)’
We only had a few groups of trick or treaters come round, and they were well behaved and had made an effort. That means we still have a few chocolate footballs and jelly baby skulls to snaffle with the late night cocoa!
BTW , I think the real test of when Christmas has arrived is when the title bar for this blog changes from Boadicea’s Chariot to Boadicea’s Sleigh! 🙂
More likely to become “Boadicea slays”. 😕
The Royalist, so pleased to hear your son has inherited your sense of humour 🙂
We had no callers last night, which is surprising. I had a box of jelly babies ‘just in case’ – now someone else will have to eat them…..