Escaping the alphabet...part one

 

Heading up the motorway for a weekend in Suffolk after a week of giving interviews, we were looking forward to a rest.
"Does that mean we are eating normally now - no alphabet?" asked Alex.
"Yes, I replied. "No alphabet. We will be eating loads of vegetables still but that's it for the alphabet."
"Actually Mum", said Freddie, "This weekend I am not eating ANY vegetables at all. I have talked about them all week and I want a rest." We agreed it could be a vegetable free weekend.
We arrived at our friends' beautiful 15th century home, where they grow soft fruit and have a lovely vegetable garden,which Freddie resolutely avoided. He got his cricket set out and started to play with Chris. A while later the ball fell into a flowerbed. He went to retrieve it,foraging around amongst the stalks of some huge prickly looking flowers. He looked up.
"What are these? They look enormous - like something a dinosaur would eat."
"They are Globe Artichokes," replied our friend Sue.
Freddie looked up at the artichokes who winked back at him.
"Those are the ones we ate with all the butter right at the beginning of the Great Big Veg Challenge," he said.
He went back to the cricket game. But a little while later he came and found us in the kitchen as we were getting the artichokes ready for supper. This was a task that required a strong pair of kitchen scissors and tough skin to withstand the spikes.
"I know I said I didn't want to eat any vegetables this weekend but I would like some of those artichokes, as long as there is loads of butter."
So not only did he eat artichokes with gusto, something even more sinister happened. We found ourselves back at the beginning of the alphabet again. Which is not what I wanted at all. Are there strange vegetable forces at work?