Dishwashers, deer and pickles

Something I discovered today was that the dishwasher was invented by a woman. Josephine Cochran (1839-1913) was her name. She was forgotten until 2006 when she was finally inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in the US. In 2013, she was commemorated in Romania on a stamp – she had no connection with Romania but was used to celebrate World Intellectual Property Day. Josephine was an amazing and determined woman who deserves more recognition.

Back in Trosa, we had a couple of unexpected visitors at the house. They ate a lot of the pears that have started to fall from the pear tree in the front garden. They were very welcome to them as they’ve just been littering the grass. I feel like dad when he had to clear up all the mangoes before mowing the grass at the house in Coronation Avenue.

I have no idea whether deer eat mangoes or not but I’m sure dad would have preferred them to having to collect and dispose of them himself.

I only saw them after Emma went off, alerting me to their presence. She also went off in the early evening when a hare appeared near the tree. Was it eating pears as well? I don’t know but Emma certainly wasn’t impressed.

Actually, Emma was particularly active today. She also carried on when Jason made a couple of appearances ahead of his bedtime. He has a very early start in the morning for his flight to Paris and decided to get to sleep earlier than usual. He also came over for dinner at Chez Gaz – courgetti spaghetti bolognaise.

I have no idea what Jason did in the stuga all day but my day was delightfully spent researching a few dead soldiers, reading about the invention of the dishwasher, taking the girls for a walk around and through the woods and pickling beetroots.

In the box of super fresh veg that we bought from Raija, there were three small beets. I love pickled beetroot so I decided to give it a shot. I was quite happy with the result and, hopefully, they will taste pretty good as well.

Fingers crossed they worked. I’ll find out on Saturday, when we try them.

Oh, and in Mirinda news – she managed to survive the long train journey to Malmö and, in fact, praised the joys of slow travel. She sounded quite happy on the phone as she walked back to her hotel after dinner in the old town. That, in turn, made me very happy.