Brrrrr!

Ranunculus and sleeping Thomas

Cold weather the last three days; nice and bright, sun-wise, but a freezing easterly wind makes staying inside in the conservatory much more pleasant than going out. I have managed to do quite a bit of gardening though, around the back of the house where it's sheltered from the wind. Thomas has stayed inside too, he dislikes a cold wind as much as I do.
  Not much going on. Reading a biography of the last empress of China, "Empress Dowager CiXi" by Jung Chang (who wrote "Wild swans"). I haven't got far into it yet, but it seems readable so far. I've just read about the Opium Wars and Britain's despicable treatment of Chinese sovereignty. The Brits needed a market for their Indian opium so they sent it illicitly to China to get the populace addicted. When the Chinese authorities objected, and had a huge opium shipment dumped at sea, the Brits started an all-out war, which they won. They then forced the Chinese to pay huge war reparations to cover the cost of their own defeat, and to re-imburse the opium merchants. And of course, continued to supply opium to the increasingly addicted Chinese, who then became reviled by the Western world for their "filthy" opium addiction. Politicians, eh? 
    Work tomorrow. I'd rather bang my head repeatedly against a nearby wall than do a Sunday school-holiday shift, but there it is. If I enjoyed it, it wouldn't be work, I suppose.