Project 365 day 217: Crown Prince

Today I cut up the last Crown Prince squash from last autumn's harvest, and P made it into delicious soup for lunch - after I had played with reflections in the colander and shadow patterns through the holes. The squash was in perfect condition, with pale turquoise green skin and dense golden orange flesh. They are wonderful squashes, beautiful to look at and tasty to eat, and I'm always astonished that they can be stored for so long (though not always quite this long). The variety was recommended by C, my nonagenarian gardening guru and our nearest neighbour, who presented us with an enormous one when P went to introduce himself after picking up the keys to the house, and we have grown them every year since.

J had her PA with her for a few hours today, so I enjoyed breakfast in the sun on the balcony and caught up with some of the neglected jobs. This included researching replacement heads for our five year old Bosch cylinder vacuum cleaner and discovering that a new one would cost over £62, which seems somewhat disproportionate for an appliance which we bought for £99. I always expect appliances to run forever, and am keen to repair rather than replace whenever possible, so I'm now wondering if the supposedly universal vacuum cleaner heads available for around £10 from Amazon would work well enough or if they, like the one we have, will repeatedly drop off the tube. Time will tell.