These grapes are sweet ones

So Lord Pudding of Pudding Towers, Sheffield, Yorkshire, United Kingdom, finally met Katherine de Chevalle of Bay of Plenty, New Zealand, in the flesh. Face to face. They sat down over roast kiwi (I don’t think so) and green tomato chutney, some of which he left on her tablecloth.

Other than that one unfortunate detail, the encounter was reported by both parties to have been a smashing success. He likened the meeting to Dr. David Livingstone meeting Henry Stanley, or Paul McCartney meeting John Lennon. She called it a pleasant lunch and a super couple of hours and allowed as how she was quite sorry to see them (Lord and Lady P.) go.

I am not jealous. I am not jealous. I am not jealous.

What helps make my jealousy easier to bear is the fact that Mrs. RWP and I are the recipients of a lovely painting of grapes by the aforementioned Ms. de Chevalle, who was kind enough to award them to me at the end of a competition on her blog celebrating her having had 20,000 visitors.

One minute they were in New Zealand and the next minute (actual elapsed time courtesy of the postal service: about three weeks) they were in my house. We had them framed:

...and they now share a breakfast room corner with this ceramic plaque...

...which Mrs. RWP won as an infant when her great-uncle entered her name in a church raffle as Baby [Surname] before he even knew what name she had been given.

Our breakfast room corner...

...will soon gain another resident, a counted cross-stitch of a basket of fruit that Mrs. RWP completed in 2008 but which we also only recently had framed:

...and now you know the rest of the story.

I want to mark this auspicious occasion by wishing General Robert E. Lee of Virginia a very happy 205th birthday today.