I've come down with the flu and so we have been holed up at home all week, missing the Christmas lunch at Pilar's house and the big Feast of San Stefano today at the pub. But our time has been enlivened by the wisteria seed pods that I picked a couple of weeks ago and brought inside so that we can take them with us when/if we move and plant wisteria at the new house if it doesn't already grow there. I did not know before this that wisteria seed pods are explosive and can burst open with a loud bang and such force that they shoot the seeds themselves across the room like bullets. One of them two days ago actually managed to shatter a ceramic cup. I had no idea about this. But after having to duck screaming behind the couch cushions in terror, I do now.