A Wet Fryday

I was of the view until recently that Hamilton had only one quality which was that God, in a fit of adversity and perversity, created Hamilton to make Auckland look good. Then along came Dick Hubbard, and Hamilton failed even in that endeavour.

That then presented me with the challenge of finding something else totally useless. I excluded politicians and pukekos because, whilst both are blights on the landscape and seem to have little useful function, they are both testimony to God’s frailties and humility—He knows He made a mistake in creating politicians and pukekos but is prepared for them to remain as shrines to imperfection. As is Brian Tamaki, except that Tamaki has nothing to do with God, of He him.

So then we have moss.

What on earth, and particularly on a wet step, is the use of a moss, except to make money for Rod Genden and Wet & Forget? Mosses are, Wikipedia tells me, small soft plants that are typically 1–10 cm tall, though some species are much larger. They commonly grow close together in clumps or mats in damp or shady locations. They do not have flowers or seeds, and their simple leaves cover the thin wiry stems. At certain times mosses produce spore capsules which may appear as beak-like capsules borne aloft on thin stalks.

Sounds like The Green Party to me.

But having just slipped on my step and come close on several other occasions during the recent rains I cannot think of any reason for moss’s existence (Mr Genden apart) and I shall not trouble myself to find one. Moss exists; it is enough.

On a slightly happier subject, I am enjoying a new and previously unknown malt scotch from my beloved Islay. It is called Smokehead and is described such: "It’s like a cannonball - an explosive rollercoaster of peat, smoke and spice with some delicate sweetness. The single malt flavour is described as fresh, fruity and immense, with notes of sherry, iodine, toffee, smoke and sea salt. The taste hits the palate at once with cocoa, peat and some honey sweetness, before exploding with peppery spice and more earthy peat."

Peat is, as many of you know, a rudiment of good malts and particularly so of those of Islay. The major component of peat, which is "mined" for use as a fuel and as a horticultural soil additive, as well as in the production of Scotch whisky, is decaying moss of the genus Sphagnum.

I did not know that.

Oh well, it seems Hamilton in the totally useless stakes, as in much else, continues to stand alone.

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