Questions

[owlfish]

• Poppy Day is the only annual day in Britain named after a flower. Why, then, is it not a big day for florists? Why does everyone buy paper poppies?


• I've sent off my registration for Novacon.* The event's only in two weeks, I won't be able to register through the con for hotel space until my registration is processed, and warning signs are everywhere that singles are limited and will probably be sold out by now. I could book a single right away in the correct hotel through its website. Other than it costing more (albeit less than a double), is there any reason not to? Is there some moral factor about making sure the con has enough of its room block sold out to justify receiving free function space from the hotel, and booking via the website would mean my booking isn't helping the con?


• I went to my local post office to mail an envelope today, only to discover they don't do express mail. Regular airmail only. So I went to Canary Wharf, to a full, dedicated post office, and sent it express mail there. Are most UK post offices so limited as to not do express mail? What else is too much to expect of little local postal outlets?

* I've been dilemma'ing between the London Good Food Fair and Novacon. There's still a small chance I may be able to see the food fair as well, but I'm not counting on it. I decided to err on the side of seeing people I'd not seen in a while.

Comments

[gillo]

As lots of other people have said, the poppies are made by disabled ex-servicemen and are to support the British Legion, so florists are not really involved - though they can, I believe, order them to make up more complicated wreaths.

It's not - and I hope never will be - a "fun" thing to wear a poppy - they are worn in commemoration because they grow particularly well in recently churned-up soil, as on the Somme and at Ypres. Isaac Rosenberg and John McCrae both wrote poems in which they figure largely. Here's one by Rosenberg:

In The Trenches


I snatched two poppies
From the parapet’s ledge,
Two bright red poppies
That winked on the ledge.
Behind my ear
I stuck one through,
One blood red poppy
I gave to you.

The sandbags narrowed
And screwed out our jest,
And tore the poppy
You had on your breast ...
Down - a shell - O! Christ,
I am choked ... safe ... dust blind, I
See trench floor poppies
Strewn. Smashed you lie.

Not a fun flower, you see.

We call it "Poppy Day" because we buy the poppies for commemoration, not for the flowers themselves, which are pretty thin on the ground at this time of year anyway. And once you cut them they wilt very quickly.

[a-d-medievalist.livejournal.com]

Speaking of which, even on wreaths (in wreaths? wreathed?), IIRC, the almost-life-sized poppies are not real.

[gillo]

Nope - firstly because the whole point of the poppies is that they are made by disabled ex-servicemen - the Haig Fund was set up specifically to do this. Nowadays other disabled people also work at the Poppy Factory, and the poppy appeal supports the Royal Star and Garter Home amongst others. And secondly because real poppies are not exactly common in November. Poppy wreaths are normally left at memorials for some considerable time, too - real flowers rot, as anyone remembering the ghastly week after The Sainted Diana died will remember with a shudder.

My icon, BTW, is made from a photo I took at Lochnagar Crater on the Somme battlefield just over a week ago. Poppy wreaths aren't just for November!