Marmalade-makers like me worry that their access to Seville oranges in shops in January may be interrupted in the event of a no-deal Brexit. As I understand it, some of the oranges are harvested in November and then sit in warehouses. Why can’t they be made available in December, especially this year, when many marmalade-makers might appreciate the comforting diversion? Perhaps the Brexit mandarins could help?
Robert Veale
Weymouth, Dorset
• To maintain sanity in the current chaos (Letters, 14 December), try party games. Cut out a Ben Jennings cartoon of Boris Johnson, stick it on to a large piece of card, write the word “LIES” on another piece of card and push a drawing pin through it. Blindfold the player and the winner is the one who sticks the “LIES” card squarely over Johnson’s mouth. A variation is to use pictures of Michael Gove and a Scotch egg.
Val Harrison
Birmingham, West Midlands
• My wife easily won our daily race on 10 December by completing her in-paper grid for Picaroon’s crossword, while my iPad Guardian stubbornly resisted until I pressed “reveal” to find that the electronic grid demanded an acute-accented é. A grave situation, n’est-ce pas?
David Banks
Crookham, Northumberland
• So there have now been 300,000 Covid deaths in the US, the country that has managed the pandemic so disastrously (Report, 14 December). About the same proportion of the population as here, then.
Wendy Barnaby
Chilbolton, Hampshire
• Christmas was in fact suppressed during Cromwell’s time (Letters, 13 December). John Evelyn’s diary makes clear that from 1652 to 1658 he was only able to keep Christmas privately, at home or at underground services in private dwellings.
Bill Evershed
Kidlington, Oxfordshire
