Finally, An Artichoke Answer

 I asked Bing if we could expect to ever get real artichokes back; I said:

In the last 20 years or so artichokes have become inedible. The classic Castro Valley artichoke has disappeared from the market.  Is there any indication of bringing classic Castro Valley artichokes back?

Hi, this is Bing. I’m glad you like artichokes.🌱

According to my search, artichokes were brought to California by Italian immigrants in the late 19th century, and to Castroville in the 1920s. The original variety was the green globe artichoke, which is still grown by some local farms in Castroville. However, over the last two decades, an ambitious program to produce high-yielding, year-round artichokes has altered the flavor, color, texture and shape of them. Some of these new varieties are Desert Globe, Big Heart and Frost Kissed.

I could not find any indication of bringing classic Castro Valley artichokes back, but you may be able to buy them from some local farms or online. You can also visit the Castroville Artichoke Food & Wine Festival to celebrate this tasty vegetable.

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Several years ago, I think it was in March, my local Safeway had some real artichokes for a couple of weeks. 

I bought a dozen or so over that couple of weeks.

I was so excited that I saved the PLU stickers.

I was hoping that I might have discovered the magic code to artichoke happiness.

But I think that code covers all artichokes, not just the real artichokes that I bought in that brief interlude, the vast majority of rest of which are bogus.

Bing goes too easy on them ("high-yielding, year-round artichokes has altered the flavor, color, texture and shape of them").

Here's the real deal: that vast majority of bogus pretenders are really big, frequently are really round, but they have no flesh on their leaf bases (so what is their point?) and their hearts go from fibrous uncooked lumps to nasty tasteless mush in some mysterious window of uncontrollable time. 

As such they are inedible pointless wastes of time and money; but they are pretty.  

Somehow that seems to me to be a banner that could be hung above all of our current civilization.