No, not Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket ( but might as well be given their elusiveness ) but a ticket for the Closing Ceremony. In fact, not just one but four ... I'm on the website now and can hardly believe my luck ... but wait ... what is this ... only Band A available ? ..... hang on , let me check the price ... £1500 per ticket ? ...... so the four of us can go to the ball and it will only cost us .... £6000 ?????
Maybe not.
Tuesday, 31 July 2012
It's high time I posted some layouts
In spite of the red wine , newly invented cocktails ( did we really coin the phrase Manka Wan*** ??? for the mango / vodka based tipple you plied us with Emma ? ) , frequent snack and meal breaks and endless giggling , we did manage to get a bunch of layouts finished at Emma's this weekend. I'm amazed we ever get any scrapping done at all . It is pure joy to spend time with these lovely ladies .... and Kate , you definitely won the tennis ... hands down or should I say bottoms up ?
Until September then ...
Friday, 20 July 2012
Here's what I would wear/carry to the Olympics ...
... having just heard Seb Coe tell us on Radio 4 this morning that he wasn't sure if you'd be allowed to wear Nike ( not an Olympic sponsor ... sorry partner .. . although that would imply, erroneously in this case, that both parties had a say in the matter ) trainers into the stadium ... that is if I'd shelled out what it would cost to inoculate 1000 children from Malaria in Africa for a ticket.
Wonder if they'd let me in .
Tuesday, 17 July 2012
Silver Lining
There's only one thing tobe said in favour of feeling ill and that is being able to do nothing. We so rarely get a chance to slow down to a near standtill that when the body tells us to stop , we're at loss to know how.
I'm sitting by the banks of the Thames keeping an eye on my son who's doing his best to capsize his mates in their kayaks. Thank goodness for life vests is all I can say. I've been sitting around all day in fact whilst they play and already I've taught myself how to needle felt, make a chevron friendship bracelet and written another poem. And all from the comfort of an easy chair , a magazine and my iPad.
Time to go though , they've all just been hauled off the river by the boatyard man who suspects their antics are't in the interests of sportsmanship but rather that they're intent on proving their daredevilry. Can't take 13 year olds anywhere ! !
Friday, 6 July 2012
10 Tips to Beat the Wet Weather Blues
Not the usual .... 'well the garden needs it ' baloney but somewhat more imaginativeI hope. Please report back and let me know if any of these work for you .
1. Find a weather app for your phone/ ipad /pc /mac and set it for your home town ... but in another part of the world. I've just found a Teddington in New Zealand where, despite the fact that it's their winter , the sun is shining every day .
2. Ditch any attempts to style your hair it will only end up in a wiry frizz. Instead go buy some outrageous hair accesssory ( Accessorize have a half price sale on right now ) and wear it with pride. I'm sporting green dreadlocks today.
3. Stuff the BBQ - burnt sausages are vastly over-rated. Buy tins of warming comfort food like baked beans and rice pudding - cheap and cheerful too.
4. Do NOT attempt to emulate the picnic experience by pretending to hold one in your living room with your plethora of Cath Kidston picnicware, as the magazines suggest, to entertain your kids. There is nothing sadder than a pretend picnic in a grey living room and you will only spill blackcurrant squash on the carpet. Tell them that they've got to play on the X box all day and will likely have to for the next two weeks. Result - guilt free peace and quiet all round and remind yourself frequently that X Boxes and Play-stations improve your children's hand to eye co-ordination.
5. Buy wine by the box. Cheaper than the bottled variety and makes the evening pass surprisingly swiftly . This has the added benefit of rendering the following morning a fuzzy experience in which to ignore the morning's weather forecast.
6. Talking of which, ignore the weather forecast. you know what it's going to say . Instead invent a few Sun Newspaper style headlines , such as Wet Wash-out Weekend Wreaks Havoc in the West or Blustery Gales Batter Britain . This has the added benefit of improving your children's grasp of onomatopoeia.
7. Cancel all outdoor engagements and go internet shopping instead. Nothing like a parcel in the post to bring cheer and it's your postman who'll get wet , not you , although we like our postman- apologies Dave.
8. Chuck out your sun screen. It wastes space in your bathroom cabinet and no-one likes that greasy experience of oily hands anyway. Stay pale , it's the new cool.
9. Make Christmas Cards. One less thing to do come December.
10. Adjust your calendar. Tear off July, August and September and just pretend you've gone straight to September without passing jail. Don't forget to collect £200 when you pass Go.
And if all else fails , you can always cheer yourself up by thinking it could be worse ... at least there's no Glastonbury this year.
1. Find a weather app for your phone/ ipad /pc /mac and set it for your home town ... but in another part of the world. I've just found a Teddington in New Zealand where, despite the fact that it's their winter , the sun is shining every day .
2. Ditch any attempts to style your hair it will only end up in a wiry frizz. Instead go buy some outrageous hair accesssory ( Accessorize have a half price sale on right now ) and wear it with pride. I'm sporting green dreadlocks today.
3. Stuff the BBQ - burnt sausages are vastly over-rated. Buy tins of warming comfort food like baked beans and rice pudding - cheap and cheerful too.
4. Do NOT attempt to emulate the picnic experience by pretending to hold one in your living room with your plethora of Cath Kidston picnicware, as the magazines suggest, to entertain your kids. There is nothing sadder than a pretend picnic in a grey living room and you will only spill blackcurrant squash on the carpet. Tell them that they've got to play on the X box all day and will likely have to for the next two weeks. Result - guilt free peace and quiet all round and remind yourself frequently that X Boxes and Play-stations improve your children's hand to eye co-ordination.
5. Buy wine by the box. Cheaper than the bottled variety and makes the evening pass surprisingly swiftly . This has the added benefit of rendering the following morning a fuzzy experience in which to ignore the morning's weather forecast.
6. Talking of which, ignore the weather forecast. you know what it's going to say . Instead invent a few Sun Newspaper style headlines , such as Wet Wash-out Weekend Wreaks Havoc in the West or Blustery Gales Batter Britain . This has the added benefit of improving your children's grasp of onomatopoeia.
7. Cancel all outdoor engagements and go internet shopping instead. Nothing like a parcel in the post to bring cheer and it's your postman who'll get wet , not you , although we like our postman- apologies Dave.
8. Chuck out your sun screen. It wastes space in your bathroom cabinet and no-one likes that greasy experience of oily hands anyway. Stay pale , it's the new cool.
9. Make Christmas Cards. One less thing to do come December.
10. Adjust your calendar. Tear off July, August and September and just pretend you've gone straight to September without passing jail. Don't forget to collect £200 when you pass Go.
And if all else fails , you can always cheer yourself up by thinking it could be worse ... at least there's no Glastonbury this year.
Tuesday, 3 July 2012
The Old Lie
Jonathan Ross once tweeted, when he was still on The BBC's film programme , in reply to a 'fan' who told him on Twitter that he should stop , it was boring, " I'd just watch something else if I were you "
The trouble is , I suspect that from the 24th July onwards, there will be precious little on TV to watch apart from the Olympics. I quite like sport but in small doses . I resent the over-blown commercial nature of the Games and the fact that every poster I've seen to date, depicts an air brushed super-model in some form of lycra. Can't sports men and women just look normal ? Fit by all means but normal.
Every Sunday glossy magazine has a bunch of Team GB glamour girls done up to the nines in evening wear and killer heels. is it not enough for school children to try their hardest at running, jumping , throwing and catching without having to look as if they've just entered a beauty contest ? And god forbid if you can't run a triathlon or two before teatime without breaking into a sweat. That would imply that we just aren't competing hard enough or are is some way , grossly inadequate.
When I was about 9 or 10 , as soon as Wimbledon came on the telly , all of us would be out in the street knocking about a few balls with our trusty Dunlop Maxplys. That wouldn't cut the mustard these days. If you hadn't been enrolled into tennis camp by the time you were 5 , or been spotted by a tennis scout for Junior Wimbledon by the age of 8, you'd be deemed a write-off. It's all about being better , stronger and sadly angrier . You only have to look at the furious and contorted grimaces of some of the tennis players these days as they score another point against their opponents, to notice that their demeanor is more that of a gladiator , fist triumphant in the air , the sniff of victory in their nostrils, rather than that of a conscientious sportsman. And as for all that grunting on court ... oh please.
And since when did MacDonalds and Coca Cola have anything to do with a healthy diet such as might be promoted in the pursuit of sport ? It really is all about money , nothing more and nothing less ... oh and being better than everyone else at the expense of true sportsmanship. When Rupert Murdoch can pay £3 billion pounds just to show Premier League football for 3 years, then you know the world truly has gone mad. Doubtless that could write off a sizeable chunk of third world debt, releasing millions from a life of poverty and disease but no , lets spend it on fueling the millionaire footballers lifestyles ... after all their WAGS can never have enough handbags. Don't get me started.
So I'm afraid I've turned into a grumpy old woman with regards to this Olympic nonsense . At the risk of offending sports fanatics, I've written a poem , which anyone studying English Lit for GCSE will immediately recognise. With apologies to Wilfred Owen ....
Spent double , like old suckers, over-taxed
Squeezed dry, coughing up like saps, we cursed through drudge,
Till on the telly we turned our backs
And towards our PCs began to trudge
Politicians droned on, many had lost their wits
But carried on, regardless, regurgitating spin
Drunk with fatigue , deaf to their endless drivel
About “The greatness of The Olympic Spirit”
Tickets ! Tickets ! Quick boys , they’re on the internet,
Filling in the clumsy forms , but not in time
Someone was still desperately fumbling for the synchronised swimming
Flound’ring like a man posessed
Dim through the misty screen and tawdry 2012 logo
As if under a spell, I saw him paying thousands.
In all my dreams, with wallet open
He plunges at me , greed infested whining
If you too could see, on the Olympic site
The pathetic goading of self interested, hyped celebrity
of being proud to be a part of this scandalous hoax
And watch his credit card ignite with debt
His gloating face , pound signs rolling in his eyes,
If you could fathom how thousands for a seat at
some indulgent Opening Ceremony farce can be accepted,
Whilst half the world lies dying of starvation
Obscene consumerism at its worst
And in the name, supposedly, of sport
Of vile corporate hospitality and MacDonalds sponsorship
Thinly disguised as ‘ uniting a nation’
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate Wayne Rooney style glory
The Old Lie : Dulce et decorum est pecuniam donare quam perdere caritatem et salute *
* Roughly Translates as “ It is good and fitting to waste your money instead of saving lives by donating to charity
Sunday, 1 July 2012
From the sublime to the ridiculous
It's been a bit of a rude shock to return to temperatures of under 20 degrees and rain when we've spent the week basking in 37 degrees and upwards. Funny how quickly you acclimatise to the heat - maybe it's the fact that you get to do nothing more strenuous than swim all day and have all your meals cooked for you.
We've just returned from a fabulous holiday - the sort I thought I'd never like and yet it was like paradise. This may be partly due to the fact that it was all inclusive, a blessing when you're traveling with 2 Coca Cola addicted kids and a husband who loves beer, gin and tonic but not necessarily in the same glass . Everything was on tap - drinks, watersports, meals.
The boys were over the moon . They were able to do their own thing and eldest son hooked up with a bunch of like-minded teens - we hardly saw him all week ( another blessing if you've ever dragged a reluctant teen on holiday with you) . What make s holiday though ( apart from the sun , the sea and the endless supply of free food and drink ) is the people you meet . We met a wonderful bunch of like minded families and haven't laughed so much in ages ... this also meant DH and I didn't have to bore the pants off eachother - yet another bonus.
Our daily routine went something like this ...
Rise early
Swim in the warm waters of the Aegean Sea
Breakfast on the terrace
Maybe a lap of the pool
Down to the Sunset Bar for a Turkish coffee
Snooze on the sun deck with a good book and Factor 30
Maybe a G&T or two before lunch
Another sumptuous buffet feast for lunch with enough Rose to bring on a siesta
A spot of windsurfing or snorkelling in the afternoon
Afternoon tea with Turkish pastries and Baclava overlooking the sea
A beer ... or three to while away the afternoon
Shower before dinner
(Think I may have missed the G&T at the aptly named Sunset bar to watch the sun go down
Where and what to eat ... decisions decisions
Off to the village square in the evening for whatever entertainment has been laid on
Wander back through the Night Scented Jasmine filled gardens to bed
...and then it all starts all over again the following day.
And here are the pictures in case you thought I was making it all up.
We've just returned from a fabulous holiday - the sort I thought I'd never like and yet it was like paradise. This may be partly due to the fact that it was all inclusive, a blessing when you're traveling with 2 Coca Cola addicted kids and a husband who loves beer, gin and tonic but not necessarily in the same glass . Everything was on tap - drinks, watersports, meals.
The boys were over the moon . They were able to do their own thing and eldest son hooked up with a bunch of like-minded teens - we hardly saw him all week ( another blessing if you've ever dragged a reluctant teen on holiday with you) . What make s holiday though ( apart from the sun , the sea and the endless supply of free food and drink ) is the people you meet . We met a wonderful bunch of like minded families and haven't laughed so much in ages ... this also meant DH and I didn't have to bore the pants off eachother - yet another bonus.
Our daily routine went something like this ...
Rise early
Swim in the warm waters of the Aegean Sea
Breakfast on the terrace
Maybe a lap of the pool
Down to the Sunset Bar for a Turkish coffee
Snooze on the sun deck with a good book and Factor 30
Maybe a G&T or two before lunch
Another sumptuous buffet feast for lunch with enough Rose to bring on a siesta
A spot of windsurfing or snorkelling in the afternoon
Afternoon tea with Turkish pastries and Baclava overlooking the sea
A beer ... or three to while away the afternoon
Shower before dinner
(Think I may have missed the G&T at the aptly named Sunset bar to watch the sun go down
Where and what to eat ... decisions decisions
Off to the village square in the evening for whatever entertainment has been laid on
Wander back through the Night Scented Jasmine filled gardens to bed
...and then it all starts all over again the following day.
And here are the pictures in case you thought I was making it all up.
Wednesday, 6 June 2012
What a weekend
Feeling slightly damp around the edges but definitely uplifted. Just what the nation needed I reckon . A spectacular display of royal loveliness and patriotism ... shame the BBC were working to a different agenda. Mr River Pageant Commentator ... you should be ashamed of yourself. Possibly the worst commentary in the history of commentating . Might I suggest you do your homework before the event . It didn't help that it was peppered with a slew of 'celebrity' lightweight nonsense. So ill-judged and unnecessary.
Anyway , don't want to put a dampener on the events of the last 72 hours , not that the weather hasn't done that already... so here are a few of my own personal memories of the weekend in photographs - in no particular order , a pot-pourri of patriotism.
Anyway , don't want to put a dampener on the events of the last 72 hours , not that the weather hasn't done that already... so here are a few of my own personal memories of the weekend in photographs - in no particular order , a pot-pourri of patriotism.
Sunday, 3 June 2012
Strange Day ....
... was planning on cycling up to town to watch the Jubilee River Pageant but decided to stay dry instead and watch from the comfort of my sofa . Glad I did really , because the day turned out to be surprisingly lovely in a homely kind of way.
Waffles for breakfast , in shifts, as both the boys had friends to stay so the breakfast, or rather brunch cooking, was a staggered affair.
Amazingly even the teens entered into the spirit of things and started making up lengths of paper chains for our street party on Tuesday. Undaunted by this spurt of out-of-character activity they then went on to bake chocolate chip cookies , whilst the younger ones tipped out the contents of the Coronation Jigsaw I bough the other day and began the hunt for the corner pieces.
I thought I must have fallen into some Enid Blytonesque parallel universe, but no, the camaraderie continued with a trip to the sports club for a game of squash and a swim ( them not me ) whilst H and I returned to the sofa with a bottle of crisp white wine and some Cromer crab. Could have been worse , could have been sat by the Thames in the rain. I know it's better to be there in person but sometimes , there is another , dryer and more comfortable way.
Waffles for breakfast , in shifts, as both the boys had friends to stay so the breakfast, or rather brunch cooking, was a staggered affair.
Amazingly even the teens entered into the spirit of things and started making up lengths of paper chains for our street party on Tuesday. Undaunted by this spurt of out-of-character activity they then went on to bake chocolate chip cookies , whilst the younger ones tipped out the contents of the Coronation Jigsaw I bough the other day and began the hunt for the corner pieces.
I thought I must have fallen into some Enid Blytonesque parallel universe, but no, the camaraderie continued with a trip to the sports club for a game of squash and a swim ( them not me ) whilst H and I returned to the sofa with a bottle of crisp white wine and some Cromer crab. Could have been worse , could have been sat by the Thames in the rain. I know it's better to be there in person but sometimes , there is another , dryer and more comfortable way.
Sunday, 20 May 2012
I've Done It Again
Why oh why, when questions such as .... "Who'd like to volunteer for ...." arise at meetings, does my arm suffer from an involuntary spasm and shoots upwards ? Is it a hangover from school days when I'd sit, arm higher than everyone's, shouting "Miss , Miss ... " begging to be asked the answer to a question read aloud ? Can't be, I'd have been sitting on my hands hoping not to be picked. Maybe that's it then . I'm repenting for my lost school youth when I should have been participating rather than hiding behind my desk.
In any event , I find myself on a Sunday having just baked umpteen scones, whipped litres of cream and decanted jars of Robinson's finest, in preparation for my hosting of the 'Jubilee Street Party Bunting Get together ' for all the neighbours.
Now I know it will be fun when we get going but today of all days when I'm trying to fathom the difference between Osmosis and Diffusion , in an attempt to de-mystify eldest teen before his Biology GCSE tomorrow morning. Feel like I've just done a crash course on all 3 sciences and then there's Eng Lit as we used to call it , to wade through tonight ... and the perils of ' unseen poetry' .
My version of an English Lit GCSE would be to ship the whole class off to the Hay Festival to absorb ( by osmosis .... see I do know what it means ) the loveliness of the English Language in all its written glory . But no . The Head Honchos at Edexcel have other ideas, They're gonna make the parents suffer by forcing them to speed read every one of the set books the night before the exam in a vain attempt to explain their contents yo their reluctant teens, the morning of the exam. I'm talking here about my dyslexic and dyspraxic son who will read each book , albeit over the course of a year, thereby forgetting how it started by the end of the 12 months and be none the wiser at the end of the last chapter. Guaranteed to put you off reading for life.
I shouldn't really be wasting time blogging but it's therapy and cheaper than gin. Excuse me whilst I go drag the sewing machine downstairs , dust off the cobwebs and prepare to cut a million little triangles from assorted discarded clothing. This may just put me off bunting for life. When the next Jubilee wheels around in a decade ( pearl ? ruby ? Corgi ? ), I'll have learnt from my mistakes , in theory , and be sitting on my hands when the question " Anyone want to volunteer to make bunting ? " rears its ugly head.
In any event , I find myself on a Sunday having just baked umpteen scones, whipped litres of cream and decanted jars of Robinson's finest, in preparation for my hosting of the 'Jubilee Street Party Bunting Get together ' for all the neighbours.
Now I know it will be fun when we get going but today of all days when I'm trying to fathom the difference between Osmosis and Diffusion , in an attempt to de-mystify eldest teen before his Biology GCSE tomorrow morning. Feel like I've just done a crash course on all 3 sciences and then there's Eng Lit as we used to call it , to wade through tonight ... and the perils of ' unseen poetry' .
My version of an English Lit GCSE would be to ship the whole class off to the Hay Festival to absorb ( by osmosis .... see I do know what it means ) the loveliness of the English Language in all its written glory . But no . The Head Honchos at Edexcel have other ideas, They're gonna make the parents suffer by forcing them to speed read every one of the set books the night before the exam in a vain attempt to explain their contents yo their reluctant teens, the morning of the exam. I'm talking here about my dyslexic and dyspraxic son who will read each book , albeit over the course of a year, thereby forgetting how it started by the end of the 12 months and be none the wiser at the end of the last chapter. Guaranteed to put you off reading for life.
I shouldn't really be wasting time blogging but it's therapy and cheaper than gin. Excuse me whilst I go drag the sewing machine downstairs , dust off the cobwebs and prepare to cut a million little triangles from assorted discarded clothing. This may just put me off bunting for life. When the next Jubilee wheels around in a decade ( pearl ? ruby ? Corgi ? ), I'll have learnt from my mistakes , in theory , and be sitting on my hands when the question " Anyone want to volunteer to make bunting ? " rears its ugly head.
Tuesday, 15 May 2012
Looking Out of My Window Today ...
... let me see .... we have hailstones , about the size of frozen peas, black skies and what might that be on the horizon , a plague of locusts perhaps ?
But not even the weather can dampen my enthusiasm for what awaits me at about 11.30am on Wednesday the 16th May . Eldest will have completed the second of 2 papers for his Maths IGCSE and I can breathe again. The house will relax back into normality and I can clear away the eggshells we've all been walking on for the past few months.
I hear on the radio this morning that our Educational System's method of assessing and dealing with Special Educational Needs is to have an overhaul. Hurrah ! Now you won't have to prove that you're at least three years behind before you get dragged out of class to learn your vowel sounds with an unqualified assistant , thereby missing another essential lesson back in the classroom in the process, which will probably get you off onto the wrong track in arithmetic or some such.
Apparently lots of children have been 'mislabeled'. What happened there then ? Did they get the wrong barcode or sell by date ? A bunch of experts have been wheeled out to express their views on radio 4 . These range from 'regret' that so many children have fallen through the net , right up to anger that they'll leave school without being able to read. And meanwhile if you want a statement for your child , which still sounds like they're being classified as educationally unsound, rather than failed by the system, unless you can dig deep and hire a barrister to 'defend' your case in court (.... yes court !) , at eleventy squillion pounds a minute - you're stuffed.
So what's the answer ? More teachers, better qualified, smaller classes and differentiated work for those who can't do quadratic equations by the time they're three. Wouldn't it be lovely if our children could just ... wait for it .... enjoy school rather than endure it ? Poor loves , I wouldn't want to be a schoolchild these days.
But not even the weather can dampen my enthusiasm for what awaits me at about 11.30am on Wednesday the 16th May . Eldest will have completed the second of 2 papers for his Maths IGCSE and I can breathe again. The house will relax back into normality and I can clear away the eggshells we've all been walking on for the past few months.
I hear on the radio this morning that our Educational System's method of assessing and dealing with Special Educational Needs is to have an overhaul. Hurrah ! Now you won't have to prove that you're at least three years behind before you get dragged out of class to learn your vowel sounds with an unqualified assistant , thereby missing another essential lesson back in the classroom in the process, which will probably get you off onto the wrong track in arithmetic or some such.
Apparently lots of children have been 'mislabeled'. What happened there then ? Did they get the wrong barcode or sell by date ? A bunch of experts have been wheeled out to express their views on radio 4 . These range from 'regret' that so many children have fallen through the net , right up to anger that they'll leave school without being able to read. And meanwhile if you want a statement for your child , which still sounds like they're being classified as educationally unsound, rather than failed by the system, unless you can dig deep and hire a barrister to 'defend' your case in court (.... yes court !) , at eleventy squillion pounds a minute - you're stuffed.
So what's the answer ? More teachers, better qualified, smaller classes and differentiated work for those who can't do quadratic equations by the time they're three. Wouldn't it be lovely if our children could just ... wait for it .... enjoy school rather than endure it ? Poor loves , I wouldn't want to be a schoolchild these days.
Friday, 4 May 2012
4 Eyes
I am helpless with laughter. If you haven't tried it yet , go straight to Specsavers website and try out their new gizmo where you upload a photo of yourself which enables you to 'try on' any of their frames.
Trouble is ... I look like a cross between Dame Edna and Eric Morecombe in every single pair.
Still .... worth a good laugh on a Friday night if nothing else.
And talking of Friday night ... what is it about wine O clock on a Friday that still makes me feel like a teenager getting home from school ... childishly excited about the anticipation of the weekend ahead ?
The fridge is bursting with 4 lots of M&S dine in for a tenner meals ... should keep us going until Monday - I have no intention of cooking for the next 3 days . Instead I'll be taking my pick from chargrilled chicken and prawn paella, salmon marinated in soy and ginger, fish pie and pork medallions in a creamy something or other sauce. And that's just the main courses ... wait til you hear the puds - Irish Cream tart slices, trifle, raspberry panna cotta and key lime pie. The 4 bottles of wine alone would have cost £32 which means that the 4 main course, 4 side dishes and 4 puddings came to a grand total of £8.
As they say ... this is not just ordinary food this is ... an absolute bargain.
Trouble is ... I look like a cross between Dame Edna and Eric Morecombe in every single pair.
Still .... worth a good laugh on a Friday night if nothing else.
And talking of Friday night ... what is it about wine O clock on a Friday that still makes me feel like a teenager getting home from school ... childishly excited about the anticipation of the weekend ahead ?
The fridge is bursting with 4 lots of M&S dine in for a tenner meals ... should keep us going until Monday - I have no intention of cooking for the next 3 days . Instead I'll be taking my pick from chargrilled chicken and prawn paella, salmon marinated in soy and ginger, fish pie and pork medallions in a creamy something or other sauce. And that's just the main courses ... wait til you hear the puds - Irish Cream tart slices, trifle, raspberry panna cotta and key lime pie. The 4 bottles of wine alone would have cost £32 which means that the 4 main course, 4 side dishes and 4 puddings came to a grand total of £8.
As they say ... this is not just ordinary food this is ... an absolute bargain.
Wednesday, 25 April 2012
Food
A subject close to my heart ... and hips ... and thighs etc
Why do carbs taste so good and broccoli tastes like ... well broccoli ?
Why is everything deep fried delicious ?
And why can some people eat for England and never gain a pound ?
And why do I have to eat every least chip including the dodgy one at the bottom of the scrunched paper that looks like it may have succumbed to a spot of potato blight ?
Why does only wine hit at the spot at the end of a bad day ?
Why won't an apple do instead of a Cadbury's Wispa ?
Why can't spinach have the same allure as salt and vinegar crisps ?
The answers my friend are not blowing in the sodding wind but just plain facts of life so I'd better get over it and go bake myself a fat - free broccoli and spinach casserole.
I'm in the danger zone .. I'm poised over my keyboard lusting over scrapbooking papers as an antidote to the pouring rain outside when I should be preparing some lesson plans for my next pupil. I can't face getting back on my bike . My clothes have only just dried out since this morning's drenching. Tough choice but do I indulge in a little retail therapy in the dry with a cuppa or do I get back on my bike and pedal off into the downpour ?
Hmmmm , kettle's boiling.
And just so that you now what I may be tempted by .... it's these ...
and these ....
and these...
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