Tag: out

perlmonger and I went to Swansea today, to pick up these speaker stands from eBay. We were not pleased, when we returned from a 160 mile round trip, to find that the carpet spikes, which should be supplied with the stands, are missing. No doubt there will be protracted wrangling with the vendor, and we’ll end up without the damn things, and the stands are unusable without.

Still while we were in Welsh Wales, we picked up kalunina‘s cashmas gift, with which we are well pleased. And we did something we very rarely do – we had a Burger King. I feel ashamed really, but I’d only had a bowl of porridge all day, and it was cold, and there it was. We had a Three Pepper thing, which actually wasn’t too bad. And we drove home across the Brecons in the winter sun, and to a spectacular sunset across the Severn Bridge, which was also nice.

Yesterday, we blitzed the living room which was an absolute *tip*, and took a car load of stuff to the tip – all the boxes from the new equipment, which I didn’t want to leave out for the recyclers, the plastic bottles, etc. Then over to Woolworths for a couple of bits, and a quick trip into Next, where perlmonger *bought some new trousers* – and a shirt! And I bought a nice green woolly sweater. Then off to our favourite local restaurant for .. well, not lunch really, but a 4 p.m. meal.

Should anyone care about the rest of the week… it’s here

Was topped out by a Show of Hands gig last night. Regular readers will know that this is one of my absolute favourite bands, particularly live – we have seen them loads of times.

About 10 days ago, Steve Knightly, one of the Hands announced that his 6 year old son, Jack, had leukaemia. The first four dates of the tour were cancelled, then Phil and Miranda (the others) picked it up and did the show on their own. No problem with that – seen him and Miranda many times, and it’s always an excellent evening.

As it happens, Jack is in Bristol Children’s Hospital, so Steve actually did the gig last night (the only night of the tour he is performing) – and what an evening. Palpable emotion from audience and stage, and Steve’s solo encore brought tears to many hoary old eyes. Including mine. Lyrics below cut

Yesterday morning, we went to the library to look at the “exhibition” of possible development of new housing round our village. It’s a matter of “how”, rather than “if”, but there’s going to be very little that Long Ashton can do in terms of influence, I fear. I took the opportunity to actually *join* the library – I’ve only lived in the village for 9 years, and I don’t like to rush things. And then, of course, I borrowed some books, which was probably foolish given the size of my to-read heap.

After that, we trundled up to Telford, to collect half a cow from the inestimable Steve Rawlings. This is rather less meat than it sounds, as Dexters are small beasts anyway, and this was a small beast in Dexter terms too. On the way home, we stopped at a farm shop somewhere in Shropshire for some fruit and veg, and then at Ludlow Food Centre, which was very impressive, and not as expensive as it looked.

We bought a variety of sossidge (as we generally do when we spot new ones), a small shoulder of pork for perlmonger‘s birthday tea (a rather excellent looking pork goulash seen on The Boy Oliver’s prog the other day), a red cabbage to accompany it, and an astonishingly looking elderflower and lime cheesecake, just because we could, really.

Today we have to do the “up to the elbows in gore” thing and get this cow bagged up for the freezer. We also have to deliver some Parish Plan questionnaires for data entry to two different households, go on the village walk this afternoon, and cook this goulash, which I have just discovered requires three hours in the oven after a load of prepping. And there’s the red cabbage to do.

I’d better get on, I guess. Still, there is a bottle of Pelorus to look forward to after all our labours 🙂

Saturday dawned, and we felt rather lethargic … took ourselves over to North Street for brunch at Ceiturica, and did health food shops and greengrocers. Sadly butcher was closed, so no bacon or black pudding 🙁 Trawled the many charidee shops for HarryStuff but nothing forthcoming (unlike Dursley last Thursday!).

lunch was roasted seabass for perlmonger and skewered lamb and chicken for me – both delicious, as always. Then into Aldl (or is it Lidi?) for some waffer thin meat for the tribe and some fizzing water.

popped home with the shopping, then got back in the car and drove to Chippenham, where the always lovely purple-peril was hosting her annual bash. Very nice time indeed (thanks hon!), but we crawled away at 8, after drinking ourselves silly on water, as we were just Too Tired.

Sunday morning brought a visit from Heather, who provoked some rather startling behaviour from Lilith; she handed over the relevant files, and I am now Official Secretary to the village Footpath User Group …

We got going relatively early for that, and perlmonger gave the living room a rather overdue vacuum, while I baked some blueberry muffins to offer Heather. When she’d left, we sat and watched Jeckyll, which is glorious hokum, then returned to working on the rebuilding of Nibblous, which has been eating our spare time this last week or two. Dinner was pan fried duck (why do they call it that?), with fennel and carrots braised in chicken stock, potatoes roasted in olive oil, and braised shallots in red wine.

and, just in case anyone cares, www.nibblous.com is now finished and up – we think it is much improved.