Foodie Fest!

What a fantastic day of food Mr S and I indulged in, even in the rain!

This Bank Holiday weekend is the the Foodies Festival at Hampton Court (well it's not really at the Court it's across the road in the green!), celebrating all things food and drink related. And considering how we both now feel I think we ate and drank nearly all the food and drink there! From Argentine empanadas to Wyke Farms Just Delicious Extra Mature Cheddar, from sparkling strawberry Frizzent Prosecco to Pressed Rat and Warthog Beer (it was nearly blacker than night!).

About the only thing we didn't round to trying was any of the ostrich or kangaroo, though considering they weren't giving away free samples there's not surprise there! There were amazing muffins and cakes, of which we have been rather greedy and bought home four! The breads were amazing looking, we have bought home a cheese one, though left the £4.80 rosemary one on the shelf!

I have to say that entering the Evening Standard competition to win two tickets certainly paid off (saved £15 each on the entry fee!), though I think we spent rather a lot more than we were envisaging!

And we're definitely looking forward to Mr Pieminister's Moo Pie (british beef steak, real ale, fresh herbs and rich gravy in lovely pastry for Mr S) and the Minty Lamb Pie (free range british lamb, carrot, swede, mint and rose wine in lovely pastry for me) for dinner, with lashing of mashed potato and gravy of course!

Oh and I nearly forgot, we encounted Levi Roots and Aldo Zilli! Wicked!!

http://www.chango.co.uk/
http://spoiltpig.com/
http://www.thelittleroundcakecompany.co.uk/
http://www.pieminister.co.uk/

For the Want of a Clean Telephone Box...

... the Treasure Hunt was lost. Yes, that's correct, and would you believe it, due to the lack of a single clean (or at least one that we'd even consider being in for more than the millionth of a second) we lost the treasure hunt!

Come on London, how can this be? Is there not a telephone cleaning squad out there to ensure that telephone boxes do not contain a pile of rubbish that looks as if a tramp has been sleeping, eating, urinating and defecating in it for the last one hundred years?!

A group photo of all the team in, yes IN, a telephone box was required to benefit from a 10 minute time reduction off the final score time. Each one we were ready to dive into was a disgrace that none of us were willing to enter, apart from our very competitive team leader who kept on trying to get us in one. Unfortunately for her the team we were competing against were less squeamish than us and as they did manage to secure said such photograph, so they won!

At least the tourists we saw who were wanting their picture with a London telephone box were all sensible enough to do so with the outside of the box, though who knows what they thought about the inside...

... probably like us, total GROSS OUT!

Thatch, Cream & Salt

What a wonderful day twas had! Driving down those typically English lanes with the roof down, enjoying summer weather when it should still be cold and April showers.

We headed off to a place called Selsey, with no idea what to expect apart from the fact is was by the sea. We passed lots and lots of lovely thatched houses, businesses and even bus stops that had been thatched along the way - I do enjoy a well-thatched property!

And by the sea it was... took a short walk along the beach front, and refreshingly there was no promenade or tacky seaside tat shops... just an ice cream trailer, sea gulls, kayakers and lots of people just parked up in their cars and not actually walking or sitting! I find it very strange still that people here will drive to the beach and just sit in their cars, weird, very weird. Of course being by the sea we had to indulge in an ice cream, yum!

It was then off for a little leg stretch around the 60 hectares of salt marsh and tidal mudflats that make up Pagham Harbour Local Nature Reserve. I think we probably made about a kilometre round trip - well we hadn't had lunch and the tummies were rumbling! So it was decided to drive along the coast a bit and see what caught our stomachs, er eyes!

And you'll never guess where we ended up... that tourist travel destination that everyone likes to smile about cause of it's Butlins, yes, Bognor Regis! The town that on average has more sunshine than any other town in Britain! So we drove along the sea front, spotted a parking spot and a takeaway and it was hot chips on the beach, with lots of salt and vinegar, yum, yum! The compulsory ice cream and chips on visiting the beach component had been completed and it was a happy journey home!

Not so happy was the very bad sunstroke, and consequent vomiting! That'll learn me to remember that when the roof is down in the car you must remember not only a hat but sunscreen as well!

Selsey:
http://www.visitselsey.com/
Some of those wonderfully thatched places, thatch costs a lot!
http://homes.trovit.co.uk/thatched-house-sale-east-sussex-pictures
Bognor Regis - yes, there is more there than Butlins!
http://www.bognor-regis.org/

Shake, Rattle & Demolish!

Since February 22nd life in my home city has not been the same: work from home, boil your tap water, use a chemical toilet, not be able to go to the city centre, and so on. The loss of life is very sad, and in years to come people in Christchurch will be asking where were you on 22Feb2011?

I'll have to say that I was sound asleep in my bed in the UK, whereas my family were panicking, wondering if anyone had been killed, or running down roads with buildings collapsing round them and water gysering up out the earth.

Today the place where I first used to go drinking is being demolished, at 105 years old it would only be considered a young building here in the UK, though in Christchurch it is category two listed historic building "...places of ‘historical or cultural heritage significance or value". It served New Zealand's first beer on tap in about 1939 and opened the country's first beer garden in 1947 and first drive-through bottle store in 1954. And today it has to be demolished.

There will be many such actions: at least a third of the buildings in central Christchurch will have to be demolished, and when I visit next the city will be a completely different one to that of my memories.

It is hard being so far away, only gleaning what I can from photos, video and speaking to those living in the now. And below are a few sites that can give you a little idea:

Photos: Before and after the Christchurch earthquake
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/christchurch-earthquake-2011/4713590
Quaked: skating
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2bvozq-KK8

Pretty Little Bows..

..on day to day wearing knickers! What? I decided to splurge out on knickers for day to day wear, having had enough of broken elastic, cotton threads running and holes starting to appear.

(It's quite amazing, well I find, how I can let these vital garments just wear right out, whilst having the most amazingly beautiful lets have sex underwear for which each set gets a once a year appearance, if it's lucky, and costs twenty times the price.)

So off to a well known department store and said required knickers purchased. Once home not only taking off at least two tags each there were these dainty pretty little bows on the front of them, huh, what's the point in that. Wear a dress or other figure touching item of clothing and you have a bump. Yes a bump right in the middle of that area of the body. No I don't know what you're like but me, I do not want to walk around with a bump all day at my nether regions! So these too were snipped off, and that's not easy to do without accidentally cutting the cloth!

Come on lingerie makers, if I want pretty little bows on my underwear it's certainly not for my day to day knicker wear, it's for something special, something to be unwrapped and I'm certainly not wanting people looking at me thinking "now that's a funny place to have a bump"!

Well at least Miss Yo Yo had fun batting them round the house for about ten minutes!

Summer, Winter and a New Year!

What an amazingly busy couple of months! First it was off home to meet my niece and celebrate Father turning the big six-o.

It was great coming from a rather cold start to winter and landing in 20degreesc plus weather; wonderful to catch up with friends, and meet a new boyfriend of one; sharing time with family - especially the nephews and niece (even if they can be little scally wags at times, though weren't we all at that age!).

Not so wonderful was seeing the damage that the big quake did to my home city - quite saddening to walk pass chimney less houses, vacant sections where a building once was, propped up historic buildings and twisted bridges. Though is was good to see people getting on with lives, though having to wait for insurance approvals and payouts sure must be starting to grate a bit.

It was then back from 29degreesc to landing at zero, yes a big fat zero! It was wonderful to be collected from the airport by Mr S with my big puffer jacket though, toasty! It was fabulous to have a decent amount of snowfall - coming back from the shops with my red coat pure white and about three centimetres of snow on my hat! Not so great was the trouble all the fluffy white stuff caused to travelling, chaos! Luckily I still managed to make it to work, or was that unluckily, though increased my journey time by about forty-five minutes! Ahh well at least I had good books to read and the wonderful Mr S managed to pick-me up from work a couple of times.

And finally, seeing in 2011 at my favourite club, where I met the delectable Mr S, was a great finish and start of the years! Good to see some of the old faces still going, and dancing away with Big Ben chiming in the new year - wonderful! Not so wonderful were the folks not deodoranted up though, ugh, gross - come on folks you know that you're going to be bouncing around all sweaty like - please use the anti-smelling stuff, ick!

If my bouncing fun time celebrating in the new year was anything to go by, 2011 is going to be fabulous, bring it on!

Little Wind Ups...

... lead to wanting to scream at the topping them all off little wind up!

It ends with being the next in line person who wants bacon on a Friday morning and they run out with the person in front of you!

Though starts with being pushed in front of to get on a train that is empty when it arrives in the station by a woman who then proceeds to put her entire face on in the train on the seat opposite you, GROSS. Then when you take your second train there are feet on the seat to where you want to sit, so find an alternate seat... I sure as heck ain't sitting where their shoes have been walking on pavements that animals have pissed / pooped on, humans thrown up / spat / crapped / pissed on are resting on, cause I'm pretty damn sure hover shoes are not readily for sale yet and their shoes are in pristine condition! And when I finally get to my stop can not get off the train as some dick wad is standing in front of the door and I can't get off without standing on said stupid dick wad, so guess what, I stand on him and he's the one to get upset, well tough biscuits dick wad... move... out... the way... you'll find you get on the train faster if you let people off first and you'll also find, dick wad, that you don't get stepped on!

Middle of the day goes reasonably well.... bacon sandwich finally obtained, coffee consumed... though having to cart 80 cases of wine up the lift on onto our floor was rather irritating as the whole point of having our courier collect it, as opposed to the originating company deliver it, was that they would take directly to the ground floor stock room. Turns out that the pallet was made too high and this could not be done so have to cart it around! Going out that night, wool jersey, sweaty, oh yes, just fabulous, NOT! Rather miffed and will deal with next week... just not the motivation to cart them back down to the ground floor on the other side of the building, damn couriers eh!

Then it's a lovely trip up to London... at least a seat was obtained on the train, and well funny to watch those put their bag on the seat types so no one will sit next to me have to move their bags as this train is the kind where it's virtually stand all the way if you don't get a seat at the station after the one I get on at, well at that time of the evening... serves you right, not like you bought a ticket for your bag as well as you, if you bought a ticket at all! Lots of folks on that line try and get away with no ticket as a lot of the station don't have barriers in yet, oh how I laugh to myself when they get caught, and some of the excuses they come up with, hilarious! "Please don't give me a £10 fine, I need that to buy a new liver as the Aliens removed it." And as usual I always forget how busy London is... especially if you're walking against the flow... come on people if you are on a mobile or other such i-dick device at least look where you are walking before you are a centimetre away from me (I just love waiting for them to remember that yes, there are other people than them and their i-dick device in this world and they should really look where they am going look on their face) when the realise I am there. Mind you, considering the volume they play them at I am seriously looking at shares in hearing aids cause in about ten years time there are going to be a lot of deaf people out there.. heck if I can hear your music, you must be playing that LOUD!

At least to make the day end a lovely one I had a most wonderful dinner and drinks with Miss S, scrumdiddlyumptious!