Home alone (except without the comedy burglars)

This week promises to be a quiet week. Mr Manbag is out for two nights on the trot. Normally I'd arrange to see friends. Maybe go to the cinema. Perhaps a meal and some drinks.

But this week I feel like winter is creeping in. I feel like I should be hibernating. Wrapped up in blankets and cardigans and the like (maybe even a slanket). Toasty and warm and ready to wait it out until spring (albeit without sticks up my bottom. I don't think we suffer much from ants round here).

I know that I will plan to watch some DVDs. There will almost definitely be some Percy Pigs or something fruity from Hotel Chocolat (even if they've stopped stocking my favourite - the drunken raspberry). I'll have ambitions to make long overdue phonecalls. To get some cleaning done, a light touch of laundry. I'll even consider putting some nice nail varnish on my much neglected toenails, even though they don't see daylight at the moment.

Of course I know what will really happen is that I will get home from work, grab a yaki soba from Wagamama or something vaguely ready meal-y. Then I will veg in front of the telly, netbook (currently with weirdly misfunctioning screen, but that's another matter) on lap with a rum and coke to hand. And normally I would consider this a waste of a lone evening. But if I do it over and over again does that maybe mean that's what I want to do?

I am struck

Watching the telly this evening I am struck by the parade of servicemen and women which is showing right now. Hundreds of magnificent looking chaps and ladies with a variety of uniforms, medals, hats and moustaches march together past the Cenotaph. Kilts and berets, walking sticks and wheelchairs and thousands of beautiful bright red poppies.

I have never before paid much attention to Remembrance Sunday. Of course I bought a poppy. And of course I paid my respects with a moment or two of silence. But I have never given much thought to what it means to fight for your country, to lose your friends, to see things that you can never forget and to be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice.

With the news this week of so many lost fighting in Afghanistan and the recent death of Harry Patch the plight of our soldiers is very much at the forefront of the mind of the nation. I don't think I've seen so many poppies on the lapels of strangers before.


Mr Manbag calls me Connie Hardbitch for my lack of empathy with others. For my sometimes cold demeanour. But I watch the parade of rightly proud soldiers and widows and I find myself moved.

Make room for the mushrooms

*warning. Do not read this post if you are hungry*

Friday is always a tricky night. Sure, we have food in the fridge. But as the working week draws to a close neither Mr Manbag nor I have the energy to cook it. Plus there are the usual after work Friday night drinks to attend to which would mean that we wouldn’t get home until it’s too late to start cooking. So we go for drinks and decide to eat out. We even decide where to go – we’re going to got to LSQ2, of disastrous breakfast fame. Give them another chance.

LSQ2 is a really nice looking restaurant. There’s a leather banquette down one side with buttons coloured to match the massive lampshades that are in various shades of purple and pink. It’s a nice space. We haven’t booked so we take a seat in the bar waiting for a table to be free.

We wait. Annoyingly we can see several empty tables and the staff seem to be on a mission to ignore us – no chance of some drinks, nibbles or even a copy of the menu while we’re waiting. We watch the other customers. Aside from being distracted by a bloke with his shirt unbuttoned far too far for his age, medallion glinting against his chest, hair combed forward to hide his male pattern baldness we notice that quite a few customers aren’t paying at their table – they’re taking their bills to the bar to pay. And there are people sat with menus when we arrived that are still sat with them 10 minutes later. It would seem that did we manage to get a table here it would be a long time before we got served. So we take our voucher for a free bottle of wine and decide to go elsewhere.

After a brief bit of bickering we decide to go to Pepe Sale, a local and independent Sardinian restaurant. It is in the mankiest part of town. On the side of the ugly Broad Street Mall with the 70’s multi-storey car park above, the 99p store and super-ugly Civic Centre just around the corner. Even the dining area itself is a funny little place, like an office that has been converted in to a restaurant. As ever, though, the welcome is warm. We are fairly regular visitors, coming for a touch of real Italian food (as opposed to the food from the glut of chain Italians that Reading is plagued by) every couple of months. Marco talks us through the specials (hand-picked mushrooms sauteed with garlic and herbs, home-made spaghetti with clams, chillies and tomatoes) pours our favourite wine and leaves us to think. When he returns I mention how lovely the pasta they used to do (creamy sauce, loads of mushrooms and some kind of spaghetti that Mr Manbag insists were noodles) was. He says that the kitchen can make it for me. For little old me! So that means I need to change my starter (from the wild mushrooms). Marco suggests some pan fried goat’s cheese with griddled courgettes and some balsamic glaze. It sounds delicious. I order it.

After Marco walks away and we’re tucking in to the big basket of Sardinian flatbread (wafer thin unleavened bread baked with salt, olive oil and rosemary) when Mr Manbag says “so you’ve basically ordered food that isn’t on the menu”. Indeed I have. We are such a part of the clientele here that we go off off piste, or at least I do. Not just off the set menu (a.k.a. off piste) but off the menu altogether. I feel smug.

I feel even smugger when my starter comes. A delicious round of cheese which has been cooked until the outside is crispy and sweet (with a touch or garlic. Garlic oil, maybe?) and it goes wonderfully well with the courgettes and balsamic. Gorgeous.

But that is nothing. When my main arrives I am bowled over. Home-made tagliatelle, wild mushrooms of all shapes and sizes, a dollop or two of cream, a generous helping of garlic, a sprinkling of parsley and just a touch of freshly ground black pepper, added by Marco himself. He proudly tells us that the mushrooms were picked by him. I ask what one of the wide white slices of ‘shroom is. He offers to show us. And of course we say yes.

He returns with a basket of mushrooms, all different shapes and sizes, covered by a napkin like some special secret gift. My white slice is from the stalk of a humungous beast of a mushroom. It must be 6 or 7 inches wide and about that tall. The stalk is over an inch thick, creamy and white and tasty (it seems especially good at soaking up the garlic and cream flavours). He handles each mushroom with care and tells us “this one is found under oak" and then he picks up another, smaller mushroom "and this one I find under pine trees”. He tells us how he enjoys going out picking them by hand. Just him and his dog. I can even picture it in my mind (the dog in my imagination is a terrier, wiry and small). He covers the mushrooms back up , carefully laying the napkin shroud across their truffly bodies, and leaves us to enjoy our meal.

Eventually I am replete. I can eat no more. Each mouthful is a mix of pleasure and pain – pleasure at the taste but pain at the increased feeling of stuffedness. I pass my plate over to Mr Manbag, who had a much more compact and less carbohydrate based main than me and he duly does his duty. And complains that I always order better than he does. Whilst troughing the rest of my food.

As we stroll back across town, arm in arm, distended bellies bouncing away, we decide that we should eat there more often. That LSQ2 probably doesn’t warrant another try. That wild mushrooms are really rather nice. That it’s lovely to feel special and eat things that aren’t on the menu. And that all is right with the world.

I am leaving Mr Manbag

Louise from Tooting Squared has a love of Percy Pigs and is a wonderful baker, hostess and is also lovely and tall. Today she has said she is going to try and make cinder toffee. If she is successful I have said I will marry her. She hasn't actually said she'll accept but I am hoping she will. Especially if I offer a dowry of Percy Pigs. Mr Manbag will need to buck his ideas up if he's going to beat homemade cinder toffee.

This evening (with Mr Manbag still around, at least for the time being, cinder toffee experiments pending) I find myself drawn in to The Family. This is Channel 4's latest fly on the wall drama watching, get this, a family. Last year's family were angry and pretty hateful (the effect of teenage girls, perhaps) but this year's family is a funny, happy and oddly functional Indian family. Watching the parents fight over breakfast and affectionately argue over who is thickest while dyeing each other's hair is strangely charming. I think this could be compulsive viewing (and having it on a Wednesday when we rarely go out is a big plus).

In other news tomorrow brings both the carpet fitters (a last minute change of plan executed by me in order to have a lie in on Saturday when they would have been coming) and a return trip to the garage for my poorly-but-almost-better Figaro. And as a bonus for working from home I get another lie in. Rock and roll!

I know, I know

I ought to be blogging. Or if not blogging then tidying up the spare room which gets two visitors in one week this week (not on the same night. That would be unfair). And if not that then there is plenty of other cleaning, tidying and general housework to be done. But instead I have been sat here eating Montezuma's chocolate buttons, drinking tea, watching telly (including Flash Forward which I am quite into despite the fact that the lead bad guy is an ex-hobbit) and maniacally playing Bejewelled Blitz on Facebook. I've got a bit of a headache from too much playing and I know I'll see little gem shapes on the insides of my eyelids and then probably play it in my dreams from repeatedly trying to beat my high score.


Then the rest of this week sees the very belated excitement of the new carpet in the hall. Well, I am excited. And there's even a new mirror to hang after a recent successful eBay purchase (don't ask me about the unsuccessful one). Plus the delights of a visit from the lovely Judy, big sister Heidi, Pork Fest and maybe I'll even get to the bottom of the EU dirty laundry mountain. Or maybe not.

I think I need a weekend after each weekend in order to recover from my weekend. Best start buying more lottery tickets. Oh and I've decided that the national lottery is not a tax on stupidity, as is often claimed. It is a tax on hope.

Right. Time for bed, said Zebedee.

Condition

I am in London today. Hopefully Mr Manbag and I will be wandering round Shoreditch and Brick Lane exploring and shopping.

Last night I wandered through Reading in search of a coat. I couldn't find the coat I wanted so I compromised, buying something for now that will tide me over (a short red coat, rather than the long winter coat I am after). Shopping is hard work.

As I left The Oracle I passed a pair of ladies. They were laden down with shopping filled paper bags (mostly Primark, but not all. Maybe some of their clothes will last longer than a few weeks). As I passed them I overheard a snippet of their conversation...
I've got a condition, haven't I? (sighing)
So have I. I'm shaking. I could barely pay for that!

The last train

My fig is back. She is running well and the garage have even had her cleaned (she was filthy. I bet Mr Manbag wishes I were as dirty as my car was).

So today I took the train for the last time. At least I hope so. The perils of driving a near vintage car is that it can be off the road on occasion (though I am hoping that this will be the end of serious things for Quite Some Time, having had the engine rebuilt).

On today's journey to the office I didn't put on my iPod or open a book, for a change. The clocks have gone back so the dawn broke long before I boarded the train. This morning's train journey took me past a burned out train, sitting lonely on tracks in the middle of nowhere; back gardens of pink bricked houses, their wooden clapboard panels pure and white in the morning sunshine; a spread of allotments with gardeners busying themselves at their vegetables.

And then on the way home I left early and sat down at a random seat, pleased to be in the warm and facing the direction of travel (which is an unusual treat). The chap opposite me was fascinating. He looked like a tiny Indian Dustin Hoffman, the size of a nine year old child, his head not even reaching the top of the carriage headrest. His clothes were sort of dusty and shabby like he'd been working on a building site and he had on a cheap coat similar to the sort I used to wear as a child - synthetic and padded with panels of colour and piping. He worried at a scab/scar on his wrist, nervously attempting to pick away at it. He talked inaudibly to himself for the whole 6 minutes, constantly removing and replacing his ancient KFC baseball cap before we pulled into Reading West station. We alighted together, me standing behind him as he ever so politely waited for everyone from the opposite end of the carriage to leave. Silently and courteously waiting his turn, his manners placing him far above his appearance.

I left at Reading West, too. Me to hand over a small fortune to pick up my silly, girly, trivial car. I don't know where he was going.

Early to rise

I am not one of nature's early risers. To me there are few things more wonderful than being snuggled under a feather duvet, between crisp cotton sheets with maybe a warm woollen blanket from my home town. Toastie and snoozy. Perfect.

My normal morning means I drag my arse out of bed at about half past seven to get in to the office a bit before 9. This is okay. I can cope with this.

This morning I was in the office at 7. No fair. Especially considering I didn't leave it until gone 8 last night. Less than 12 hours away before I had to be back there again.

I do not plan to make a habit of this.

This weekend Mr Manbag and I will be in London. We have a hotel room booked on Saturday night so will spend most of Saturday and Sunday there. We don't know quite what we're going to get up to but I am hoping a nice long lie in will be part of the plans.

Suicide isn't painless

I am still catching the train. The fig is almost ready but until it is I am bound to the public transport system, like a smear of turd on the side of a toilet pan.

My train journey takes 8 minutes. Which is almost but not quite no time at all. It's a rubbish journey. Not long enough to relax and have a cuppa. Just enough time to remember where I was in my book but not enough to really read any before I have to alight. As they say. Then there's a 10 minute trudge/skip/plod (depending on what comes up on my iPod) to the office through an unremarkable business park with me trying not to walk behind any smokers along the narrow path. It's not at all scenic. And I essentially double back on myself because the train passes my office building before carrying on for a minute or so just to make sure I have to traipse a full 10 minutes from the mingy station.

This morning was all different. An alleged suicide near Burnham had brought the trains that pass through Reading heading to London Paddington to a standstill. No trains were going anywhere. I waited on the platform with about a hundred other sullen looking people. We waited. And waited. The "expected time" came and went with no updates and no train. In turn each person wandered over to the nearest fluorescent jacketed chap to ask what was going on. There was tutting. There was sucking in of breath. No-one knew when our train would come. It was only a few minutes away but it was stuck behind another train. And no one knew when that would free up the line.

This proved to be something of a crunch time. Lots of people wandered away to get coffee. Some rallied together with their colleagues and wandered off to get a joint cab. Me? Well, I reminisced about the croissant (almond, as well. How decadent!) I'd eaten. Leaving me with the princely sum of 35p in my wallet and possibly but probably not enough time to get some cash from a cashpoint in the station. Bah. No chance of getting a cuppa with those odds. And I had a box of Twining's delicious Earl Grey tea bags in my bag. All my money wasted on a croissant when I need a cuppa.

So there was some more waiting. And some more. And then the train came and we left.

The final thing I remember about the morning was that there were comments from one of the be-jacketed chaps saying it ruins everyone's day...Why can't they just stay home and take some pills?

You can't beat a bit of sympathy, can you?

Ain't muffin going on but the eggs

This weekend in the UK the clocks go back to GMT, giving us an extra hour in bed, or an extra hour of daytime or an extra hour of whatever we want to waste it on or achieve. In our home most of that time is spent changing the time on all the clocks. Definitely a downside of owning so many nice timepieces.

I took a trip to Oxfordshire on Saturday to visit my family. The nearest train station (Hanborough, a tiny one track stop where the opposite ex-platform is covered in shrubbery and foliage. A station so small that one has to make sure one is at the front of the train else there will be no platform to alight on to) is only half an hour or so away - no distance at all really. Ideal for those of us who are sans voiture.

My family were lovely company. Even the myriad of children were lovely. Personally I can't really stand children. My nieces and nephews are neither naughty or mis-behaved but I always find them so tiring. Their relentless energy and constant need for attention saps my reserves and leaves me feeling brittle and tired. Of course, this is not because of them or the way they have been brought up - all children make me feel like this. This is why I will never have children. I would be an awful mother - angry and short tempered. And worst of all I can't stand the dirtiness that having children seems to bring. Whether it be cleaning a dropped dummy by sucking it (bleurgh!) or watching them eat, getting crumbs and slimy traces of food everywhere except in their mouths. Some things are just not meant to be.

Of course, I can understand people who do want to have kids. A little mini-me to bring joy and laughter into your home must be a great thing. At least I am told it is. What I don't understand is how so few people who have or want kids understand my desire not to follow that path. I get bored of people telling me to wait until I am older. That I will change my mind in time. Inside I am revolted at the thought of it but I usually just nod and politely say that I don't think so.

This time, though, the kids were a little more subdued than normal. James just wanted a hug and a lap to sit silently on. He had a fever so just wanted to sit quietly. And Lara, the whirling dervish of the family, was having fun sitting in a baby bouncer, far too small for her, and bouncing up and down repeatedly shouting "wheeee!" in a maniacal voice. Hilarious.

Anyway, I digress. The weather was miserable - drizzly and cold and grey and damp. Rain that seeped and dripped and spoiled everything without refreshing or cleaning. But on the train back to sunny Reading the pastoral scenes that the train passed were beautiful. The sun was unexpectedly out and the sky blue and filled with big white clouds. Birds wheeled and dipped overhead and the fields were filled with dogwalkers, rabbits, lazy looking cattle and the shadow of the train. The autumn colours were simply stunning. The leaves golden, brown, yellow, red and green still not fallen. There's plenty of time for that yet. Even the red brick bridges that we pass under look especially beautiful in the warm light, the Victorian arches appearing to glow.

Then this morning, as a special treat, Mr Manbag and I decided to try out a new brunch venue. We've been poorly served for breakfast type products since the much loved Ha! Ha! relocated to the Oracle riverside, stopped doing its all day breakfast menu and started charging £12 for a chicken burger. So we were excited when LSQ2 opened on our doorstep (not literally, mind. That would make getting in and out of the flat really awkward). We'd tried their branch further out of town and enjoyed the food but not the location, so this seemed like a big win for us. And they serve brunch until 5pm. And they have dark wood tables and big lampshades and even a live musician quietly doing covers or Bob Dylan and The Eagles and stuff. Yes, it all bode well (boded well? Bade well?) when we went through the door this morning.

I decided not to go too bonkers after having a near-gout experience on Saturday (in my head a sore toe = gout = the foie gras I had the night before exacting its revenge) so I ordered the smoked salmon and scrambled eggs on English muffins. Mr Manbag, for market research purposes only, ordered the full English.

Tea and coffee turned up and it all looked good. Nice pot of tea with a decent quality bag, a mocha with a reasonable amount of froth. And the breakfasts going past all look nice. The waitress came over with Mr Manbag's brekkie on a wooden board (fancy!). Looking good. And then my omelette was brought over to me. Looks nice. Hang on. Omelette? How on earth does smoked salmon and scrambled egg on an English muffin equate to an omelette? Naturally this plate went back without even hitting the table. The waitress apologised and said that my scrambled egg et al would be minutes away. I encouraged Mr Manbag to continue lest his delicious breakfast go cold.

First reports on the full English were good. Streaky bacon (far superior to back in my humble opinion), a couple of sticky looking sausages, a big slab of bubble and squeak, perfectly poached eggs and, oh, hang on, no toast. Where's the toast? You can't have poached eggs without some toast for yolk moppage! Sacrilege! So we ask for toast. And, hurrah! My breakfast arrives.

I take a forkful. Hmm. I was expecting the smoked salmon to be laid on top of the scrambled egg but I am okay with it being mixed in to the scrambled egg. Maybe it's a bit meaner than I was expecting. But this scrambled egg is quite nice. Not overcooked. Tasty. Simple to make but so often done wrong, I feel. And then I notice, underneath the pile of scrambled eggs, that it is not an English muffin that my eggs rest upon. Nope. It is pancakes. Small, sweet Scotch pancakes.

Now I love pancakes. I nearly had pancakes, maple syrup and bacon but held back in the name of being sensible for a change. But surely pancakes aren't going to go with scrambled eggs and smoked salmon? I did try it, dear reader. And I can tell you it was bad. And wrong.

I summoned the waitress over. Again. I asked her isn't this supposed to be with English muffins? These pancakes are sweet and it is all wrong. She went off to check. And at the very moment she came back I discovered a piece of eggshell in my mouth. I pointed this out (and fished out some more shell. Delicious. Crispy, crunchy scrambled eggs). She apologised and called for the manager.

He apologised many times and offered me a different breakfast for free. So naturally I ordered something else. Eggs Benedict. The classic.

I waited. Mr Manbag finished off his breakfast. The feedback was broadly good. But the sausages were different to each other. I asked if he was sure. And he was. Fortunately the second sausage was the better of the two. And he saved his black pudding until last. But he shouldn't have to ask for toast. And the bubble and squeak was too squishy.

And then my breakfast came. Good job too. I was getting peckish and I was jealous of Mr Manbag's veritable feast. Even if it did have odd sausages. And lo, there was ham, there was beautifully poached eggs and there was rich creamy hollandaise sauce which had even been given a few minutes under the grill. Nice.

On pancakes.

They had put my motherflipping Eggs Benedict on motherflipping pancakes. What kind of chef puts classic Eggs Benedict on flipping sweet pancakes? It's every sort of wrong. I'd already sent two plates of food back to the kitchen and they present me with this? What the flip?

I sat there, arms crossed and summoned another waitress. I asked the same question I had asked before. Isn't this supposed to be on English muffins? She just looked a bit baffled. I waited. The delicious hollandaise sauce cooling in front of me. Must be my icy stare. Another waitress comes over. Is there a problem? Yes. There is. Again. Do I really have to explain it? Sorry, we have run out of English muffins. I mean. Okay. I can't get mad at you for not having muffins but you should do at least two things. Firstly tell me that you have no muffins. Not tricky, is it? I've already had one meal which was supposed to have muffins so you can't be that unaware of the kitchen muffin shortage. Secondly replace the muffins with something similar. If you have no muffins then toast would be fine. Sweetened pancakes are really not. They are really wrong. Of course I didn't say this. I just said can you send the manager over please?

So I waited. And waited. The plate was still there. No sign of the manager. And no sign of the cup of tea that I ordered. *sigh*

And then I saw the manager coming through the front door of the restaurant with an M&S carrier bag. I turned to Mr Manbag and said I wonder if he's been out to get muffins and we both laughed. For that would be ridiculous. Wouldn't it?

A moment or two later and the manager came over. He apologised. Lots. And said that he had in fact just been out to get muffins. We expressed our dismay at the mix ups. We said how disappointed we were. We said we were surprised that the kitchen thought that pancakes were a suitable replacement for muffins. And how they had managed to send out three wrong plates of food in a row. Which I guess is quite an achievement. We were firm but fair. We tried to be nice. We left without paying for anything.

We will go back. Give them a second chance. Mostly because of the free bottle of wine we've been promised. Fingers crossed we get to eat together next time.