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IN 1979 a crack team of commandos escaped from a maximum security stockade

Ahem.
So hi, how are all three of you? Well, I do hope so. Ormksirk life contnues with interesting variations. There has been rehearsal for this Manchestery guitary thing. Which is fun (and will be a small box ticked in my mental inventory of aims), and beyond that not a great deal.

No, that's not strictly true. Roe and I had the most entertaining meal of our lives at the execrable St Petersburg. I urge anyone with the capability to do so to go. It fascinating. The tone of the evening was set when the waiter insisted we go up the stairs first, largely so he could gaze at Roe's arse, we gathered. Starters were fine, if a little on the smothered in cream side, and my lamb dish was fine, until I came to the side veg. What had been described on the menu as "traditional russian fried potatoes" was nothing more than, well, a pile of stale crinkle cut crisps. Undeterred, and hungry I mashed them into the (otherwise perfectly pleasant) lamb stew.

Roe's "Scallops in a butter sauce" (my inverted commas) weren't so much in butter sauce as in butter, a mingy three or four scallops languishing at the bottom of a bowl of underspiced melted butter. When the waiter asked if we wanted dessert our eyes locked briefly, and each could see that the other was contemplating what horrors the dessert menu may encompass. Don't get me started on the wine. Suffice it to say the the description on the list read as follows: (God I love copy / paste)

Tamada Saperavi (dry red)

18.95
A high quality naturally Dry Red Wine of dark-red colour The tasters are cribbing the bottle. A rich but subtle aroma with good sour plums as one taster less eloquently puts it Tamada has a blessed balance in taste and tannins that has the lady sitting next to you drooling about bitter dark chocolate.

Correct only in that it was read. Precisely what they meant by "the tasters are cribbing the bottle" I have no idea. Russia is not a big exporter of its wines. Now I know why.

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