Skip to main content

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.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What is happening?

An unpleasant, but in the grand scheme of things quite minor, incident occurred at a local school yesterday. Two lads entered the premises looking for another kid they wanted to assault. The school followed protocols and was locked down until the situation was resolved. Grim enough in and of itself, but not exactly a massive piece of news. Except, of course, on local Facebook pages, where a cast of many hang around visibly thirsting for events like this. This isn't a post about them, however. There is something desperately sad about a million posts on the same subject, everyone breathlessly recycling the same story without checking whether it might have already been covered. It speaks to an unfulfilled existence. Nor is this a post about Facebook and it's local pages, though they are a weird and interesting ecosystem. Were it not for running the pub, my Meta presence would be minimal, I need to be on there for work, and stuff like this is a necessary accoutrement. No, what depr...

Inedible

"He says it's inedible" said my front of house manager, as she laid the half-eaten fish and chips in front of me, and instantly I relaxed.  Clearly, I observed, it was edible to some degree. I comped it, because I can't be arsed arguing the toss, and I want to make my front of house's lives as simple as possible. The haddock had been delivered that morning. The fryers had been cleaned that morning. The batter had been made that morning (and it's very good batter, ask me nicely and I'll give you the recipe some time). The fish and chips was identical to the other 27 portions I'd sent out on that lunch service, all of which had come back more or less hoovered up, we have have a (justified, if I do say so myself) very good reputation for our chips. But it was, apparently, "inedible". When it comes to complaints, less is more. If you use a hyperbolic word like that, I'll switch off, you've marked yourself as a rube, a chump, I'm not g...

Worthless Art

Ah, we're back to calling humanities degrees rip-offs, are we? What a semi regular treat that is. There is a persistent strain of thought in British public life which runs thus: things are shit, blame clever people. When a politician needs a convenient punchbag, higher education is always a quick and easy mark. Everyone hates students, right? And those lecturers, bit up themselves, aren't they? And so Kemi Badenoch, bereft of ideas, takes up the cudgels once more, because why not? It's not like she's got anything else sensible to say. Might as well try and score a few populist points. Cuh, English degrees eh? What use are they?  Yes, this week, the erstwhile leader of His Majesty's Opposition decided to wander down a tired and well-trodden path and try to score a few points off the back of the much maligned Arts and Humanities. She's not the first, I highly doubt she'll be the last. She set out plans to a somewhat sparsely attended Conservative Party Confere...