Thursday 30 April 2009

Lunch!

Sort of succumbed to temptation today.

Peppered smoked salmon with new potatoes and rocket (280 cals) and a pack of ready to eat King prawns with a marie rose type dip. Shouldn't have had the prawns, but the good news is I was going to have them for supper if I had managed to get a sausage roll from the west Cornwall pasty shop.

And I really want to lose weight before Canadia. 24 days to go :-)

Wednesday 29 April 2009

Nay Nay and thrice Nay

For some reason I am thinking of Frankie Howerd today, no idea why, anyway that is the reason for the titles of these bits!

Twitter ye not

I have been thinking about twitter, a lot of people seem to be using it, however firstly I cannot imagine that there are people who are interested enough in me to want to know what I am doing every five minutes (generally I’m not interested in what I am doing every five minutes) and secondly, as anyone who has struggled through my entries knows I think that 140 characters is beyond me. I have to admit I am having difficulty keeping up with my chums on Facebook (Although I am well impressed with Dragonflies on Bejewelled blitz and Bebo on Chain RXN).

The Prologue

The obligatory whine - had a really bad drive in yesterday, my journey is sort of divided into three parts and all of them were very crowded and very slow, it took me almost two hours instead of the normal one, to cap it all I was feeling slightly lightheaded and “not right”. Drive in this morning was about 75 minutes, but not stressed like yesterday, and I am feeling well, so no worries.

Get your titters out

Actually I have a t-shirt somewhere with a photo of Frankie on the back and “Frankie says Get your Titters out” on the front. Anyway I’m going to stick to the tried and tested and go for another joke that I told on MCs blog.

Some chappie has been sitting on a motorway for about four hours, and nothing is moving at all. Eventually someone knocks on his window. After exchanging greetings the chap in the car says

“Any idea on what’s the problem with the traffic?” and t’other chap relies

“Well, about five miles up the road a bunch of terrorists have captured Gordon Brown, Jacqui Smith, Peter Mandleson, and Tony Blair (spit) and are threatening to douse them in petrol and set them alight unless they are given ten million pounds ransom, I’m coming round doing the collection now”

“How much are other people giving?”

“About a gallon”

I thank you, I’m also available for pantomimes and bar mitzvahs.

Ooooh Missus

So I was driving into work on Monday, and realised just how blasé I seem to have become. I went to Windsor on Sunday morning, my supermarket is nicely located in the middle of the town, and it was a gorgeous day so I parked up and went for a brief mooch around town, had a cup of coffee, meandered around the station, my favourite shop seems to have shut down, but in this environment a nick-nack shop may well have problems, ambled along the high street, nearly all restaurants, fudge shop, and bank but I love looking at restaurant menus, then down Pescod street, which is probably more the main shopping street but has mostly shops that locals might use, Tchibo, M&S, Waterstones, Ryman, Dyas etc. where again I enjoyed just window shopping until I reached Hotel Chocolat. Where I succumbed to temptation and purchased some of their filled choccies, (drunken raspberry, cup-a-cinno, and a bar of peppermint filled). They are still seriously the best chocolate I have ever had (apart from my first memory of an old recipe crème egg of course). They are in the US now, and may deliver to Canadia from the UK, but looking at the shipping price that aint going to happen! Actually I did send someone a bar of their chocolate, and haven’t heard if it has arrived or not, I really should check. After that some more meandering and finally Waitrose and my shopping bogof on pizza express pizzas! Now I adore Pizza Express, but like most (well all in my experience) restaurants, once they chill it and sell it the product just isn’t the same, still they are doing a new pizza with a salad in the middle http://www.pizzaexpress.com/promotions/leggera.aspx yes it does sound strange, but at the same time… Once again I purchased a rotisserie chicken, and once again popped to my mothers on the way back so it was cold when I eventually got home but I adore chicken sandwiches, and a whole cooked chicken was about one pound fifty more than three slices of chicken breast.

So (you may justifiably ask) what the heck has this got to do with being blasé? Well, I didn’t even register the castle, if you have ever been to Windsor you know that the town is dominated by it, if you are on the high street by the station it is more like a huge wall of rock than anything else, but I didn’t even notice. Also I was there at the right time for the changing of the guards (and there were not too many tourists around) but I just walked down the hill window shopping.

And why did I think about it on Monday? My drive into work is via Hampton Court (btw I used to play real tennis there, I think I was ranked about 8002 in the world, that is if only 8000 people played the game, I enjoyed it but was truly terrible) a nice little nook of the world, I never register it when I am driving in to the office, I know I have to concentrate on the road and all the idiots who have been allowed control of over a ton of metal with apparently little training on how to do so, and the worse idiots who appear to think being on a pushbike means that they are invulnerable, but still I would like to think that I would take it in occasionally.

I work in a big town which I used to love shopping in, haven’t been into the town further than M&S for a salad for over a month.

Dash it cannot think of any more 1

I have booked my hotels in Canadia! Three nights on points in Toronto when I arrive, then the train to London, three nights there, then back to Toronto and a different hotel, another five nights there, then down to Niagara for two nights.

The only irksome thing at the moment is that I seem to be unable to hire a car at the airport for the drive to Niagara, my hotel is in the middle of town (allegedly) but I would rather start driving on the wrong side of the car with slightly fewer traffic lights and side streets, so I can get used to it. (Yes I said “The wrong side of the car” the whole world drove on the left until the French decided to do it differently).

So now I need to book some baseball tickets, and work out what to do in London and Niagara. Although of course this may all change again if the Hhilton decide to drop me too far down the loyalty scheme.

Dash it cannot think of any more 2


And finally (OK this is a lot longer than I intended, and full of sound and fury accomplishing nothing) I would like to thank Buggy, I seem to have been in a bit of a fugue lately, and her enthusiasm about books has made me decide that I will set aside at least an hour a night to read, I have a number of books in my flatlet that I haven’t read yet, and that shouldn’t be allowed (apart from Tanith Lee books).


Peace out!

Saturday 18 April 2009

Chinese Super Supper

Took my Mother out for her Birthday yesterday, her actual Birthday was a couple of weeks ago but this was the first time my Brother could make it. So I took her to a Chinese restaurant about 12 miles away.

The way the restaurant works is that you order whatever you want for a set price, so we ordered a lot of appetizers, and then half a crispy duck between the three of us! When it came to the main courses we were pretty much full. We ordered two mains, the waiter suggested that we may want more, the portions were small, and they were both delicious, however I think we were all glad that we didn't order more. Alovely meal for twenty quid each, you can't really do better than that.

My favourite Chinese food though is Dim Sum, I have to go to London to have anything other than Siu Mai, but it is always so worth it, my ultimate favourites are the paper wrapped prawn, and Har Kau. If there was room in my freezer I would pop up to the Chinese supermarket and buy a few packs tomorrow.

The weather has been quite springlike for two or three weeks, which is generally lovely I have managed to take a few walks which has been pleasent, the only downder is that this has been the worst year in record for pollen, so half the country seems to have the snuffles!

I found out a couple of days ago that a friend of mine may be getting married in Toronto a couple of weeks after I leave! Still they want a quiet wedding.

Monday 13 April 2009

Dwarf Back

Well, it is a long time since I have written in the blog :-( Apart from about my holiday of course.

Truth to tell my life continues a little dull, oh I get excited at the latest government scandal or idiocy, however even though there are a couple of scandals a week now Gordon still seems less corrupt than tony bliar who was just pure evil.

Just generally been working and sleeping.

I was listening to the wireless the other day and they were talking to Benny and Bjorn from Abba and once again raised the possibility of an Abba reunion, which was shot down because they feet that their energy on stage was a very important part of their shows, and everyone would be dissappointed by seeing 50 year olds with less energy doing those shows. Having seen Bjorn Again a couple of times I would have to agree with them.

The reason that this comes to mind is that three new episodes of Red Dward were made and broadcast this Easter, and they were very very disappointing.

Friday 10 April 2009

Toronto

So I have booked my flights to Toronto with some airline called Air Transat, never heard of them, but the club class was relatively inexpensive, and the times of the flights were very good, no early start either end and landing at civilised times both ways.

Still in the planning phase at the moment, I'm thinking of Toronto for three days, Casoloma, Royal Ontario Museum and maybe Toronto island (noticed a restaurant called Bite Me that sounds good).

Then head off by train to Kingston (I work in Kingston!) for a couple of days just looking around the waterfront and town, then back to Toronto to catch a Blue Jays game, do some more sauntering and to meet some nice people :-)

Then off to the airport on Tuesday to pick up a hire car and drive up to the Deerhurst resort to chill for a couple of days, then down to Niagara falls for half of Thursday and Friday, drop off the car and home :-)

Hotels? Now where to stay? I have booked the Hilton at Niagara, but am not sure about where to stay in Toronto itself, I think I would like to be in the city so that I am able to get around easier, the Cosmopolitan looks very nice. As above I am not planning on driving until I have left Toronto so I need somewhere central, being a diamond Hhilton person staying there would probably be good, but it does seem pricey.

Still thinking of maybe hiring a car for a bit earlier and going out to the burbs instead of Kingston though.

Wednesday 1 April 2009

Holiday!

I have finally managed to agree a fortnights holiday!

So where to go?

There was a super deal with Air France to San Francisco, but that has disappeared now :-(

Still considering Toronto and/or San Francisco, blowing the last of my BA miles :-) Also hoping that my Hilton Diamond card lasts!

Anyway, does anyone have any interesting places to suggest that I visit? I can sit on a beach for about two days without going mad, and I like interesting things to see. However for places like China and Japan I would prefer to go on a package and this is going to be an independent deal.