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Saturday, February 16, 2013

Where's the sun?


The day has started with a grumpy sort of sullenness which is not the ideal incentive to gird loins and get to the swimming pool.  Nevertheless, my desire for physical exercise has the added inducement of displacement activity as I should now be penning a description of Coketown as outlined in the first five chapters of Hard Times.  This little exercise is more difficult that it should be because I have lost a book.  Lost electronically!

I last read Hard Times in an eBook format and experimented with highlighting and associating notes with the highlights in a more than adventurous manner.  All lost!  I have tried computer after Kindle and nowhere is the edition of the book that I used to be found.  I have bought a new edition (OU approved) but I cannot believe that this new version has written over the last one.  My book must be there, but lurking is some sort of obscure folder that I have not yet opened.

The ironic thing is that this is an electronic example of what is hidden behind closed doors of the IKEA Billy bookcases in the living room – chaos.  It is nice to see that electronic verisimilitude extends to mirroring human indolence and lack of organization in the so-called real world!

The weather, as is the way in this country, perked up a bit and we had a few scraps of sunshine, but then there was a half hearted attempt at rain and now we are back to “brightly dull” which is the default position of this climate when it is not sunny.

Chocolate Week, by popular demand, has been extended to an unprecedented Second Week and I have taken it upon myself to promise further chocolates made with my own fair hand.  I have been stymied in this laudable intention by a complete lack of suitable raw materials not provided by our local Carrefour.  I am yet to find a shop which actually sells marzipan for example!  Such barbarism!

I trust that I have learned from my last attempts and this batch (should I get the stuff) will be a marked improvement.  I shall attempt to make them substantially smaller and each to have a little less sweetness than the normal daily sugar intake of a family of six!

Perhaps we can go to St Boi and the hypermarket before we have our meal-  As it turned out it was after the meal that we went there – and no marzipan was to be had for love nor money.  But the meal itself was interesting.

When I first arrived in Castelldefels I used to go to a restaurant called Club Lancaster.  I thought it was the last thing in value for money and interesting food.  I still remember with warmth and appreciation the first leaving of a bottle of wine on my table.  Should I drink it or was it just left there as a forgetful gesture of a harassed waiter?  I thin I actually asked!  Much to the amusement of the waiter who urged me to drink.  And drink I did.  So this is living in Spain, I thought to myself.  How good can it get?

Well, with experience, a bloody sight better!  And now that restaurant has closed down and an brand new Indian restaurant has taken its place.  Admittedly only one of the chefs is actually Indian, all the rest are Pakistani – just like the so-called Indian restaurants in Britain – but the food was good.  Over-priced possibly, but good nevertheless.  Somewhere to take the Pauls when they come over!  And we were given two shots before we left – which is a positive invitation to come back!

I have failed to find any marzipan.  I will be driven to go on YouTube to find out just how it is made!

I do have glacĂ© cherries so it is possible for me to make the super-calorie sweets that I mad previously though I do have some calorie reduced ingredients to help make them this time – and a little less calorifically explosive!

Tomorrow is a workday in which the horror of marking has to be leavened with the delights of writing about Dickens.

Roll on Monday!

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