There are few things that show up the vulnerability of the British than a faulty kettle.
It is never a pleasant thing to discover that you are a walking, talking, thirsty stereotype!
The bloody light on the kettle wouldn’t come on, and that reassuring rumble of 2Kw of electric power surging into action was silenced. My default approach to electronic equipment which fails to work is to hit it. If that fails to work then to hit it again. And again.
This tripartite pugilistic approach actually brought the light back on!
Then it failed to work again. My world stopped. Life without tea. Unthinkable!
You might, were you not British, consider heating up water in a saucepan. But it is not the same. Any Brit worth his tea bags can tell when water has been heated in this way rather in a bona fide saucepan. Heating water in a saucepan is the sort of thing that someone who heats milk to put in tea would do. And that, as Lady Bracknell would say, puts one in mind of the worst excesses of the French Revolution. And we all know what that unfortunate event led to!
The misery of tea-less existence was augmented by the misery of dripping taps.
The tap in Toni’s bathroom was leaking. This being a rented flat we informed the thieving bastards who masquerade as estate agents and who are supposed to represent our interests as tenants. To my speechless amazement we were informed that the replacement of the tap would be the responsibility of us, the tenants! After five months of living in the flat we had to replace an old tap. Why? Well, we were told, those things which we use ‘every day’ were our responsibility to replace. A light bulb I can understand; but a tap? Since when have taps only lasted seven months? Our new tap will be there for the increasing of the wealth of our Mercedes driving landlord long after we have left. The simple injustice of this system takes my breath away!
We have now replaced the tap and emptied our wallets. I was so annoyed by the whole episode that I bought myself some flowers; I have given up hope of Toni buying any. I also bought the next volumes in my double series of books which are on special offer with La Vanguardia newspaper.
The Grans Genis De L’Art a Cataluna has now reached the sixth volume and the painter Joan Miró. Miró is another Catalan artist with whom I have problems in appreciating. I have to say that this series of little books has managed in its limited space to produce a stimulating range of paintings from each artist which do encourage a retrospective interest. In Miró’s case there are some very interesting early works
It is never a pleasant thing to discover that you are a walking, talking, thirsty stereotype!
The bloody light on the kettle wouldn’t come on, and that reassuring rumble of 2Kw of electric power surging into action was silenced. My default approach to electronic equipment which fails to work is to hit it. If that fails to work then to hit it again. And again.
This tripartite pugilistic approach actually brought the light back on!
Then it failed to work again. My world stopped. Life without tea. Unthinkable!
You might, were you not British, consider heating up water in a saucepan. But it is not the same. Any Brit worth his tea bags can tell when water has been heated in this way rather in a bona fide saucepan. Heating water in a saucepan is the sort of thing that someone who heats milk to put in tea would do. And that, as Lady Bracknell would say, puts one in mind of the worst excesses of the French Revolution. And we all know what that unfortunate event led to!
The misery of tea-less existence was augmented by the misery of dripping taps.
The tap in Toni’s bathroom was leaking. This being a rented flat we informed the thieving bastards who masquerade as estate agents and who are supposed to represent our interests as tenants. To my speechless amazement we were informed that the replacement of the tap would be the responsibility of us, the tenants! After five months of living in the flat we had to replace an old tap. Why? Well, we were told, those things which we use ‘every day’ were our responsibility to replace. A light bulb I can understand; but a tap? Since when have taps only lasted seven months? Our new tap will be there for the increasing of the wealth of our Mercedes driving landlord long after we have left. The simple injustice of this system takes my breath away!
We have now replaced the tap and emptied our wallets. I was so annoyed by the whole episode that I bought myself some flowers; I have given up hope of Toni buying any. I also bought the next volumes in my double series of books which are on special offer with La Vanguardia newspaper.
The Grans Genis De L’Art a Cataluna has now reached the sixth volume and the painter Joan Miró. Miró is another Catalan artist with whom I have problems in appreciating. I have to say that this series of little books has managed in its limited space to produce a stimulating range of paintings from each artist which do encourage a retrospective interest. In Miró’s case there are some very interesting early works
which show little sign of the sparse faux juvenile symbolist surrealism that characterise his later years.
The National Geographic series on the Patrimonio de la Humanidad concentrates on Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Among the wealth of religious buildings which has been the staple of past volumes, it was refreshing to see industrial monuments in this volume together with the Bauhaus
and fossils!
The kettle has been replaced with a rather elegant Bosch model and I have purchased a cheap kettle to take to school for my classroom. The way in which the school day is organised in our place means that I can be without my Indian Drug for hours at a time. This is not good for me or the pupils I teach. A Briton without a regular tea fix is a basically unstable element in the educational system.
Infuse those leaves!
PS. This is blog number 400! That must mean something. Mustn't it?
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