All plans fail!

I am in a foreign country!

It is the smaller things that tell me so.

Yesterday I attempted to buy marzipan.  Ah yes, you who are older and wiser may smile at my simple minded optimism that such an exotic commodity could be found in what is, after all, an exotic country.  I went to three supermarkets of increasing magnitude asking for marzipan and was met with barely concealed astonishment that I could find it in myself to ask for such an obscure item!

This means of course that my Plan B for my triple chocolate cake is now almost officially dead and I will have to think of Plan C and probably Plan D – or Plan E, which is to avoid all the other plans and do without what I was thinking of in the first place.  That one looks increasingly likely!

My first impulse on being frustrated in something that I want is to spend money.  Which is what I did yesterday; not only then and there but potentially as well.  Ah well, I am not one to deny the therapeutic value of commercial activity!  And at least with this particular purchase I can say that I am actually saving money in the long run.  The very long run!

Though, I am reminded of a comment by my accountant (ah, happy memories when such a thing was even a partial necessity!) who told me in no uncertain terms that, “You should not spend money to save money!”  Sound advice, which I have systematically ignored throughout my life, using the tissue-thin excuse of saving money to justify all sorts of expenses.  It works for me!

We are, amazingly, gearing ourselves up for another round of examinations.  Why we are doing this, even given the warped logic of this school, I know not.  A picture of a typical student from our place would be a child clutching a sheaf of notes being ardently scanned (the notes not the child) and wandering aimlessly among other similarly desolate young humans!

I have given up trying to find marzipan.  I have visited my last supermarket in the search and am fed up with being met by frank disbelief that I should be trying to buy some at this time of the year.  At least in this place they made an attempt to look for it, even though they had told me it didn’t exist!

So I bought a half price garlic crusher instead.  And a spare single cup coffee plunger thingie.  And a half price special tea thingie which a special button which drops the tea into the container.  I know that isn’t well explained, but take my word for it that it qualifies as a sort of gadget and that makes me happy!

Tomorrow the cake and now the final touch with the umpteenth plan just about to be put into effect.