'Jambone' and a quick stroll to Rome

I have returned! Veni, vidi, vici! (Or as some would have it, weeny, weedy weechy.) I should explain that a couple of weeks ago I walked from Siena to Rome, undertaking a journey that can only be described as epic in terms of length, beauty and of course quantity of pasta. I embarked with a mere 25 other peers all of whom were similarly school leavers with a good-nature, a very fine History teacher with an illustrious surname and good sense of humour, and our expert guide who was none other than my highly esteemed and adroit (if not only slightly eccentric) Italian teacher, who I shall refer to only as ‘our great leader’. We were led through miles of stunningly beautiful Tuscan countryside, the flora varying from acres of sunflowers to vast expanses of barely fields, to seemingly endless expanses of forest, whilst not forgetting the unforgiving canvas of thorns and undergrowth which made no hesitation to cause my shins to sting at every opportunity. We painfully climbed and gingerly descended mountains, crossed streams, stayed with monks and priests who have been carefully nurtured at the rich bosom of the Catholic church, drank from springs and once all that was done, we had the luxury of staying in some of the most quaint towns rural Tuscany and Viterbo had to offer.

It was in these charming places where to my joy (and my teacher's embarrassment) I at last had the opportunity to practice my rather scratchy Italian. I say this, not because I have great problems with getting my head around the grammar, or with picking up words and phrases, but instead because I have a knack for causing awkward embarrassments by insisting on using a word which simply does not exist. Most memorably when I was ordering a pecorino cheese 'panino' (yes, believe it or not it is a panino, not a panini. Make a note.) You see, each morning we would go out and buy ourselves a sandwich, the purpose of which was to serve as a modest lunch en route in the 46 degree sun. Unfortunately however near the beginning of the pilgrimage, as I shall refer to it, I could not quite remember what blasted ham was in Italian. I thought of the Spanish, jamon, the french, jambon, and decided that therefore the closest Italian equivalent would be 'jambone' (pronounced jam-bon-ay). It seemed like a perfectly plausible Italian word, and I thought that if I simultaneously pinched my fingers together and waved my arms about I would sound authentic enough. So, I sidled up to the counter and said smoothly and confidently:

"Vorrei un panino con jambone e pecorino per favore."

The woman at the counter, who I should add was of healthy, matronly proportions and a red physiognomy that had ripened in the summer sun did nothing but stare at me, with an expression that was between confusion and total horror. after the silence got too intense to bare, I decided to repeat myself, this time flapping my arms about more enthusiastically. Mid-sentence, however, she suddenly interrupted me and in a deep, rustic voice that seemed to resonate with a frequency as thick as the slices of cheese on display, bellowed:

"Ma ch'e jambone?!"

Putting emphasis on every syllable. Confronted by a voice that put my own fairly low range to shame, I quite weakly squeaked back:

"Jambone. Jambone! Ma vorrei jambone!!"

What ensued next all happenned in such a flurry; we began a verbal ping pong match of who could shout jambone louder, one in a tone of misunderstanding and frustration, the other in one of total confusion and cluelessness. I finally ended up thrusting my finger at the ham, at which she stopped yelling and instead laughed at me throatily and said:

"Ma questo e prosciutto!"

I let my arms fall to my sides pathetically. Of course. Bloody prosciutto. Trust the Italians to be different. Where the hell does that word come from?!

Other than my linguistic mishaps, other misfortunes befell. And I don't mean the uncanny number of hideous, raw blisters which everyone seemed to harbour. One evening, we were staying in some converted abbadia somewhere, and the girls in one room had unwittingly left the shower running in the bathroom. So as you can imagine, half way through dinner upon opening the doors we were forced to bear witness to a cascade of water flowing quite freely through the ceiling of one of the rooms. It was an accident and wasn't really anyones fault, and for once surprisingly not entirely mine, but I still wanted to drown myself in the mushroom soup from embarrassment. I suppose at least that death would have tasted good. 
...
What?
Anyway, and of course Rome was stunning; I need not elaborate. Except for the few minutes when my ears were forced to endure some Italian woman's terrible rendition of the Spice Girls' song 'Wannabe', my least favourite song of all time. Which naturally I knew all the lyrics to, and ended up singing to myself for the rest of the evening.

So many wonderful and funny things happened on this trip, and I would love to write them all for you, but I do not have enough time or space, and besides even if I tried, in the words of Dante: I could never give full account, for the telling would come short of fact.

PS. Hope everyone who did the walk has a great time at uni.
PPS. To all other readers, I would like to mention that I have since found out I got my Italian qualification. Yay. 

Parading around on a Sunday Morning

My goodness, it has been another few months since I wrote my last post. Silly how when I first started off I updated every other week, but now I can barely write a post a month. I am sorry readers. Exams are looming, and now I am on study leave I have more time to write an update, as well never having another school lesson again, which is in itself a bizarre thought. Overall I have really enjoyed my lessons at school, and do have a deep respect, fondness and appreciation for a few of my teachers, which I will probably maintain for the rest of my life. However, if there is one thing which has characterised me as anything but a good, frugal student, it has to be the way any punishments I receive seem to follow each other in a sort of Butterfly effect.

We have pretty bizarre Draconian punishments at my school; among which is what is affectionately known as a 'pink card'... which is funnily enough a piece of pink card (I now have a serious aversion to pink these days), and 'Sunday Morning Parade'. This is when the 'powers that be' or in reality a biscuit-munching teacher who serves the purpose of being in charge of all punishments (you know, one of those people who spend their entire lives gazing at subfuscous flasks full of chemicals and have the periodic table printed on their pyjamas), requires you to march around the town at an obscene hour on a Sunday morning picking up... litter. Lovely. So come Sunday, when there isn't even any litter left around, we busy ourselves trekking around the campus with essentially nothing to do. It just so happened that one week of an extraordinarily bad run in with three 'pink cards' which had already resulted in one 'Sunday Morning Charade', the library, in some paroxysm of schadenfreude, decided they were going to give me another one for not 'returning my books'. As if anyone even takes books out of libraries anymore, and when someone does, they have to ruin their weekend lie-in. The next time I saw the librarian I was tempted to drop an Oxford English Dictionary on her head.

On another matter, I haven't had a good old rant for sometime, so I think its time for me to re-ignite my complaining voice about one topic which has annoyed me at school: handshakes. Why is it that nowadays people cannot give a normal handshake? Although we could go on forever trying define what we mean by normal, in this case I take it to mean the good solid, firm handshake with a gentle swinging movement which has charactererised our noble, stuffy English culture, but it seems that my generation is incapable of doing a normal handshake. Have you ever just met someone, and they try to pull some palm-slapping switchy, twitchy, friggity hand-jive, which most people would need a special class to train for? And I don't really buy into this whole fist-knocking thing either. I've seen monkeys do this on a nature programme, and not only are we stuck in some anachronism in which we have failed to evolve out of this primitive behavior, we also seem to now have some co-ordination disfunctionality which renders us incapable of just holding someone's hand without finding the need to do some spastic finger snap. At the same time, for those of you who do take part in the humble handshake, if you are going to do it, please don't do limp handshakes as though you've just been treated with flunitrazepam. I suppose the reason I'm going on about all this is because I once did a tour for a prospective student and his mother, who gave me a handshake which was so pathetic it made her hand feel like a piece of dead lettuce.

I also had to explain to her the whole principle of what is called CCF at our school, something which is essentially when the students get the chance to play soldiers with guns, with the excuse of trying to ossify themselves for their later lives. However, some of the boys get a bit too attached to their army kit, going so far as to wear camouflage style trousers and tops in their spare time, with the excuse of that dumb urban-pseudo philosophy:

"Well, I, I wear 'em, cos on the streets, I'mma soldier yo!"

And what you do see them wearing is some acrimonious, bizarre 'designer' camo-trousers sporting the colours yellow and black. What the hell are you trying to blend into? A bee hive?! The worst is white and black... I call this, cow-mouflage.

Speaking of cows, I have had a few unfortunate run-ins with the local fauna at my school. Doing rowing as a sport I have to run down to the boat-house which is happily surrounded by fields of cows. However these silly animals seem to have taken a certain interest in me more than anyone, and I have found myself on numerous occasions running like a maniac away from a pile of inquisitive, charging, 2000 pound lumps of mooing cellulite. We also have a resident dog in my boarding house which, unlike the cows, has a definite hatred of me, and will try to subdue me by any means possible; including pinning me to the ground and barking directly into my face like a manic wolf on LSD.

Still despite all this I will always hold my teachers and merry school days in very high esteem. Who knows. Maybe when I'm a millionaire I'll donate money to the school to hire some bin men.

Listen to the album 'A Thousand Suns' by Linkin Park, as well as 'Fortunate Son' by Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Time for an update

Wow. I can't believe my last post was before Christmas. I apologise. But I am also very glad to say that a lot has happened since then, so for this post I will be writing a gingerbread flavoured, chocolate-topped, cinnamon sprinkled, extra-fruity pineapple double foamy chopped-banana VENTI of a post. Firstly of course, lets not forget New Year's Resolutions. The promises which everyone makes so bravely and then generally break within 2 weeks. This year people have been very bold with their resolutions and I have been very impressed. Although when I was asked what mine were, all I could think of was "I will eat more celeriac and remember to feed the cat". I don't even have a cat. As for the celeriac... I still wouldn't touch it even if it were deep fried, dipped in yogurt, covered with strawberry gum drops and sculpted into something deeply resembling Michelangelo's David.
It seems like a very self-critical process. I mean, people's resolutions always seem to be about changing something they dislike about themselves, never "I will take better care of myself". I have always wondered if criminals ever use New Year's Resolutions in court. 
"Hey, I burnt down someone's house, but I have made a resolution to not do that again! So thats OK!"
But thats the way it always seems to go... you commit a crime, and then before you know it you've found God or some other sympathy attracting ideology like Buddhism, Pacifism, Christianity, Humanism, Vegetarianism....
Anyway, to me, New Year's Resolutions are just about as useful as a chocolate ice-cream teapot.


Near Valentine's Day its seems that everyone begin calling each other by increasingly strange and fluffy names. I don't have a problemo with dear, darling or sweetheart.... they are all very elegant and charmingly nostalgic. Its when people start calling me their little artichoke, or a cute pumpkin. In what possible way is being called a pumpkin in any sense a compliment!? Also, I don't understand why around this time family members start referring to each other by varying sizes of foodstuff. I once met a family who was insistent on calling each other 'Big Cheese' and 'Auntie Cheese', or 'Mummy Cheese'. What was their child supposed to be called?? Babybel?! Is the Italian cousin supposed to be called 'Signor Parmigiano'?!? I know that Goldilocks and the Three Bears is a lovely story, and I do love porridge both salty and sweet, but another thing is to put the family oat-eating fest into practice. No, I am a good fan of the old-fashioned Valentine's day of chivalry and romance, when you receive a big bunch of red roses and some chocolates which you stuff down so quickly you probably turn off your partner completely.


I also found out the verdict of the Americans. I should explain, that I had an interview for an American university, not that I was really intending to go there, but I thought I'd have a go. Anyway, I received a letter saying in a really flamboyant and long-winded fashion that I had been rejected. I t didn't really surprise me. At the beginning of the interview they asked me to describe myself; I told them that was for them to do. They then asked me to talk about my achievements, as though they didn't already have my CV right in front of them. Essentially, they asked me to big my self up and self-grandisize, in a very typical American way, something which is very un-English and I am not accustomed to doing. So, I told them, I had been given the medal of honor, received a knighthood, hosted my own cooking show, and that I can hold my breath for 30 seconds. That confused them. We then got onto what I thought would happen to Cuba when Castro dies; I told them that I though the USA would take over and turn it into Disneyland Havana. I don't think they liked that. Ah well, I was only really interested in the burgers and cheesecake across the Atlantic anyway.


Last weekend I went to Manchester with my quartet to take part in a music course that was being held there, playing a piece by Ravel. It turned out to be really good fun and a nice break from school. We were however, staying in a Premier Inn in what was probably the most dingy area of Manchester possible, and also I was on pretty much the top floor. Like the London Tube, elevators are one of those mysterious places where you are never sure what to say to your fellow companion. Which in my case, just happened to be none other that Manchester's finest, wholesale prostitute. Despite the fact that she was about 40, had hair the colour of a banana souffle and looked as though she has been high all day, she seemed like a perfectly nice person. Being one who is inclined to reserve all judgements, I politely said "Hello" to her. It didn't take long for her to realise that I was clearly not from the area, and so she asked me what I was doing here. I told her that I had come from school and had been doing Maurice Ravel all day, to which she replied;
"Ooooohhhhh!! So you go for tha French guys! You got tayste!!"
I didn't  know whether to be more surprised that she had recognised Ravel to be French, or that she had failed to recognise he has been dead for over a century.

Last week, we had the highly extravagant school concert which went very well, but left everyone exhausted. So when I finally got back to house after a hard day, I decided to go online shopping. As one does. And I was highly entertained by the fact that almost every store I entered had a clearance section, and every clearance section was FILLED with these things which some highly innovative people on the Apprentice decided to create: 'capelets'. They look kind of like ponchos but are not. Ah, the capelet! We had such high hopes for you as a fashion item! But now we have all learned An Important Lesson, namely, "We should not base our Winter line on anything recommended by the contestants on the Apprentice," and also, "Why would anyone actually need a capelet, anyway? This item of clothing makes no sense."

The Capelet: What You Wear When You Just Can't Commit To A Coat! What You Wear When your Shoulders Are Kind Of Chilly, But Not So Much Your Arms!

Anyway. I'm getting a little carried away with the capelets. But my shopping day culminated with the purchase of several items, most of which were for myself. Which is not necessarily the way Lent is supposed to work, but you know. A girl has to have something to wear. Anyway, along my adventure surfing the internet, I came across an amazing offer of a set of 21 domestic knives with a FREE knife sharpener for only £21.99! I was so tempted to buy it, but eventually decided against it, not knowing what I would do with them once I had them. Instead, I decided to do the moral thing and buy a goat for some random family in Africa.

So my shopping spree amounted up to the following:


Gifts Bought: 0
Items of clothing bought for self: 6
Goats Purchased: 1
Domestic Knives NOT purchased: 21, plus a FREE KNIFE SHARPENER
Pointless entries written, but, y'all, it's just so EASY with the movable type and the typing and the thing and then, WHAM, it's there, and I wanted to post something despite the fact that I don't have anything to say, really, and also, the phone keeps ringing and I lose my train of thought so I'm all, uh, people, GIVE ME A SECOND, but there it goes again, and I've forgotten where I was going with this, exactly: 1


Thanks everyone for over 200,000 reads to date!


Happy Belated Birthday to Pini and Cecily! (And mine tomorrow.... Beware the Ides of March!)

Trees and holly

I really cannot believe it. Christmas is almost here once again. I love Christmas; its my favorite time of the year. I don't know about you but I have been heartily filling up on mince pies and madeira wine, as well as decking the halls with boughs of holly and trying to do a bit of much-needed revision (I confess the latter has proved to be the hardest). I got the Christmas tree a few days ago; just so happened that was the day of the great blizzard and the car got stuck in the snow behind several other stranded cars, and so I had to make my way home carrying an 8 foot tree up a hill and through the snow. Ho ho ho. And of course I have been slipping and sliding in the ice (as per usual... I don't think I even have a centre of gravity), watching the Christmas lights and decorating the tree, but this year I have tried to steer clear of hysterical mothers and children dressing each other up in fanciful costumes made out of foam and lycra, and as such I confess that I have not quite felt the sincere religious element to Christmas. However, after listening to the King's College carol service which is, of course, very beautiful (better than our school carol service put it that way) I have been reminded that Christmas is not just about being a mince-pie-munching-turkey-devouring-present-hogging dinosaur. In my fit of nostalgia, I remembered how at my preparatory school we would do the annual nativity play, the only production which always made an effort to include every pupil in the Junior part of the school, and consequently and inevitably all their mothers as well. 


I have never been much of an actress, but when made to as schools generally enforce, I would generally prefer either to play the humorous fool or else the emotionally complex Machiavellian villain (complete with evil laugh). However despite my convictions I was consistently cast as the Angel Gabriel, which as you can imagine I was able to play with as much grace as Ann Widdecombe on roller-skates. As coincidentally suiting as the role may seem, it did not exactly match with my bouncy temperament and religious ambiguity (I was still, by this point, trying to make up my mind as to whether or not Jesus had walked on water... the only conclusion was that it was an exceptionally cold year and he was using ice-skates). But every time I pitched my thoughts, I was told it was either Gabriel or a sheep. 


The year before my promotion to the big-cheese angel, was the year I first featured in and saw a nativity play. From my teachers' flowery explanation and frequent use of the word "miracle," I was expecting to be blown away by the production. Unfortunately, the mums and the pathetic excuses for actors that they called their offspring failed to bring the characters to life in the way I had hoped.  And the story just seemed to center around everyone being really impressed with Jesus and there wasn't much plot suspense, dramatic irony, character depth and not a single battle scene. And yet, all the parents seemed to be enthralled by the production. I could see that the story had potential, but I was rather disappointed by the experience. The following year I decided that on day I was going to take matters into my own hands. My opportunity came when I was in the final year of the Junior school, and so of course felt very superior and independent, oblivious to the truth of that I was still only at the age of when one thinks Leonardo da Vinci is a famous actor who played in a film called Titanic which is about a boat invaded by aliens.
All the teachers had gone for a coffee break and so the only remaining adults were a couple of parents who had been cooking with wine and brandy and had occasionally put some in the food.
I stood up and said with great determination that I was going to reinvent the production, and that this time it would be AMAZING. I began with my own part.


I ad-libbed my lines with great sincerity, punctuating my words in a very thespian manner and announcing  to where the audience would sit how Mary was to give birth to Jesus, the son of God.
My attention then turned to the girl who was to play Mary. I felt that the plight of the character needed to be emphasized. The audience really needed to understand that she was suffering. I constructed her costume accordingly. I ruffled up her blue cloak (why is it always blue?), back-combed her hair and made her talk with a croaking stammer and walk with a cane and a limp. She was also deaf. 
I demanded that Joseph shout at the inn-keeper with passionate rage until he let them in.
It was finally time for Jesus to be born. Due to my incomplete understanding of childbirth, the scene I directed involved Jesus being tossed across the room, as if in flight, and then Mary running over to where he landed and acting really surprised to find him there.
I then ordered for the Three Kings to come and present their gifts. They came on stage and yelled, as if the baby Jesus were partially deaf or mentally challenged "HELLO JESUS. WE COME BEARING GIFTS." They stretched out their hands which were empty. I ordered for the two mothers who were now giggling uncontrollably and were also pretty intoxicated to find something the Three Kings could present to the baby Jesus. They scavenged around the room for a few minutes and then returned bearing a flower vase, a pack of cigarettes and an Elvis Presley cassette. I told them that it wouldn't do; Jesus doesn't like Elvis Presley. They replied: "Oh of course Jesus does. He and Elvis share one common trait... they are both immortal". And they both broke into raucous laughter. At this point the teachers came back to see how we were getting on, and saw two parents in hysterics, Joseph gone ballistic, Mary having an epileptic fit, and Jesus lying in the manger with a packet of fags. 


So lets all forget our troubles and enjoy Christmas with family and friends, in the spirit of giving and loving. In all honesty, Christmas is my favorite time of the year, and so this leaves me with just one more thing to say;


MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL.

Let there be light...

Finally at long last I have re-posted! I have to owe this massive delay to the hectic lead up to universities and exams. Now is the time when everything seems to be in full drive, and I must have confess, I have had barely no time at all. When eating begins to seem like a loss of time to me, I definitely know that something is very wrong. All around people seem only to be talking of their next homework assignment, university applications and interviews, and there seems to be a general air of stress about the place. And now the days are getting shorter and ice starting to form all over the pavements, a feeling of 'health-and-safety' seems to really be in full swing. And I don't even like health and safety (goggles to play conkers.... ha) .
Walking on my way to merry old compulsory school chapel, I was attempting to prove my eclectic capabilities and do the old ice-skate-on-the-icy-pavement move in some crazy moment of impulsive behaviour. I very nearly wiped out in front of half the school, but luckily regained balance at the last minute, and casually strolled off hoping that know one noticed. Eventually we all filed into the chapel, and were seated in the most random fashion in between parents,other houses, and just plain strangers. I have to say, when the chapel was plunged into darkness, I really did feel a sense of mystery and religious comfort what with the light coming up through the stained glass windows and the choir chanting from ambiguous places. But when the lights came glaring back on at "and God said let there be light", I couldn't help but think "well gee God I thought you could do better than tungsten from Ikea". Then of course candles were lit during the service (I swear I thought someone's hair was going to be set alight at any moment), and people gave addresses about the annunciation (I've always thought Mary was such a weirdo... I mean, if some random angel came along to tell me that I was to give birth to the son of God my first response would be to say "hahahahahha..... wait, you gotta be kiddin' me man!"), and then of course the entire congregation bellowed out the hymns at full volume. I think one of the lines about Christ in the last hymn was "deeply wailing", which is probably the most accurate description possible of what it was.
However sitting in the chapel listening to the choir sing beautiful hymns with the ethereal atmosphere of candles and flowers really made me think... what if there are more important things in life than universities and exams, applications and interviews? What if these things really don't matter at all. We should all just enjoy advent and the anticipation for christmas, playing about in the snow, singing songs and forgetting about the routine and toil of school. I suppose you could say I had an epiphany of sorts; I am going to forget about all the stress and expectations, the necessary assignments and revision. I'm going to be the ultimate rebel... screw physics prep and english essays. I am just going to sit back and relax, watch the sun shine through frost covered trees, walk through the powdered snow with friends, and admire the beauty and surreality of the winter aura. After all, it seems so foolish to waste its wonder and charm on trivial endeavours and exertions. One could do worse than be a wanderer of the snow.

Right, ehem, uh, I think I should go finish my homework now.

Listen to 'Trouble is a Friend' by Lenka and 'All the Money or the Simple Life Honey' by the Dandy Warhols.

Remember, Remember

Once again, Bonfire Night has passed, and we have all gone out to enjoy the fireworks and bonfires and gunpowder. I absolutely love fireworks and bonfires; I’m a bit of a pyromaniac like that. Its not that I like running about the place setting everything I see alight or am planning blowing up the Houses of Parliament anytime soon, but there is something quite surreal and wonderful about fire. It’s unlike any of the other elements; water and earth and air are all tangible in some sense, or are at least made up of some sorts of atoms we are aware of. But fire isn’t anything you can capture or hold, its just pure, abstract energy. And for this reason, I find it totally mesmerizing (oh I am such the physicist.) However, having said this, I cannot say all my experience with fireworks has been wonderful. Speaking of ‘remember, remember’, I remember when I was a lot younger back in the good ol’ days of when all the kids in the town would meet around a massive bonfire, and then retreat to one particularly welcoming parent’s house (heaven forbid) for some jolly old fireworks. However I distinctly remember that in one year, I was particularly interested in the all-you-can-eat- buffet, which as you can imagine, I took to mean literally. So rather than being interested in the sparklers, the apple bobbing, and the eloquent conversation of fellow 7 year olds, I busied myself with stuffing my face with as much burger, sausage, avocado and cake as I could possibly fit in. In fact, I ate so much, I think I turned into a massive black-hole sucking in every possible edible thing which had been roasted on charcoal, until the world was stripped of all things smoky and covered in ketchup. Anyway, I was so busy eating all this food, I was completely oblivious to the fact that the giant ‘Golden Fountain of Midos’ had been set alight, and that everyone had retreated to the back of the garden. And suddenly, midway between bites of hot-dog, this huge explosion set off right next to me, and the next thing I knew, I was prancing about the place, yelling for someone to turn it off, trying to avoid the sparks of fire which were coming straight towards my face. My first instinct was to throw the hot-dog into the inferno, which just set on fire and bounced back at me. So not only was I avoiding the firework itself, I know had an evil fire-sausage on my trail. I was jumping about so much, that all the other kids thought I was part of the act, like some Greek sprite doing a hot-dog ritual, and so just stood there going “oooooohhh” and “aaaaahhh”. Even these days, I still have a fear of demonic hot-dogs.

Please, just please watch anything by Charlie Chaplin. Especially the ‘Great Dictator’. Frickin’ amazing. Listen to ‘Mad World’ by Gary Jules, and ‘Run On’by Moby.

Supermarket Mishaps

Well, I am not going to lie, I felt pretty crap today; although I have done my upmost best to avoid it I finally succumbed to the dry, coughing throat thing that inevitably occurs at the end of every cold. So, I decided to head off to Tesco to buy myself some nice honey and a few lemons to try and make the old ‘lemony hot water honey’ concoction to soothe my glands. Supermarkets are funny places don’t you think; not only is everything not in the place you would expect it to be, you always have some kind of awkward problem like, the scales for the self-service counter not working, or rogue trolleys rolling away from you (or in my case, with me) at a speed that would rival that of the cars in the Grand Prix. Anyway, I arrived at the local Tesco and after having grabbed some lemons (and a couple of avocadoes for good measure), I set about searching for the honey. But being a complete supermarket retard, I had no idea where to start. So I thought… if I were a pot of honey where would I be… I started in the jams and conserves section; no luck. Went over to sauces and dressings; no further discoveries there. I began to feel a lot like Winnie-the-Pooh. I passed by all sorts of rows of interesting foodstuffs like spreadable (ha) butter and Scottish smoked salmon which is in fact grown in Chile, smoked in Spain and merely packeted in Scotland, until I finally encountered the honey section, which turned out to be next to the eggs (who’d have thought.)

I chose a good old orange blossom out of countless exotic variations, and it was at that precise moment, just as I had reached up and lifted up the heavy glass jar of sweet, liquid amber when I saw them: stacked right on the top of the very top shelf of the honey section, were boxes upon boxes of the most delicious looking, sumptuous cakes. Why any supermarket would put its goods far higher up than any human could possibly reach beats me. I tried to be a true Catholic, resist temptation, not be a glutton and all that jazz, but I must confess that my inner cake-monster got the better of me. (Father, I have sinned: I ate cake.) My ‘must have food at any cost’ motive immediately kicked in, and aided by my wiry frame, I began to use my bizarre climbing abilities to scale the skyscrapers of honey jars. No-one could stop me, no-one would pull-me down, no-one could stand between me and MY cake; no-one except perhaps gravity. With each lurch I could see my goal coming ever closer, and although I could feel the distinct wobble of jars and eggs on either side of me, I ventured upwards. Meanwhile various members of the public were taking much interest in my crazy acrobatic antics that were terrorizing the honey shelves of the Amersham Tesco, and I was surprised at how many people were actually willing to take time out of their busy schedules to stand and watch an aspiring Indiana Jones in action. Mainly with their eyebrows raised.

I am pleased to announce that I got my cake and returned to earth safely without any further incident nor with the need to call the fire-brigade. However I subsequently ran into an old friend who I’d known when I was…  about 5 years old. What are you supposed to do when you run into somebody who you knew a long time ago, but have completely lost contact with? Especially in a place like a supermarket?  You used to be too well acquainted to completely ignore them and not say hello, but at the same time you haven’t seen them for so long that there are too many things that have changed and occurred for you to update them in a one-off conversation. So instead, you just stand there making small talk, and talking about… the most irrelevant thing you can think of.

“Hi there!”

“Oh wow hi! Haven’t seen you in a long time!”

“Yes, how are you?”

“I’m OK thanks… you know, just normal. How about you?”

“Oh right, that’s good... yes I’m fine… getting on with life…”

“Yes I see… so ummm… why are you here?”

“Uhhh… doing the shopping… you know…”

“Um yes of course… I’m just buying a pizza…”

“Oh cool… yeh, I once bought a pizza… it was yummy.”

“Oh right… I’m so glad.”

“…”

“…”

“Right, well, it was really nice seeing you.”

“Yeh you too… give my regards to the family.”

“Likewise. Byeeeeee.’

Completely pointless, but nevertheless, completely necessary. So I waddled over to pay for my commodities and joined the shortest queue available, which naturally, took the longest to recede. After 20 minutes of queuing and paying I left the Tesco. A labrador tottered past me with a banana in its mouth as a hysterical young child ran after it.

Whilst you’re fishing for your salmon listen to ‘Blood Bank’ by Bon Iver, and to get you through the supermarket queues, listen to ‘Dancing With Myself’ by Billy Idol.