We meet The Old Farmer who is out for a morning stroll in open toed sandals, black leggings, voluminous khaki shorts and his brown cut off dressing gown jacket. He still hasn't heard back from the Belarus Embassy in Paris about his proposed trip.
The supermarket freshly stocked with foreign 'delicacies' ahead of the holidays. Marshmallow spread, peanut butter and chocolate cookies fill the 'American' shelves. Bottles of Ginger Ale lurk on the bottom shelf . At 2.45 euros for a small 25 centilitre bottle they're likely to be there for some time. Exotic delicacies don't come cheap.
The English shelf ( No point in a Scotsman trying to point out it should be British ) is home to Heinz Baked Beans, Marmite, a wide variety of potato chips and assorted Muesli's. Perhaps the French think is all that Brits and Americans live on.
There is a sale of grape pip oil. It must be popular as there are mountains of the stuff towering over the aisles.
When we get home Bob is sporting his long suffering '' I've been here alone guarding '' face.
Angus spends much of his morning dealing with the fancy furniture store in Tottenham Court Road. The after sales service is abysmal. Finally he gets through to the Finance Directors Secretary. She seems horrified that a customer might have the audacity to call her and ask to talk to her boss. She adopts a tone of haughty froideur. I am promised that the problem will be dealt with by this afternoon. We shall see.
Interesting thoughts on how we can use our postal service to help an aging population. The system is already in use on Jersey will it be trialed on the mainland ? : https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2018/04/23/roy-mayall/call-and-check/?utm_source=LRB+blog+email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20180424+blog&utm_content=ukrw_subs_blog
This is a cheerful start to a Wednesday : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=go1vsCgzFJo
Had never heard the word ' incel ' before the Toronto attack : https://www.straight.com/news/1063001/toronto-mass-murder-suspect-alek-minassian-declared-incel-rebellion-and-praised
13 comments:
I have to admit that I always look forward to the arrival of your Fluff photos every spring. Looking at this year's selection of USA and English delicacies, I was thinking maybe they'd inadvertently switched the Cadbury chocolate and the Heinz baked beans, but Wikipedia informs me there are both English Heinz baked beans and American Heinz baked beans and that they are VERY different. So perhaps there is American Cadbury chocolate as well. In any event it's nice to see food go global. We actually have a Deeney's food truck parked outside our local supermarket these days - just in case anyone in central Tokyo is seized with a sudden yearning for a haggis sandwich.
Lovely picture of Sophie today. I also look forward to the reappearance of your wisteria every spring, although I am deeply jealous. We have a little potted wisteria out on our balcony, but that's not at all the same and, worse yet, something has upset it this year and we have no flowers at all.
Ah yes, muesli, that traditional English breakfast cereal! This Englishwoman who lives in Scotland is just tucking into the very same in a hotel in Amsterdam.
The USA section never contains stuff I actually need, like aluminum-free baking powder, canned pumpkin purée or Girl Scouts Thin Mints.
Re the Call and Check--it was par for the course a few (3 or 4) decades ago, at least in France and Belgium. The postman would help the elderly bring in their delivery of coal, or would pick up a prescription and drop it off. They would stop and chat, especially with older residents, having a cup of coffee or a shot of liqueur (which probably didn't help their driving, but there were fewer cars on the road then). A number of retired postmen have lamented that the emphasis on making the post profitable has come at the expense of isolated and lonely pensioners.
Not a huge leap from incels to Tuesday's New York Times article about "Trump Voters Driven by Fear of Losing Status, Not Economic Anxiety, Study Finds." It says: "White, Christian and male voters, the study suggests, turned to Mr. Trump because they felt their status was at risk." Meanwhile, another article in the NYT today points out that there are as many CEOs named John as there are women CEOs, so white male privilege is alive and well.
We have friends in Palo Alto ( he an ambassador to a mid east country, she a physicist in a large university ) who took a two week vacation driving around the heartlands and found to their amazement that de-industrialisation is a thing and that the incumbent is as popular as ever. A trip to Youngstown explained why. It's not just voters in the rust belt or Brexit voters in the UK who feel aggrieved if this article in Der Spiegel is to be believed : http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-and-immigration-the-changing-face-of-the-country-a-1203143.html
Never knew US baked beans were different to US ones. Aren't you heading off to Scotland university visiting soon ?
Muesli is probably the most exciting option with a Dutch breakfast. Dutch breakfasts being like Swedish ones heavy on milk and strangely processed bread.
Hari OM
...Although the UK ones are called baked beans, they’re not the sweet, thickly sauced kind that most Americans are familiar with. Instead they are rather plain with just a light tomato sauce. (according to one commenter in an entirely different region)... more in my comment below.Yxx
Hari OM
You have provided us much 'food' for thought today Angus! Now, to add my extra ten cents worth...
Regarding Heinz in Britain, a brief history and status. American company made good over here.
Regarding Cadbury's Chocolate... which is British company that has gone global. The chocolate recipe is different everywhere else becuase it needs to have an 'anti-melt' element. I do not enjoy non-Brit produced Cadbury's...
Regarding elder-contact and care... there are a number of different schemes with this intent behind them. Good Gym is one which came to notice this week.
...and really? Incel? Far too close to infidel...
YAM xx
I wonder what those aggrieved Midwesterners think about their hero smooching with that Frenchman, President "Muhcrone" as our president consistently calls him. You'd think he would have at least learned how to pronounce the name of a leader here on a state visit. I once heard a Wisconsin dairyman being interviewed on the radio who was on the brink of tears as he spoke with a tremor in his voice about his admiration for Trump. So difficult for many of us who feel the opposite to understand.
Good luck getting that red/gilt chair back to London.
I highly recommend the Pepperidge Farm chunk cookies - especially the Nantuckets :-)
We're going to visit St. Andrews and Edinburgh at the beginning of August. It feels like cheating as to the weather, but then again my son liked the schools we saw in Maine notwithstanding grey skies and huge piles of dirty snow, so maybe winter in Scotland would not faze him. As to the baked beans, Wikipedia advises that the variety sold in the UK is more like the original American version and does not include brown sugar - who knew?
I'm sure you know but August can be chilly - it's those North Sea breezes !
There is a very popular australian ginger flavoured non-alcoholic drink called 'Bundaberg Ginger Beer' which our local Leclerc has decided to stock...not in the 'international foods' section, but in the beer section.
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