Here, the weathers fine and there's no doubting that St Andrews is once again a college town :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evq5H5KViyk . The Dunhill golf tournament is underway which may explain the arrival of a bright red Ferrari outside one of the village cottages .Red Ferraris are unusual in this part of the world. Wee village boys stand and stare at it with that enraptured ' Just you wait until I can drive' intensity peculiar to wee boys.
We are now almost recovered from jet lag. The secret is staying up until your usual bedtime on your first night back. This may generate a little 'tetchiness' as the day wears on but ensures a good nights sleep. Bracing walks by the North Sea help shock the body into alertness.
Over a bottle of Cornas ( also a dead cert jet lag cure ) we discuss the little things that intrigued us during our trip away.
We stop off for a pre-dinner drink at a bar in DC. The bill when it comes has $1.95 as a service fee ( Not a tip ) for making a cocktail and $3.00 for what we can only assume is use of the the cocktail glass. How interesting . Bar tender creativity never ceases to amaze. How long will it be before bars everywhere start charging for the use of their glasses or for adding water to whisky ?
Do people in Maryland not drink bottled water ? Whenever and wherever we order a bottle it is presented in a champagne bucket. This happens nowhere else. We can also report that San Pellegrino dominates the market with Saratoga Water a distant second and Fuji reserved for 'fine dining' establishments. In some places the bottle is separated from the ice by a napkin. This forces the bottle up and brings a touch of the theatrical to the otherwise mundane.
The Marylanders penchant for bottled water showmanship may be down to a residual puritan resistance to paying a bottled water tax which is presumably different from sales tax. The US tax code is nothing if not complicated.
We discover a 1930's work by Ila McAfee. The two mountain lions by the Black Canyon of the Gunnison look extremely contented.
13 comments:
Adore Ila McAfee's mountain lions.
The 'service' fees, not so much...
Hari OM
That painting is gorgeous... I'd be packing a picnic and finding a tap... YAM xx
Beautiful mountain lion composition. Maybe the tax on bottled water is designed to encourage a move away from it.
Nah, that's not so much reflective of the standard US tax situation or pricing structure, but more reflective of what we, around here, call "gouging". Big city/tourist destination shenanigans. To be sure there's not as much fancy culture to experience in rural America, but it sure is cheaper.
The bottled water tax would be either state or local. That is a great museum, the portrait gallery is always worth the walk.
That's a striking painting.
That painting is beautiful. My brother and sister-in-law are in Colorado right now and were at Black Canyon of the Gunnison a couple days ago.
What is next - a "rental tax" for sitting on chairs?
I'm sorry about your mishaps to my corner of the world, but glad that for the most part it was enjoyable! I love the Smithsonian, and really should take more advantage of it being just a metro ride away. We do have tickets to an upcoming show at the Kennedy Center in a few weeks. But the places I'm typically dining at in Maryland are usually only serving water in a carafe - I need to get out more!
And that is why we never go out and would rather entertain at home.
We had a mountain lion in our back yard a few years ago, munching on a fawn. Such a large beautiful animal but had to be relocated, of course.
Gorgeous painting.
Love the painting, must Google the artist and see more.
The extra taxes on everything in the U.S. always come as a nasty shock to us Europeans.
Love those contented mountain lions against the craggy Gunnison background (McAfee's home i believe). Here in South Florida tax tales /aka rip offs are legion as creative restaurants and hotels find ever new ways to capture tourist dollars.
Agree with others who deem the tax craziness to your being in a touristy area. I live a few hours away and have never seen anything like it. I do love Annapolis, though.
Nina
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