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Escaped!

We’ve promised ourselves we’ll get out and Do Stuff as much as possible while the nice weather lasts, so today we took a field trip to Pevensey Castle. Haven’t been there in years.

This is an old one. It started its life as a Roman fort some time before AD 300, and it looks as though something big and pissed off has been teething on it ever since.

To the East is the Church of St Nicholas, where this man lies in effigy. They had held their flower festival over the long weekend, so the was church full of flower arrangements. Also, someone had laid close-cropped living turf down either side of the central aisle, so grass was growing in the church, for all the world like the opening chapter of Phantastes (a story that freaked infant me out a little). Spooky.

We walked West past the castle to the Church of St Mary, Westham, which calls itself the first church built by the Normans after the Conquest. Unfortunately, it was locked — which is quite unusual. I hope it doesn’t mean they’ve had vandalism trouble.

And we also visited the old courthouse and jail (now museum), which was being minded by a daft old Yorkshire woman, for some reason. There I bought a half crown from my birth year. And I gave the old lady two bantam eggs I discovered in my pocket (Violet laid them under the lavender), for her tea.

And then we went to Mickey D’s and had a Big Mac. The End.

Comments


Comment from tomfrompv
Time: August 27, 2013, 11:35 pm

Did the Brit McDonalds also drop “Combo #2” from the menu? Its the two cheeseburger, fries, and medium drink. In the old days, it was called the All-American Meal.

I used to order this item on virtually every visit – max calories, meat, cheese when normalized to price. Way better deal than the BigMac.

Alas, its no longer offered here. And nobody will say why.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 27, 2013, 11:41 pm

Special Sauce! Special Sauce! Special Sauce! Sorry, Big Mac rules.

I dunno, Tom. They dropped the Big Tasty, though. That’s Uncle B’s usual meal. It comes and goes, that one.


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: August 28, 2013, 12:15 am

Huh! AND the useless bastards still don’t make a worm pie!

It’s a puzzle to this badger. McDonald’s is much sneered at yet I don’t think its food is bad. I just wish it didn’t make the experience of eating there as unpleasant as it can and still stay on the right side of the law. What with the beeping and the crap seating and the screaming children. It’s like they are trying to drive grown-ups out of the place.

I’d go to Burger King but somewhere along the line some genius decided it didn’t matter if the food was served cold.

See that guy on the slab? Looks like he went to Burger King.


Comment from QuasiModo
Time: August 28, 2013, 12:38 am

Double Big Mac! omnomnom…best fast food fries at McD’s too.


Comment from Stark Dickflüssig
Time: August 28, 2013, 1:07 am

I had a McRib (the first time it came ’round, before we had any presidents named Bush) & I will never go back there again.


Comment from scottthebadger
Time: August 28, 2013, 1:07 am

Ah, I remember how tasty McDonalds used to be! When the fries were fried in beef shortning, and the Coca Cola was made with cane sugar, rather than corn syrup. McDonalds used to buy the leanest beef they could, and cow bellies, the beer belly cows get in finishing lots. The taste is all in the fat, so McDonalds could blend the hamburger for optimum taste. But fat is EVIL, so now the beef at McDonalds is just cardboard disks. Here in Baraboo, they tore the McDonalds down. to replace it with a new one. I haven’t had anything fron McDonalds since June. Won’t until sometine in Oct.


Comment from dissent555
Time: August 28, 2013, 1:23 am

So I hope you polished off that Big Mac with a hearty flagon of mead.


Comment from Nina
Time: August 28, 2013, 2:52 am

Aside from the McDonalds visit, that sounds like the perfect day to me, pottering around old English buildings with a dashing British badger!

I’m not a fan of the special sauce, or anything else with mayo, save egg salad or tuna sammiches with only the barest hint of it. Why would I go there when I have Carl’s Jr., Habit, Smashburger, etc.?

But I wouldn’t mind being in England!


Comment from Deborah
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:47 am

Do you go to the beach? (are you waiting for the tourists to go home?)


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 28, 2013, 9:47 am

Mayonnaise is the only reason to get out of bed in the morning, Nina.

Yes, we go to the beach in the off season, Deborah. Most of the ones around here are shingle, not sand. There are various cool shipwrecks and things visible at low tide, so we walk along them when we can.

I haven’t been in the water in a thousand years, though. As a landlocked weasel (I was nine when I saw the ocean for the first time, and 18 when I saw it for the second time) I really, really mistrust the sea. I’m just sure it’s waiting to suck me out into a shark or a fish hook or something.


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: August 28, 2013, 12:17 pm

I’m with Nina on the mayo question.


Comment from surly ermine
Time: August 28, 2013, 1:40 pm

Hey is Pevensey Castle near the “Moo Man’s” place? Watched that little documentary the other nite on NetFlix. Very familiar to us living on my wife’s family farm. We can look out the window and see nearly the same story. Well, different color cows.

Wow Nina, Smashburgers. That takes me back, used to go there with Grandma and Grandpa Ermine. Is there a Piggly Wiggly nearby as well?


Comment from Deborah
Time: August 28, 2013, 1:59 pm

Hooray for the off season. It’s finally safe to head back to the beach. I’m about three hours from feet in the water on Padre Island. And feet is as far as I go, since I’m wearing an umbrella.


Comment from AltBBrown
Time: August 28, 2013, 2:15 pm

The in-house term used by the local McD’s rising stars for the “special sauce” is McJizz.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:08 pm

…and it is a simple mixture of ketchup, mayo and relish. We used to make it for salad dressing at the pizza joint I worked at.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:25 pm

I had to look that up, Surly. Yes, yes it is. Pevensey Bay is a few miles from Hailsham.

Do you recommend the documentary? We’re always stuck for stuff to watch.


Comment from Stark Dickflüssig
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:45 pm

A bulb of barely warmed ground moo-beast on texas toast topped with a fried egg & too much mayo is basically nature’s perfect health food.

You dip it in Louisiana Crystal hot sauce.

Pickles are optional.


Comment from Stark Dickflüssig
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:51 pm

(also, I dunno if rocks the size of Volkswagens count as `shingle`, but this park close to me has a fairly nice rock beach)


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 28, 2013, 3:52 pm

Spam comment of the day:

One tablespoon is sufficient for every 20 pounds of body weight, given every four to six hours, depending on the animal’s activity level (more activity requires more sugar). Small business or home business owners, however, can subscribe to BI services on the Internet at a fairly reasonable cost. Many times, the parks and campgrounds that have the picnic tables don’t have the manpower to make sure that all of the tables are always clean.

Thank you, speaker of gibberish!


Comment from mojo
Time: August 28, 2013, 6:02 pm

How many half-crowns in a guinea?


Comment from beasn
Time: August 28, 2013, 6:02 pm

It’s been a reallly long time since I made potato salad or bought mayonnaise. Years, in fact.
I was shocked, SHOCKED, at how expensive mayo is. Went with Hellman’s as it was on sale. Meh. Had to add a bit of mustard to taste anything…(which gave me a hankering for deviled eggs).
I’m thinking I should have gone with Miracle Whip.


Comment from Deborah
Time: August 28, 2013, 6:04 pm

Husband and I have been eating a low(er) carbohydrate diet for a few weeks. Naturally, I am craving any meal from McDonalds, but my dearest little love is the sausage biscuit, with a packet of strawberry jam squeezed inside.


Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: August 28, 2013, 6:52 pm

mayonnaise is the only reason to get out of bed in the morning….

Yes – Gin doesn’t require refrigeration so I can keep it on the night stand.

As for McDonalds I recently saw an article (which I can’t find now)that said that McDonalds burgers represented the most economical and practical answer to feeding the world. Protein? Check. Vegetables? Check? Carbohydrates? Check. Low price? Check.

Having said that it’s been years since I’ve been to Mickey D’s. after they quit using lard in the fries it kind of ruined things for me.


Comment from AltBBrown
Time: August 28, 2013, 7:41 pm

When a night in a tavern leaves one too muddled to trust oneself with cooking utensils and things that make fire or extreme heat, but thankfully able to drive slowly, God’s grand plan for McD’s is realized. Or so I’ve heard…


Comment from surly ermine
Time: August 28, 2013, 7:57 pm

Yeah Weas, “Moo Man” is alright. A bit slow but that’s accurate. A little snippet in there where he mentions how the government effed up farming just like over here.

I think we all enjoyed the Nova program on the moai better, “Secrets of Easter Island” I think.


Comment from Uncle Al
Time: August 28, 2013, 10:11 pm

@mojo:

How many half-crowns in a guinea?

8.4


Comment from Paula Douglas
Time: August 29, 2013, 1:31 am

McDonald’s lost my respect when they started baking the apple pies, instead of frying them. Big Macs are still the greatest fast food ever invented, but what the hell are you supposed to top them off with now? A sundae? Please: They melt before you get to them. Yeah, I guess you can go back and get in line again for dessert after you eat–unless you go through the drive-through. Then you’re stuck with their pseudo-healthy pie. Baked pie, forsooth.


Comment from Bikeboy
Time: August 29, 2013, 8:30 pm

Is the Lamb McTasty still on the UK Mickey D menu? We were in London a number of years back, and every McD proclaimed that delicious-sounding treat in the window.

(Like a previous poster, I tried the McRib once; it’s hard to imagine anybody going back for another. Their Idaho Potato fries are the best thing they serve, in this gourmet’s opinion.)


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