A little slice of heaven on a sesame-seed bun
I know I’ve bitched about this before, but if you get hungry between 3 and 6 in the UK, you’re screwed. Restaurants and cafes, from the poshest to the unposhest, open from about noon to three, shut for three hours and reopen from about six to…whenever. It’s maddening.
Except for fast food chains. Good old Mickey D’s.
Got ourselves grievously lost trying a new route into Londinium (exactly as I predicted when I was handed the map and told to navigate). Got there hours late, quickly conducted our business and scooted back home again. Too late for shopping or museums or anything. One Big Mac and out.
So, the usual.
March 16, 2011 — 10:31 pm
Comments: 31
Happy VD!
Valentine’s Day! Attentive readers — examples of whom, I feel sure, will exist some day — may remember this as our wedding anniversary. Our second.
Year Two is the Big Mac anniversary, yes? Because we went to the zoo, followed by Mickey D’s. Because basically, both of us, when we turned eight our brains stopped developing.
To be fair, we tried to think of something more grownup to do, but so many things aren’t open in February. And some that are, aren’t open Mondays.
In the spirit of grown-uppedness, we’ll share a bottle of decent champagne tonight. We got two as a consolation prize because the inn which served our wedding supper screwed up our nephew’s vegetarian dinner. We looked it up and it’s suitably expensive, so WHA-HEY!.
Anyhoo, this is a wildlife park I’ve written about before, specializes in British aminals. I didn’t know there was a European lynx. Lovely pussies, seen here being a bit frisky — he’s giving her a playful head-butt, which I managed not to catch, quite. (Wire mesh erased courtesy of Photoshop, a thing it does creepily well).
Also, there’s a European bison. Who knew?
The stoats and weasels were all asleep (I managed to spot a little patch of weasel fur poking out of the straw, expanding and contracting as it snored). Likewise, the minks and otters. All the reptiles were in hibernation, with some of the rodents.
The wolves wouldn’t howl for me, but then an ambulance went by and they all tuned up their pipes. WooooOOOOoooo! That must’ve been effing spooking around the campfire, back in the days when you had nothing but sticks and rocks to drive them off with.
They seem to have a new batch of badgers. Three younguns. The underground sett is inset in various places with glass windows, so we watched Badger A chase off Badger B and dig himself a nice bed in the straw, while Badger C took a dump in the community latrine. Yeah. I was going to say I paid money for that, but I didn’t — they let us in free because we turned up late.
Last up always, we pass the cage of the Scottish wildcat, ounce for ounce the meanest bastard in the park. Really. They look like adorable hearth-rug moggies, but nobody’s ever successfully tamed one.
Solitary beasties, too, so we were shocked at how close this one was. Sitting on a high wooden platform, staring around with seething disgust. Didn’t even acknowledge us.
So, pretty much like Charlotte, then.
February 14, 2011 — 9:24 pm
Comments: 33
Name that beast!
Check out this mystery beast we caught on the wildlife camera last night. Usually, the pictures are a bit clearer than this, but dark objects are difficult for the infrared.
Remember, wildlife of this size is very limited in the UK, so don’t be guessing raccoon or wolverine or spiny anteater, okay? Little baby bear? Right out.
Maybe an obese black cat, but the legs are awfully stumpy. For reference, the grass is not especially deep and the heap of shit on the lawn (my goodness, how Uncle B hates my heap of shit on the lawn) is about knee deep.
Badger? The legs and body fit, but it’s too dark, a little small and I’d expect to be able to pick out the stripey snout.
I haven’t posted about the wildlife camera before, have I? I was kind of waiting to catch a hedgehog wearing pants or a tapdancing stoat or something really interesting.
But no. Most nights, we get a few pictures Meester Fox and our two cats. Not together. When the sun comes up, chickens and dickie birds. This is because I put leftovers on my heap of shit on the lawn. Heh heh heh.
I bought the camera for Uncle B, but I think I get the most pleasure out of it. I really look forward to checking that chip every day.
This is the one we have (and let me say I think “Prostalk” is an appalling product name). They make much better ones, of course, but this seemed like a good entry level.
Mucho recommendo. And you might get lucky and catch a nice shot of your burglar or your ex or something.
February 9, 2011 — 8:17 pm
Comments: 52
Kung Hei Fat Choi, y’all
It’s Chinese New Year — the Year of the Rabbit — though I’ve read that ‘rabbit’ should really be translated as ‘hare.’
Phun Phact: rabbits are not indigenous to the UK. They were brought here by the Romans for food (as was the ground elder that is utterly pwning my garden. Fucking Romans).
The hare, however, is native and fairly common around these parts. We narrowly missed hitting one that darted into the road in front of us one dark and stormy night. Big, lean, rangy beasts — almost dog-like.
Anyoo, Won Hung Lo!
February 4, 2011 — 12:02 am
Comments: 16
I’m so hungry, I could eat a huss
Also known as spiny dogfish, blue dog, common spinyfish, darwen salmon, dogfish, grayfish, Pacific dogfish, piked dogfish, rock salmon, spiky dog, spotted spiny dogfish, spring dogfish, spur dogfish, spur dog, victorian spotted dogfish, white-spotted dogfish, and white-spotted spurdog.
In Sussex fish and chip shops, they are known as huss. They’re related to sharks. We always get cod or haddock, but tonight we had to wait for our chips and we struck up a conversation with the fishnchips man. He told us the huss was local today. Eh, what the hell. Batter-dipped and deep fried, I’d eat worse.
It was good. Finer-grained flesh than cod with a slightly stronger flavor. They leave the backbone in and you eat around it. I’m not terribly keen on finishing my meal with a spine on my plate, but other than that…yeah, I’d eat it again.
I don’t experiment nearly enough with local food. I’d be missing the point of being an alien if I didn’t try some unfamiliar gnosh from time to time.
Of course, I yearn to discover the British equivalent of Ho-Ho’s, Ding Dongs and Suzie-Q’s.
January 27, 2011 — 11:14 pm
Comments: 29
GIMME!
They’re always telling us that things cost more in the UK (when they’re not denying that things cost more in the UK) because operating costs are so high. Gas is expensive, so moving things around is expensive, heating a shop is expensive, storing things in warehouses is expensive, personnel is expensive.
So how come it costs about $300 more to download Photoshop off the internet in the UK, compared to the US.
I don’t know, but I’m guessing it has to do with VAT. For fuck’s sake, people, don’t let them impose one on the Land of the Free. It’s invisible; it depresses commerce insidiously. Silent but deadly.
So! I’ve ordered my fabulous new dedicated Photoshop machine. It would’ve been here by now, if it weren’t for this stupid snowfall combined with the Christmas rush. It is entirely spec’ed to run one program — Photoshop CS5. The latest and greatest version with the 64-bits and he multiple cores and all that other modern shit I don’t understand.
And it turns out my version of Photoshop is one rev too old to be upgraded.
Well. Huh. Ouch.
What’s this going to cost me? Using today’s exchange rate of $1.53 to the pound, the price of a full Adobe CS5 license from Amazon.co.uk is $928.50. From Amazon.com? $624.99.
As an upgrade, UK $278.55, US $161.19. (The student version, they just fucking stand in the cafeteria and throw it at people).
So the difference between an upgrade in Rhode Island and a full download in Sussex is $767.31. I kind of get the reason software companies approach it this way, but if they ever wonder why people don’t respect their intellectual property rights dot-dot-dot
Oh, yeah…sorry the illustration is lame. My version of Photoshop is old and retarded.
December 22, 2010 — 11:04 pm
Comments: 28
Fucidin H? *Really*?
I’ve got a nasty rash. Have I mentioned? I really, really nasty poofy itchy bleedy thing. My arms, my legs, top of my feet, back and shoulders and…oohhhh, my sweet Aunt Fanny…on my butt.
I’ve been ignoring it for a couple of weeks now. That’s my default position on any illness: if I can probably survive the night without medical intervention, I’m willing to give it a shot.
But today Uncle B put his foot down (fair enough. Sleeping next to it might even be more disgusting than wearing it). Rather than try to get an appointment with my regular GP this close to Christmas, we opted for a walk-in clinic a couple of towns over.
The doctor there said it was likely either ringworm (which is actually a fungus) or ovoid eczema (which is bacterial, but I think he’s bullshitting me there, because “ovoid eczema” just means “round swollen bit”).
To find out which, all he’d have to do is shine an ultraviolet on it. If it’s fungal, the rash will fluoresce. If it’s bacterial, it won’t. But he couldn’t do that, because that’s technically a “test” and he’s not my GP. NHS rules say only my official GP can order a test.
So he had to give me treatment for both.
And there you have it: socialized medicine. The NHS isn’t terrible. It isn’t Soviet. If you didn’t tot up the eye-watering cost, it’s actually pretty good, at least around here. The doctors are competent, the staff is polite and professional, the facilities are clean and modern. I got to see a doctor within hours of deciding I needed one.
But always the ham fist of government making sure nobody uses common sense.
Oh, and hey — I get to rub myself down with liniment five freaking times a day.
Yay! Sandy Claus brought me ass cream for Christmas!
December 21, 2010 — 11:23 pm
Comments: 31
Frozen in mid-weasel
We weren’t supposed to get the travel chaos down here. This little corner of the Sunny South was predicted to be cold and bright. We had plans to take a train along the coast for the heck of it.
Long about noon, we looked up to see blizzard conditions. Total white-out. Couldn’t see to the end of the drive.
The chickens — which, for reasons explicable only to chickens, are absolutely terrified of snow — were huddled under a table in the garden. They were so paralyzed with fear, they allowed me to pick them up and carry them to the hen house without the usual clucking fuss.
It was wild. Standing in the garden, I could see sun and blue sky in one direction, apocalyptic cloud and squally snow in another, and an improbable bright moon hanging over it all.
Damn, we do get some weird weather here.
When it passed, it had only dumped an inch or so, so we decided to drive into town for staples. Mistake. They hadn’t done much to treat the roads and the bit of slush had refrozen to a glaze of wet ice. Pretty much friction free. We watched people and cars slip-sliding all over town, turned right around and got our chilly asses home.
They say warmer and heavy rain tomorrow. Do we believe them, children?
December 17, 2010 — 10:33 pm
Comments: 71
Oof. Throw another runnybabbit on the fire
Can you make out the outline of Britain in the picture? No? That about sums it up.
It’s been snowing for three days. I reckon we got…getting on for two feet. It’s hard to tell with the drifts.
That would be a pretty good early storm for Rhode Island on the 1st of December. It is expletive extraordinary for the South coast of England.
And like most places that get hit with a lot more of the white stuff than they’re accustomed to, everything has skittered to a halt. The usual; people spending the night in immobile trains, massive jams on major roads.
It’s supposed to stop tomorrow and get sunny, but then the temps will drop to 19ºF tomorrow night (another extraordinary number for this place) so the refreeze should be eeeeeevil.
I’ve been clomping around in my Wellies all day, cracking the ice on the chickens’ water and feeding bits to our neighborhood’s one stray cat (we take turns looking after him).
Vodka supplies….running low. Please. Send liquor.
December 2, 2010 — 11:36 pm
Comments: 28
Good news! Our marriage is invalid!
See, this is what happens when I try to do everything all nice and proper and churchy.
The Church of England’s Book of Common Prayer, which sets out all the proper church rituals and magic spells, went merrily unchanged for three hundred something years. In 1980, modern busybodies decided to tweak it — i.e. throw out all the wherefores and whosomevers and replaced the lovely old language with words suitable for primary school remedial readers (I believe this was the point they decreed all hymns be sung to the tune of Kumbaya).
Problem is, the Marriage Act of 1949 specifies the exact language to be used. Which is the old version. This is just coming to light, for some reason.
And it’s not even the flipping vows. It’s the flipping banns that are read out in the flipping church weeks before the flipping ceremony.
Minor tweak. From “cause, or just impediment” to “reason in law.”
Considering this affect everyone who got married in the C of E for the last thirty years — including a royal or two — you can imagine the Church is poo-pooing the significance. But what do you want to bet somebody tries to wriggle out on the basis of.
Oh, I liked this bit:
Leading secular divorce lawyer Jeremy Abraham said: “Technically, many marriages are invalid. However, if both parties believe they are married, then they are protected.”
Nice. Puts the strength of our marriage contract in the same league as the existence of Tinkerbell.
November 26, 2010 — 10:06 pm
Comments: 37