h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A driech day. Sue is slaving away in the shop. She'll get home at 7.15-ish. She's delivering some veg boxes tonight - an important part of her business. It's a lot of work for her, but I think she considers it one of the more rewarding parts of the job. I may however be wrong. I phoned her at lunch time. She wasn't able to speak for long, as she had a queue of secondary school kids in - boys. She puts a bit of work into civilising/socialising teem, and maybe THAT'S the really rewarding part of her job - when a morose teenage grunter says 'please'. Och, I couldn't do it. A bunch of them wanting 31p of penny chews and a choc ice (even in the height of Winter)? In her position, I'd run a mile, but she perseveres and it seems to work.

Our little cat is burning up more energy than a floodlit football stadium, writhing about the carpet, trilling frantically, having half-hourly ten minute hairy fits and presenting her bum at anything that moves or doesn't. She will be a different animal on Friday, though.

Lamb meatballs, pasta and a nice piquant* sauce for tea. Yum.

Douglas

* 'Piquant' means it contains tabasco, paprika, celery salt, parsley, basil, thyme, black pepper, some sugar and the best part of a tube of tomato puree. The kitchen sink was already being used, and therefore unavailable for throwing in too.

I bet Sue likes to get home to a cooked meal. It is so interesting to listen to your two lives as they seem so different. But again, rest assured that I keep telling my students that Scots built the best parts of the Empire due to their inner sense of duty (and hardened by the weather) and they can be trusted with money... The tale of Sue's and your doings testifies to this.

Now back to work, to the tune of the Hungarian dances and Kozena's arias from French operas. I mean it is serious work.

Yum back atcha, Douglas! You liked the sound of my Meat Vindaloo last night and your tonight's dinner sounds delish. I'm having soup and a sandwich again I think.

Richard

I have decided to throw in a handful of toasted pine nuts for good measure, and I think I'll crumble some feta cheese over mine (but not Sue's - she complained on Saturday that she found it a bit goaty). It's revision revision revision from now on, so no DVD tonight but I'll have a wee chuttrie before bed.

I was thinking about trying the Khyber Pass later this month. Neither Sue nor I do seafood. I like hot. She likes medium. We like to go the whole hog - pillau, poppadoms, peshwari nan (and I keep a jar of Sharwood's Chilli Pickle in the fridge). Any suggestions for us?

Douglas