skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Lord Roby chose to go native today.First up a 'Tarte da Djote' pronounced Jot.It is the local speciality for Nivellians(who are actually known as Aclots(Nails in English).This tart is made with fermented cheese and beet leaves and very fermented cheese.Under the bed fermentation is not unknown.I had my reservations.After 2 mouthfulls I had regrets.It was very very pungent and very sickly.I managed to eat half of a 9" tart with the help of some ketchup and Perrier.Never again!..The reason natives of Nivelles are called Nails goes back to medieval times when the city portal was under siege and the word went out to get more nails to batten down the hatches.After this it was off to the Christmas market.An impressive affair which involved marquees and a section with in the Cathedral trancepts.After a few free tastings Lord Roby could not resist a bottle or two of wine and a stick of pepperoni.All in all a very satisfying day so far.After the tastings Lord Roby is still a bit tiddly,so is it wine and TV or wine and Irish Bar?...I'll let you know later,
I was caught behind a white van last night while travelling to my local Oddbins, for my regular Friday night bottle of claret.His bumper screamed at me 'WELL DRIVEN IF NOT RING THIS NUMBER' Of course it wasn't being well driven.But would anybody seriously bother their arse to ring up and have him sacked.As if it's not bad enough having a tracker fitted just in case you can't be picked up by a CCTV or traffic camera; your boss now wants to enlist the help of any other driver you might encounter to judge your performance.Are any other professions persecuted like this I wonder? Does your average whore have "WELL BATTERED" tattooed on her backside?Does your local gigolo have" WELL HUNG" on his lower abs? Is your pole-dancer obliged to be "WELL SLITHERED"? I guess not.
You may not realise it, but all this layered persecution does take it's toll.It was only when I was in Venice for a Christmas weekend a few years back that I realised that something was amiss.I actually became aware that I wasn't being watched or directed at every possible juncture.It felt really liberating as it should.There where no traffic lights(obviously) and only three signs in the whole of Venice!St Marks Square and the Rialto Bridge being two of them and third I can't recall,probably because I never came across it! And yet nobody gets lost.Well not forever anyway....A miracle!
Now Big Brown and co wan't to gather every e-mail and text and phonecall and, and, and....Why the fascination,they've never insisted on reading and storing every snail mail ever sent.Why?... as an old old friend of mine once said..."Because they can!" Arthur C Clark and the waller who invented the binary system have got a lot to answer for! I wonder what this gargantuan computer might be called.BIG BROWN maybe.From trilobites to kilobytes... did we really come all this way just to be spied upon?
I've decided to start blogging today not because it's 'Lodge Day' but because It coincides with my first trip to the Labour Exchange since leaving school many, many, years ago.I think it's called JobCentre Plus nowadays.Where the Plus comes from God only knows! It all seems pretty damn negative to me.There doesn't seem to be much work out there for an over-qualified scientist,Evertonian with a penchant for fine wine.
I'm expecting a rough ride when I get to the JCP office.I don't know why ; I just am.I'm pretty sure that it won't resemble the one in 'Boys from the Blackstuff' but nonetheless I'm not looking forward to it.To me it represents failure.In over 33 years I've never 'signed on' before and this gives me an immense amount of pride.I'll keep you briefed from Quaff Castle,Two Dogs.
