Howies

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Monday, and a normal working day started.  Walked over to the Lothian Road, listening to the sweet tones of Green Day on my new toy.  My whole, well almost, CD collection in a box smaller than a packet of 10 hamlets.  Worked the whole day through, until well after 18.00.  I am sure a sales man would say I worked until 19.00.

Eating, today is a Monday and in the Winter.  So many of my favourite places are closed.  The Petit Paris has its blinds firmly in place. The Mussel and Steak is in darkness, ah a sign, the establishment is under refurbishment! It’s been open only for a couple of years.  So time for new places.  How about Scottish fare? – there is Howies on Victoria Street.

Entered, quite empty at the moment, not surprising for a wintry Monday.  Very industrial style, huge great ventilation pipes over the ceiling taking the fumes from the kitchen,  large cast iron pillars in the restaurant supporting the road and houses above.  Two pretty waitresses though, and some men in the kitchen.  This smoking ban allows you to see the chefs, as they dash outside for a quick nicotine fix.

What did I eat? Well started off with the Cullen Skink, or as I almost said, Cullen Skunk.  It had a nice smokey smell of the smoked haddock flakes, oh and one small bone.

Mains, was Borders pheasant breast wrapped in bacon on crushed potato and some cabbage.  Very nice.

Afters, I missed this, went for the Scottish Illy espresso coffee.

I have to say, there seemed to be lots on the menu which would not have struck me as Scottish, such as the chili sauce, the Banoffee Pie….

 

Edinburgh on a Sunday

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Had a call from the bank during the week.  As I was working in Edinburgh for another company on Monday, would it be possible for me to work for them on the Sunday!!

Flights are a bit sparse on Sunday, so flew up to Edinburgh Saturday evening.  I really think I must do this always.  There was nobody in Luton airport.  Just two check-ins for Easyjet, no queues.  Nothing. Lovely.  (Only joking, Rosemary.)

Plane late though, but with my new solid state 8Gig MP3 player (thanks, Dad!), and a book (Boris Johnson, thanks, Joan!), I was well away into fantasy land.  Funny though arriving in Edinburgh, and walking through the streets to the hotel while everyone else was out in the streets shouting, laughing and enjoying themselves in a typical British City binge drinking Saturday evening manner.  Oh and when some do good prissy nanny state paid employee defines binge drinking as four pints of beer, then all their credibility has gone out of the window.

Peaceful Sunday in the office working, bus station next door was even more peaceful.  It was closed because the side of the building had been ripped away in the storms.

Petit Paris open for business, had their plat du jour.  Black sausage starters followed by tartiflette, made from Reblochon cheese.  New waitress, she comes from Angers, quite nice.

 

Working in the office

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I had a whole week working in the office.  Don’t worry, it was all chargeable work, so I am still wanted.  Quite unusual being in the office, I still have a desk and nobody had thrown the contents of my pedestal out.

Quite a wild week this week.  One panel of our fence blew out in the gales on Thursday.  easily repaired though, just slotted it back between the concrete posts.

Sheep have arrived on our field this week, they are making good progress in eating the organic grass.  So weird watching them, they have access to our field, and the field next door.  They all have to be in one field or the other.  Not sure what makes them move from one to the other. All this rain and wind can’t be nice for them sheep, walking across our field I noticed how deep the water was now.  The whole of the field is covered in water.  Everyone blames global warming for this rain, but last year there was very little rain during the winter.  The field was never water logged.  The pond was never full until quite late on.  No matter what the weather does, it will be blamed on GW.

The Esse cooker has been giving us problems this last year.  Sooted up withing two months of using it this year.  We found a new company to service the cooker, but the engineer was having dreadful problems trying to make the cooker run smoke free.  Lets just hope he has it cured.

The OldWalkerites

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Decided it was time to entertain a few people, so we had a dinner at home on Saturday, and entertained the Curds and the Willsons to roast pheasants (one of whom was shot by David L) cooked in a Gary Rhodes style with barley in a whisky sauce.

The evening started fairly early at around 6.00  Not much point waiting around on these dark and wet winter evenings.  A few G&Ts, then starters based upon a few Middle Eastern recipes.  The pheasants, cheese course (Rosemary had forgotten to remove pudding from the freezer) and finally the frozen Christmas pudding ice cream.

 

 

I am still alive

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I have not posted my blog entry for a while.  I know you all must be missing my exciting missives.

Christmas has come and gone.  We had Selina and Graham over for turkey.  Eating at the usual time of 4 in the afternoon.  Next day I went clay shooting.  Now called Clay Target shooting in deference to the tree huggers and cute feathered creatures.  Talking of which we plucked and disemboweled a pheasant, kind present from David.

 On New Year’s Eve, we had an excellent lunch of roast lamb at M&Ds.  (Must click the review checkbox.)  The lamb, as usual was cooked to a tender, mouth watering succulence which only Margaret seems to be able to achieve.  Good fresh British lamb, and not that frozen entombed stuff from across the world with all those carbon units.

 Since then I have been travelling to Scotland, and have just arrived back.  Very windy, and lots of the smaller flights from and to Edinburgh were cancelled.  Weather in Scotland and at home has been crap.  Windy, rain, not at all nice.  At least the hotel is snug and warm, with the free Internet access I have no need to venture out.

 But, yes, I ate at the Petit Paris and at Mai Thai.  Then out of share perversity I went to Black Bo’s, a veggie place, and had a meal there.  Don’t worry I did tell the waitress I was a carnivore, just checking out how the other side survives.

 

Ladymead Joinery

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Made it home.  Boarded the plane at around 16.00, but air traffic control at Luton were restricting the landings more severely, so we sat there for almost another hour.  Eventually arrived in Luton just before 18:00. Then the interminable wait for the luggage and the funeral  procession drive home in the fog.

Home at 19:30, and straight out to the Plough and Anchor for supper.  Lovely Christmas meal, and lashings of wine made the evening speed by.

British fog and Edinburgh airport

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Still sitting here waiting for the 13.25 to Edinburgh to leave.  Every half hour it gets delayed by more than another half hour.  So will it ever fly?  Presently it is showing as leaving at 15:40.  Yesterday it didn’t leave till almost 17:00.  Will I get home in time for Ladymead Joinery’s Christmas party at The Plough and Anchor?  Looks like a tight schedule.

At least I am not flying to Heathrow, if I was I expect I would be spending Christmas in Edinburgh.  The British airports are too busy, so a little fog soon causes delays and cancellations.  Time to double the number of runways and build a little redundancy into the transport system.  B****r all those Nimbies who bought their houses near to airports, knowing full well that planes make a small amount of noise. (Which is getting lesser every few years, with better engine design.)

The food at Edinburgh airport is quite nice.  There is this French run place that serves excellent tarts.  They are so good looking and yummy tasty in the mouth. 

 Must go and buy a magazine, as the power on this battery is getting low.

Edinburgh just before Christmas

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I am here again for another week.  Working for another client.  Started off badly.  Missed my flight from Luton, slight mishap on the flight time.  Paid 35 pounds and was on the next flight.  This was of course delayed because of the fog at Luton.  Arrived at client’s by 11:00.

Staying at the Radisson, so a nice walk to Lothian road where the office I work in is based.  Couple of routes there, around the base of the castle mound, or through Grassmarket and then past the strip clubs.

 Been eating at all my favourites this week.  Tapas at Barioja where I had sardines, masses of olives and various baked vegetables.

Then it was the Mussel and Steak bar for Calamari, followed by a 12oz rib-eye steak.  The steak was excellent.  I am so disappointed with steaks generally because of the way they are cooked.  I asked for rare and generally get medium.  Here I asked for rare, I got rare, it was trimmed, no waste and chewy bits on it.  It was beautifully rare.  I congratulated them on the steak.  So many rare steaks are cooked medium or even well done.

Then it was the hotel for their tapas menu.

Last night a treck down the hill to Mai Thai, where I had a mixed Thai starter, followed by their spicy duck,  Absolutely gorgeous.  The owner was very happy, they had been doing masses of business over this Christmas period.  He also asked me if I was keeping the blog going.

So if you are in Edinburgh, then I can really recommend those restaurants, the Mai Thai especially for informal Thai eating.

One restaurant that was not eaten at, was the Petit Paris.  For some reason or other, they have chosen this time of year for a complete renovation.

The fog and the cancelled heathrow flights is a worry.  All Thursday I kept a check on the flights.  At least Edinburgh has no problems.  Easyjet from Luton was flying all its flights, though the intended flight (1.30) was delayed by 3 hours on Thursday.  This though seemed to be a one-off.  Shall be watching the flights avidly today.  Let’s pray.

 

 

GT Christmas party

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A whole week in Edinburgh, and the weather was appalling.  Rain every day.  Not many highlights in the week, other than the Group Technology RBS Christmas party.

The party, on Thursday, was at the Jam House on Queens Street.  Much alcohol was consumed, people dancing, finger food available.  There were several bands, blues, and rock.  Alas there were a couple of women doing Abba Songs.  Think that was the low part of the party.  Trouble is you can still sing along to them.

Made to leave quite early, and found myself with Neil and Stephen going to the casino on the same street.  Alas as with all gambling, I left a couple of hours later at 1.00 20 pounds lighter.  I was playing Black Jack.  Neil on the other hand stayed till 3 and went away with 600 pounds extra on the Roulette wheel.  From 20 pounds he had been 800 pounds up at one time.

I made my way to Whistle Binkies for some music and a final pint.
Back at home the Christmas spirit is beginning to rise.  The Christmas tree was erected at the weekend, and then decorated.  The lights are up.  The turkey is in the freezer, the Christmas cake has been made. Amazon have been and gone many times bringing their goodies. Now its for me to do that last minute shopping.  Christmas Eve, hurry please.

Edinburgh in the wind

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I have been in Edinburgh a couple of nights now. Flew here on Monday, quite a bumpy flight as we came in over the City. Despite the rain in the rest of the country, Edinburgh has been pretty sunny for the last couple of days.

First night I went to the Mai Thai hoping it was open.  It was undergoing renovations the previous time I went there.  Still closed, but people inside.  I went in and had a few beers with the owners and staff. The place was opening on Tuesday.  The had increased the seating in the bar, and moved the loos downstairs.  The extra space being used by the pool table.

Tuesday I managed to make the Petit Paris for their plat de jour.  It had been changed to offer both a starter, mains and coffee for under 10 pounds.  I started with pickled herring salad, and finished with navarin of lamb.

For those of you wondering where the spikey haired waitress has gone, well I can tell you. She is doing Yoga in India.