Strawberries, T and Snow Patrol sleepiness

Last Wednesday, a week ago tonight, on July 4th, Ka and myself celebrated our third year Wedding anniversary. We didn’t celebrate with anything particularly special. A Chinese carry out from the Jasmine Inn and the exchange of a couple of small presents followed by a couple of bowl of strawberries.
For some reason we both went out and bought each other strawberries to celebrate. I’m not sure what the relevance of strawberries was, and even why we both intuitively thought they would make a great surprise present on a Wedding anniversary? Perhaps it was the Wimbledon influence?
A David Guetta album too. Ka liked the ‘Titanium’ single so I got her the French DJ and producer’s album.
Or David Ghetto as Ka calls him.
He was just one of the acts we missed at the weekend.
We had tickets to T in the Park this year but decided against it after Ka got pregnant. Now that she’s getting a little bigger, a little more uncomfortable and a lot more intolerant to the idea of camping, we thought best of it, but did manage to sell the tickets on to a couple of guys in Andy’s football team. Looking at the news reports and pictures from the festival over the weekend I am now very glad we made that decision. It would have been a nightmare putting up with Ka in those rivers of brown. Colin and Jillian were there and posting on facebook, mud up to their shins. Colin text me on Friday night, raving about how wonderful Florence and the Machine were but no matter how much he may want to go on about it I’d rather wait and see Florence in the SECC at a semi ludicrous price than in the mud of Balado.
I have wanted to see Florence for a long time though and I suppose I was secretly jealous. In fact, I’m not sure Pauline’s ever forgiven me for calling her a b*tch, at Christmas time, when she revealed she’d bought herself and a pal some tickets to see Florence and her band at the SECC when they played back in March.

No, instead of Balado, Ka and myself watched from the comfort of the couch on Friday night, occasionally getting up to dance when the mood took us, jumping about like loons to Olly Murs. He did ask us to dance with him so who were we to refuse?
Afterwards Snow Patrol took to the stage and so we swiftly fell asleep.
Nothing against Snow Patrol. I quite like Snow Patrol.
They do make you awfully sleepy though. Unless you’ve got a lighter, at least then you’d have something to do to keep you awake, keep your attention focused... but even that could be dangerous. You may inadvertently end up setting yourself on fire by falling asleep in mid lighter sway. The alcohol fuelled mud underfoot at T in the Park wouldn’t do you any favours either. A burning Snow Patrol fan stumbling through the mud, ablaze, screaming, confusing others into thinking they’d accidentally taken a wrong turn and dropped by the Wickerman festival. The screaming Snow Patrol fan being commended by passers by for his Edward Woodward tribute.
Anyway, on Saturday night we went out to dinner to Viva Pizzeria Ristorante, on Bothwell Street where we enjoyed a slap up meal involving meatballs, veal ravioli and chicken, washed down with a healthy glass of wine, or soda water and lime, in Ka’s case. Afterwards we walked up West Campbell Street, up on to Sauchiehall Street heading to the flicks to see Jason Segal and Emily Blunt in ‘The Five Year Engagement’, a film that’s been advertised and reviewed as a very strange, odd, occurrence. A half decent romcom.
Unfortunately, as we stood in the queue, a flash of red on screen alerted us to the fact that it was sold out so we ended up donning the 3D glasses again for the new Spiderman movie starring Britain’s very own Andrew Garfield.
Even though it’s barely been five years since the end of the last trilogy with timid Toby McGuire, it seemed a little strange for a new trilogy to start all over again and for that reason I wasn’t that fussed about seeing it. Even so, the new movie was surprisingly enjoyable with Garfield suitably impressing as the geeky, awkward Peter Parker with the spider bug and Rhys Ifans as the villain of the piece, a villain with heart and reason. There’s only one scene in particular towards the end which lets the film down a little, veering into American cheese, but, on the whole, a pretty good piece of escapism with a great moment involving Stan Lee in headphones.
Earlier that day, on the Saturday morning, Ka and myself took a trip along Calderwood to see a house. A house that’s been sitting on the market since the turn of the year.
The rain was peeing down and we arrived in the slightly crowded street early, barely able to see the property’s front door through the pellets of rain bouncing off the windscreen. Getting soaked in the short run to the front door we were greeted by one of the sisters leading the efforts to sell her parents’ home. My Aunt Anne knew the family and had been insisting that we go and view the property from as far back as February and we were only now getting round to it. With baby number two growing well, we thought we’d better start making a move, literally.
The short trip was worth it.
We liked it. It was a blank canvas and I like a blank canvas.
I like a blank canvas because it’s there for the taking. It’s empty and waiting for you to begin to create something wonderful with.
Ka likes a blank canvas because it is clean.
Plain and simple.
Clean, pristine and white. Perfect for the taking.
As soon as I got into work on Monday morning, whilst everyone mourned Andy Murray’s loss, I made sure I made a quick phonecall to the sellers’ solicitors and requested the Home Report.
By Tuesday morning, we’d made an offer.
Fingers crossed we may have a result by this time tomorrow.

The finest tea available to humanity

The rain continued to fall outside, soaking the surrounding Bothwell, whilst Ka and myself took our seats in the Silverwells restaurant for our Afternoon tea. We had planned to get a bus to our posh afternoon appointment at the swanky Bothwell restaurant but, thankfully, my Dad had come to the rescue over the phone and offered us a lift, earlier in the morning. After I'd come off the phone to him I looked out the window to see the rain sweeping through our street in sheets making travelling by bus an extremely unpleasant and unlikely prospect.
I’d never had Afternoon Tea before. Angela had bought Ka and myself it, as a gift for our Wedding Anniversary, back in July. I’d always thought Afternoon tea was for either little old ladies or snobby rich and privileged housewives. Miss Marple used to attend Afternoon tea quite a lot from what I remember. It also reminds me of that great scene in ‘Withnail and I’ where Richard E. Grant and Paul McGann stote into a small English countryside tea shop, in the middle of the afternoon, and demand “the finest wines available to humanity” from Mrs Blennerhassett, the frightened little lady who was dishing out the tea and scones to the surrounding, glaring, old ladies.
Thankfully there were no old ladies in Silverwells on Saturday afternoon. We stepped into the large elegant restaurant to find it empty, each table immaculately set for the coming Saturday night.
The Spanish Maitre D’ welcomed us and sat us down at a small table for two near the front of the dining room, where the old building’s large bay window looked out into the restaurant’s car park and surrounding Bothwell streets, still suffering under the gloom of the grey clouds rumbling overhead.
We started with a glass of prosecco, delivered to us by the small Spaniard (at least I think he was Spanish, Ka and myself had a slight debate about that over our wine) who immediately started up conversation by asking where we were from and what the occasion was. We told him where and the Maitre D’ revealed himself to be a native of East Kilbride, himself, at least for the past forty years anyway. Specifically Tasman Drive, just off Rockhampton, in the Westwood. At least I think that’s what he said, his Spanish accent (or French) was still quite thick, even after 40 years. I then told him we were celebrating our first wedding anniversary. Ka didn’t seem to bat an eyelid until halfway through the Maitre D’s following conversation, at which point she must have realised what I’d said. Once the waiter had beetled off to talk to the kitchen, (I’m not sure if it was a specific appliance), Ka was not slow in pointing my mistake out to which I frowned and slowly nodded with realisation. I almost used the old, ‘how times flies when your having fun’, phrase, but stopped myself.
Not that I haven’t enjoyed married life so far, just that it hasn’t all exactly been a barrel of laughs, a feeling which, I’m sure, most husbands would admit to at the best of times and that’s without the tragedy of a losing a child.
Shortly after, our tea and coffee was delivered with a silver, two-tier, stand full of sandwiches and cakes. Sandwiches of tuna, ham salad, cheese and pickle. Scones with jam and clotted cream. Flap jacks. Meringues. Caramel shortcake. All were mounted on the cake stand before us, making us feel overweight, just by looking at them. There was even good old Scottish Dumpling. The teas and coffees also arrived with large round piece of shortbread biscuit, sitting tilted on the edge of their porcelain saucers. There was no way we were going to get through this lot.
Soon after making our way through the sandwiches the Maitre D’ was back and talked of his work in EK’s Bruce Hotel, his experience as a sales rep in a whiskey company, his wife whom he’d immigrated for, his family, his friends and the fact he knew Mr. Kennedy, the Spanish and R.E. teacher from St. Brides High, who was now living it up in a Spanish villa, just outside Alicante.
In fact, the Head waiter told probably us a good portion of his life story.
He would talk for a short time and then say he was leaving us to our tea, before coming back another ten minutes later and starting up another conversation.
At one point he asked us if we had kids. To which we hesitantly and uncertainly shook our heads but then told him about Lucy. You’d think this would shut most folk up, but no. After a short apology he was off again, talking about his son and his family and how they were off to Spain.
He was a lovely man though, even though he made our teas and coffees go cold on more than one occasion. He may have realised this though as he organised more than one tea and coffee refill for us, each coming with yet another large shortbread biscuit, to join the previous other two, moved to the cake stand.
Halfway through the afternoon, after I’d finished my share of the sandwiches and cakes, the Maitre D’ beckoned us away from our table, just as I was biting into Ka’s flapjack, to give us a guided tour of the large old Victorian house which Silverwells now occupies. The large, colourful stained glass window, standing halfway up the large staircase in the hallway, shone in what light it could muster from the skies overhead creating a calm, ambient atmosphere in the welcoming hallway, now decorated by lines of small sparkling Christmas lights. The Maitre D’ led us up the stairs and around the large function rooms upstairs, showing us the large, private dining room and the three remaining rooms which, when connected by way of the large opening double doors in adjoining walls, made up Silverwells’ largest function suite and bar, for parties of up to 80 people.
All very interesting, I thought, but my tea was getting cold.
The Maitre D’ done a good job in selling the place anyway, and my interest in the function rooms was apparently so believable that it led Ka to become a little uncomfortable, half expecting me to bring out my debit card and book one of the function suites, there and then for something, anything. Sign the dotted line for some strange, mystical party night in the future. Any event would do.
Upon returning to our table we ordered a nice bottle of Pinot Grigio just as a few more customers started arriving for lunch and afternoon tea and we soon found ourselves thankfully being neglected by the over eager Head Waiter.
As the two of us sat chatting over a fine glass of wine, and the rain continued to pour down outside, it seemed like a long time since Ka and myself had enjoyed such a lazy, calorie filled, afternoon.
A nice way to celebrate our first Wedding anniversary. Seventeen months late.