Cheese

Last week to London to refresh the supplies of Lincolnshire Poacher, a brand of cheese which, I believe, is owned by just the one farm, the one noticed at reference 1. How much cheese can 230 odd Holstein Fresians produce? Does the farm go in for that trick of buying in lots of milk from elsewhere, so that they can concentrate on making cheese rather than making cows?

It was not April Fools' Day, but there does not seem to have been much action. Not like the dreadful occasion when my mother convinced me that it was sausages for lunch, moved lunch to before noon (as was proper for such a purpose) and then served up a large covered dish which turned out to be empty. I recall that I was extremely put out, only to be calmed down by promise of sausages on the day following. Or at the very least, I recall being told that that was the story. So on this occasion, the only April Fool that I know of was Sainsbury's putting it about that they were stocking their stores with a new sort of exercise shopping trolley so that all the housewives doing their shopping would get some good exercise along the way.

I might also mention that I am going through a bad patch with Simenon and Larousse. The current work - Les Petits Cochons sans Queue - seems to contain lots of words which are not in Larousse, odd because my understanding is that Simenon made a point of using an everyday vocabulary and eschewed words smelling of the ink-horn (as Elizabethans would have it). Irritating because it means that one is missing something. Guessing might get one near the mark, but that is not the same. Usually too much trouble to get up and ask Bing or Cortana - with this last having the advantage of being portable, but a pain for serious queries like these would be. Give me a proper keyboard every time.

To return to cheese, the day was cold and overcast, and I was wondering whether there was going to be a cold head wind on Waterloo Bridge, sometimes a bit daunting.

Sign

But things got better and I found that the signpost which belongs in the middle of the Meadway roundabout has been put back in the middle, having been, a few weeks previously, erected on the periphery. I think the post is something of a target for young men returning from town after a few beverages, and I have had occasion to return it to its hole before now. It is surprisingly heavy and the middle hole is clearly not deep enough for it.

Onto the station and found that they had installed a fan heater a couple of feet above the head of the man from Southern in charge of the gates onto the platforms of Epsom Station. A bit better than nothing apparently, but too much hot air down the back of the neck. I thought that the great coats they used at Hampton Court Palace might have served better for such a purpose.

Onto Waterloo to pull a Bullingdon from the bottom of the ramp and found that there was no head wind blowing across Waterloo Bridge and so made it in good time to Drury Lane to find the stand there full, and so had to push onto Newton Street, a total of 10 minutes and 37 seconds. Plus the extra time taken to walk back to the cheese shop in Short's Gardens.

Poacher purchased, I pushed on down to Terroirs for a spot of bread, black pudding and Riesling. And Calvados. Bread very good, black pudding good but a touch dear.

Recto

Verso

A good Riesling, something to do with a monastery, I think from the not very informative people at reference 3. Shake & Wait does not help the search at all, but eventually I get to reference 4 which does seem to be the right place. An oddly heavy bottle.

Made a good decision to have some Cantal and some more white bread for desert. Not a very big bit of cheese for the money, but good.

A cheerful waitress, who I think recognised us.

On the way down to Hungerford Bridge came across a fancy car, nicely sandwiched between two waste disposal vehicles.

Ferrari

What is it about fancy cars which means their registration is all numbers, in this case a Ferrari with registration '209576', a Ferrari 458 Italia (Type F142) according to Google image search, while us common mortals have to make do with numbers and letters? See reference 5 for another.

Across the bridge, I made a pit stop at the Royal Festival Hall, where squatters were in evidence.

Recharging point

One might have thought that said squatters would be more careful with their telephones, but I could not see who owned these two and nobody seemed to take any interest in my taking an interest in them. Maybe this lack of care and interest has something to do with why they are squatting.

Onto Smith's in Waterloo Station for another round with the Economist. I was served by a very cheerful lady, while other punters grappled with their rather tricky self service machines.

Thought hard about taking further refreshment on the way home, but managed to avoid the fleshpots of both Earlsfield and Epsom. I even walked rather than taking a taxi: the drill is to say to myself perhaps a little something in the Cricketers (on Stamford Green), but then by the time I get there, tea at home beckons.

Reference 1: https://lincolnshirepoachercheese.com/.

Reference 2: Les Petits Cochons sans Queue - Georges Simenon - 1939-1948. Volume XXV of the collected works.

Reference 3: http://petnat.de/.

Reference 4: http://www.winesutb.com/.

Reference 5: http://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/04/place-cells-episode-2.html.