Thursday, 9 May 2019

Fish dream

Mostly set in what seemed like Regent Street in Cambridge, walking from the town to Station Corner.

It seems that I had three errands. First, to buy some fish. Second to buy some kind of fruit cake, the sort of fruit cake which is black and white inside, rather than black and brown. A currant bun, only larger and fruitier, rather than a rock cake or a rich fruit cake. According to the dream this sort of thing could be bought from one of the bakers in Regent Street. Third, to buy some concert tickets. Again according to the dream, this could be accomplished at the railway station.

The fish was easy. The fish shop had a long fish draped across the top of the counter, which I bought and carried away in a large plastic carrier bag. Very cheap it was too, but as I walked along, I wondered whether it was pike, dogfish or what. Far too cheap to be anything respectable. Our only experience of pike was not too clever and I was not sure about dogfish, although I knew at least one person who liked it and bought it from fish and chip shops when available.

The cake was more difficult. All the bakers had diversified into other stuff, in one case fish, in another fruit & vegetables, with bread & cake not getting much space at all. Eventually found something that would do, although not really what I wanted. Terrible trouble getting my money out of my trouser pocket to pay for it.

Wound up outside the shop worrying about the various cards, credit and otherwise, in my wallet. It turned out that they were all still there, but all stuffed into the one pocket, so that it looked, at first glance, as if most of them were missing.

At this point, I realised that I did not really need concert tickets and abandoned that part of the expedition.

And then I realised that I had left the bread on second rise back at the house.When it had probably risen out and over the inside of the airing cupboard. Frightful mess. Wake up.

PS 1: the war memorial at Station Corner was a feature of my childhood, passing it twice on school days. I had thought that it was the work of the sculptress widow of Scott of the South Pole, but Wikipedia tells me I was quite wrong about that. Where did I get that idea from? The Scott Polar Institute, not so far away? It also reminds me that the memorial has been moved since I knew it. In any event, the product of an earlier attack of memorialitis, rather more justified than the one we seem to be suffering from presently.

PS 2: I associate now to buying this same sort of cake in various other bakers. Bakers which are probably the products of other dreams rather than of real life. Must have a thing about this particular sort of cake.

Reference 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_War_Memorial.

Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathleen_Scott.

Reference 3: https://www.spri.cam.ac.uk/.

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