For my dog loving friends, I just met Pixie, an adorable black 14 week old staff terrier, who lives on the canals with P. P’s retired from Waitrose – used to work in their wine and spirits department so she would have been a very useful friend to know! She was telling me that originally she worked in their accounts department and one night forgot to lock £6,000 cash in the safe. A genuine mistake, due to her mind being on also training up a new member of staff, and the money luckily was still on the desk in the morning. The reason for recounting this story is because of the treatment she received from the lady from Waitrose head office, sent to investigate the matter. She basically accused P of trying to steal the money, even though she had worked as a valued member of the team for over 20 years. P was so upset she handed in her resignation and was promptly offered a pay rise from her own store manager to entice her to stay. He knew her value. Just a reminder of how important it is how we treat others and that we shouldn’t jump to wrongful conclusions without knowing all the facts. On retirement P bought a narrowboat and has never been happier or more relaxed. She makes things, such as incense burners, out of recycled bottles and other craft items and calls herself a narrowboat trader. Lockdown has hit people like P hard with lack of passing trade. Thankfully for P, it’s more of a hobby as she has a pension, but she says she knows of many canal traders who are going out of business.
Tried out our new boots, not as early as planned, but we’ve had a dry day so far. We took a lovely walk around the lakes but I bemoaned the lack of coffee shops and wished I had thought to take a snack with us! So many walkers, you would have thought a van might have thought to find a spot to offer refreshments. I believe there’s someone doing that around the ponds near to our home but perhaps its not encouraged in lockdown. I still would like to offer cups of tea to passers by on the towpath in disposable cups but I am unsure of the rules about this and don’t obviously want to put anyone at risk. Towpath activity where we are at the moment is scarce, but the cold and snow perhaps discourages towpath walks – noone wants to slip and fall in the icy water!
Did a batch cook up of some beef mince, lentils and lots of veg which I then split into 4 bags. 2 went in freezer, 1 in fridge and we had the remaining one for supper, doctored with Worcestershire sauce and herbs. Plan is to change flavour of each bag so that we get a chilli, a cottage pie and a bolognaise, with very little added effort on my part. Not night after night obviously. Reminds me of when R was hope alone one summer for a couple of weeks whilst the kids and I were in Suffolk. I suggested he defrosted some salmon for his supper. He found a bag of 6 pieces (brought reduced and frozen ready for a family meal together), defrosted them all and proceeded to eat them over the next six nights. How he did not get food poisoning by day 6 I do not know. And to eat the same meal repetitively – I think he eats to live, not lives to eat! Makes him easy to feed but I am seriously fed up of finding new meal ideas without the odd takeaway – it’s just too cold to go out to pick one up and there’s only so many fast food meals that are good for you!
Thinking about R and his taste buds, his bike accident left him with a much reduced sense of taste and I remember him remarking one day that you don’t know what you have until you lose it. Growing up he was happy to eat anything as long as he was full but once he couldn’t enjoy the flavours he missed the variety of tastes.
A game of bridge in the evening and then two episodes of ‘Mum’ (Britbox) finished the evening well. Mum makes us laugh out loud – not much does that. The characatures of the main players are just so real. You get the feeling we all know someone like them, just not so exaggerated. Such light relief. Mind you asking R what I did yesterday, because I seem to not have done much, I have to admit to a guilty pleasure sans R. I started watching Bridgerton, having heard so much about it and found the time for two episodes, wrapped in a blanket with a hot water bottle because it was before stove lighting time!!
NarrowboatTLC 