The sea bass is off and there’s only one chicken

What a lovely day. The weather was perfect for starters. Then we met Charles (FATN) and his wife, Janet at the Angel and Blue Pig pub for a most entertaining lunch. The conversation flowed, there were laughs aplenty, the food was great, even the staff joined in the fun.

I think, what makes an excellent lunch is a jolly good convivial atmosphere, and that’s what we had today. From the off, while we took a seat and waited for Charles and Janet, the South African waitress stopped and chatted about Australia, where she’s going in April.

Apparently, she’s sick of the weather here, in the UK. I think she also just wants an adventure. And I reckon she’ll get one.

In order to get a work visa, she had to choose five places where she’d like to work. She chose the Sunshine Coast, the Gold Coast, Surfer’s Paradise, Coffs Harbour, and Byron Bay. I told her there was no point going anywhere but Byron Bay.

Before we headed down the chatting track, she asked us what we wanted to drink. She wound up asking Mirinda three times. The third time she ordered for her. They were out of Mirinda’s first two choices of wine and, to save the server’s legs, she figured it would be easier to just get her what they had at the bar.

This seemed to be the order of the day. When it came to ordering food a bit later, we were told that there was no more sea bass. This was exactly what I was going to order. There was also no more pan fried chicken, but I didn’t want that.

Then, at the end of the meal, when we all fancied a coffee/tea, the manager forgot to ask us and just gave us the bill. This led to a lot of hilarity when we told the South African server. It probably sounds awful, but it was incredibly funny.

Actually, the manager was also highly entertaining, particularly with Janet’s spare sausage which she was going to feed to their fox. Not that they own a fox…one visits their garden regularly, and she thought it would quite like the sausage.

Lunch was a delight, from start to finish. There was a lot of chat about travel, the horrors of Brexit, the fact that we all despise the Tories, and so many other things. We invited them to visit us in Trosa and they might, next year. I’m sure they’d love it.

We walked back to the house, replete with food and fun. Unlike this poor little chap, who, despite appearances, was clearly having an awful day.

Thanks, Charles. Lunch was such an excellent idea.