Tuesday 4 June 2013

Bereft

Damn it. Only been back 3 days and already I have run out of one of my favourite sorts of chocolate. On our day trip to Belgium from France last week there was a special offer on Galler bars of chocolate, 4 for the price of 3. So I stocked up with one bar of framboise (dreadful over-sweet raspberry goo, like something out of the 1970's), one bar of something else so nondescript that I can't remember what it was, and 2 bars of Manon. This classic Belgian combination of white chocolate, rich coffee filling and (normally) walnuts is phenomenal and the Galler bar has 4 very generous chunks of it. I first tried it with a friend who I spent most of my year in Belgium with; we bought it because her name was Manon. In fact a long blanked out memory has just resurfaced: Galler Manon was in fact responsible for my one and only foray into the world of bulimia, one dreary morning in Liege in 1989! Tonight for some reason I looked at the list of ingredients and was surprised on two counts: first the walnuts that are normally found in a manon chocolate are actually in this bar allegedly hazelnuts, even though they definitely taste walnutty (it makes me wonder how accurate the list can be), and second, the coffee filling is mostly made up of date and apple puree instead of the rich cream and cocoa butter concoction I imagined I needed to get out of my system back in 1989. What a waste. It could have been one of my five-a-day. The other waste is that of the two bars of it I bought last week, I ended up giving one away so it is now all gone. I gave it to someone as a thank you while we were still in France; she had helped me out enormously when I had done a proper stupidity. Imagine charging your phone in your husband's van while he is driving you to a big French shopping centre, and he has given you carte blanche to ring him up for a lift home whenever you have finished shopping for your heart's desire, on your own, without children. Then imagine getting out of the van without a care in the world, thinking about the underwear, swimming costumes, perfume and nail varnish you are going to try, then realising your left coat pocket is a bit lighter than usual and that the phone you need to get your lift home through the French countryside is still in the van. Imagine explaining all this to shopping centre staff and asking if you can use their phone to ring England to get someone to give him a message (can't remember his number off by heart) and in response getting an understandable "Oh la la la la" and a shrug of refusal. Then imagine trying one more time and explaining to them that if they can get internet access, they could look up the apartments we stay in and get a number for the housekeeper who might just be able to go there especially to drop off a message. Then realising that she can talk to him all she likes but as she speaks no English and he speaks no French the message will be pointless. So imagine finally spelling out letter by, er, French letter to her a written message: COME TO CITE D'EUROPE AT 12, JO and asking her to take it to him. I guess she deserved a Galler Manon bar after that.  But I am feeling truly robbed right now. And because of my trauma at the shopping centre I never did get the chance to get any underwear, swimming costumes, perfume or nail varnish. Plenty of cheese though.

I am having trouble getting back to felting. I have bought more wool in preparation but cannot quite bring myself to do anything with it yet. Bit of a writer's block. I am incapable of getting up off the sofa in the evenings and the days have been too busy. It is easier for me to sit here and type this than to go and do something creative. I must get cracking: a friend wanted another square sea scene like one I sold in Arts Week, and my brother has asked for some little pictures that might fit onto a card. I am also trying to gear myself up for my first ever paid felting workshop on Thursday night, another by-product of Arts Week which could turn out to be an interesting path to go down, but which is scaring me a little right now.

I did manage to do a tiny bit of creative yesterday in a vague attempt to snap myself back into action. The dress I made for the 5-year-old's Great Fire of London day at school was actually a very wearable if drab sundress and needed some embellishment. I suggested a flower on the front and she said "It has to be white with a yellow middle" so a big daisy it was...


 
I am quite pleased with my daisy and it reminds me of the opening credits to "The Good Life". She says "Mummy you should have coloured it in!". Ah well. More chocolate anyone?


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