Graeme's Recipe Corner - Lamb Meatball Jalfrezi

I've recently become very attached to making curry recipes with Patak's Jalfrezi Paste, using different meats. This one, using lamb meatballs, was probably my least favourite to eat (more to do with the fact I just don't eat lamb normally) but I photographed the process rather comprehensively and made this. For me it is best with chicken or prawns.

Full recipe is on the jar. Takes approximately an hour, in my experience.

I surrender to the dental authorities ... and other confessions

My dental X-ray - it's all about what goes in my mouth


I've been really shit at doing this blog lately. I'm sorry ... I'm so sorry.

Fellow porn fans may think I've been hard at it, with an almost daily piece of meat on the digital slab, but those were pre-loaded last April, before I realised they'd be pretty alone on here

Anyway this post you're now reading is meant as something of an update on the state of my health, especially since health is currently becoming a major pre-occupation as swine flu surges.

You may recall I chose to cut my alcohol intake just after Easter. That was dutifully followed by five whole weeks of sobriety. Once I'd satisfied myself that I didn't chemically depend on the drink, I felt OK to go back and try to find a 'sensible' level - much more difficult than just not drinking, which is damned easy if you're not addicted, and I had just demonstrated that I wasn't. So I underestimated the task and had to get a little outside help to get a framework together.



This mainly consists of being given the safe limits for male adult drinking and then noting the units marked on the cans and bottles I buy, plus realising what triggers me to reach for an alcoholic drink, so that I can somehow diminish, counter or avoid them. Again that written down looks fairly easy BUT the maximum units is 21, which is roughly two bottles of wine in seven days and however you calculate with your particular tipple, some daily rationing or not partaking must go on. I'm now pretty sure most regular drinkers haven't done the arithmetic and might be shocked if they measured their own intake. If your own is regularly over 50 units a week (the serious risk on the scale) I'd advise getting some similar help, though if you occasionally clock a few units over 21 don't beat yourself up.

You also find cost becomes quite a factor in all this too, and realise how we are encouraged to buy in bulk where the bevvy is concerned - it was certainly why I used to buy Diamond White in 2 litre bottles. Whereas the glam blue plastic bottle is £3.07 currently, each individual 440ml silver can in 4-pack is £2.07 if you buy less than 4 (strangely even the 4-pack itself is £3.64 for 240ml less). So basically you have to go for 'small portions' that you not only like the taste of, but you are not going to be ripped off buying.




On a slight tangent here, I wasn't convinced of the recent SNP plans for minimum pricing on alcohol, but I agree in principle about making sure multiple packs always cost the same amount as single units. The jist of the current proposals would be to put up the price of the 2 litre bottle, but surely the fairest way to the same goal is to bring down the price of the 500ml can to £3.07/4? Nobody loses. Sure it looks like I'm saying here that cans should be 52p - crivvens! But that amount of the same stuff already is 52p and people are buying more of it than they really want.



Anyway, I've come down to three default 'safe' drinking patterns for me. The first is to pick two nights that I'll have a bottle of wine. The second is to pick three nights I'll have two bottles of (Asda Extra Special Vintage 500ml) Cider - these are £1.25 for a 3.5 unit bottle. The third is not to drink at all, which ironically feels like cheating the system. Possibly because no arithmetic is required.

I've also experimented with those mini-bottles of wine, notably when I 'fell off the wagon' in Fort William during my holidays, but it's quite difficult to stick at one or two - I find wine the most 'more-ish' and fastest units downed of my tipples.

The 'no arithmetic' option 3 is becoming more common for me. For reasons I will soon explain, I had to be put on a course of antibiotics on the third of July, so was obliged not to have any alcohol for those seven days. But I downed any alcohol anyway since the previous Saturday. Indeed, when I finished the course last weekend, though I had a rather naughty blow-out involving slightly more than two bottles of wine I haven't had a drink again since. It's just what's happened - no signifcant willpower or sacrifice - and equally if I drink today or not I'm not too bothered either way. This is where I want to be, drink-wise.

If the threat of swine flu and the trials of alcohol reduction were not enough, I'd had a particularly long bout of toothache during June. Having not had a dentist since I came back to Scotland in 1999 (and was last seen by one three years prior to that!), I've just been grinning and bearing it as my teeth have grumbled and crumbled over the years. The occasional toothache usually lasts no more than one day or night and I'm quietly hoping the nerves are quietly dying. However, in June it was more than ten days with some sort of pain, sometimes sharp, sometimes dull. I actually said to several people that was the final straw and I'd have to get an emergency appointment. When I did say, the next day it was gone again and I thought, 'Phew- that was close'. But only a few days more passed and it was back with a vengeance on Thursday the 2nd. I dosed it with the max amount of paracetemol and managed to sleep through to morning OK. Gone again I presumed when I woke up with no pain, just a bit of a fuzzy, buzzy feeling in near my jaw. It was when I looked in the bathroom mirror I realised I'd not swallowed a gobstopper in the night - I had an abscess!

This time it really was the final straw and I made an emergency appointment that afternoon at Lynebank - I didn't even think we had a dental hospital in Dunfermline. Because of the abscess and the complication of having to check my blood INR was below 4.0, I could only be examined, be prescribed the antibiotics and be sent to get an x-ray as some surgery to the gums might be needed. I think there may have been one tooth in my nouth that was passed as healthy when the dentist was spouting away that upper/lower dental lingo to the nurse, but the headline diagnosis was I needed six teeth pulled, just for starters!



Initially I was meant to return the following Friday afternoon to get the first extraction, but my INR count was inexplicably high (my sexy pharmacist could only guess it was the infection itself causing my blood to thin) and so it happened yesterday. I was in double stress about how much it would hurt and how much it would cost, especially since the last time I had teeth out was decades ago. I was relieved to discover it would only be £11.44, and when the tooth was pulled it was so swift and painless I had to ask the Polish lady with the pliers 'was that it?'. Mind, there was only a sliver of it left above the gumline - the rest are more substantial. And next time I'm getting two out at once - on the 31st. Plus I don't know when they start putting stuff IN.

I celebrated with an over-elaborate (see below) and over-priced (£2.95) mocha in Debenhams cafe on the way home. They call it mocha 'chocolate soup' but I'll know better next time - the only suitable place from which to lick spray cream and molten malteasers is a willing sex partner.



Anyway, just to be needlessly patronising for a second time in this post, if you are in the same position I was and need dentistry doing, just go. Well if you qualify for the NHS anyway - the financial pain is a lot greater otherwise. Only one warning to beware, the quick-acting anaesthetic meant absolutely no pain in the chair, but when it wore off a couple of hours later you need drugs. The pain was as bad as last month's toothache, and I actually had to retire to bed without seeing the second live "Big Brother" eviction show (catching the 1pm repeat shortly) and didn't have a good sleep even then. Suffice to say, the paracetamols are still at hand.

Here's where I cleverly link the two topics to finish the post...

One of the things I've noticed very clearly since cutting down on the booze is that I'm eating and drinking more unwisely. Unwisely night be the wrong word - childishly is closer.

As I lived through the 90s and noughties I'd gradually educated my brain and palate - as many of us have - to healthier, low sugar, low fat choices. Though this was also when I picked up the unhealthy drinking habit alongside (I think we kid ourselves this is a Mediterranean diet of sorts). I still don't touch cheese, but just because I can't stand it, not because of the fat content. And my default is to buy semi-skimmed milk, decaf coffee and wholemeal bread. Admittedly before the squeeze on the booze, I discovered last year I did still enjoy full fat milk and sugar with corn flakes and I even started adding salt in cooking every so often. Recently I even bought butter for the first time (creamy, salted stuff at that)!





I've never resisted chocolate, but in recent months fizzy drinks, cakes and sweets have become as much a part of my intake as they were in my primary school days and I don't need to go anywhere near a scales to know I'm putting on weight. This is somewhat unavoidable with the drinks - generally I'm substituting a fizzy alcoholic drink (cider) with a non-alcoholic one. Though I don't know whether it's better or worse to have moved from the non-alcoholic bottled spritzer I was using to just plain Asda cola. It's the diet, no-sugar, decaf label but only 47p per 2 litre bottle so I have my doubts.



But I've no idea what has so gravitated me towards mint-imperials, cup-cakes, danish pastries and suchlike. I even have a huge portion of iced coffee cake by me at this very moment.

Has cutting down the alcohol made me crave other unhealthiness and can I expect to get very well known to my dentist from now on, if not the local weight-watchers?

Is this my mid-life crisis or is that my growing neurosis about it all?

If I grew a beard would I make a good bear?

All these questions and more will surely not be answered in my next post, whenever that will be.

Sunday Snacks!

You don't know how close you come to being bombarded with these food pics - I've become rather obsessed with taking them over the years. I've given in to the urge today with these shots of my morning and afternoon snacks (before and after some unseasonal hail and rain showers).

The first is of the first BLT (bacon, lettuce and tomato) sandwich I've ever made. I took enough shots during this that I was going to post a slideshow, but you're spared that until I find how to export it.

Below is my mid-morning hot chocolate and chocolate cupcake combo. I don't recommend the toffee flavour 'Options' pictured (nor the white chocolate one - both are sickly sweet).

Irn Bru "If" advert

I'm no longer a consumer of this particular 'golden nectar', which might go some way to explaining why I don't fit any of the criteria meted out here (anyone who knows me care to challenge that?) in a new TV ad loosely based on the Kipling poem.

No doubt many don't consider me a proper Scot anyway.

Actually I do remember very occasionally being called 'jock' when I lived in London ... but it tended to annoy me.

3 Jun update: The Guardian has picked up on this

Drench Your Brains!

Cute little ad that's recently appeared featuring Thunderbirds' resident geek Brains putting on a nifty dance performance to 1992 dance fave, "Rhythm Is A Dancer". The dance styles do veer off into a Gene Kelly or Chippendale stylee at moments but it's great fun.

M&S: The "food porn" trilogy

I'm in a YouTube kinda mood today and I've collated the tracks which have backed the Marks & Spencer "food porn" ads over the last 3 years (helped by Dervla Kirwan of course).

For 2005 we started with Fleetwood Mac's "Albatross"



In 2006 it was "Samba Pa Ti" by Santana



And currently we have that now ubiquitous summer sound, Groove Armada's take on "At the River"

Edinburgh recommendation: Craigie's Farm & Deli

...

Having done down a local hostelry this week I must balance this out with a recommendation for a rather new, if rather off the beaten track venue.

The cafe and deli only opened at the end of June, and I discovered it on a working lunch in the dazzle of this afternoon. The clear day view takes in everything from Fife to the Pentlands and a fair bit of the capital city. As well as the well presented (normally organic/free range variety) food and drink served there's a shop and you can even pick your own fruit and veg at pretty competitive prices.

I didn't have my camera with me, which was a shame, but the buildings you see top centre of the above shot from last summer are of the farm. Best reached via the Burnshot flyover turnoff of the A90. After that it's the first right turn on the southwesterly road going towards Kirkliston.

Here's the web-page to tell you more

BarWatch: a warning about NBs, Edinburgh

Since I complained of a £5 large glass of wine in Ealing last month I thought it only fair to point out a dearer example nearer home. Just prior to attending the Tattoo last Thursday I arranged to meet my mate Stuart in NBs bar in the centre of town (it's in the Balmoral Hotel opposite Burger King at the east end of Princes' St) and ordered my usual 'large glass of dry white wine' without checking the price list. I had intended to check the place out anyway following it's redecoration earlier in the year. I was told to take a seat and it would be brought over. While waiting I checked the wine list and found the cheapest was a Pinot Grigot at £5.25 a large glass! And some sneaky bar staff don't always decide on the cheapest to serve of course. My wine was brought over by a smart Justin Timberlake lookalike, alongside a pretentious black leather 'wallet' containing the bill plus a pen where I was to sign for it and included a space to add a 'gratuity'. The cheek! At least it was £5.25. Bizarrely It was further complimented by an unwanted dish of cheesy nibbles (I wasn't hungry and I can't stand cheese but did they ask?). Stuart managed to eat some of this 'garnish' upon arrival but the real bonus was he was able to hand out one of his modelling cards to a comely blond barman who I paid the charge to.

I know it's the festival but these prices and 'extras' are a joke. Were I to walk down to the other end of Leith Walk there's a Wetherspoons serving a large glass of (perfectly fine) dry white wine for £2.50. That's my gratuity for any of you visiting Edinburgh who don't want ripped off. Unless you want to check out those 2 bar staffof course ...

London Visit: The Black Tie Do and the BA Lounge

I had an eventful couple of days last week on my first trip down to London since September 2003 (and my first flight since a festive shindig in Belfast in December 2005).

Anyhow, despite my advanced years (43 in September) it was also my first ever 'black tie' do. I've only ever been to rather informal weddings and wedding receptions where the suits are up to you and completely diverse. Equally the expensive 'tradition' of high school proms recently adopted from America was well after my time.

Adding to the pressure this was a works do with our head office (hence London ...or Harrow more specifically) and held in a military mess, with attendant etiquette. It was also a Grade II listed building with amazing lansdcaped gardens (see mobile phone picture above) complete with working fountains!

Since I'd first accepted the RSVP last month I'd researched what exactly "black tie" entailed, and what it didn't. It's basically a black tuxedo with a black bow-tie of some description. You can also wear either a cummerbund OR a waistcoat but not both. I also researched how much the costume hire would be, weighing up whether to pick it up here or in London on the day. Having baulked at the costs, I was also being encouraged by some folks on the Digital Spy forums to wear formal 'Highland' outfit as an acceptable alternative. I'd never kilted it before either but the hire costs were much more bearable and extra attention was guaranteed.

About a week later though my boss (who was also going) mentioned a follow-up email that she'd had and deleted which somehow relaxed the dress code to include lounge (i.e. normal) suits as long as they were dark grey or black. So I sighed with some relief that I could just wear the plain suit I wear when I need to, matched with a black silk tie, though I also felt slightly cheated of the opportunity to dress up, even at cost.

Alas I never actually saw this email or had the contents confirmed. On the night I was the only one in a lounge suit ! Luckily no-one made anything of it except me, and I didn't stand out as much as the two who came wearing white tuxedoes which I'd already discovered were also not considered 'black tie'. And I didn't get the James Bond jibes all night (though 'The Blues Brothers" was referenced to a group of us). Equally, had I gone for the kilted option I'd also have been alone in doing so. We had group photos done on the grand 3-sided staircase and I made sure my faux-pas was not too apparent in the shot.

With a glass of champagne on arrival and the waiting staff attentively refilling your glass at the slightest opportunity I was soon fairly relaxed about it and started some proper mingling. We had a formal seating plan for the 3 course silver service dinner, amazingly managing a boy-girl alternation throughout. Luckily I'd unexpectedly been involved in completing the document when I made a surprise trip to our head office itself that afternoon so I'd had sight of it and knew 'who' to expect. I was bamboozled though by the rule that I had to escort the lady on my right into dinner, not because of my inclinations but because I was at the table end and had no-one on my right and a man opposite! Answers on a postcard please as to what the solution to that etiquette puzzle is.

I thought I'd be irritated or intimidated by the rules and regulations and conventions of the mess (saying grace, standing to toast the Queen etc) but I took it as a bit of fun, and oddly that seemed to be the idea. Certainly the bizarre practice of having to pass the port in one direction was enjoyably surreal. And after the main course all us gents had to move '2 gents' to our right while the ladies stayed put which I can see is a good way to mix things up and meet new people in principle.In practice though I was still with more familiar faces, including my boss. Thankfully the rule about not going to the toilet during the meal was ignored. There's something vaguely sadistic or certainly 'challenging' about an event that routinely fills you to bursting with alcohol then obliges you hold it in for a period of hours.

The food was first class too. Basically a smoked salmon starter, beef main and summer fruit dessert. I wanted to nick a menu as a souvenir but forgot. Probably related to the fact that we apparently retired to the bar until 3am (even though the bar closed at 1am). Even when we were paying by this point a glass of wine was £1.20 and a G&T even less! Thankfully I was on a day off on the Friday.

There's talk of this event becoming at least an annual fixture for us and I hope it does. This time I'll be ready with the proper attire. The idea of me doing a week's secondment in the London office also came up, again something I'd be keen to do as I was comfortable during my afternoon visit. Then again I did work down there for over 10 years (December 1987-February 1999), so not overly surprising.

I had a spare few hours to wander on Friday, catching up on normal London bar prices these days. I decided not to linger overlong in Central London though a large (250ml) white wine in a Holborn Wetherspoons was a not unreasonable £3.60. Foolishly I decided to break my tube journey back to Heathrow and revisit an old haunt, The New Inn, in South Ealing. It had completely lost the feel it had in the days when I was a regular in the West London Doctor Who Group of the late 80s and the same measure of wine there was a round and cheeky £5! So much for nostalgia and suburban pricing.

However, I had an ace up my sleeve. While on my journey down at Edinburgh Airport on the Thursday my boss texted me to say that if my flight ticket had 'BA BUSINESS' marked on it - which it had - I was entitled to use the BA lounge. She texted me too late as the last call for my flight was just being called and I didn't have time to locate it even. I was of the impression that this was just some posey place with sofas and stacks of in-flight magazines so I wasn't too miffed about missing a visit. However, I happened to have arranged a meet-up with my lovely ex Nigel on Friday lunchtime. To call him well travelled is a considerate understatement and he was off for another QE2 cruise that weekend. He explained to me that the BA lounge was stuffed with unlimited free booze, net access, food, newspapers etc etc and I should make the best of it. Actually, although I arranged for an earlier flight than booked when I arrived at Heathrow, once I arrived in the lounge this new flight was delayed by an hour and 10 minutes so I did get to have a decent carouse in there. One slight dampener was that the internet terminals there had blocked this very site on the grounds of 'pornography'. As if!

Needless to say I'll be on the prowl for more business flights down. A bit disappointed no-one told me sooner.

On a related point I think I may also take advantage of the airport option next month for purchase of the long-awaited MacBook as it is £706.37 in the Duty Free shop as opposed to £829ish normally. The difference is greater than the air-fare which would have just been by train otherwise.

A Wetherspoons in Dunfermline? But surely the sky will fall in!

Now I know this is going to be of direct interest to only a minority of you out there, though I'm sure the general principles involved are more broad.

In the past week it was at last confirmed that the JD Wetherspoon chain have been granted permission to open a "superpub" in a derelict Dunfermline church premises in the town centre. Work starts in June and a November opening is expected. The present publicans are squealing like little piggies once more.

Once more you ask? But surely Wetherspoons have only just been granted permission? Strangely (or not) this goes back years to when the firm first considered having a presence here.

I was relieved that my favourite flavour of pub was finally going to be in my home town - I've been a keen patron since 1993 when I was gobsmacked to learn you could actually have non-smoking areas in pubs, appealing decor, no piped music, decent choice of food and room to swing a cat. In a very few years they were also the only sanctuary of the non-footy fan. And that was when I lived in London, with a lot more pubs on offer (in fact Wetherspoons replaced smokey gay hostelries as my default). When I was on detached duty I always checked if and where there was a Wetherspoons.

Come my moving back to Scotland in 1999 - where the brand had only a handful of pubs, usually in city centres - I was plunged back into the dark ages I remembered from my youth when I rarely bothered to visit any of the holes that Dunfermline offered. So the prospect of a JD Wetherspoon meant I wouldn't have to do my drinking at home or on visits to the cities. Alas the local licencees united in opposition to proper competition and somehow had the ear of local moribund councillors who blocked plans to move into a derelict cinema. I don't remember the councillors asking the general populace, but maybe we had nothing to offer them outside of re-election times.

Another year or so passed and another opportunity came around, in an even more ideal corner spot opposite the Glen Gates, where a large shop was selling up. This one looked a sure thing with all the contracts and permissions seemingly passed, albeit none too quickly. But at the last minute the eccentric seller decided he'd had a better offer from .... Marks & Spencer (who already have a prime site in town, but that was his story). Needless to say this was just guff and the site remained derelict for a little longer. I wonder how much ... erm ...sorry, what actually changed his mind ?

Ironically, by last year both these sites were filled by new pubs, just not Wetherspoon ones. Both were apparently 'superpubs'.

The one that took the cinema, "All Stars" which called itself a 'sports bar' (despite being no more sport-centric than any of the rest) with club attached behind. This appears not to have been a chain, as far as I can see. However it soon got a bad name due to the behaviour of its clientele upon leaving and was also not getting enough custom. I think it really didn't know where it was at, and who it was trying to attract - among its 'sports memorabila' was a full size Dalek! First the club shut down and then the pub. In the meantime the pukka restaurant next door ("The Townhouse" - one which actually cooked on the premises) had given up due to the disruption of body fluids literally on it's doorstep and so had its Oz-themed successor.

So opening a 'superpub' per se does not a success make.

But to the other 'lost' site. It took months upon months to renovate, and obviously had a lot of money spent doing it. This though was a chain - Belhaven - who already owned another Dunfermline 'superpub' in the shape of "The Foundry". Initially when I heard this was the case, I was dismayed that Wetherspoons had lost out to just a less innovative chain, and wondered why no backlash here. I'd actually been a fairly frequent visitor to "The Foundry" as the best of a mediocre bunch but with a permanently installed DJ and a barrage of screens showing Sky Sports or their own drinks promotions I knew it didn't have my sort at heart. Plus, ironicaly, it frequently seemed empty even on Friday nights after work. As I usually go out for the company that was getting a frustration.

Anyway, this became "The Seven Kings" as of early last November (the name derives from the seven kings who were crowned in Dunfermline I think). I missed the opening night but visited the following Monday afternoon around 3-ish. It was busy! Not packed but there must have been about 20 or so people drinking and/or eating in total, and a fair mix of ages. I immediately spotted that this was no "Foundry II" despite the piped but muted Sky Sports again. What was so obvious was that their blueprint was Wetherspoons! I've actually had a review of the place in the pipeline since then so I won't gab on about it now. Importantly THIS brought a revolution to the town - not only was this place packed most days after 6, but many of the other pubs were taking the overflow and were no longer so barren. Basically I think people who would either have gone to Edinburgh (or even Kirkcaldy/Perth) or just stayed home with a Tesco vintage now ventured into Dunfermline. Interestingly the prices came down too to match "The Seven Kings" tariff.

Surely this is not armageddon and surely an near equal match for "The Seven Kings" with an actual Wetherspoons opening will sharpen this influx and healthy competition even more.

What pisses me off most about the standing licencees is their complacency, their pleading for special treatment and basically their running little fiefdoms for the indulging of themselves and like minded mates. Are they running a business or not? Or are they just not very good at it and can't acknowledge when that's shown up? "We can't have them - they're a real business not someone who just fancied having his own pub". Are they not capable of adapting with the 'market' they so frequently and selectively cite ?

Prior to the smoking ban it's this same breed of pub landlord that said 'the market should decide' to propose smoking and non-smoking pubs with the unsaid presumption that any non-smoking pub would fail and that it wouldn't be any of them. Of course the point of a blanket ban for all pubs is to ensure a level playing field to start with. Now they want protecting from that same free market. Just as the dinosaur publicans hadn't noticed that the majority of their potential customers didn't smoke they don't notice that other tastes move on in less than 10 or 20 years. While decrying the monster that is Wetherspoon (est. 1979) they don't address why such alternatives are a success. And in the years the Dunfermline publicans have been playing Canute have they tried to adapt and diversify to pre-empt the changing profile of the population? Have many of them even redecorated this decade? Simply put, no. They are risk-averse in the extreme and continue to superserve a narrow section of the public, the male, 40+, beer/lager drinking, football-obsessed section. Fine, but why attack businesses that want to spread their net wider and succeed at it?

Some of the landlords have even desperately tried to wrap themselves in the flag:

"Norrie MacDonald, licensee of the Creepy Wee pub, believes some pubs won’t survive the opening of Wetherspoon’s while some, he said, were already resigned to giving up their lease.

“The smaller pubs sponsor football teams, have pool teams, let local bands rehearse in their lounges but all the big companies do is take money out of Fife and send it to their bosses in England.

And who exactly are your suppliers Norrie? And is a Scottish based chain OK to wipe you out? Also I frankly don't care whether my pub sponsors a football team (free advertising anyone?) or has a pool team. And what's a 'lounge'? I'm not sure the Creepy Wee Pub has one (or the room for a band).

Another madcap claim they make is that the local pubs have had a double whammy of the smoking ban and the opening of "The Seven Kings", conveniently forgetting the latter opened up 8 months after the ban so surely only a single whammy from anyone in particular? No customer who goes to "The Seven Kings" is one who's banished themselves after the smoking ban.

Challenging times ...

Sorry for my slight disappearance - I've had a challenging few days with transport-induced stress on Sunday and a conference at work (which I was chief arranger & gopher for) on Monday and Tuesday. As a team building exercise an unfortunate few of us were promised a hillwalk in the Pentlands over Monday lunch. I hadn't bargained for the 'hill' being the highest peak in the range - Carnethy Hill - which is 470m high and described as a steep ascent. About the only item of kit I had right was my boots, and I'd been drinking the night before. Not recommended. My camera's batteries wore out half way up Turnhouse Hill (and I knew just how the battery felt) but I have a handful of pics somewhere.

Also had to get through an Indian meal in the evening (I really don't do Indian, but my pleas were ignored). We packed a table of 12 in the Indian Cavalry Club and I had Chicken Kalari - OK apart from my accidentally chewing a green chilli - washed down with several stubbies of Strongbow (I also don't do beer or lager) . Must be a top place - First Minister Jack McConnell was dining at an adjacent table.

I think my troubles (with Stagecoach buses) on Sunday may yet deserve a post of its own and a letter of complaint.

Also, my "Torchwood" review will be late because of my misadventures on that day, and my going to see "Casino Royale" tonight.