Good food, good company

What is it that makes a good night out. The people you are with obviously, the ambiance of the venue or the striking surroundings in which you find yourself. 

Most of us have triggers which ignite memories  of yesteryear, the music or the decor, the lighting, the service, all collaborate to stimulate a moment or a period when you felt on top of the world and everything you did was enjoyable. Living and eating amongst other cultures at a time when you were less sceptical and more open was a memorable and informative experience which never left you and needs only the right ingredients to spark afresh.
The Brasserie in Swansea always ticks my box for having a good night out. The food is delightful, the setting always reminds me of being overseas, the service and the bohemian lack of formality is what makes it special.

When I come to Swansea it's become a ritual to go there with Angela and Marie before I leave and return home and so last night we were there, happily chatting away  lost in the hold of the good ship Brasserie as she ploughed her course of escape from the wet streets of of a wet dark town. A bottle of wine to help steer the course was opened and we chose our food with barely a thought to those Vegans amongst you and even less I'm afraid to the animals that had preceded the choice. We humans can be a self centred lot I'm afraid and although we can philosophise later and attend to our Hail Mary's, if we feel it appropriate, the thought for the day was "would it be tender" !

Faced with the two women in my life I'm sometimes taken to task for a minor infringement. 'Something I have done without noticing' or 'noticing something I have done without thinking' or, as is usually the case, 'just something I have done' !! 

I play the Boycott defence, soft hands deflecting the ball to point or gully, perhaps silly mid-off if the claims are wild and too ridiculous. Play each shot with patience, lots of patience. Never fall foul of sledging or wild accusations, leave that to the umpire. Never wave your bat at a out swinging comment, simple watch it away into the keepers gloves. Never feel intimidated when the bouncers are being balled at you, the aim is not to dismember but to warn, remember, the bill has still to be paid !!

I love these evenings when we are all together but we miss that other member of the team,  Andrew who would always provide an off stage commentary as to why we had misunderstood the true meaning of the game, it wasn't soft hands that were important but a rewriting of the rules which then made a mockery of needed a scorer since the runs were irrelevant !!

That was last night and tomorrow it's back down the M4 into 'Gods own country' facing the M25 with an Englishman's stiff upper lip "throw at me what you will".

The front door will be barricaded with mail, mostly junk but hopefully a message to pick up part 2 of the second years (2013) 'blog annual'. It's like going back to my childhood and opening the Rupert the Bear Annual, (my best Christmas gift). My blog stories laid out in technicolor on a shiny, china clay coated  page in sharp relief, capturing the import of a story in April or May or a critique of government and a warning of the dire events to come. A modern day Nostradamus.