The run up to the Easter weekend, dear reader has been somewhat sporadic. I made the mistake of summoning the gas man to Chez Kojak. For some time I have been a tad disturbed by nocturnal noises from my central heating boiler. To give it it's due, it does work efficiently enough but after it has switched off a fan or some such technical thing switches on to disperse unwanted heat. Unfortunately it appears to be reverborating against something. At first it was just a faint background noise but now it seems to resonate throughout the house like a diesel engine revving and dying back. Anyone who has read Harry Potter and The Chamber Pot of Secrets will be alarmed to know that the noise seems to be coming from the pipes... Anyway, I digress again. Regular readers of course will know that I frequently digress and I propose to continue to do so...
My sainted neighbour has made no complaint but he must have noticed the nocturnal commotion so something had to be done. Naturally I picked a bad time, the proximity of Easter weekend and a princely wedding made inroads into the working week but I am heading for the Grecian isles shortly so I wanted to have the old boiler sorted. I also intended to head up to God's own county of Durham to stay with my sainted sister over the Easter weekend. Of course the best British Gas could do was Maundy Thursday and as usual, the gas man decided that he would renew a part that he didn't possess and would not possess until Easter Saturday. With a heavy heart and noisy boiler I cancelled my pilgrimage north.
The approaching Grecian jaunt and the promise of good weather caused me to embark on a major spot of laundering - not the money sort but the undergarments and sprung edge 4 drawer divan bedding type. Good Friday dawned and saw me furtively and guiltily sneaking some washing on the rotary dryer. My mother's horror of such an act haunted me - washing was never hung out on a Sunday and any such behaviour on Good Friday would have been condemned as blasphemy. I thought I'd got away with things until late afternoon when the Good Lord evidently spotted it and sent a brief but heavy shower to put an end of such capers. At least I was spared a plague of locusts and rivers of blood but I dare not commence holiday ironing on Easter Sunday!
Diverted by boiler antics it was late on Thursday before I made it to the supermarket for a spot of trolley rage. Now the shops don't even close on Good Friday these days but one would have thought that there was a famine imminently upon us judging by the crowds of people jostling to fill their trolleys to bursting. A ripe breeding ground for a quick rage or three and I indulged with relish. I did manage to procure some fish for the next day and ambitiously planned a tasty fish pie with smoked fish in a cheese sauce. By the time I'd salvaged my sinful laundry from the penitential shower on Friday it was quite late in the day and still very hot and humid. Just ripe for the addition of a hot oven. Some time later, surveying the results of my culinary labours after much cooking and washing up I was so hot and bothered that I'd quite lost my appetite. In fact one could say that I was thoroughly cheesed off.
Today, most of the fish pie is now sitting in the fridge...
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