Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Posh nosh

Off to Claridge's yesterday for a late lunch. This is, I am now convinced, the only way to eat. Eating at 12:00 means that you're rushed out by 2:00 and have nothing to do all afternoon, arriving at 2:30 means one eats all afternoon and then one can comfortably move on to drinking during acceptable social hours.

Claridge's is fantastic. I'm at home just about anywhere other than McDonald's but there is something about having your drink constantly topped up, your napkin refolded and your chair pulled away when you stand up and pushed under your well-fed arse when you return that makes you miss it when it doesn't happen in, day, a Harvester.

The doors to the private dining rooms remained firmly shut and one could imagine that they held either a selection of malcontented Army types planning a coo or some lottery winners that the hotel thought best to hide from view as they were afflicted with being working class.

The food was great. God alone knows how one actually kills guinea fowl - I imagine that if you had a guinea fowl load in the cartridges it would be blown off course by a puff of wind, while loading it with the traditional hunting mix of lead shot, napalm and rusty nails would vaporise the little sod. Maybe the trick is to wing the things, or just scare them to death?

Remarking on the service brought forth tales from travels. My favourite was the story that, in India, the toilet attendant will follow you into the trap and freshen up the seat for you before you do your business. This is either the lap (or is that seat?) of luxury, revolting or simply a response to disease control because the last chap in the trap died of cholera and they now wipe down with dettol between customers. If you enter somewhere tropical and the attendant follows you into the trap with his 'rat hammer', you know you're in trouble.

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