3 November 2018 (Saturday) - Stormageddon's Visit


I woke with something of a headache and a sore arm. Was that the after-effect of yesterday’s flu jab?
I got up and had a quick look at the Internet. It hadn’t changed *that* much since yesterday. This morning people were grumbling about how Christmas decorations are appearing in shops and Christmas adverts are on the telly. Personally I think they are probably right to grumble. Every year I start off in early November all keen and enthusiastic about the festivities, but by the time they arrive (two months later) I’m thoroughly sick of hearing about it. Starting all the Christmas stuff now spoils it for me.
Talking of Christmas I also read that there are no plans for a Christmas Day episode of Doctor Who as the people who make it have run out of ideas. I think they reached that point some time ago. I’ve not seen last week’s episode yet and am in no rush to see it. Which (as a life-long Doctor Who fan) is something of a shame.

"er indoors TM" and "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM" came downstairs; we got ourselves together and drove out to the Beefeater on Eureka park where we’d planned to meet "My Boy TM" and his branch of the tribe for brekkie.
Have you ever been to the Beefeater on Eureka park for brekkie? I can’t recommend the place. Having been told there was a half-hour wait to be seated we sat for forty minutes looking at empty tables and watching people (who’d arrived after us) being seated and served. Eventually we got a table. After half an hour of being pointedly ignored by the staff "My Boy TM" fetched over a waitress who took the food orders. After another half an hour they brought up various plates of food; not one actually corresponding to what we’d ordered. But bearing in mind how long we’d waited already, and also bearing in mind that the McDonalds over the way had stopped doing breakfast by then, we decided to just eat it. I ate what I could. The black pudding was red where it was still raw. I don’t mind a runny fried egg, but it is the yolk which should be runny, not the white.
As I looked at my inedible leftovers I tried not to laugh out loud at the waitress who was clearing tables. What I worked in a restaurant I would carry away more than two pieces of crockery at a time when clearing a table. I also would pick up the cutlery that I dropped; not leave it for twenty minutes.
We’d read that if there were any problems we should bring them up with the duty manager. However when the duty manager came over to us we didn’t have chance to bring anything up. He marched up, announced that we should get a move on because breakfast was finishing in five minutes, and he marched off.
When I paid, the waitress was apologising profusely; she knew what a poor service they’d offered. Realistically they should have half the tables or double the staff. I told her so. She agreed but said that this had been pointed out to the management already.
Bearing in mind that the duty manager had had his chance, I slated the place on Google and TripAdvisor.

We then drove round to Bybrook Barn garden centre to have a look at the fish stuff and the toys, and then "er indoors TM" set off to a girls’ lunch in Folkestone. So we went home to collect the dogs, and took "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM"  and the family wolf-pack round the park for a walk. As we walked I recorded some of our antic which I made into a little video.

"My Boy TM" and Cheryl went home; "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM"  and I settled in front of the telly and watched “The Annoying Orange” videos on You-Tube until he got bored. We then had something of a fight which his mother tried to referee by phone from thirty miles away.
I suggested we might take to dogs up the park again to amuse him; he readily agreed but dawdled so slowly that it was dark by the time we got there.

We came home to find "er indoors TM" had returned. She boiled up pizzas for tea. "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM" has settled in front of the telly watching walk-throughs of video games (that he doesn’t understand) on You-Tube. "er indoors TM" has told him it is bath time several times. he has pointedly ignored her on each occasion. He seems to be rather proficient at doing that…

No comments:

Post a Comment