it's going to be a long (cold) day

I’m not going to have time to write a blog entry today, which is why I’m doing it last night.  Today is a working day.  I don’t suppose there’ll be many (any?) customers, as it’s still forecast to be jolly cold, and the roads will be icy, but it’s my weekend to work.  The only thing I can imagine the manager will find for me to do is to tidy away dead leaves and spilled compost in the tunnels, although come to think of it that’s all there’ll have been for my colleagues to do all week.

At the start of February our finishing time moves later, to 5.00pm.  It is light until then, so on a normal day that would make sense.  If we have any customers after 4.00pm today I’d be very surprised.  I’m hoping to negotiate to go home then, even though it is February, as I need to get cleaned up and changed for the supper concert and then drive back to the village hall with the apple crumbles.  It’s probably going to be so cold that the boot of the car won’t get any warmer than a fridge, and I could get away with leaving them in there all day, but I’m nervous about making the experiment.

Goodness knows what they’re going to be like, after an eleven-mile drive to the hall.  I still have bad memories of an apple crumble cooked in a school cookery lesson, taken home on the bus and carried the final mile from the bus stop.  It was pretty soggy by the time we ate it.  Cookery lessons at school were a waste of time anyway, because I’d already done more than that at home, apart from learning how to gut herrings, a skill so revolting I have never again put it into practice, and made sure I wouldn’t need to by marrying a non-fish eater.

I haven’t been to the supper concert before and don’t know what to expect.  At the committee meeting they were talking about tablecloths and flower arrangements, and the timetable of events said the rehearsal was at 6.30pm.  I asked whether this was a musical rehearsal or a catering one, to general hilarity, but honestly I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing.  Scurrying about carrying plates of chicken stew to 90 people, I think, which I don’t mind.  I’m glad I volunteered to cook extra pudding and not get involved in the main course.  The scope for accidentally poisoning people with apple crumble is quite limited.  I’m slightly amazed that this kind of community catering hasn’t been banned by now, unless all the volunteer cooks have obtained Level something-or-other Hygiene and Food Handling certificates and submitted their kitchens for official inspection.

I suppose that at the end there’ll be washing up, and then the roads will be icy going home, and it will be horribly late, and then on Sunday morning I’ll have to leap up early to go to work again.  Still, the thaw is forecast to start on Sunday.  Here’s hoping.