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I’m not exactly lying. But I have noticed over the past ten weeks that when people ask me where I live, instead of saying “I live in Carluke”, I have taken to using the phrase, “I’ve been living in Orkney for the past couple of years.” Of course there is nothing wrong with living in the Clyde Valley, and I am incredibly grateful to my cousin for giving me this opportunity. But can you blame me? I mean, let’s face it – a remote Scottish isle in the far north has far more cachet that a town just outside Glasgow. Which would generate more interest on your part: “I live in Inuvik.” or, “I live in Oshawa.”? Exactly. Fortunately, the perfect continuous present tense can blur quite nicely with the simple present tense, so I don’t feel I’m truly lying to people. Misleading? Possibly. Lying? Of course not.

My Mum was a very good cook (actually latterly Dad was pretty good too, but this is about a memory of childhood). My sisters and I have very distinct memories of how Norma prepared white fish like sole or halibut. One way was to poach it on a dinner plate in milk then use it in a fish pie or pudding, using the milk in the sauce. But the one that sticks out, that we’ve actually talked about on and off for the last couple of decades, was breading fish fillets in orange crumbs of some sort. We all remember it vividly – we even associate the same recipe with our Grandma Reid making it too, although that may be a slightly less clear memory; if ever my Dad mentioned his mother cooking something, my Mum would snort derisively and say, “Your mother? Cook? Ha!”

I think we all liked these orange fillets well enough, certainly none of us has complained while discussing it. A couple of years ago, I finally found a box of the breading, Ruskoline in a store and brought it home. LIke all childhood memories, it hadn’t quite stood the test of time. You know, you go to your high school reunion only to discover the classrooms and halls are much smaller that you remember. Well, same idea – while the fish breaded in Ruskoline tasted the same, clearly we had amplified the orange-ness of it in our memories. Turned out to be more of a pale coral. Ah well.

Last Thursday the fish van came by as usual (see previous posts), and I bought several halibut fillets. Just as I was paying, the fish monger (there’s a word we simply don’t get to use as often as we should) asked if I wanted some breading with my order and produced a baggie of virulent orange crumbs. I mean electric orange. OMG! We were right all along! Those fillets of our youth were orange!

So last night I had electric orange fish, just like when I was little, along with courgette and tomatoes from my cousin’s allotment in Kent. Childhood memories live on. *As an aside, he didn’t charge me for said crumbs, it’s just all part of the service of having a fish van pull up outside your house once a week with fish caught that morning in the North Sea.

(*Ignore the broken fillet – it tasted deelish.)

Last month I found Scout out in the back garden, quietly nuzzling a dead bird. Yesterday, I saw her fussing about at the foot of the far garden wall, but gave it little thought. Until I saw the big black lump in the middle of the closer patch of lawn a couple of hours later. WTF was that? It seems she had unearthed the carcass of a dead crow (Jeez those things are big) and had dragged in into the middle of the backyard.

This morning was garbage day, so I grabbed a large plastic bag, one of Uncle Ian’s many coal shovels, Marigolds (yellow rubber gloves), and a face mask (overkill? probs) and headed out. After much swearing and swerving on my part, and complete disinterest on hers, I got the corpse into the bin.

Why do they come to Uncle Ian’s to die? I’m starting to miss the dead seals from Orkney.

Last year a very good friend sent me a surprise package from home, full of Canadian goodies and red & white party decorations. The All-Dressed chips and President’s Choice Mac & Cheese were gone within the week, but I hung out the decorations last July 1st in Kirkwall, then carefully packed them away and brought them south with me for this year.

When my friend Jean & her husband came to Glasgow last month, they asked what they could bring and I said graham cracker crumbs, so she brought me two hefty boxes – wonderful. They don’t have them here, and crushed digestive biscuits just aren’t the same. So this morning I decorated the house and made Nanaimo bars for the neighbours. I can’t stand Nanaimo bars (too sweet and I hate coconut) but from what I understand most Canadians do love them, so they seemed like the perfect Canadian treat to share, and I’ll have some to give my cousins when they visit next week.

So thank you Michele for my lovely decorations and thank you Jean for my ingredients – and Happy Canada Day, everyone!

Another item on my bucket list was travelling on the Scotland-England overnight train, the Caledonian Sleeper. It goes from the highlands to London and back, and their Club Car Class is quite swish.

It is known for its meals as well as its roomettes and in a perfect world I would have taken the train from Inverness – the train from there leaves after 8pm and gets into Euston twelve hours later. This would mean being able to take full advantage of the dinner car, as well as a leisurely breakfast in the morning – and they allow dogs in the rooms. But, the opportunity never arose while I was living in Orkney, so this week I settled for second best: taking the 11pm train out of Euston which would get me to Cartairs at 6:15am.

I limped into Euston Station after my lovely dinner at Hoppers, hoping the Caledonian lounge would be open – it was. Had a great visit with Kim from Calgary and Sandra (?) from Australia, before we headed down to the train. Of course it was at the other end of the station, and of course my car was the 13th of 14 cars. I limped along past the friendly, smiling staff – just as I got to my car, one staff member saw my limp and said, “You should have asked for assistance at the gate.” Really? Not one of the dozen or so staff I passed before thought to mention this? Ah well.

It was a peedie wee cabin, spotlessly clean and fully set up. A steward came by and said the bar car would be open another hour, but as it was five cars back, I didn’t see much point. She took my breakfast order and told me an attendant would be by at 5:30am to help me take my luggage to the dining car. Perfect.

I had the best night’s sleep and in the morning woke to a beautiful day. I watched the scenery roll by as I dressed, and then headed to a delicious breakfast of hot smoked salmon frittata with hollandaise, and a cup of tea.

Got off the train at Carstairs Junction and my new friend Caroline drove me home. A lovely ending to an eventful week.

As I said, I probably had more wine to drink than was necessary over the course of the 12 hours that I was at the wedding. By the time I left I wasn’t stupid, or dangerous, or legless, just a good, healthy tiddly – as were most of the other guests. So it was time to go – at around midnight I said my good byes, walked a ways away to the car park, and stood waiting in the dark for my taxi.

A young lady stomped by, turned at the back of the barn, and sat down on a low wall, clearly in a snit. She was followed by an angry young man, pleading and exhorting with her, and as she beagn to yell at him and he started accusing her, I gotta admit, my first thought was, “Oooh, goody. Drama!” and I chose not to move away (to be fair, I was there first and I was waiting for a taxi exactly where I said I’d be). As they continued arguing other young men came up and started to – I dunno – take sides? – yell at them both? – threaten the young man? I must admit, I was quite enjoying this.

Then things got physical – the shoving started, then the pushing, and suddenly I realised I was in the trajectory of the punch-up. I tried to move away but with my sprained ankle it was hard to get very far and then – yup, wouldn’t you know it – I was in the midst of things. One hard shove and down I went, onto a low wall, into a flower bed, and against the wall of the barn.

The crowd scattered like buckshot. One of the men did help me up (I may have been a tad rude to him when he started brushing me down), and I just stood there, stunned. (I’ve never been in a fist fight before, you see.) The venue staff were wonderful, asking my taxi to wait while they washed and bandaged my bleeding hand, and then off I went back to my hotel. All over, nothing to see here, folks.

It wasn’t until morning that I discovered the state of the clothes I was wearing, stained and scraped from the plants and the brickwork (they are at the dry cleaners and the jury is still out as to their fate). And it wasn’t until much later in the day I discovered the scrapes down my back and legs, along with the bruises and the goose egg on my head.

Now, the fact that I chose to stay in my room until one minute before check-out watching cooking shows and packing, and then settled at a table in the pub for five hours people-watching and reading a book, had much more to do with the sprained ankle than it did the barroom brawl (altho I did share the story with the bar staff, who were quite entertained). I left the hotel at five and headed into the city for my second dosa dinner of the week. Then off to Euston Station for the Caledonian Sleeper home.

I gotta say – while getting shoved about and knocked down in a stranger’s fist fight was neither the best way to end a beautiful wedding day, nor the best thing for my already damaged ankle – it does make for a good story (the women in the lounge at Euston were riveted).

Norma could fall anywhere: the aisle of a plane, a pub in Oban Scotland, a park in Hershey Pennsylvania, her own living room. I feel legacy is important, so I have chosen to carry on the tradition. I once broke my foot at a Raptors game (I wasn’t playing), I sprained my ankle while standing still at work chatting with a colleague, I own my own crutches, and most recently I did a Chevy-Chase not-quite-stumble-and-save on Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow.

So I shouldn’t have been surprised when, Friday afternoon, strolling along Trafalgar Square towards Charing Cross to get the train to Tunbridge Wells, I found the only piece of uneven pavement and fell, spraining my left ankle, scraping my right knee and wrenching my right foot. Well splendid.

Thank you to the lovely people who helped me up, found my glasses, and saw me on my way. I found the Boots (Shoppers Drugmart) in the station, bought a tensor bandage and painkillers, and limped to my train. Taxi-ed to the lovely hotel (expensive, slightly posh, but with no elevator or air conditioning), and instead of spending the rest of the afternoon/evening exploring Royal Tunbridge Wells, I proceeded to numb the pain in the bar, then off to bed early to sulk and suffer.

I had booked a hair appointment for Saturday morning at a salon 200 yards up the street (I could see it from the hotel’s driveway) because it would have been an easy walk. Right. No taxi was going to come for a 200 yd journey and I didn’t want to have to walk it both there and back, so I went into the hotel restaurant and asked if any of the staff wanted to make a tenner and drive me there. The barman said he would but didn’t want payment (so kind), but then a patron stood up and said he’d take me, while his wife ordered their breakfast. Honestly, people are so nice.

I did still have to walk back from the salon, which was fine, I just walked very slowly. The worst part was finding a gap in traffic to cross the road. 🙁 Then change into my outfit for the wedding. Not the cute outfit with the stacked heel slingbacks – no, that was a pipe dream now. Instead into a more practical ensemble that showed off my sensible flats and bright white tensor bandage. Taxi-ed to the absolutely lovely outdoor venue and tried not to be ‘that woman’, hogging all the attention with her tale of woe on someone else’s special day.

It was a beautiful wedding: the bride & bridesmaids were gorgeous, the groom handsome, my cousin very chic, and her husband dapper in his kilt. I had a great time – met some lovely people, drank too much wine, ignored the throbbing ankle, and just generally enjoyed myself.

Until a barroom brawl broke out in the parking lot at midnight, and I ended up in the middle of the melee.

(I’m getting quite good at these cliffhangers, aren’t I?)

I never really liked paintings with people in them – I always preferred landscapes, or city scapes. Art like the Group of Seven, or the Impressionists. But in my 20’s I read Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time, and it made me think about portraits completely differently. I still prefer non-representational work, and if any prints in my house do have people in them I prefer them to be somewhat indistinct or off in the distance, but since reading that novel, I will seek out portraits in an art gallery and really spend time looking at them, and thinking about them, about the subject, and about the artist.

There’s a wonderful British TV competition series called Portrait Artist of the Year (its companion series, Landscape Artist of the Year is equally wonderful). My sisters and I watch these shows and discuss the portraits we see in them. The winner each season is commissioned to paint a famous person (Alan Cumming, Hilary Mantel, Tom Jones), and the portrait is hung in Scotland’s National Gallery, or Ireland’s, or most often, The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) in London.

London’s NPG has been closed for over three years, but I found out last week that its re-opening was Thursday. So, slight change of plans – now Friday was to be a morning visit to the Portrait Gallery, and the afternoon to the National Gallery next door. After yesterday’s British Museum crowds I was concerned, but, I have to accept that major London venues aren’t going to change just for me. (How annoying)

OMG – it was wonderful. More than made up for yesterday, far fewer people, actual air conditioning, and room upon room of amazing paintings and sculptures. It was an absolutely great visit. In fact, I enjoyed it so much that after lunch (champagne & duck at the restaurant Ochre, a part of the galleries), I ditched my original plan and went right back into the Portrait Gallery for a second visit. I saw kings, writers, scientists (see below), the famous & the infamous. I also missed a great deal – I had really thought this would be my last visit to London, but after today I want to go back to the NPG and to the skipped-over National Gallery. BTW, all these museums and galleries are free – gotta love the U.K.

It was hands down the best day. Until I fell in the street and sprained my ankle.

I had curated a list of places I wanted to dine, based on foodie podcasts, YouTube Channels, and the restaurant critic for The Guardian newspaper. I managed to hit most of them over the course of the week, although I never did find the Thai restaurant Kiln, in spite of going up and down the same block 3 or 4 times (I know it wasn’t just me – I passed some young business men and heard, “I’m pretty sure it’s along here – that’s what Google says.” and I have to think they were talking about the same place).

Right outside my bedroom window was the Berwick Street market, full of all sorts of international food stalls. Over the course of my stay there, I had the chance to watch these stalls do set up and take down from the comfort of my hotel bed, and I learned a lot about the hygiene of these places. My God, the attention to detail – copious soaps and detergents, constant running water, taps of near boiling water for rinsing, scrubbing and polishing – if you have ever wondered about food safety, well these guys are in a league of their own. I had coffee one morning at Soho Dairy and a salad from Jerusalem Falafel with the silkiest hummous imaginable.

The restaurant I was anticipating most was a Sri Lankan restaurant called Hoppers. My last year at BMO was in Brampton. While I enjoyed all the exceptional North Indian & Pakistani restaurants that my colleagues took me to – it was Sri Lankan and South Indian food that blew me away. Nilgiris and Gurulukshmi became my two go-tos in Peel region for dosas – so good. Of course, Orkney is not exactly the epi-centre of the south Asian diaspora – I mean, the tarka dhal and aloo Bombay were perfectly fine, ditto the Indian restaurant just up the road here in Braidwood. But, like almost every Indian take-away in Scotland, they serve North Indian cuisine. So when I saw the owner of Hoppers on my favourite food channel (Sorted, for anyone interested) making dosas, I had to go.

The owner Karan happened to be there yesterday afternoon, and overheard me talking about how much I love dosas, so he made a point of sending over some chutneys and sides as a wee treat. My dinner was even better than I had hoped – so much so that I have booked to come back for dinner on Sunday.

I wish my niece had been able to join me in Soho; she might not have enjoyed all my restaurant choices, but we definitely would have found common ground somewhere and she would have loved the overall vibe of the neighbourhood.

*I had already taken the first bite when I remembered to take a photo. 🙂

The plan was: a day at The British Museum. In the past, any trips to London involved my not getting to see some of the galleries or museums I really wanted to (took me over 20 years to finally get to the Tate Modern). As I am invariably the one holding the map, this is in no way the fault of my travel companions – it just seems to happen this way every time. So, finally, after many visits to London, The British Museum.

Atfer a delightful breakfast at Maison Bertaux, I made my way to the Museum, wandering through gardens and stopping to listen to buskers. Got to the museum in time for the first of two tours I had planned on joining: Ancient Greece in the morning, Roman Britain in the afternoon. I was looking forward to seeing the Rosetta Stone, the Parthenon Sculptures, the Japan displays – lots and lots.

About 16,000 people live on the main island of Orkney. It seems 17,000 people visit The British Museum every day. Every day. And, in spite of the fact that artefacts should be kept in a climate controlled environment (or so I would have thought), the museum is not air conditioned. In fact, the huge glass ceilings, which make the museum beautiful to behold, add to the heat of those 17,000 bodies on a sunny day. One staff member advised me that the temperatures in the museum are a real concern and they hope to have the issue addressed by the end of the decade. Really? That soon?

I don’t like crowds; I don’t like heat. Not exactly a recipe for a fun day out. Oh dear.

Our tour guide of Greek antiquities was very good – we were jammed fairly closely together to be able to hear her and navigate the crowds – and we saw some amazing amphorae and kouros (thanks Miss Mayhew – I knew exactly what she was talking about). But after twenty minutes, I had to step away from the cozy little heat-trapping display nooks that we were visiting and find some air. I headed up and over to Korea, Japan, and east Asia, working on the theory that the farthest displays would be the emptiest and the coolest (they were). But as the morning wore on those rooms heated up too in the 28° sunshine. So I gave up. I couldn’t take the crowds or the heat, so I headed out, after a too-short detour to see the Rosetta Stone and Ramesses the Great over the heads of school children, with no intention of going back in the afternoon.

As I’m pretty sure this was my last visit ever to London, I’ll admit I was disappointed – I really feel that had the circumstances been different, I could have spent a wonderful day immersed in some remarkable history. But, even though the day was cut short, I did get to see some pretty amazing items, in a very beautful setting. That will have to do.