Food, drink and TV

The Food and Drink Festival was back at the weekend, and better than ever. I couldn't be bothered to go on the Taste Trail this time because neither Lola II nor Mr A would be with me, and all that food doesn't go well with weight loss. They've learned from previous years, too - the Trail was free the first time, then we paid a pound for entry last time, but this time they're charging a pound per restaurant, which is only right.

There were more stalls than in previous years in the Pump Room Gardens, and most were mouth-wateringly attractive, although the produce was not cheap. We met some neighbours and got talking about pheasants, and I now have the opportunity (when the season starts) to learn how to draw and pluck a freshly-shot bird. I bought a couple of things (German salami and Warwickshire sausages) and came home, then enticed Mr A out again for lunch. He chose paella, I had a very tasty vegetable Thai green curry with rice. Mr A bought a couple of things (a venison pie and a pork pie, local cheeses) and that was it.

In other news, a job vacancy came up over the weekend which I applied for, and we attempted to install Freeview. Our turn has come for digital switchover and the removal of analogue terrestrial broadcasting to our area. It should have been straightforward, but our analogue TV is old and there is the added complication of the BARB monitoring device which is wired in to our setup in a manner that I couldn't fathom. So they are sending a chap round this week to sort us out. In the meantime we have some extra BBC channels and we have lost ITV until the second phase of switchover in a couple of weeks. It hardly makes a difference at all, and we can still watch our DVDs, so everything's fine really.