Immeasurably More

Tonight I learned to play a game called " Killers ".  Essentially, everyone is assigned a number from the dart board and loses a point when another player gets a dart in their section. Everyone throws a pound into the kitty and the last person standing takes home the money. Can't remember the last time I played darts.  Never played in a pub before.  Won 2 out of 3 games so I'm 8 pounds richer than I was before.  This is either a wild case of beginner's luck, or my opponents were really off their games.  Or both.

Scotland's most lauded poet Robert Burns was born January 25, 1759 making tonight Burns Night.  In honor of the man and his Address to a Haggis , a friend and I went out for haggis, neeps (swede in English and rutabaga in the US) and tatties (potato) with whiskey sauce. I can't claim to have been won over to Robert Burns's opinion of the haggis, but once a year I think I can manage.  My principal objection to tonight's meal was that the haggis, neeps and tatties were all the same texture.

I wanted to go to church today so I found my hotel on Google maps and picked the church geographically closest to me.  This is the interior, but of course the photo doesn't do it justice.  The sanctuary is round, reminding me of the church my late grandparents attended.  The ceiling beams and the ceiling over the organ are painted with an intricate pattern.  The first song we sang was new to me and had a definite authentic celtic lilt.

When I arrived in Edinburgh last Sunday, I spent about an hour and a half in Sainsbury's grocery stores (yes, two of them) looking for gluten-free things to eat.  I didn't find a loaf of bread or a box of crackers.  I was very disappointed (and hungry!) and maligned Sainsbury's to all my friends! But now I have to apologize.  TIRMa called me after visiting one of these stores and said there was a section of shelves called "Free From" which is where they stock the gluten free specialty items. Impossible! I said.  How could I have spent so much time in that store and not found it? Well, she replied.  It is behind a pillar.* Oh.... in that case, my sincerest apologies to Sainsbury's. * Which just makes me think of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy... "But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months." "Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday af

Dear Reader, I have a cousin who when he was young had a number of food allergies.  I can remember the rest of the grandkids eagerly going after some holiday snack while he held back and asked my mom, "will that make me itch?" Given my current paranoia about possible negative reactions to all things edible, a surprising number of my recent posts have been about cooking or restaurants.  Evidence of food on the mind, I suppose. This post continues the pattern as tonight I joined 7 other diners at Charlie and Evelyn's Table , an Edinburgh supper club.  As I'm traveling, the best parts of this for me were a) they take eating preferences (e.g. an aversion to eggplant and gluten intolerance) seriously when they select a menu and b) it's a chance to have dinner out but not alone!  Tonight's guests were 3  transplanted English, 1 Irish, 3 Scottish and me.  The menu  (which you won't be able to read in the photo) also included fried haggis balls, which fortun

TIRMa and I had liqueur coffees at Angels with Bagpipes.  We got strange looks from the restaurant staff for photographing their reflective table tops.  I can't imagine why.

American programmers could not work without the humble parenthesis and might be surprised to learn that their English and Scottish counterparts never use them.  Instead they use brackets: '(' and ')', square brackets: '[', and ']' , and curly brackets: '[' and ']'. This was explained to me today when I was reading out some code to a Scottish customer.  She stopped typing when I said "Open parenthesis..."  When I pointed out the appropriate key on the keyboard, she said "Oh.  I call that a bracket." "Then what do you say when you want to refer to a 'Parenthetical Expression'?" I asked. "We don't!" So, what would they call this: (I know, I know... There's no photo today!  But how do you photograph a '('? )

Dear Reader, Last week I had four vials of blood taken.  One of the things I'm being tested for is Celiac disease, and while I wait for my results, I'm making the effort to eat gluten free.  I'm still pretty far away from the "I'm gluten free and I've never been so happy!" attitude of many bloggers, so I'm more or less eating whatever I want that doesn't involve wheat and related cereals.  This includes cherries, especially cherry pie filling (which is labeled "cherry compote" in England).  Tonight, I had cherries in a balsamic vinegar reduction with ice cream and whipped cream.  And yes, I did eat the wafer cookies.  And I feel fine.  Hmmmm..... Cherry-fully yours, LeAn

Dear Reader, Today I arrived in Edinburgh where I will be for the next two weeks.  I thought I would take my new digital camera out for a spin by posting a photo every day while I am here. Before I moved to the UK and began traveling extensively for work, I used to literally live out of my suitcase during trips.  But traveling with TIRMa taught be better.  Now I unpack on arrival, and my mornings are much, much easier!  (And my clothes are less crumpled.) ~LeAn