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| Haggis, neeps & tatties |
Last night Ann of the Tartan cooked a delightful dinner, including the Scottish national dish: haggis, neeps and tatties. Tatties are mashed potatoes; neeps are parsnips; and haggis is… well, you don’t want to know. It tastes good, though, and Ann’s was especially tasty. Followed by a macaroni and cheese casserole with a heavy cream sauce, and a superb dessert of fruit, custard & cream (no, make that custard, cream and fruit; or maybe cream, custard and fruit), my taste buds were never so happy.
Today, Ann of the Tartan escorted Dr. George, Lady Ann, and me around to the best sights of Edinburgh. Edinburgh is a pleasant city with gobs of history, but it suffers from the same festival condition that afflicts other British towns and cities. The Edinburgh Fringe starts this week, as does the world famous Edinburgh Tattoo, which has nothing to do with having pictures drawn on your body. As a result, about 400 million tourists were in Edinburgh today. To make matters worse, today was sunny, to that brought out the residents, also.
We tried to visit Edinburgh Castle, but there were too many tourists. We walked down the main tourist street, but there were too many tourists. Ann of the Tartan then had a wonderful idea: we toured Edinburgh’s fancy new parliament building, from which the tourists stayed away in droves. After Dr. George and I saw how our tax dollars were being spent (hey…, even though I’m an American I’m still paying the 20% British VAT for all the goods and services I am purchasing on this walk), we needed a drink, so we dragged the two Anns to a café for lunch and ale.
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Lost-a-lot, Ann of the Tartan,
and Lady Ann |
Following an after-lunch walk around the city, we returned to Ann’s home for afternoon tea. Then out to a pub for dinner, after which we toured Queensferry to look at the two bridges over the Firth of Forth that I should be able to see tomorrow from Linlithgow as I walk along the Union Canal.
Oh, and then we returned to Ann’s home for a whiskey. It’s occurring to me that Scotland is a lot like England with all the eating and drinking. It’s a strange custom. I would never do that at home.
© 2011 Ken Klug
Life is good....you are back living large with Dr George & his entourage. So glad to see that you made it out of the bogs and pass the long horns!
ReplyDeleteYou had me worried there....Have some fun with the Scots.
That should be whisky, Ken, whisky! Whiskey is the kinda strange, corn based liquor you guys make in the Tennessee and Kentucky. Better not confuse that with the malts of Scotland, especially when being in Scotland. You don’t want the infamous Highland Charge being unleashed upon you, do you?
ReplyDelete