While it was Memorial Weekend in the US, we here in the UK had a ‘Bank Holiday’…which literally means the banks close and people hit the streets for some fun.
Of course, most Americans hit the beaches...we here in chilly NE England hit the pub…
Well, most of the time, at least. Actually, this weekend, we had quite a diverse range of fun. Our excitement started on Friday evening, when we all went to our friend Rob’s house for delicious bbq, whisky, cigars, and some exciting poker. It was my first time playing poker, and I’m happy to say that I won a few times. We each put £5, and I left with £1.50 2 hours after we started playing, so not too shabby, I think. The experience was complete: Rob even played some American Blues in the background…I felt like a drunken Sea Captain trying to make a few extra dabloons on the side…or something equally sleazy…it was great!
On Saturday, after a tormenting trip to the taylor’s (the Adolfo Dominguez dress my mum got me doesn’t fit!- my ribs are too fat), Bret and I went on a neighbourhood adventure. We found a geocache in Ouseburn, then went to The Cumberland Arms in Byker where I had a half pint of cider, and then we took a stroll ‘round the beautiful park nearby. I cooked a simple pasta dinner with Red Pepper/Limoncello sauce, and we headed out to the newly refurbished Tyneside Cinema to see Persepolis. The cinema is fantastic- gorgeous interiors, two bar/cafés, and excellent indie movies. Persepolis was funny and sad and interesting, though the beginning was a bit hard to follow with all the Iranian politics…
On Sunday, Bret and I started the morning in the Quayside Market, where we got tshirts, vine leaves, and good smelling bath bombs. After our decadent purchasing, we headed over to the gym, and I did the workout my personal trainer gives me (a tough 1 hour with 20 minutes floor/arm work, 20 minutes cross trainer on level 6 Kilimanjaro, and 20 minutes little elliptical on level 8 cardio) while Bret did some horrible, killer exercises. To replenish ourselves, we had lunch at the Royal Café- me a delicious celery/carrot/ginger juice and Chicken terrine with red pepper chutney and Bret a salmon/egg bagel.
Finally on Monday, we had the most exciting day of all: we went to the Northumbria County Show in Corbridge. The town is a half hour train ride from Newcastle, very beautiful with lots of trails surrounding. Because it was an unusually gorgeous day, the festival was packed! Almost everyone had a dog and/or baby with them. Needless to say, my cuteness cup got full pretty fast. And I haven’t even mentioned the actual show animals yet. We saw bunnies, horses, cows, alpacas, and sheep. I discovered that cows are skittish and slobber a lot. When I would pet them, they would often whip me with their tails (I think they noticed I was wearing a leather jacket- I know, how insensitive of me!). The alpacas were very soft and fairly friendly. And the sheep (poor sheep) were being sheared at record speeds. There was an ongoing sheep shearing competition, truly amazing to watch, in which men had to shear 5 sheep in under 5 minutes. After we saw a contest, we went round back to take a closer look at the sheep. The furry ones were quiet, but the sheared ones were baaing non-stop. They had lots of nicks from the shearing, some looked half-slaughtered to be honest, but overall, the shearers really did a great job. After 5 hours, we felt we were animalled-out and we headed back to Newcastle for some of Bret’s amazing chorizo chicken and lemon asparagus.
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