"So it's Thai then innit?" asked Tel, rhetorically, as we studied the takeaway menus online. Friday 11.30am, his place, Mrs Tel away in Braintree Freeport buying "the usual tat" according to her husband, who said it with the sneer of a man who had long ago accepted this as his lot in life.
It certainly looked like Thai. Bored with Indian, and having had Chinese last week, the joint tastebuds were craving a new experience, one which combined spice, crunch and freshness with the familiar grease and grime of a curry or a Chicken Chow Mein with pineapple.
The pub loomed. Not our usual haunt though, as we're also tired of that. The beer garden is normally a den for smokers and ne'er-do-wells who want to escape the saloon. The tables are sticky, the seats splintery; they make a sort of groan when sat on, which for me is a better gauge of my weight than any scales. The louder the bench groan, the fatter the arse. We fancied proper summer chairs and tables unencumbered by faded and stained umbrellas advertising popular soft drinks. So we went to the next local.
The next local fancies itself. If it were human, it would be David Beckham, plebeian but with added gloss and carefully manicured. The outdoor seats were placed under a marquee, which flapped and rattled in the wind. It had a nice view of the Stour estuary. It still had Fosters on tap, along with three ales it euphemistically called "Real' and which included Broadside, Timothy Taylor Landlord (which was off, as the barmaid explained as though talking to a small, idiot child) and John Smith's. The lagers were the aforementioned Fosters, the wife-beater, and San Miguel, which Tel opted for after a long, internal argument as to the merits of Stella.
I settled for an Aspalls. This tasted a bit like a car battery to start with, but got sweeter as I drank. The barmaid, unasked, added two massive lumps of ice in it. Fortunately she didn't bother with a lager and blackcurrant cordial top. Yes, it was THAT kind of boozer.
We watched a couple of seagulls loudly scrapping, until one flew off, wheeling, with something in its beak. "Got a chip" murmured Tel. Then "Sh*te'awks love chips, don' they?". When David Attenborough dies, he'd be a shoo-in for nature documentaries. "Ah'm 'ere in this jungle, bleeding 'ot'n'sweaty it is, an' look, there's a monkey wiv a big red arse on it. They love chips, they do".
My week off following birthday celebrations was a week of curious abstinence from society. I went in to Ipswich town centre on Thursday afternoon, ostensibly to look through the 80% reduction jumble sale that was Debenhams for a pair of jeans and a nice shirt. The town was quiet, and mostly Eastern European voices blasphemed and bounced from the walls of the great Citadel. The dusty roads and the water sprinkler in the middle of Cornhill made it vaguely unseemly, like those dreams I have where I'm somewhere supposedly familiar but can't find anything. I bought the jeans and a nice grey Jasper Conran shirt for £40 the pair and then went seeking the car, unwilling to remain for more time in this strange town of empty-ish shops and market trader stalls selling fag papers and brown fruit.
I had an afternoon pint at The Bull in Brantham and then came home, pleased to have got what I went for, saddened at the lack of positive energy in this post-lockdown public space. Mrs Tel is off for her hospital treatment next week. She'll be in for one night, The Oaks in Colchester, having her genitals prised open with metal rods and scraped, as Tel succinctly put it on Friday, for tests. He's arranged a pub meeting on the Thursday night when she's in. We'll have dinner there. Hope it doesn't rain. I'll probably get the blow-by-blow account of Mrs Tel's medical procedures then. Must remember to avoid the fish.
Yesterday was a good day. Awoke at six, walked with the early dog-walkers and the nutters, got a paper and a pint of milk and a loaf and some bacon from Tesco, came home and made bacon sarnies with HP sauce and a big pot of tea and sat reading the Times until ten. Had a clear-up, did my washing and ironing, watched Sheffield Wednesday draw 0-0, did some work on the laptop, then tuned in to Sky for the 3pm's. Tel avoided the Ipswich game in the weekly bet. "Gotta win one aint we?" he said, with the foresight of Zoltar the machine from Big. In the end, he was right. His bet was also a good'un. £269.
There were no highlights on Sky as Norwood crashed in the opener and then the second. Shame, as they had highlights of just about everywhere else, including Sarfend's attempts to beat the drop. Again, I thought, we'll show 'em next season. They'll be cooing over us like they have the Scum this year. We'll be their favourite little club. My day dreams are based on us running at teams like a rampant Barcelona, perhaps winning the title in February, de-boned of the losers who let us down this and in previous seasons. The mouth waters at the prospect of being there to see the renaissance. Then the earth comedown starts with the whispers of us retaining some of the crap. Let's hope not.
The Thai was lovely as well. You were right, the sirloin steak was a stunner, as was the Pad Thai and the duck thing spelt like prick that Tel laughed at before asking me to make the order as he didn't find it consistent with his dignity to be ringing some Thai woman to ask if they had prick. In the end, it wasn't a Thai woman who answered. It was an Englishman, business-like and clearly experienced in handling people who had difficulty pronouncing the names of dishes.
We ate on my Kitchen table, the bottles of Estrella iced and the brandy calling us from my drinks cupboard. We ate the lot, save for a few coriander stalks and a bit of rice. Tel departed with Mrs Tel, fresh from Freeport and wearing a black leather bomber jacket and a Clash T-shirt and dark blue Levi's. She didn't walk like a woman with problems in the old gusset. Mind you, she didn't exactly walk too far either. Their car roared away with hands out of windows waving goodbye.
Nearly at the end of another season. Been a strange one, this. Not set eyes upon Portman Road, except for the faintest glint of floodlights from the Orwell Bridge and from Cardinals car park. It's like seeing the Mary Celeste dock at Felixstowe. You know it's there, but you also know it's ethereal. Hopefully, the team playing in it will be a darn sight less ghostly next season.....
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