Saturday 29 December 2012

Weekend in Edinburgh*

Last night as we lay in bed, before I moved to the nursery so Chris could sleep in peace and quiet, we reconstructed how our overnight to Edinburgh was supposed to have gone:

Our direct train to Edinburgh went directly to Edinburgh. It took the expected less than four hours, not seven, and we didn't have to change over-crowded trains twice all the while being told things about the rest of our journey that, frankly, were lies. We dropped our bags at the hotel and had a quiet afternoon tea before I went for my bra fitting (they were able to see me right away, I didn't have to make an appointment for the next morning) and Chris went to meet with a prospective client (who emailed him first thing the next morning to say "when can you start?"). We wandered around the German Christmas market which wasn't loud with shrieking people and conflicting music blaring from past-their-prime speakers. The weather was lovely, really, not bitingly cold with high winds and an edge of rain, so we rode the Ferris wheel again like we did on our first trip to Edinburgh four years ago and were quiet disgustingly schmoopy.

By then it was time for dinner, Mexican of course, being in a city with a Mexican restaurant, and Chris liked his entrée as much as his starter and I got to have horchata and Mexican hot chocolate, neither of which they stopped serving some years past. We stumbled back to our hotel and spent an snuggling in the bar, ordering fruity drinks with or without rum in. Back in our room, well you don't need to know about that, but it was followed by a deep and restful night's sleep in which I didn't snore at all, not even a little, and certainly not enough to wake myself up and be heard through Chris' earplugs.

Our breakfast place in the morning was as charming as one could hope. We both had the pancakes and Chris' cappuccino was as nice as my Darjeeling and we had pleasantly full tummies on which to face a day of wandering around Edinburgh, visiting yarn shops stocked with the specific size needles I wanted, nibbling and purchasing at the Cheese Monger's, and trying on silly hats at the hat place. We collected our bags, bought a picnic lunch for the also uneventful train ride home, and I was able to read my Kindle and listen to my ipod as I'd not left them in the drawer of the night stand at the hotel.

Home was toasty and warm, the heat having come on shortly before we arrived, the kittens were delighted to see us, and we ate on the sofa in front of the fire having not put half of our planned leftovers in the outside freezer and forgotten about them until everything else was ready. The whole weekend was a rousing success.

To be fair, some of those things did happen if not in the ideal time or manner (Chris had his interview; I was fitted for and bought a bra; we had Mexican for dinner; I got pancakes for breakfast) but a lot did not. We really did not want to be outside in the push and shove or the wind and wet. There's nothing you can do about the weather and the crowds of people were inevitable. Our reasoning for going the week between Christmas and Hogmanay were sound; I'm off work but not likely to go inconveniently into labour, and at my breast-size being properly fitted for a bra necessitates a trip to Bravissimo which isn't going to happen any time soon post-baby. Thus Edinburgh in the busy shopping season.

And, importantly, I can now put Operation: Don't Leave the House into proper effect. I am currently trying to decide if going to the detached garage counts as leaving the house or not. I did go outside to pick up the bird feeder, knocked over in last night's high winds.

~ * ~

* not actually a weekend, but it felt like it and that's what counts. Also, I am so far removed from the notion of weekdays and weekends as to make no difference.

2 comments:

  1. Let me know when you want to have your own personal chef make you tacos again. Can't promise horchata but might be able to pull off the Mexican hot chocolate.

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  2. I don't have a whole lot of relationship to day of the week other than "Is Noah working out of the house, in the house, or not at all?" :)

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