Eating out

You'd think that going out for lunch would be a straightforward exercise, wouldn't you?  Leave the house at about lunchtime, travel somewhere that serves food, have some food, come home?  Easy. 

Even when you factor in the relative immobility of one of the people involved, how hard is it to go out and eat?  Not very, would be the answer.

Well, that answer would be WRONG, my friend, wrong.  West Wiltshire on a Tuesday lunchtime is a desert.  A food desert.

Admittedly, Bestest Mate and I have previous form in this area.  It has been known for us to go out for dinner, drive miles, sit and wait for hours fruitlessly*, and then end up eating a home-delivered pizza at 11pm because things went terribly, bizarrely, wrong in an entirely unpredictable manner.

So.  We hopped (in my case literally) into the car and drove out to a local farm shop where they serve nice lunches.  But wait!  What's this?  It's closed on Monday and Tuesday?  Arse!  Not to be daunted by such a minor setback, we continued on our way.

Every so often there would be a conversation as follows:

Me:  Ooh, I've never been down this road before...I think it might lead to FUCK SLOW DOWN a nice pub HORSE! HORSE! yes, there it is...shall we stop there?

Bestest mate:  Looks shut.  Let's take a closer look.

Me:  Mind that bloke...THAT BLOKE THERE...yeah it's shut.  Arse.  Keep going on this road...there'll be another pub in a HORSE! minute.

And so the long day wore on.  He's not a really terrible unsafe driver or anything, I was just a bit jumpy, what with not being able to drive at the moment, and my ankle hurting like hell every time we went over a bump or round a corner. 

We drove the entire length of the Wylye Valley, only finding pubs which were shut, occasionally glimpsing a pretty church or row of thatched cottages which we ignored in our feeding frenzy.  Eventually we turned onto the main road back towards the village, and decided to stop at the rather splendid Indian for lunch.  It was just closing. 

Nothing for it but to head back to the house, and go over to the local pub for a sandwich then.  But no...they'd stopped serving food.  Admittedly by the time we got there it was after half past two, but we still felt disgruntled. 

We ended up having a sandwich back at the house, and watching a DVD** while I sat with my foot up and whined how much my ankle hurt.

On that subject, I went and had an X-ray earlier this week, and got the result over the phone from a nurse this morning.  Apparently there is no "obvious bone damage" but there is "significant soft tissue damage".  And, helpfully, because I had the accident 3 weeks ago if it was a slight fracture it would be healing by now and might not show up on an X-ray.  So.  Probably not broken, but possibly broken.  Yeah, that helps. 

I can hop around a bit more easily, but I still can't drive as I can't hold my foot in any other position apart from "flat on the ground" without a good deal of discomfort, and stabs of pain in my anklebone.  So I am wiggling it about in short busrts, and taking painkillers when it starts to really play up.

God, I'm old.  Nothing works properly these days.





*also meatlessly, fishlessly, chiplessly and puddinglessly

**Tropic Thunder.  He hadn't seen it, and I still find it amusing.