"Even if I got rid of all my problems, I'd just go out and get new ones..."

A weekend away with my mum
8:49 p.m. on 2004-07-12

So I went on holiday with my mum over the weekend.

Went to a very pretty town (well, technically a city, since, y'know, cathedral and all. But I don't think that counts).

Mosied on down through the prettier parts of Derbyshire and the Peaks, saw the Plague Village of Eyam and some well dressings (yup, that's how bored people are in the country, their only hobbies are cow tipping and dressing a well), before arriving in Lincoln to do...

Shopping. Well... my mum treated me to a very lovely pink skirt. Handmade, flows out in that fifties style that is so 'in' these days, and stitched with a couple of butterflies and beading. Except then I had to go find a matching top and shoes. Of course.

To quote Edward Monkton, "Buy me, beautiful lady," said the frock, "and I will make you into a beautiful and whole and complete human being." "Don't be silly," said the man, "for a frock alone cannot do that." "True," said the lady, "I will have the shoes and the bag as well."

As well as a plentitude of dress shops, from the handmade designer gear, through the second hand alternative stuff, right back down to Oasis and New Look... Lincoln has an array of pretty, specialist type shops. An entire shop selling highly priced tea, for example, complete with attached bullshit note explaining how: "This tea comes from the white petals of the kurasakwa plant, which only flowers on a full moon in midsummer, and which is collected by blind nuns who play the banjo and make nighties out of their leg hair. That's why you're paying �30 a pack, you see. It's RARE." An old fashioned sweet shop, its shelves stuffed with jar upon jar of pear drops, lemon sherberts, aniseed balls, comfies, eclaires, liquorice sticks, and five different flavours of sherbert. I spent over six quid and came out with a bag of rainbow letters, of rainbow kali, a hundred grams of sherbert pips, six sugar mice and three packs of chocolate sticks. You know, those ones that were sold in a cigarette packet and were banned because you used to sit at the back of the bus and pretend to smoke them. And this was bad, apparantly.

Back to the sight seeing... we headed to the coast, saw the beach, said hello to a man and his brightly coloured jumper who was flying a kite. The man, not the jumper.

Drove through the very pretty Wolds, and saw a Grouse and her Grousling trotting beside the road. Saw a hare (yes, a hare, not a rabbit!) skitter off down a path, scared by the car. Saw pheasants. Tried not to see roadkill.

The hotel was lovely. Staff perfectly trained in the art of customer service, attending to the customer's wishes and never raising a surprised eyebrow. Beautiful food. Amazing view.

It was all so very... English. I'm not one who insists on stopping in a five star hotel (god help me, I couldn't even if I wanted to) but there is something nice about staying in a proper, English hotel. A place that isn't uniform and stark like a Travel Lodge, but has genuine personality. A place which knows its clients' tastes - English breakfast, fruit juice and cereal, none of that 'continental' crap, sensible meat and two veg dinners with an array of traditional deserts. Newspaper in the morning, coffees at night. Where people still dress up to go down to dinner.

It was very relaxing, and I got to see a part of England I hadn't before. I've been in various directions across the world, and will no doubt continue this in a futile effort to check every one off my list, but I don't know my own backyard very well.

I am now well versed in the art of well dressing, however.

Listening to: Marylin Scott - "Beer Bottle Boogie"

Quote: "It's not like you have a social life."
"True. But some day I plan to."

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