I have heard people complaining that lockdowns and tiers are making life slow and boring. That’s not how it feels to me. Perhaps it’s my age, but the days seem to be spinning by ever faster. Once again it is Sunday and our day for shopping at the supermarket.

Pentonville Road

Pentonville Road was fairly busy although I caught it at a quiet moment in the above photo. There had been rain overnight, quite heavy to judge by the size of the puddles remaining, and now the weather seemed to be hesitating between rain and sunshine.

The Castle, preparing for lunch

Our way took us past The Castle and we saw that they were preparing to open for lunch. We both had the same idea at the same time: how about having lunch there today? (Did we? Wait and see!)

Santa Bus Driver
Photo by Tigger

Just then, a 73 bus turned the corner and Tigger spotted that it was being driven by no less a personage than Santa Claus! Is business so bad that he has to moonlight to make ends meet or is this a Christmas present for the real driver? We shall never know 🙂

Baron Street

This is Baron Street, looking very dull while the weather is trying to make up its mind…

Street musicians
Photo by Tigger

When we reached Chapel Market, we saw two street musicians performing. We wondered what the small plastic tent was for and decided it was to protect their amplifier from the weather. I’m not a fan of twanging electric guitars accompanying secondhand lyrics so we continued on our way.

Children’s furniture stall

This stall selling what looks like children’s furniture is new. At least, I haven’t seen it here before. It occupies a prime spot usually given to a crockery stall which had been demoted to the pitch next to it.

A good turnout

There was a good turnout in the market today, almost like old times. Approaching Christmas no doubt acts as an encouragement to stall holders.

Christmas trees

There were two rows if Christmas trees in White Conduit Street though whether they both belonged to one retailer or separately to two, I don’t know. Some of the trees were ready wrapped in transparent plastic.

We say “Christmas trees” but of course, the tradition of decorating one’s dwelling with greenery in winter dates back far beyond the 4th century when Christmas was invented. In fact, the religious festival was created in the hope that it would supplant the earlier pagan traditions. In that it was only partially successful and different traditions still exist side by side.

Awkward perch for a pigeon

On reaching Sainsbury’s, I went to fetch a trolley and, as I did so, something flew over my head. It was this pigeon which decided to perch, if that’s the right word for its awkward posture, on what seemed to be an impossibly small protuberance. I think it must have done this before and worked out how to position itself there but why it would do so is a mystery.

Surfing the aisles

We timed our arrival nicely: just after the queue had been absorbed but before the main rush of the day started. Progress through the aisles was fairly easy and we soon had the job done. We even found a checkout with nobody waiting. Bonus!

Back through Chapel Market

After shopping, we made our way back through Chapel Market.

The Farmers’ Market

We saw that the Farmers’s Market was in full swing but we had no need of their products. However, we did, as usual, stop off at…

Stopping off for coffee

…Mercer’s for takeaway coffee. (Yes, it’s a reused photo but you know what they say: “Waste not, want not…”). Today, there were people sitting in the coffee shop but we preferred to make for home and get ready for lunch.

The Castle

We had decided that we would go to the Castle for lunch. Knowing that they were limiting the number of customers in order to implement “social distancing”, I decided to try booking a table online. Unfortunately, when I filled in my details and clicked “Continue”, this gave me “Page not found”. Frustrating.

So I telephoned and was able to book a table. I received an email confirming that we had a dining slot from 12:30 to 1:30. Perfect.

The menu

We consented to consult the menu although we knew what we wanted: the vegetarian roast.

The vegetarian roast
Photo by Tigger

Actually, we should have looked more closely at the menu because today’s veggie roast had a twist to it: instead of gravy, there was something called Bloody Mary Sauce. Neither if us liked this very much but we will know for next time. Live and learn. Apart from that, it was fine. I don’t know how many vegetables there were in it but there were a lot, and many different kinds.

I think that will be the end of our outings for today. I’m off to make tea. How about you?