Today we are back in the Edinburgh, Athens of the North. That title is perfectly understandable when you look around – it is a beautiful city. A couple of hundred years ago, however, it wasn’t quite as civilised as it appears now. For example, one of the punishments for persistent miscreants was for them to be placed in the stocks and one of their ears nailed to the wood. The only means of escape was to tear their own ear off the nail … arrggh! The damaged ear then served as a permanent signal to others that that individual was thoroughly untrustworthy – hence the term ‘earmarked’. Has anyone seen Boris Johnson’s ears recently? We think we now know why he wears his hair the way he does. Of course, things have improved since these days, however, judging by the film we went to see, perhaps, not that much.

Uplifted!

We are at the Cameo Picturehouse again. This time to see Sorry We Missed You, a movie by Ken Loach. An excellent film but not an easy watch. One of those films where everyone leaves the cinema in complete silence. A graphic illustration of what years of Tory rule has done to this country and the hard working people at the bottom of the heap trying to raise their families. Many just get into an endless cycle of debt and are driven into what’s now known as ‘working poverty’.  Should be compulsory viewing for anyone thinking of voting Conservative on Thursday. As you can imagine, we left the cinema in silence as well. Walking out of the cinema though we spied what looked like a scone emporium directly opposite the cinema … Caffe Carlucci! Our spirits lifted – we felt wind beneath our wings once again!

Frozen

Not that much wind, however – just enough to get us over the street! Caffe Carlucci is a nice enough place in a thoroughly unspectacular sort of way. There seemed to be only a solitary member of staff and he didn’t seem that pleased about it. We had a light snack which was excellent and then a fruit scone. We didn’t choose a fruit scone, that’s all they had. Both scones came in a rather peculiar elongated shape and were accompanied by prepackaged butter and jam none of which came from anywhere near Edinburgh. The butter was frozen to a degree that rendered it completely useless. There wasn’t any cream so just scone and jam for us. All in all not a bad place but definitely not the greatest scone experience.

Only a couple of days to go before ‘E’ Day on the 12th. Mild apologies to readers outside the UK who have little interest in Britain’s politics. ‘Mild’ because they have not had to endure the last three months of electioneering. It has been ghastly! Parties falling over themselves to promise us the earth, the moon and the stars! We have already used our postal vote, so we’re done. Of course we voted correctly and hope that everyone else does the same. Where on earth will we be on Friday? Will Boris show his ears at last?

EH3 9JP         tel: 0131 466 3188           Carlucci

///ropes.curve.spots

ps This is what happens when your order involving a potato scone and a sausage roll gets misheard by the waiter. You get a scone with link sausage! It’s a new one on us. Definitely fits the ‘weird’ category. And no cream or jam by the look of it?? Unfortunately we cannot remember who sent this in but thanks, whoever you are.

pps our correspondents from, jam first, Devon, have sent us a photo of a mixture of Saracen and Carron K6s in Truro in, cream first, Cornwall

Fabulously, they also found these Falkirk made cannons while in Paraty in Brazil but not on the same outing … obviously!

Many thanks