It is Saturday and I’m looking forward to the England – Austria World Cup qualifier. But first, there is the small matter of lunch. Now the wife and the daughter are on diets and have promised themselves (and their menfolk) a lunch of Roast Chicken, but a small Roast Chicken enlivened (for their menfolk) by lashings of bread sauce, stuffing, Yorkshire pudding, assorted vegetables, etc., etc. It’s the perfect warm-up for an afternoon with David Beckham and the Big Match.
The Aga is fired up, goose fat is bubbling around the roast potatoes, a couple of bottles of Fleurie have been uncorked, and we are nearly ready to eat, when unexpected visitors arrive. From over the neighbour’s wall they have come and thence through the churchyard; they are animated, noisy and rather indignant.
It is a posse of bantams come to check out whether or not that strange smell means that we are about to eat “Mother”. After that, and Beckham’s sending off, and the awfulness of the Big Match, I think I’m about to turn vegetarian.
