59: Café del Market
Since lockdown, I've been getting my food from the market. It's open air, so I'm less likely to panic about airborne particles. It's more spacious and there are no shelves, so fewer people are there reaching directly over my shoulder for cereal boxes they just couldn't wait three seconds for me to move away from. But over time, these reasons have faded slightly to be replaced with other, better ones.
The atmosphere reminds me of the pub, a bit. The cheese man remembers me and what I usually order. The ham and cooked meats guy let me pay another day when I realised he didn't have a card machine. The wandering people have started to become familiar. I feel comfortable spending time here, even on days of high anxiety. But the best bit, the absolute best bit, is the vegetable stall.
Spanning ten stalls or more, at this time of year the tables are rolling with Victoria plums, are caked in muddy potatoes. The cabbages are ten-feet wide. The broccoli house whole families of jackdaws. Neatly packaged prunes (best of the season!) sit primly on slim cardboard cases that are pink and decorated fit for tissue paper and lingerie. I've never seen so many extravagant types of tangerines. Even the turnips are beautiful.
In fact, the turnips are the most beautiful, especially after they're pickled. Fermented in a salt solution and sliced thin, they take on a peppery spice, their pretty pink and white hues gain a delicate translucency, they become the vegetable they were born to be.
Other Stuff
On the top of Pendle yesterday, we wondered for the millionth time what trig points are actually for. Thank god that Ordnance Survey have actually written a comprehensive blog post on the subject. (Also, the cross section of a trig point is probably not what you were expecting)
I went to Buckfast Abbey last week and there were surprisingly few people there with the same intentions as me. I've wanted to write a book on Buckfast for ages, but for now I'm going to read this great article on it's weird popularity in Scotland by Sean Murphy for The Scotsman again.
As a teenager I was merely a vessel for the album A Song To Ruin by Million Dead (except the first track which honestly, is trash) and I've revisited the song The Rise And Fall this week. It's 14 minutes plus, and is about knowledge surging through a dark and crumbling Europe via invasion -- and then the subsequent tragic destruction of that culture through war and retaliation. Plus it gets all feedback-trudgy for minutes and minutes and minutes which I also think is pretty cool.
Ibiza sunsets every night via the 24/7 Café del Mar radio livestream. Dress me in board shorts and drape a glowstick necklace around my neck. This is all I need. (Tonight's will be at around 7.40 UK time FYI.)
I found this piece on self-awareness in modern literature interesting, but not because of the topic. Reading books and then discussing what they should or could have been isn't something I do with much enthusiasm, but through the eyes of Katy Waldman here I've been forced to. While it was an interesting thought experiment for me, can we really ask authors to discuss sharp and complex sociopolitics when they have no background or expertise in them? Especially at a time when we're simultaneously crying out to read books about topics that reflect writers' genuine lived experiences?
A week and a bit ago I was bottling The Old Man And The Bee at Little Pomona, so please read this by Nicci Peet on Little Pomona's wonderful patch of paradise and their brilliant ciders and perries so you can feel like you were there too (although when Nicci went it was chilly and when I was there it was 30-odd degrees).
My Stuff
Something I wrote about how things could change for the better in pubs post-virus is now available on Ferment's website.
ICYMI: A few weeks ago I wrote about burger vans and bike rallies for Pellicle mag.
I've sent another article off to Pellicle and I'm working on the edits this week so hopefully that'll be with you all soon.
I've been working on a fair few pieces for Ferment too, so expect to see them soon.
I'm working on the second round of edits of my book.
I'm writing a lot of short stories and have even managed to rope a pro in to edit one so I'll be working on that for the foreseeable too.
A project I'm working on with Tom is coming together. More info soon.
I'm not going to be on Twitter much for a while -- it's all A Bit Much and honestly it just fucks with my productivity. If you need me, or you just want to tell me something, find me on Instagram, or email me. I've also got a book-based Instagram if that's more your thing.
Pendle Hill trig point looking towards Whalley and Clitheroe.
Photography by Lee Pilkington