Food & Explorations
I wore myself out with Qi's visit but came round a bit by the time Thursday arrived and so decided to share dad's cab into town and explore Bold Street. I've been to Bold Street many times before, but I'd been lead to believe it was bigger and better, well, more varied, than previously. Its part of something called Ropewalks, which is vaunted as Liverpool's "cultural quarter" (we also have museum quarters, a Beatles quarter and likely other similarly designated areas), along with Renshaw Street and other parallel streets and side streets running between them in that part of the city. So I got the cab to drop me off by the ruined church at the top - they're planning to do open-air film screenings there this year which is a good use of the space - and started my wanderings. If I'm out on my own I do like to have lunch, and even though I've had a pub lunch, and a trip to Pizza Hut by myself I'd not done a "proper" restaurant so decided to rectify that. A bit of online research suggested The Italian Fish Club might be worth checking out, so I wandered in:
Nice little place, with a very helpful, personably waiter/bar man in charge, and I felt ok being there alone (I still reckon smartphones help with that, so you don't sit along looking bereft of company), and decided to treat myself to langoustines, which were a bit pricey, but I've never had them, and wasn't really in the mood for anything too filling so thought why not. I think I made a fool of myself asking for them to be deshelled - the waiter and the kitchen staff seemed a tad surprised - and when the plate came there were just these little wiggly white things there next to the salad and bowl of aioli. In the shell they'd have been more impressive, but I'm still not sure on having a "special tool" to remove the meat, and the idea that the "head juices" add flavour is a questionable bonus.. utterly delicious either way, and lovely home made chips, plus a quick tutorial on langoustine anatomy courtesy of the handy picture on the place-mat when I mentioned I might have made an error to the waiter, who is clearly passionate about fish and about people. Anyways, its a learning experience, I'm really out of practice on being out places, and certainly haven't been to a wide enough range of eateries to know everything so I'm still working on that.
Twas a pleasant wander down Bold Street after that, though I'm rather questioning this whole "cultural quarter" thing because most of the shops are the same old same old (got a small label folk cd in News from Nowhere, still a great independent bookshop if you want your left-wing politics, gender politics, ethnic studies and GLB literature, I got lots of lovely lesbian novels there years back), and the fair trade shop had pretty things to admire, including a shiny string of small circular mirrors I couldn't resist, and a couple of multi-stranded bead things to dangle round the house. I checked out the menus of various cafes along the way, for future reference, and had a lovely relaxing sit down in Starbucks with a my favourite caffe mocha with whipped cream (slurp), while reading Cinderella in Italian on my phone-kindle, as you do... *g*
I was pleased with my stamina to be honest, I was out for *ages*, though was glad of the squishy sofa upstairs in Waterstones where they actually.had.books. I wanted *faints* Truly - ok, the philosophy section was trivial, though better than the Liverpool One selection (Qi is fascinated by Heidegger and other writers and I'm a bit fuzzy on most names so was looking for a summary/introduction type thing, but they were either too basic or went by topic rather than philospher name. And drattit, forgot to introduce Qi to the Python's Philosophers Song, must remedy that. Anyways, in their sale I found one of the Lonely Planet phrasebooks, I collect the obscure ones and East Timor is pretty obscure for sure, and then in the language section finally found a decent Italian grammar to replace my overly-basic-but-confusing book, and Hugo Italian in Three Months which I've already started working through and learning vocab from. Oh, um, and Dickens' Great Expecations in Italian *blush* Which seems easier to read in translation than the original, I do find Dickens quite tedious but have wanted to read that for a while so its an.. interesting.. solution. Plus the free ebook of the original will provide good back-up in case I get utterly lost in what's happening. We shall see.
So yeah, good day, nice food, bookses and yay exercising independence yet again! Er, and I wasn't really so sleepy I missed the turn into our street in the cab home and had to get the man to turn round and double back, oh no, not me. Oops. *giggle*
Nice little place, with a very helpful, personably waiter/bar man in charge, and I felt ok being there alone (I still reckon smartphones help with that, so you don't sit along looking bereft of company), and decided to treat myself to langoustines, which were a bit pricey, but I've never had them, and wasn't really in the mood for anything too filling so thought why not. I think I made a fool of myself asking for them to be deshelled - the waiter and the kitchen staff seemed a tad surprised - and when the plate came there were just these little wiggly white things there next to the salad and bowl of aioli. In the shell they'd have been more impressive, but I'm still not sure on having a "special tool" to remove the meat, and the idea that the "head juices" add flavour is a questionable bonus.. utterly delicious either way, and lovely home made chips, plus a quick tutorial on langoustine anatomy courtesy of the handy picture on the place-mat when I mentioned I might have made an error to the waiter, who is clearly passionate about fish and about people. Anyways, its a learning experience, I'm really out of practice on being out places, and certainly haven't been to a wide enough range of eateries to know everything so I'm still working on that.
Twas a pleasant wander down Bold Street after that, though I'm rather questioning this whole "cultural quarter" thing because most of the shops are the same old same old (got a small label folk cd in News from Nowhere, still a great independent bookshop if you want your left-wing politics, gender politics, ethnic studies and GLB literature, I got lots of lovely lesbian novels there years back), and the fair trade shop had pretty things to admire, including a shiny string of small circular mirrors I couldn't resist, and a couple of multi-stranded bead things to dangle round the house. I checked out the menus of various cafes along the way, for future reference, and had a lovely relaxing sit down in Starbucks with a my favourite caffe mocha with whipped cream (slurp), while reading Cinderella in Italian on my phone-kindle, as you do... *g*
I was pleased with my stamina to be honest, I was out for *ages*, though was glad of the squishy sofa upstairs in Waterstones where they actually.had.books. I wanted *faints* Truly - ok, the philosophy section was trivial, though better than the Liverpool One selection (Qi is fascinated by Heidegger and other writers and I'm a bit fuzzy on most names so was looking for a summary/introduction type thing, but they were either too basic or went by topic rather than philospher name. And drattit, forgot to introduce Qi to the Python's Philosophers Song, must remedy that. Anyways, in their sale I found one of the Lonely Planet phrasebooks, I collect the obscure ones and East Timor is pretty obscure for sure, and then in the language section finally found a decent Italian grammar to replace my overly-basic-but-confusing book, and Hugo Italian in Three Months which I've already started working through and learning vocab from. Oh, um, and Dickens' Great Expecations in Italian *blush* Which seems easier to read in translation than the original, I do find Dickens quite tedious but have wanted to read that for a while so its an.. interesting.. solution. Plus the free ebook of the original will provide good back-up in case I get utterly lost in what's happening. We shall see.
So yeah, good day, nice food, bookses and yay exercising independence yet again! Er, and I wasn't really so sleepy I missed the turn into our street in the cab home and had to get the man to turn round and double back, oh no, not me. Oops. *giggle*