Truckfest 2008

I've spent the weekend helping at Truck Festival in Oxfordshire. Like last year I was helping the Rotary Club of Didcot who run the catering tent. A team of volunteers put in some seriously hard work cooking burgers, bacon rolls, chips, donuts and more for over 12 hours each day. There are 6,000 people on site during the festival and most pass through the catering tent several times during the weekend. All of the money raised is donated to charity. We weren't quite as efficient as the ruthless Chipotle*, but I think we did pretty well keeping up with the hordes.

It's good fun, but you do come home smelling of chip fat and need a couple of baths before the smell is gone!

*Chipotle is a Mexican takeaway in the US that I thoroughly enjoyed visiting. An amazing website for online ordering, but pretty intimidating in the restaurant. The ruthlessly efficient staff pass you down the line and barely give you time to order.

UPDATE: Just under £25,000 was raised for charity.

The Perfect Shave: Courtesy of Clint

Now this is a bit of a post for the boys. I hate shaving, it is one of those chores that you have to get through each morning. I recently had a bit of a revelation courtesy of my friend Clint.

Clinique Shave Aloe Gel followed Clarins aftershave balm. Throw in a sharp razor of course.

They'll be no looking back. Although both are substantially more expensive here than back in the US.

Pip's Wedding!

Yesterday I was in East Sussex for my friends Pip and James' wedding. I am almost exactly a year older than Pip and I count her as my oldest friend. To get some respite when we were babies our mums used to give one of us to the other to look after. Her parents heartlessly moved away when Pip was 4, but we spent so much time together in our formative years that we still feel quite close. It was fantastic to see Pip and James on their happy day.

The wedding was in Pip's school chapel at Mayfield School. The priest started off with some very stern and solemn words on the sanctity of marriage and I wondered if we were in for a lecture rather than a celebration, but then he loosened up and was quite funny during the blessing.

The reception was in a marquee at Pip's family home. Pip is an event organiser and some serious work, timelines and flow charts(!) had been put into the day. On each table were eight tag lines and you had to work out who you and all the other people on your table were. Mine was "Pip's first boyfriend" which caused a few raised eyebrows; ex's aren't normally invited to the wedding!

Do you bank with HSBC?

I was trying to use my credit card today and it was declined. At almost exactly the same time I got a call from HSBC wanting to verify who I was.

The lady on the other end of the phone wouldn't give away many details, apparently in case it were to prejudice any potential legal action! I did manage to glean that they have lost the credit card details of quite a few people. They let my transaction through, but have now cancelled my card and are sending me a new one. As soon as they hung up they rang me back on my mobile as a "second check". Someone has tried to the address on my account too.

Clearly some major cock up has taken place. If you are an HSBC customer I would get in touch and find out if you are affected. I wonder if it will break in the mass media? Or they will own up and tell their customers?

Restaurant Review: El Faro, Crossharbour

I went to El Faro for dinner on Wednesday night with some friends from work.

El Faro is a Spanish restaurant in Crossharbour, near Canary Wharf. It was a food and sherry tasting evening run in conjunction with Tio Pepe. Sherry isn't a drink that I would normally go for, but as with a wine tasting evening, when you have someone explaining what is going on you realise how complex and varied they can be. There was a red wine and brandy on offer too. I have to admit I wasn't a complete convert on the night and the red wine was still my favourite tipple.

Accompanying the sherry (or should it be the other way round?) was a five course tasting menu. There was lots of regional Spanish food, olives, jabugo ham, braised oxtail and local cheeses. All of which were very good. One of the people I was with had been to some of the villages where part of the menu had been sourced from.

I'd never thought of heading to Crossharbour for dinner after work, but it is great to know such a good option is on your doorstep.