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Malone

Thanks for the report on Artie San. I have never heard of it and dont know if there is one here. Goats cheese and sun-dried tomato quiche - wow - but there has been no sun to dry the tomatoes recently. Perhaps they were tumbled-dried, that might make them tasty and give some texture. I like Poundland, though I always get a funny look when I ask an assistant how much something is.

I know you dislike football but you may have heard that Cristiano Ronaldo has re-joined Manchester United. According to the Times he has quinoa and avocado (several plates of it) in the canteen. No doubt you have been advising him on diet.

I hope to go to the market cafe tomorrow, no quinoa there, and I will make enquireies abiout Artie San.

malone

You are right that heels are definitely not for the sportswoman. She certainly does not want to take a risk at the start of her career. I think she can afford a few more tennis dresses now, as she wore the same one in every match.

I loved the Artie San piece, definitely no branch here. Quiche is not for me, I prefer the goats cheese and tomatoes on toast. I would love to try their pies though. I bet they have a big range of exotic fillings.

Grunger,

Glad you enjoyed hearing about my (super)market research. Artie San - and Artie Sanal - produce is appearing all over the country. It started with bread and coffee... who knows where it will all end?

Emma R was wearing a very fancy outift at the Met Gala (the biggest night of the fashion year, though it's passed me by for decades). You might be pleased to hear that she wasn't wearing trainers, but the footwear looked distinctly odd - very black, very shiny, very pointed, wedged boots. I think I preferred the trainers!

I'm sure you saw the clue in a recent puzzle -:
See woman work in 'errors' section (9).
The answer is rather ... unattractive to me.

Malone, Grunger
I hadn’t been to the market café since the first lockdown, but now that I am getting out more, I felt I must go there for breakfast. I was delighted to see that Cassie the waitress was still there, and I hoped for a warm welcome.

“Where have you been?” she demanded, and I explained that I had been in lockdown for 18 months.

“We’ve been open all year, what do you want, your usual?

My “usual” is one the multi-item breakfasts on offer, but that always causes confusion. So I ordered “Poached eggs on toast, please, is that 2 eggs on one piece of toast?”

“You’re wrong. Poached eggs on toast is 2 eggs on 2 toasts. You want Poached eggs WITH toast. Do you want one egg on the toast and the other on the side, or both eggs side by side on the toast?”

“Actually, I should like the eggs on top of each other on the toast, if you don’t mind” I asked rather cheekily.

She made no reply, but when the breakfast arrived, the eggs were beautifully stacked. How about that for customer service!

Jigjag

Maybe your market will have Artie San stalls popping up all over the place - and I wouldn't be surprised if Ivan Apple got in on the act too. Provenance is very important nowadays - if Ivan can't tell you where his apples came from, you could perhaps tell him where to put them?

I enjoyed hearing about the footballer and his unappetising fodder - and 'fodder' is probably the right word for items such as quinoa. I am sure you will find something far more appealing in the market cafe.

malone

I haven't been to the Met Gala for a few years either, and I dont like the sound of those boots, very unwise. I agree she should stick to trainers, much more comfortable.

I haven't solved your clue yet. I think you might have missed Jigjag's report as your posts crossed.

jigjag

You are very unlucky at finding something simple to order. I am sorry you didn't get a friendlier welcome and hope you enjoyed the breakfast. I dont think I have ever had a poached egg, with or without toast.

Grunger, thanks - I had missed our restaurant critic's latest report. The answer to the clue is definitely more your sort of thing than mine - I sighed, tutted etc when I solved it.

Jigjag,

Thanks for filling us in = after you;d fiiled your face. Who would have thought that toast and poached eggs could be such a tricky thing to order? Still, you managed it all very skillfully. The only disappointment for me was hearing about the eggs being stacked one on top of the other. This is one of my pet hate, towers of food - towers that slide down into a big, messy heap as soon as I put a fork anywhere near.

Malone

I agree about stacked food. But having facetiously ordered stacked eggs, I had to go through with eating them. They were nicely presented, but it soon became the messy runny heap that you suggest. I left the cafe with egg on my face.

Grunger

You really must try poached eggs, very healthy and tasty. Btw thanks for the ER/telegram stuff which was very funny.

In a letter in the Times today (16 Sep) someone claims that in the second of these two lines from a poem by John Donne there are five consecutive prepositions:

Licence my roving hands, and let them go
Before, behind, between, above, below.

Each of those words can be prepositions in certain contexts but I think here they are being used as adverbs. I'm fairly sure of that but I will be happy to be convinced otherwise.