Pool Bliss

Just back from holiday where we had a full sized open air pool all to ourselves. It was brilliant. It had a springboard from where I made a huge splash and water rushed up my nose and from where my husband did a dive but didn't quite compensate for the spring. It had a little slide, depositing you into the water which the children loved and which I longed to go on but felt that it might just collapse under my weight.  This oasis was heated too. It was fun, fun, fun and it was really really cheap.

My tip for the summer is when it rains and you are wondering what to do on holiday venture to the nearest heated open air swimming pool. It's warm once you are in, it's great swimming in the rain and there'll be very few people in the pool with you. Bliss. The only drawback is you'll have three very bored lifeguards watching your every move...wobble...inferior stroke...funny dive....but what the hell. Take your contact lens out and you won't know they are there.

I know which cake I prefer to eat

If I asked my husband to go to the local fish n chip shop and get me fish cake and chips over here on the Lancashire side of the Pennines, he'd come home with chips and probably a small round soft burger-like 'cake' often coated in breadcrumbs and consisting of flaked fish and mashed potatoes.

If I asked my brother to get me cake and chips over on the Yorkshire side of the Pennines, he'd come home with a small parcel about the size of a large flattish potato, made of up of a piece of fish, sandwiched between two scallops of potato and then covered in batter and deep fried. Ahh...the taste of a special treat of fish n chips and/or cake as a child.

I wonder at which point along, across the border the one transforms into the other?