lifestylesupportguru

Category: Food

Life Is What You Make It

Life is what you make it

Stuff what I have learned this week:

A very good day from the Lifestyle Support Guru! Today I am going to share with you some pieces of wisdom that I feel may help you, faithful followers, in your journey along this rocky road laughingly called ‘life’. As far as I can tell, ‘life’ is what you make it and what you make of it – in my case, perfection has almost been achieved. I say ‘almost’ because to say that I am perfect would be rather bold and would imply that I have nothing left to learn. Nothing could be further from the truth, beloved believers – I am constantly learning (for example, Spanish at the moment) and would never be so presumptuous as to think that I know everything (although some might accuse me of being a ‘know-it-all’, but I put that down to jealousy, pure and simple).

But I digress; here is what I have learned this week, which I hope will be of some use in your own miserable and worthless existences (and please do not think that I insult you by referring to your lives in such words; I use them only in a sense relative to the almost blissful state in which I, the LSG, exist). (Again, note the use of the word ‘almost’, showing my true humility.)

Sainsbury’s

1. If you are on a diet (or, as I prefer to say, starving yourself to death), you would be wise to buy a packet of six corned beef slices from Sainsbury’s (other supermarkets are available but I haven’t checked their corned beef slices) rather than a packet of three, since there are fewer calories in each slice in the six-pack – in fact, 10 fewer calories per slice, saving you 60 calories in all! This difference in calories I regard as one of the great unsolved mysteries of the world.

National Trust

2. If you visit a National Trust property with extensive grounds where the entrance is some distance from the car park, try to follow someone of ‘mature years’ to the initial information point where she will ask if it is possible to have a lift on the electric buggy to the entrance. With luck (of which I have an inordinate amount), she will turn around and ask if you would also like a lift – I admit I may have been looking a little fragile (a practised look) and I may (just ‘may’) have exaggerated the limp slightly – so you accept (reluctantly, of course) and drag youngest sibling on with you. At first he is a little unhappy at being driven on what is, essentially, an oversized mobility scooter, but soon starts enjoying himself when we use the royal wave as we zoom past the hordes making their way to the entrance on foot. Indeed, he enjoyed himself so much that it was he who insisted on ordering the buggy for the return journey after we had spent an exhausting hour eating parsnip and apple soup and perusing the items for sale in the shop. No calories were harmed in this activity.

Leeds

3. If you decide to visit Leeds, be aware that it is a VERY big city. It takes EIGHT minutes just to walk from the car park to your hotel – you could do almost the whole of Derby in this time! This time does not include checking Google Maps every two minutes before realising it would be quicker to ask a passer-by for accurate directions, nor stopping to look in a shop window to admire a rather nice large, green, woolly scarf just right for winter and making a mental note to look for said scarf in the Derby branch of the shop (sibling’s comment: ‘Looks expensive.’ Personal thought: ‘And?’).

And there you have the collected wisdom of yet another LSG visit ‘oop north’ – next week I shall be buying a flat cap and a whippet after building a homing pigeon reserve in the back yard.

Living The High Life!

Rucksack

A very good evening from the Lifestyle Support Guru.
I had considered giving some advice on avoiding little old ladies in pubs who whisper, ‘Can I ask for your advice?’, as happened to me about 30 minutes ago – as it turned out, she wanted to know what she should do about a rucksack she had found at a bus stop on her way home from the pub the other night. The police no longer accept lost property, so she said; I suggested getting in touch with the bus company but she said she didn’t have a ‘slidey phone’ like mine, just an ordinary one at home. ‘Ah,’ I exclaimed, ‘a landline! You can use that instead.’ (Thinks: you’re not getting a free phone call on my phone – I’m on a pension too, you know, AND I know you get a taxi to and from the pub every night AND you manage quite a few vodkas over the evening before you head back to a pub nearer where you live. Not that I’m judging, you understand. Who am I to judge?) I gave her the necessary numbers, which I found on my slidey phone. Still, at least she didn’t want advice on bladder control, which was what I first thought – I shouldn’t have liked to discuss that over my Sauvignon Blanc, I have to be honest.

Anyway, enough of little old ladies (LOLs for short); I know that you, my devoted followers, are

Cheshire

far more interested in knowing what life can be like in the fast lane, as experienced by my male siblings and me in Cheshire at the weekend as we prepared to send DOT off on the next stage of his life (or having fun whilst working, as I call it). These are the rules, as far as I could work out:
1. A Range Rover is absolutely essential for driving up and down the main street and parking outside small boutique shops where the sales are on and a pair of tights is reduced from £40 to £20 – a bargain!
2. The Range Rover must be black or white; no other colour is acceptable (or even available, judging by the car showrooms we passed).
3. The Range Rover must not look as if it has been anywhere near something that might resemble an off-road route for which it was originally designed.
4. The only other acceptable vehicles are: BMW (black), Audi (deep red); Mercedes (silver); anything convertible, providing it’s a Bentley or a cute little Italian job in pale green.
5. All women (except the LSG, who is above such ‘rules’ because her ‘diet’ doesn’t allow for it) must be stick thin and wear tight black dresses (bought in the sale, a bargain at £390) and very high heels.
6. Restaurants are not called ‘restaurants’; they are either an ‘Eatery’, a ‘Grill’ or a ‘Food House’.
7. The ‘house wine’ will be sold out and the next available ‘house’ wine will be at least £6 more expensive than the already-expensive house wine.
8. Red wine and coke is a ‘classic Spanish cocktail’, according to one menu – just trying to remember how many Spaniards I’ve seen quaffing this delightful combination.

It’s just like being abroad, but you don’t have to learn the language! Happy holidays!

You CAN Live Well for Less – If You’re Not An Idiot!

order on line

A very good afternoon from the Lifestyle Support Guru. Today, I wish to offer a cautionary little tale, as recounted to me by a close friend, in the hope that I may save you some money. Let me set the scene:
This close friend, having successfully ordered groceries on a previous occasion using ‘Click and Collect’, decided to use this facility again, partly because this stops her wandering around the store itself and ending up buying things she doesn’t need (I.e. clothes) and partly because it means she doesn’t have to get annoyed with others of the older generation who seem to think that supermarket shopping is some sort of social occasion, blocking the aisles while they discuss their ailments and what they watched on telly last night .
The friend goes to collect her order and the very nice ‘Click and Collect’ man (no, you can’t actually click and collect a man, but one can live in hope…) tells her that there is only one change to her order. The conversation goes as follows
CacMan: They’ve only managed to supply 11 packets of frozen Golden Vegetable Rice, not the 12 you ordered.
Friend: TWELVE??? (in a high-pitched squeal, an octave higher than normal)
C: Didn’t you want 12?
F: (Still in a voice that only dogs would be able to hear) No, I only wanted 2. I haven’t got the freezer space for 12.
C: That’s OK. I can change the order.
F: Oh, thank you so much.
C: Don’t worry – people do that all the time. I had one customer who wanted 3 kilos of bananas but ordered 30 kilos by mistake. Took me half an hour to load them into her car.

CacMan loads the rest of the order into the car and the friend decides to say nothing when this includes a bag containing 12 packets of the most expensive cat food (because, like the LSG, she

tempt the cat

has pets of the feline variety), which she only uses as a special treat or to tempt a jaded palate and normally buys just in ones or twos. Luckily, she knows they won’t go to waste because Malcolm-the-strangely-named-cat-from-Australia (yes, by an AMAZING coincidence, the close friend also has a cat with such a name – who’d have thought it?) is a little under the weather at the moment, so she needs to try and feed him up.

And the lesson to be learned? When ordering online, don’t assume that putting a 2 in the ‘Quantity’ box will automatically replace the default 1 – it simply adds it next to the 1 to make 12!

I think Sainsbury’s (other supermarkets are available) needs to change its slogan:
‘You CAN live well for less…if you’re not an idiot’.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend, dear followers, and eat well. I’m thinking of a nice rice salad accompanied by ‘steamed tuna in a tasty gravy for your favourite feline companion’.

DOT calling LSG – Advice Please

I have received this heartfelt plea from DOT and, although I was going to post some sound advice about going oop north to Halifax, I felt this merited a more urgent response. Halifax can wait – we’ll always have Halifax, as Humphrey Bogart said so movingly in ‘Casablanca’ (or was that ‘Carry on, Casablanca’?).

“to: Lifestyle Support Guru

Tanzania

Message to LSG from DOT (Dai of Tanzania)
Dear LSG, I shall soon be making a brief (ha ha – you’ll get the joke later) visit to the UK, where I shall change from DOT (Dai of Tanzania) to DOT (Dai of Turkey). My letter is not about my change of name, but a necessary change in my circumstances.

Istanbul

I need a reputable place, recommended by you, to buy a complete new set of underwear. You may recall that on my last visit I also had a similar need and purchased 10 pairs from M&S. I can hear you wondering how I could have worked my way through 10 pairs of underwear in such a short time.
I didn’t.
The items in question were all several sizes too large and none of the assistants at the aforesaid shop pointed this out to me, or even raised an eyebrow.

boxer shorts

At first I found the extra room useful. I cut down enormously on my excess baggage to Tanzania by simply filling my underwear with towels, and other soft furnishings, such as pillows, a duvet, 2 waterbottles and 20 pairs of socks. They didn’t set off the alarm at the airport, and my body shape ensured that undesirables didn’t wish to seat themselves next to me. However, things haven’t gone as smoothly since.
I have had to learn to walk with a mincing step whilst in Tanzania: left hand firmly inside the back belt of my trousers holding on to the waistband of the undergarments to ensure they don’t end up around my knees. Occasional forgetfulness has me having to hunt, using my complete arm down inside the trousers, whilst smiling and nodding at alarmed passers-by. Shopping has become problematic as I often need both hands to carry the bags, and the faltering garments ensure the mincing steps become more exaggerated at these times, only able to move my lower limbs from the knees downwards, attracting unwanted attention.
I haven’t replaced them whilst here as I’m never sure that someone hasn’t worn said items previously.
So, all I want is a reputable place where the assistants will raise their eyebrows and ask suitable questions like, “Are these for your own use, sir?”, or “How many people are you expecting to get into each pair?”
Dear LSG. Please help. I can’t spend another 2 years like the last. And as you are a Support Guru, this seemed an appropriate plea.”

Oh, DOT, DOT, DOT … (Did you see what I did there? Ha ha!) What can I say? If only I had read this before I went to Netherthong in the Yorkshire Dales …
Firstly, I have to congratulate you on your highly inventive use of the extra luggage space created by your purchase of over-large undergarments. With careful marketing, you could branch out (so to speak) into the travel industry, offering Ryanair customers a foolproof means of packing all their holiday clothing without having to pay those pesky ‘hold luggage’ charges. (‘Hold luggage’ is not, I hasten to add, an order – that could lead to charges of a very different kind and at least one night’s stay in a local prison cell as you try to explain just what you were attempting to do with your arm buried down your trousers. I don’t think ‘Looking for my underpants’ will translate too well into Turkish.)

CHEESE

You could, of course, pop along to Derby’s Eagle Market, which still advertises itself as ‘Britain’s largest indoor market’ (even though it isn’t and, to my knowledge, never has been) to purchase more undergarments in a more appropriate size. Unfortunately, there is one immediate problem I can foresee – there’s only about one stall left in the market and that sells cheese. I do not recommend purchasing anything from this stall because a) you don’t eat cheese and b) using said cheese as a ‘filler’ for the previously-purchased garments could lead to even stranger looks from people and, probably, unwanted attention from dogs and other creatures with a strong sense of smell.
I can only see one solution and that is to ask a sibling (you have a choice of several) to accompany you next time you sally forth on a shopping trip and get him/her to read the labels on packs of undergarments BEFORE you purchase them. This could serve two purposes – i) hours of entertainment and amusement for passers-by as they watch you peering closely at labels, asking, ‘Does that say Large or Extra Large? I don’t want them round my knees again.’ and ii) a warm glow emanating from the sibling who was chosen because (s)he feels loved and wanted, although that warm glow could, equally, be emanating from sheer embarrassment.
Personally, I would recommend going to a town where you and/or glowing sibling aren’t known. Alfreton (see previous post) has some shops – and very few pubs, so you can wander round purchasing underpants in a variety of sizes without fear of being recognised or of going into a pub, drinking too much and ending up doing a Superman impression as you try on your new pants over your trousers.
I hope this helps. Do keep me informed.

Guide To A Good Funeral

Headstone

A very good evening to you all from the Lifestyle Support Guru, although you may think that the title is rather inappropriate tonight, given that I wish to give a brief guide to… a good FUNERAL (take note, whoever’s going to organise mine!).
1. Get the ‘guests’ to wear a cheerful colour (but not pink, please; yellow is good). Black is so depressing and doesn’t flatter the older face.
2. Ensure that the organist can actually play, especially ‘Jerusalem’ – or maybe the version I heard today was a new ‘hipster’ one where the notes are played at half the speed of the congregation’s rendition and not necessarily in the same key all the way through. Or the organist may have been from the Eric Morecambe School of Organ Playing, where the notes are right, just not necessarily in the right order.

Church Choir

3. Unless you live in Wales, where they are compulsory, consider hiring a male voice choir (there’s usually one in every city, just hanging around waiting to be asked to a good funeral) – this will ensure that the hymns are sung with the right amount of gusto and volume and will drown out the sound of the organist (see above).
4. Choose hymns that are not too high in key (such as ‘Morning Has Broken’) – remember that some people are getting on and can’t reach those high notes unless they’ve got their knickers in a twist. (‘Bread of Heaven’ is always a pretty safe bet, catering for all voices, and harmony if required.)

Cream Bun

5. Ask whoever does the ‘speech’ about the ‘dear departed’ to avoid phrases such as ‘an independent woman’ because this is just another way of saying ‘bloody-minded’, ‘annoying’ or ‘opinionated’.
6. At the ‘do’ afterwards, it is not a good idea to have large cream buns included in the buffet, as one or two of your guests will end up looking like they have been in a custard pie fight, which will be particularly noticeable on the dark clothes that everyone will be wearing (yellow is far less likely to show custard pie stains). Some of the more ‘refained’ guests will demonstrate how to eat a cream bun properly by cutting it in half first, or by separating the top from the bottom (so to speak), thus making those with cream and icing sugar all the way down their front feel that they have no class or style at all (this would not, of course, happen to the LSG, whose timeless sense of style and class is often imitated but never fully equalled).

On that note, I shall take myself off to bed. It is likely that I shall wake myself up at some point during the night with my own rendition of ‘Bread of Heaven’ (yes, that has really happened!), so I need to get as many hours of beauty sleep as I can before that happens. Sleep well!

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