I haven't got any interesting photos, but we are married

In the absence of any vaseline-rimmed shots of me and the pathologist looking over our shoulders and/or kissing under a fruity maple tree, I offer you the scant pickings of my own camera.


 You will have to wait if you want to see one of me looking like Queen Victoria; we did not have a wedding photographer, choosing instead to spend the money on crystal meth and biscuits, so are hoping for the goodwill of friends with cameraphones to instead create us a virtual (and semi-focused) wedding album that we can look at when we are old and smell of wee.


(And yes, we had a lovely time.)


Here are the wedding cakes that I made with my own monkey paws.
















Here is the extraordinary cushion our friend Sarah made for us:

And here are the medals, made by our friend Charly and given to and worn by all 79 of our geeeests. (I am still wearing mine, and refuse to take it off.)  We have kept one aside for Captain Sir Dave Shelton, responsible for so many of the things that have made us happy in the last few months (and years).

More to come, including what happens when you put a 3-piece Quebec folk band and 10 dancers in a room with 30 English people and an open bar, and what happens when you introduce 30 French-Canadians to fake moustaches and noses from the joke shop on Upper Richmond Road. 

WEDDING COUNTDOWN: Day 3

Many years ago, when things were bleak and there was not much to look forward to, a friend of mine - a sensible woman with an eye for fashion and colonic irrigation, but otherwise full of common sense - gave me a birthday present that I was not expecting: an hour with a psychic.

Now, this psychic did not reside in a tent at a fair, or in a caravan in a parking lot.  She did not reside in a shady side-street in Bournemouth, or up a dusty stair in Soho; she was not at a 'hippy festival' and did not wear shoes made of tofu. There were no mirrors on her headscarf and nowhere could I see bells, crystals, eyes in pyramids, scented candles, velvet curtains, etc etc. She looked like a secretary and worked at a rather grand health spa place off Oxford Street.

I do not believe in this stuff. It doesn't make sense, in the same way that lots of things don't make sense: God, ghosts, the Immaculate Conception, Uri Geller bending spoons with his head, astrology, etc.  But then there are things like hypnosis and acupuncture, or women working together all going on the blob at the same time, or people going a bit bonkers just before thunderstorms that shouldn't make sense but sort of do, and that are proven fact-type-things*.

The thing was, five years ago someone who knew nothing about me (that I had lived in France when I was a kid, that I had sworn I would never live outside Britain again,  that I was single,  that I didn't care that much about having children , that I had a funny tooth or two, etc etc) told me that:

1. I would move to North America;
2. I would speak French regularly again (but she couldn't work out what that had to do with North America);
3. That, if I wanted to, I could have children with a little difficulty;
4. That my 40s would be where "it all began to make sense";
5. That my grandfather, my unlikely spirit guide, said not to let the dentist take out the tooth.

I am not saying ANYTHING but may I remind you all, adoring readers, that I have moved to Montreal,   and am marrying a French Canadian two days before my 40th birthday; that a week after I saw her, a tooth split and my dentist offered me extraction or re-construction that may not hold (and that is still holding 5 years later).

Spooky!!!!




* Homeopathy is absolute nonsense, however, and I will ignore any comments that are about for e.g. my dog was cured of rabies with a distillation of 1,000,000th of actual rabies in a droplet of wee; so saying, if you believe it works it probably does make you feel better, even if you are actually mad and probably also believe in fairies at the end of the garden.

 

WEDDING COUNTDOWN: Day 2

I have been writing this web-blog for over three years.  Readers have come and go (talking of Rolf Harris rather than Michaelangelo); the seasons have changed; I have moved to Amsterdam, and then to Montreal; I have seen gigantic classical cocks, got chewing gum caught in my ladygarden, spent night after night sharing a house with a Genesis tribute band, and begun a no doubt life-long project involving cooking my way through a set of 1967 Marguerite Patten recipe cards.

But in that time, you have never seen my REAL FACE. That is because the illustration(s) of me that you seen strewn about the place, drawn by the exquisite Mr Dave Shelton, reflect better who I truly am; they are an exact replica of the mental image I have of myself, jaunty fez and tiny little monkey hands and all.

The truth is darker.  But the truth must now be revealed, because there is something that must be shown to you as a matter of some urgency. What is the thing? It is a wedding card, the gift of my beloved colleagues, that is so excellent, so well-done, and so generally brilliant, that keeping it to myself would be like owning the Sistine Chapel ceiling and only opening it once a month for private picnics.

Here it is, front and back. (Regular readers will be familiar with the little monkey in the snow.)  And yes, that is me on the front, pulling a face.  As you can see, in real life I am very beautiful (almost supernaturally so), and look not unlike a young Peter Sarstedt. 

The card is full of Quebec jokes that I will not try and explain but that I get, and that gives me a very nice feeling inside, like Marmite on toast and a nice cup of tea.

Thank you, Jean-Luc and Andrea.

WEDDING COUNTDOWN: Day 1

To pre-empt any questions: it is this Saturday, at 5pm, in Montreal at the bottom of the mountain.

In other news, the following cakes (links provided where I have been able to find them on the internets) have been baked and are ready for action, nestling in their icy beds, waiting for me to meld their glazes, whip their ganache into shape and glue their soft receiving folds together:

Lemon and lavender (Bundt)
Sour cream and chocolate (Bundt)
Carrot, ginger, orange (Bundt)
Coffee and walnut (yer classic English style cake)
Apple, maple and olive oil (Ottolenghi recipe and truly extraordinary)
Chocolate cake (with ganache not buttercream)

This will give me ample opportunity to apply the "cake topper" (see below with your eyes) that came to me on an aeroplane last night.  But ... what is this? Another cake topper*, given by a friend? Sweet Heavens! Whatever next?! (Please note the exquisite detail of the tiny cake topper on the tiny cake on the tiny cake topper.)

* A truly appalling expression, but I cannot find another.

WEDDING COUNTDOWN: Day 1

"If you can't beat them, join them", as taxi driver philosophers say, squinting as they draw on a roll-up. I cannot beat 'them', whoever they are, as I am not sure what the competition is, but I will join the massed ranks of those who are to be married and who are - to a greater or lesser extent - preoccupied by their forthcoming nuptials.


I will start the day-by-day countdown with some exciting news. Regular readers may be aware of the magnificent drawing that was a gift from Mr Dave Shelton, and that then ended up on our 'wedding invitation'. 


 But no reader is yet aware of the sugarcraft genius that is this statuette (the expression "cake topper" does not do it justice), based on the original drawing, and made entirely of icing sugar and edible paint.  Made by Monkeymother's friend Claire, it is a miracle of modern craftsmanship, and I encourage you to look at it carefully wondering, as you do, at the detail of the leaves and the REAL tassel hanging from my fez. 


BEFORE:

AFTER:

Incroyable, mais vrai.