30 | November | 2013 | Chronicles of an Anglo Swiss

Tell us about a time you found out after the fact that you’d been mistaken and you had to eat a serving of humble pie.

Photographers, artists, poets: show us REGRET.

Lemon Meringue Pie and cream in the Toby Carvery, Romford

This is not a humble pie, but a lemon meringue pie that I ate the last time I was in England at the Toby Carvery in Romford, England. When I visit my dad I do not bother him with cooking for me: at the age of 98 it would be a stress. I leave him to his own thing at lunch time and eat out in a restaurant. I do get some strange looks sometimes when I take photos of my food, but it is all in the name of holiday souvenirs. I quite like lemon meringue and have not made one myself for some time.

I very rarely eat humble pie, if at all. If I talk rubbish and in the conversation it crystallizes as a mistake, then I have no trouble to say it straight away, no problem. I do not make an issue of it and have no intention of becoming a Mrs. Uriah Heep. He was the bloke in a Dickens novel, David Copperfield, who was “ever so ‘umble”. He was so occupied with being “umble” that he was eventually caught and put into to prison for his ‘umbleness. The word always reminds me of this character.

So I really do not have much more to say on this.

As far as regrets are concerned, “je ne regrette rien”. Now that would be good for a song title. Aha, it has already been done by great singer Edith Piaf. Let’s see if we have a video on you tube.

Look what I found and an original recording. Lovely song and great voice.

I did not regret marrying Mr. Swiss and because of this, leaving my home country to spend life in Switzerland. They gave me citizenship when I got married, so I had no choice. After 46 years of Swiss life, 44 married to a Swiss, I am quite happy. Would I like to return to England? Definitely not, I would feel out of place in England, have lost contact with the English way of life and I am not keen on the food. It is good to see old friends and relations again, but I feel like a cuckoo that has been planted in the wrong nest. The world has become smaller with the computer and I have contact with many, even in the dreaded Facebook which also can serve its purpose sometimes.

Perhaps I am not too keen on the cold, snowy winter weather in Switzerland, but the country functions in spite of this. Early mornings are a Russian Roulette on the road with the car, but usually by lunch time the ice and snow on the road surfaces is cleared away: as long as there is a supply of salt to scatter on the roads, no problem. If I was in England and it would snow, the roads would not be cleared by lunch time, salt supplies would probably dwindle to nothing and the schools would be closed. Admittedly England is not a country that lives with cold icy Winters as Switzerland, but it can happen and when it does everything stops.

Mr. Swiss just told me that the comet ISON has reappeared after taking a trip on the other side of the sun at close quarters. It did not burn to a cinder, but survived and is now winging its way again in the sky: a little dimmer, perhaps not so spectacular, but it survived.

I will now leave everyone tucking in to their confessions and humble pie and hope they have more to say about this than I do. This was a little bit of a boring subject to write about mumble, mumble, mumble.

Daily Prompt: Humble Pie

Humble Pingbacks