London Bridge new platforms open!

Soooo...back from happy holidays (and look - all the new platforms are finished and open at London Bridge!  So glad I missed all that nonsense...), only one day of disaster to report (holiday was largely great weather and great fun) - the day we were supposed to pack up and move from Bude to Warminster (and do Wookey Hole) we had got up early, packed up the car, unpacked the car again to find the kids shoes, packed up the car again, handed our keys back to reception, strapped everyone in, waved to Nanjan and Pops (who were there to see us off and help out with baby-sitting during the packing process - thanks for that!) turned the key in the ignition - aaaand - NOTHING!

The guys from the caravan park were extremely helpful, tried (in vain) to jump start us with the puny battery from their little white van and so we called the AA...(trying to make it sound like we were in a more terrible position than we actually were) and then began a wait of almost two hours without a single update (which I am generously attributing to the 95% lack of mobile signal in the entire South West)...when the nice AA guy finally arrived (from just up the road), he ran a battery test and held up the machine to show me the "BATTERY FAIL - REPLACE" message but was happy to let us sail away into the (now afternoon) sun so long as we didn't turn the car off until we got to Warminster (where he would arrange a new battery to be waiting for us at around 5pm)...

Off we went and (of course) the M5 was a car park, so we swung off onto to the A303 tightly crossing our fingers (which turned out to also be a car park as a direct result of the M5 being a car park)...so we covered the kids ears, cursed, and drove, very slowly, towards our destination, past signs to Wookey Hole (having no time to visit it now - telling disappointed little ones that we would have another go in October half term), time now getting tight, we pulled off the A303 onto some tiny little roads following the Garmins instructions and hit the centre of a tiny town where there was a closed road which the Garmin was absolutely adamant we take (even when we were 3 miles past it, it was *insisting* we go back before it would issue any further directions - argh)...!

It was just about now, pretty much lost, with no mobile internet to get directions from Google maps, time running out to meet our battery man that Poppy was sick...*very* sick...all over the back of the car, including getting some onto Thomas, who was not amused, and Annabelle decided that it was dinner time and started screaming like we were trying to murder her...and it was in this exact fashion that we finally clawed our way into the car park at Warminster Travelodge (after five hours on the road instead of the predicted two)...head and hands up against the windows looking and feeling a little like an Edvard Munch composition...

The battery was finally replaced about an hour later (the AA guy got stuck in traffic too), and actually, even though it seemed like it might be the cherry on the top of the cake, our dinner at Little Chef that evening was a pleasant surprise...I recommend the "foot-long" (it isn't quite) Chilli Dog... ;)

Double take and Office decor...

Got to the Wharf this morning, enjoying the bright sunshine (although not the wind-chill, my ears almost frozen off twice on the way in), beep my RFID enabled ID card at the tiny perspex security barriers in reception at One Canada Square, waited patiently for one of the lifts to come and get me, crowded in with a bunch of other skyscrape-o-naughts and prepared for takeoff (16 floors of Express Zone - a literally ear-popping journey)...when the doors opened I took one step outside and decided I must have (daftly) got off on completely the wrong floor (and *almost* got straight back in again, until I confusedly noted the number 22 on the wall - basically when I left on Friday night, this hall was completely devoid of subtle squares), the second thing my brain did is decide that all the pillar-box red I could see through the doors (at each end) was some variation on that plastic netting you see erected around roadside excavations and there had been some sort of construction incident I was being protected from (it used to be an elegant clear glass curved wall beyond the doors)...

As it turned out, our area (as it had been since the move) was not complete after all and the decorators had been busy over the weekend finishing everything off...I'm not sure I'm terribly fond of it (not that I'm pretending to be any sort of Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen figure, it's just that) when it comes to decorating choices at *home* (at any least) I tend to shy away from massive blocks of primary colours, preferring a simple white (or off white)...anyway, that was not all, we now have a functioning hot desk next to us (only used so far for cake storage) -

- complete with chairs and giant plasma screens (which show Sky Sports/News all day long), and also a tiny little meeting area with banks of brightly coloured chairs and glass tables, which I haven't seen anyone use yet, but I'm sure will be very useful when important visitors are being kept waiting by people... ;)

I guess you could say we've gone sort of "Popham Little Chef"-themed... ;)

Little Chef, Popham

More about the holiday later, the next thing I want to talk about is about what we did on the way home (and you may find this slightly strange), when we reached the M3 instead of joining the throng, we turned around and headed back the way we came, our destination? A Little Chef restaurant...

...specifically the Little Chef at Popham, to eat a spot of breakfast...

As you can see, the decor is certainly different, and I will get on to the food in a little while, but I do owe you a bit of an explaination as to why stopping for breakfast (in this particular location) is worthy of note...

Back at the tail end of 2008, Heston Blumenthal (and a number of other celebrity chefs) signed a big deal with Channel 4 to make a series of culinary TV shows, Heston's brief was a particularly interesting concept - to step in and see if he could save the ailing restaurant chain in question by revamping the menu (as only Heston could)...

The idea, or so Heston thought, was for him to develop clever ways to use a griddle pan (all they had by way of a "kitchen") to create something approaching fine dining (yep, you would have to be crazy, or Heston)...and then Little Chef head office would shake him by the hand and roll the menu out across the entire chain (fireworks/balloons/people cheering/etc)...as it actually worked out, here we are litterally *years* later and *still* the only Little Chef restaurant in the country bearing any mark of Heston's influence is the very same one, sitting all on it's lonesome attached to Popham Services, just off the M3 near Winchester...

For obvious reasons, this store, and this store alone has become a bit of a foodie mecca (or at the very least a curiosity), meaning when we did discover it was practically on our way home, it was a no-brainer but to go and see...my memory of the show was a little hazy, it being so long ago, but there was no doubt that it has deviated significantly from Heston's original brief (and subsequent work), there is, for example, a fully appointed kitchen...if the pitch to Heston had included a complete working kitchen to be installed I think his interest in the project would have fallen away quite sharply...there is also a wine cooler on the wall (bit odd for a travel cafe!) and one of those machines that pulps oranges for "freshly squeezed" - Little Chef of old, this is not - but it is also not what Heston left behind, his influence, if it is here, is now very, very diluted...

The food is, however, really rather nice -

- the eggs were, I think, the best I have ever eaten, the sausage was creditable (not quite Porky Whites, but pretty good), the mushroom was buttery and wonderful, it was only the black pudding that let the plate down, being a bit overcooked, tasteless and crunchy, but this was a distrinctly above average fare, combined with a pot of (nice fresh) Earl Grey and a nice cold glass of freshly squeezed oranges...overall - excellent...I was almost tempted to stay to sample the lamb shank lunch... ;)

It's not all perfect though, the toilet in the disabled loo played random movie quotes when a little sensor detected you sitting down (which was fun - and so Flyingpops seemed to think, a remaining original Heston invention) but in the Gents the sensor was broken...and the "meet and greet" system at the door left one table of three requesting their cups of tea and coffee around six times, only to throw their hands up in frustration and leave (all the six memebers of staff completely ignoring them as they walked out through the door)...


Although had they persisted they may be been charmed into forgiveness by the proper "Jelly Belly" flavoured American jelly beans that arrived with the bill...nice touch...We'll probably be back (next time we head home from Cornwall)... ;)