Friday 1 February 2019

Z's week. Or Z's weak, possibly, who knows?

Sorry to say that a week has gone by and I've done nothing about the other blog.  I limit the stuff I deal with in a day, and it wasn't top of the list on any of them.  It's a nuisance, and sometimes frustrating, but the only way I can plod through things without getting overwhelmed.  Next week, I'm sure.

I typed out a list of 28 lots for the next auction today - it's not until October, but I've got more than half the lots booked in already, as well as a couple of potential new buyers.  I'm not sure how long I'll carry on with the sales - I do them out of nostalgia and friendship, mostly - the work involved is not so very arduous but it does take quite a lot of time, for what that's worth.  I'll plod on year to year, for the time being.

The family is coming to lunch on Sunday - it'll be my Christmas menu of roast rib of beef etc; it having been the first time we've been all together since then.  When we went to the butcher today, he'd had a run on ribs of beef, which was a bit alarming.  I was busy planning an alternative, but he kindly went and phoned the wholesaler, who can put in an extra delivery tomorrow morning.  One of the good things about local shopping.

Actually, the proprietor of the butchery died suddenly a couple of weeks ago, of an aneurism. It was sudden.  He was very involved in local affairs; having been on the council, a former Mayor, Town Reeve, he raised a lot of money for charities and catered at many local events.  His is the last butchery in the town, so we hope his wife will decide to keep the shop going.  There are two other butchers and an assistant there, and we think she will.  A couple of farm shops, which do their own wild boar and goat, some game and chicken, but not everything, there is certainly scope for a butcher.

We are quite lucky for food shops in Yagnub.  There's a fishmonger, whole food shop, deli and greengrocer within a few yards of each other.  There are also a good many places to eat out.  Our favourite opened again today, having been closed during January so any refurbishment can be done and the owners have a break.  So we hot-footed it down there for lunch.  Which was splendid.  

3 comments:

allotmentqueen said...

Good for you. It's so important to keep local shops going. But they have to be supported. Quite a few of our shops have little posters in the window - "Only a card. If only everyone just bought a card that would keep us going." Doesn't work for all shops obviously, but you get the picture.

DUTA said...

Not everyone is convinced about supporting local shops. In our place, prices at the grocery shops are usually higher than at the supermarket, and that makes it hard to prefer the small, local ones.

Z said...

Yes, prices can be higher, I do tend to buy basic groceries at the supermarket - if we still had a little village shop, I'd shop as much as I could there, but I don't feel any particular loyalty to the small grocery stores in town. The specialist shops are different - I think butcher's meat is better than the supermarket and it is generally no more expensive, and I value the other shops too. They are run by their owners, who work very hard and just buying a few items makes a lot of difference, as you say AQ.