A quick blog from the former Democratic Republic of Germany, where I wish I hadn’t forgotten my language skills quite so comprehensively. “Sprechen Sie Englisch?” tends to get an abrupt “Nein” in response and so I have to try my luck with terrible grammar and limited vocabulary. But I have survived.
Tonight I am travelling by bus to Paris. It’s very icy outside so I’m hoping that we survive that too.
I was feeling festive yesterday while at woolies and decided I’d make some christmas themed red and green cupcakes and maybe even some christmas coloured ice cream in my new ice cream maker.
That was until I got up to the checkout with my ingredients - SR flour, cupcake mix, red and green food coloring as well as the ingredients for what was really delicious basil and parmesan gnocchi with roast capsicum, tomato and ricotta sauce. Then I was told I would not be sold the food colouring without first producing my identification… (For those who didn’t waste spend 6 years of their lives working at woolworths their computer systems prompt staff to ask for ID when an item that requires it is scanned).
I was told it contains alcohol and it would not be sold to me without my ID. A closer look at the bottle when I was home revealed that according to the food labeling laws not only is there no alcohol in the products but they are at least 93% water.
Because I have nothing better to do with my time I rang up woolworths to complain and they informed me that it was a government regulation that if someone buying those products looks underage they must show ID. I think they have food colouring confused with vanilla essence which does have quite a high alcohol base.
I don’t know what bothers me more… The fact that someone decided we need to control the sale of food colouring or that even given the other contents of my basket, the girl serving thought there was a possibility I would drink these bottles of food colouring straight.
(Sorry Rosie I wasn’t sure which category this fit under but I felt the need to share because of how ridiculous the whole thing was.)
I was full of talk when it came to relaunching the hut, and now I’ve failed rather miserably to deliver on my promise of being a devoted blogger. I apologise - but hey, being lazy is my prerogative as a UL-OL (ah, in-jokes from 2001 never get old). To fill in any readers who might still be round, I’ve discussed with Alice the idea of just having us two blog for now, and we will gradually expand the membership when the urge takes hold. So stay tuned, make lots of comments, and we’ll try to keep you all in the loop.
I’m off to Europe on Sunday, for Christmas in England, New Years’ in Berlin and backpacking across the continent before returning home via Warsaw, London, Helsinki and Beijing. This news allows me to segue nicely into the blog that I wanted to share with you all today: Strange Maps.
Welcome to the new inthehut.org blog. More information and exciting blogging will be coming in the next few days.