Death by Poison

It was bad enough that, when we went to visit Pat, she tried to dedd me by poisoning.  It is just as well that I noticed the flaked almonds dotted over the top of the croissant bread and butter pudding, for I would never have noticed the almond meal stirred through it.  When I sadly pointed out that I would be unable to eat it, Pat asked why I had not mentioned an inability to eat almonds.  But - I've had a tree nut allergy for all the years I have known her.  She knows I have this allergy.  "But," she said; "Almonds aren't ... Oh!"

She and The Builder enjoyed their croissant bread and butter pudding.  I enjoyed another glass of wine.

Now.  My mother knows full well I have a tree nut allergy.  She knows that almonds are nuts.  So when she got a piece of rolled lamb roast out of the fridge for dinner last night, we both read the ingredients carefully. No nuts mentioned.  Excellent.  But when she found nuts hidden in the stuffing as she was slicing the roll, she just took them out and told me not to eat the stuffing but just the meat.  Which had been rolled around the now nutless stuffing. Alas.  It doesn't work like that.  If it's been contaminated then I can't eat it.  So *I* had a very healthy vegetable dinner (with extra dollops of mashed potato) while they had unhealthy, fat-ridden, nut-infested, bad-for-you lamb!  Just as well she thought to mention it, though.

We re-read the ingredients very carefully afterwards.  Still didn't mention any nuts.  And no one can tell me what nuts they were.  We might need to go back to the butcher and quietly complain - and find out what they were.  Not that it matters.   I wouldn't have been able to eat them anyway.

We had great difficulty convincing Lindsey's sat nav (who I have named Wilma, just because) to bring us to Mount Martha.  She remained absolutely convinced that there was no such place.  Didn't matter what I did, she would not take us to such a place.  Eventually, I decided to put in Mornington.  I can certainly find Mount Martha from Mornington, though probably not Stella and Tony's place. I put in Mornington, and discovered that it was bringing up lots of places on the Mornington Peninsula.  I scrolled through - and found Mount Martha.  Except it is, apparently, spelled Mt Martha.  Once we put that it, Wilma was happy to take us all the way to Stella and Tony's place.  Not sure why she brought us down Springvale Road and along the old freeway, though.  Not when there's a perfectly good, brand new freeway running almost all the way from Melbourne to Frankston.  We'll go back that way.

I wish they'd stop putting in new roads when my back is turned.  It gets very confusing!

We were woken at 4:00 this morning by my phone.  It was our mortgage company pointing out that we had not sent in our new direct debit mandate for the house insurance.  Actually, we have.  They haven't got it and the insurance runs out at the weekend.  Somewhat sleepily, I sorted it out, at vast expense, by mobile phone.  It was only, at a more civilised hour this morning, when The Builder was telling Tony about it and they were discussing why the paperwork hadn't arrived, that I remembered the volcano. Of course.  If passengers haven't been able to get to the UK by plane, then neither will direct debit mandates!  Oh well.  Sorted now.