Herbidacious!
(Rosemary in the kitchen: Glasgow, UK)
I was pleased to discover that my humble namesake is the herb of choice this month in Waitrose. A branch of the supermarket opened less than a year ago in Glasgow and although I cannot afford to do any sort of proper shopping there, I sometimes visit it when passing in order to peer at all the goodies on offer. I have recently discovered a tendency to be a bit of a food pervert, and I am happy to amble past the Waitrose cheese and fish counters, devouring their delights with my eyes. In fact, the ability to be able to afford to shop there regularly remains one of my guilty aspirations – along with owning my own stationary cupboard and having one member of staff working for me, licking envelopes and going to the printers and so on. I have other ones but those are the guilty, unworthy ones.
So I bought one of the sprightly looking plants, partly because I don’t have a Rosemary anymore and in part because of the label; there is a strange but rewarding feeling in me when I see my name printed on a teatowel of herbs, or hear it in a song. It happens fairly infrequently as it’s no longer a popular name. It is in fact very uncommon, especially for anyone under fifty years old. I only know one other person with the name; my friend’s mother, who also happens to be born on the same day as me. It’s an amazing coincidence and when we discovered it, the fact was a source of wonder and amusement to all. Anyway, to celebrate the fact that there are two Rosemarys (or Rosemaries) living in my flat, I captured one of us standing on the kitchen table.
My laptop is sitting on the left – I’m preparing to write this – and behind the Rosemary, you can see our world map, complete with all national flags, which we regularly reference to illustrate where we have come from, been to and plan to go. We also occasionally decide which flag is the best, but I have firmly decided on the Marshall Islands for the past few discussions. Since being in this Glasgow flat, I have lived with students from England, Scotland, Ireland, Malaysia, Kenya, Japan, Poland, South Korea and Germany, so there is always somewhere new to point to. You may also care to admire the luscious relief wallpaper, which I hasten to add, I had no part in choosing. It was on the walls when I arrived here and unfortunately was nowhere near the direst interior décor situation we had. The wallpaper in the hallway is exactly the same shade and texture as pasty skin that has been exposed to the cold and has become all mottled. It is something I intend to tackle with a paint bucket shortly. This year’s calendar is on the wall on the right and you can just see a boomerang sneaking in on the left that previous flatmates decoratively painted and left as their legacy.
– Today Rosie is having meetings in Edinburgh, UK –
Where can I get the rosemary cunninghams? They’re supposed to be more aromatic…