British Foods

All photos and written work copyrighted sstaas. All rights reserved.

Down in Key West shadows creep up ye olde brick wall. It will be evening soon and the buskers will be out and about entertaining the crowds. There is a huge Disney ship docked just down the road a bit. Tourists saunter about in gaudy tee shirts and loose sandals.

I spy a shop that advertises British foods and jaunt over quickly to inspect the joyful joint. It does look joyful! I'm almost certain I'll be able to purchase good old Branston Pickle and maybe some Cadbury Flake. Yum. Digestive Biscuits too? Yummer yum.



Inside the shop I'm gazing on the foods I used to eat growing up in Scotland. Wine gums anyone? A girl in her twenties appears at my side, reeking of booze. She speaks with an English accent.

"I've been boozing it up all day." That was her, not me, speaking, by the way.
"Oh?" We British tend to be polite. I really wanted to say to her that I could tell she had been drinking for she stank like dried up pee and vomit.
"My tummy aches. I really need Andrews Liver Salts."
"They still make that?" I hadn't thought about Andrews Liver Salts in years.
"Of course. And I love it! It always does the trick. What are you going to be buying? Oh, look! Maltesers! I love Maltesers!"



I leave the drunken girl in the shadows of the shop, pleased with my purchases, and wonder if she was from the Disney Cruise ship? I'll never know.

Do you ever shop for British foods?

Submarine - tiny beds

All photos and written works copyrighted sstaas.

I visited the Requin, a submarine, located on the Ohio River.


Couldn't wait to get out of it! Just too crammed and smelly for me. People actually worked and slept in it. They even shared a bed. One person would get up to work and another person would lie down and go to sleep on the same bunk bed. How narrow the beds are! How narrow the submarine is! There's hardly any room to walk about or jump up and down. How on earth did the sailors get any exercise? How did they manage to live together in such teeny tiny quarters?!

I used to have a Queen size bed and thought it was small. Got myself a King size bed now. I wouldn't be able to sleep on a narrow bunk bed, I don't think. I'd probably roll over and fall out! And,imagine sleeping so close to other people! Horrible. Add to that, imagine being below the water for weeks on end.

The kitchen is kind of tiny too. Food for around 80-100 people was cooked here. And I thought my own kitchen was small!



A submariner's life is definitely NOT the life for me!!

Falling Leaves of Autumn

All photos and written works copyrighted SStaas.

The leaves just keep falling! We're surrounded by trees, and the wind has been blowing the leaves everywhere. Time to rake them up and dump them! So glad our yard backs on to the woods.

Sometimes it'd be nice to keep the leaves. Protect them from disintegrating, drying up like an old prune.



But, with so many leaves, how can we even consider NOT getting rid of them?!



I'm allergic to the leaves. I plaster Vicks on my nostrils and use a saline nasal spray to help. I take an antihistamine as well. If I'm really congested, then I also take a decongestant. But, the leaves are so beautiful, and it's nice to walk through them, allergies or not.

Now, in the local village, close to where I live I don't have to worry about clearing the leaves away!



I can just enjoy them, admire them. In between sneezing and blowing my nose that is!

Do you enjoy the autumn?

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Learning German

All photos and written works copyrighted SStaas

Have you ever noticed that so many publications imply that you can learn new things quickly and easily? Take for example, the 'For Dummies' series. There's Photography for Dummies, Computers for Dummies, etcetera. There's also a series for learning foreign languages that make out that you can learn in a fun and fast way.

I just had my third German lesson today. We're using the textbook in the photo above. It's called "Learn German the Fast and Fun Way". I don't think I'm going to be learning in a fast way at all! It may be fun, however, but I think German is quite difficult.



There are just too many odd things about the German language. Das, die, der - to begin with.



Plural of nouns?! Don't get me started.



Umlauts? Who invented them?! I think they're something to do with forming the plural. So many things to try and figure out. In German, nouns have capital letters. Weird. Thing is, as I translated to the English the German word 'Haus', I wrote 'House' with a capital 'h'. What a silly person!



Anyhow, here's a useful link for beginning students of German. I've visited the site a few times now and quite like it. You can listen to recordings of simple conversations.

Here's another link, which I found at You Tube. It's also for beginners.

Now, if only I could figure out the umlaut, the der, die, and the das.

Guess what? There's also a 'dem'! That's got to do with the dative case. Something like that. I'd just as soon not worry about that type of case and instead have my suitcase packed, ready to travel. Hmm. Maybe I'll go to Switzerland and speak some German? Better start studying! Of course, I could always go to Switzerland and just have good food and wine.



Have you ever studied German?

Autumn Leaves

All Photos copyrighted SStaas. All rights reserved

See any leaves in the back garden? Nope. Me neither. Yeah! But, that's all going to change soon.



Every year there are tons of leaves just hanging about waiting to get picked up and dumped.



Our back garden meanders down into the woods. So, anytime the wind blows we get the leaves from the woods. And, of course, the leaves from our own trees. Now, where it can get tricky here in the suburbs, is if your neighours' leaves happen to blow into your yard. All hell can break loose! I sometimes wonder if people sneak out at night and blow their neighbours' leaves back into their own property. Tee hee. Wouldn't surprise me.