We were having friends round the other day and P was cooking, stuff from the sea, shellfish starters mussels for the boys and clams for the girls, Cornish brill all round for the mains, P doesn't do puddings which is a shame because I'm sure they'd be good. There was a problem and we had to dash out to solve it, you see I forgot to get the mussels.
P seemed quite horrified when he checked the fridge and they weren't there. He asked me where they were and I just said oops sorry, I forgot, which was the truth. I suggested he divi the clams up between all four of us, it would be fine but he said no there weren't enough. We had a couple of hours before our friends were due, P said we were going out to get some, I said I don't need to come P, it doesn't take two to carry a net of mussels, but he said I was the one who forgot them so I was the one who'd get them, no argument.
Now I want you to know there was no real anger here but there was certainly a determination on my husband's part to have his mussels as planned so I got up and off we went. Our first port of call was Waitrose and they didn't have any, P looked anxious, they had loads of other nice stuff, I asked him what was the big deal....why didn't he just choose something else. No, he said, mussels will be out of season for breeding soon and I promised Geoff we'd have some. P asked the counter guy if he had any in the back but the assistant said almost exactly what P had told me, they were in short supply because the breeding season was starting and they had a responsible sourcing policy.
'Well I didn't know that did I?' I said to my husband as he ushered me out of the store.
'You didn't need to know you just needed to do as you were told,' he said.
We headed to Tesco's where presumably they don't have a responsible sourcing policy and they had a few nets left sitting in ice. P handled them and the assistant came up immediately and asked if he could help, customers weren't supposed to handle the fish. P told him he wanted the ones with the least open shells, then he made his choice and the guy popped them in a plastic bag with a bar code sticker. 'Don't seal the bag please,' said my husband, 'they need air'. The assistant probably though my husband was a right prat but P didn't care, he'd got his mussels which he handed to me to take through the quick checkout.
So we got home, panic over, disaster avoided. But that wasn't quite the end of the incident....you see it got me spanked and frankly I didn't deserve it, I mean I didn't do it on purpose at all, I just really forgot which anyone can do sometimes, and I didn't know about mussels' breeding habits and all that so it wasn't exactly a priority to my way of thinking...but it still got me spanked. Not too hard and it was only over my jeans but hard enough to make a link between mussels and spanking. Then P was off to do his kitchen prep leaving me to smoulder with a unjustly warmed bottom.
Not often I say anything good about Tesco but I think they saved my bottom:)
We did have a lovely evening and P's mussels in garlic white wine and coriander went down well.
Ronnie
xx
Couldn't find a picture of someone being spanked over jeans.
