Well the shopping day has arrived. I set of to take Christine and Margaret to York to do some winter clothes shopping with the intention of finding a decent coffee shop somewhere, getting a morning paper and whiling away a few hours until they finish their shopping. Maybe we will meet up for lunch, it depends if they can tear themselves away from the shops.


But what happens when we get there? There are lots of posters about a food and wine festival taking place and when we get to the town centre sure enough there are a lot of stands with all different types of food and would you believe stands with bottles of wine waiting to be tasted.


I very quickly get Christine and Margaret on their way to the shops and I start to look round. I notice the stands with the wine bottles and remember the Food and Wine Festivals out in the Bahamas, I also remember that the first one I went to out there I spent sixteen hours quietly sleeping off an excess of sampling so maybe some restraint is needed. It certainly is at the moment because I am driving but just maybe a text to Christine reminding her that she is driving home may be a good move. Perhaps she will think she has agreed so I send the text.


Now working on the principle that having sent the text and not got a reply she has agreed I head for the first wine stand. Well it is eleven o-clock, the school bus must have gone passed somewhere in the world. I have also turned off the phone to ensure a reply doesn’t arrive.


I decide to start with a little white, nothing to heavy before lunch so to start it’s some very nice Sancerre and Chablis followed by a delicate Burgundy and a couple of samples from Savoie, where we have just been on holiday with Chris and Gwen. This is very difficult because so far no money has changed hands, they just keep pouring the wine. Bearing in mind the Bahamian Festival experience I decide to explore the food samples on offer.


Naturally I decide to pick at the free samples before spending any actual money, I am a pensioner remember so I set off in search of food. Mushroom Stroganoff is followed by Sweet and Sour Pork, only sample helpings remember so they are quite small. I then discover the sausage stand with the English Breakfast Sausage as well as the Cumberland Sausage and that’s not to mention the many other varieties of filling including Blue Cheese and Apple.


I quite liked the sausage stand but reluctantly move off to investigate what else is on offer. I think it’s wise to move on before either they have no sausage left or the young lady behind the counter decides to throw me out. So what’s next?


I come to the pie section. Can the day get any better? A small sample of Game Pie is followed by Pork Pie with red currants on top and after a couple a sausage roll samples it is obviously time for some more wine. The Rioja and the Bordeaux nicely wash down the pie and I decide that it’s about time I catch up with Christine and Margaret.


Turning the phone back on I have a couple of miss calls from Christine so I ring her back and explain the phone reception where I am is not good and I have only just got a signal back.


She tells me they are just going for lunch and as it’s only a sandwich I set off to join them. So over a prawn sandwich Christine agrees to drive home which is probably a good job seeing as I have by now had thick end of at least one bottle of wine in various samples.


As Christine and Margaret set off for an afternoon of shopping I pop back for some small samples of cheese and chutneys with side orders of Salami, Chorizo and perhaps a little Serrano ham. All in all it’s not been too bad day for a day out shopping and it gets even better when we arrive home.


Christine ‘tries on’ the clothes she has bought from M&S and decides they don’t go with whatever they were meant to so they are going back to our local Beverley store tomorrow, a nice little saving. But then both Christine and Margaret decide they don’t want to cook tea so it’s off down the pub for fish and chips and a carafe of wine. As we watch England stuff the Tongans the ‘not too bad a day’ is now a brilliant day. Just think people have been at work today, this retirement is OK.