Looking down, it felt like this working-class northern lad had arrived. His eyes drawn to a multicoloured hippy picnic blanket in front of him; the rug laden with a wonderful smorgasbord procured from a Fortnum & Mason festival stall.
His partner belying her usual similar lack of culture by swooning at the champagne feast. Her reaction when witnessing the hamper’s contents, an appreciative exclamation of “What a wonderfully romantic gesture, Gary!”
With her like putty in his hands, the Leeds lad’s visage gleamed from this gleeful appreciation of his lunchtime treat. Sure, his bank manager may have been alarmed at the ostentatiousness of his reckless early afternoon spend. However, deeming his beau worth the financial and emotional investment, Garfield J Strachan cared not one jot.
He was, though, shocked Sarah (as she known by people who call her Sarah) seemed surprised he was capable of such romantic benevolence. After all, during his fledgling years this fella’s dad raised him with a stringent dating code. This set of rules included affording a beau high levels of kindness, generosity and thoughtfulness.
His father’s advocacies the edicts of a man who himself treated ladies with similar high regard. Directives advocating his progeny didn’t belch cacophonously until a second date, avoided expelling flatulence in front of a lady until a sixth date, and a mandate to dodge receipt of a restraining order until date twelve.
Anyhow, I digress… What about this picnic? What goodies lay within the couple’s F&M chiller bag? Was the champers up to scratch? And, more importantly, why was Messr Strachan so awestruck in the presence of food not prepared in a deep fat fryer?… Answers on a postcard to:- John Craven’s Newsround, BBC Television Centre, Wood Lane, London, WC1
This alfresco feast, whose magnificence led Strachan to conclude it had been prepared by the Culinary Gods (Fanny & Jonny Craddock), including smoked trout, chicken salad, a cheese/cracker/grape selection, and a fruit fool.
This fare washed down with fizz eminently more charming than the cava or prosecco the couple ordinarily procure from Wetherspoons. While quaffing the champers, GJ Strachan concluding grape liquor was infinitely more pleasing on the palate when sealed by cork, not a screw cap.
As the Cambridgeshire sun bore down on the festival goers, serenaded by a soul set from D-Train, the middle-aged couple talked about this and that… Mainly that…. These erudite conversations touching on the topics of Buddhism, the existence of God, and what time Love Island started next Monday evening.
While augmenting the flavour of the smoked trout with squeezed lemon, Garfield raised his scepticism of an omnipresence force’s existence. Arguing, in his finest debating style, if there was a God why was the number 36 bus to Ripon always late?!
However, Sarah, shortly after misguidedly eating a quarter lemon wedge whole instead of using it as a condiment, pooh-poohed her beloved’s cynical take on theism.
The Ossett lady arguing that if there wasn’t a supreme power, in her opinion the pair wouldn’t be enjoying such wonderful afternoon tuck… Also arguing, the unerring punctuality of the number 75 bus from Ossett to Morley further backed her faith in the Holy Triity’s presence.
With Monsieur Strachan and Ms Brook agreeing to disagree about the presence of an omnipotent force, the pair moved onto the topic of political discourse in the UK. In particular, the nation’s upcoming General Election.
Garfield revealing to potato salad scoffing squeeze his distrust of both major political parties. An indifference leading to him (on some occasions) not bothering to vote.
A disclosure bringing admonishment from an appalled Sarah. Her wrath borne from knowing the struggles our forebears (particularly women) had in securing the right to vote during the early 20th century.
Indignant, the West Yorkshire lass blasted her bemused partner; scolding him with the news “My Great, great aunt Audrey lost her life trying to get to vote!”
“Blimey, was she a suffragette?”
“No, she got run over by a tram while walking to a Polling Station in 1932.”
The bearded fella thought she was kidding, but who knows when it came to the surreal world in which both GJ Strachan and SL Brook exist.
With solar rays enveloping faces both parties embarked on the third course of cheese, crackers, grapes, and whimsy. With his fair maiden’s face reddening due to an amalgam of sun and allergic reaction from swallowing a lemon wedge whole, Garfield raised the topic of ancient Hellenic philosophy of Stoicism.
The capricious chap offering the group praise for their desire to live a virtuous life; an existence practising edicts of wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice.
Discussion around the groups insistence of following those four virtues leading to Sarah observing “Thank f**k I wasn’t a Stoic. They sound like a right bunch of squares!!”… A point at which, if you listened carefully enough, you may just have heard Aristotle spinning in his grave.
With the couple manfully seeking stomach space to accommodate an upmarket fruit fool dessert, the final jigsaw piece of the feast commenced. The top-notch food and bottle of fizz almost spent; a slight melancholy overcame the two festival goers. Both parties ‘surprised’ the champers appeared to ‘evaporate’ with the haste of a Nevada Desert pond.
At the festival fodder’s denouement, Garfield treated his now satiated female buddy to a cacophonous belch in appreciation of the meal they’d just enjoyed… Thank God, it wasn’t a first date… If God exists of course!
