Sunday and we had friends round for a late lunch. There has been a change in the dynamic since the older children went off to university. The ones who have been left behind are less willing to watch as their parents argue out the fag end of the afternon.

We ate a slow roasted shoulder of lamb that had been coated in a spice mixture made out of ground cumin, coriander, cinnamon and  ground up dried hibiscus flowers. The recipe said dried rose petals but I wasn’t sure anyone would notice the difference, as i ground up the hibiscus flowers they gave off a very faint cloud of pink dust.

The lamb took four hours to cook and we had it with rice, orange and radicchio salad and billowy flat bread.

Yet again we had found ourseles eating out of the the Persiana cookbook. This time we listened to Dexy’s and more of Perfume Genius.

One of the staples on the menu at school was Welsh Rarebit except they called it Welsh Rabbit the words spelt out in white letters on the black board over the queue for trays and then food. Even then I wondered where was the rabbit and why was it Welsh.

This morning I took a drive round some of the backwaters of Birkenhead. Unfortunately the camera ran out of battery. I will be back.

Last week in Oxford I picked up in the second hand section in Blackwell’s a second hand copy of a book on cooking with cheese. It sold itself to me as it had half a dozen pages devoted to Welsh Rabbit/Rarebit including a couple on which name was right and why it was Welsh, It transpires that no-one really knows.

We had it for lunch today although I didn’t follow any of the recipes in the book.

A good lump of mature cheddar was grated into a bowl. I stirred into it some mustard, a squashed clove of garlic and enough light bitter to turn it into a sludge.

Bread was toasted under the grill and the cheesy mixture smeared on top and then put back under the grill until it browned and bubbled.

One or two heretics put a piece of ham on their toast before covering it with the cheesy mixture.

We ate it listening to Perfume Genius. The families favourite music for the weekend.

I already had a copy of the book!

Forty or so years ago I used to read a comic called Battle. It was a proper comic on thin floppy paper. It came out once a week and there were half a dozen or so stories in it all about war. There were a number of other similar comics one of which was called Victor. But Battle was the best. The stories had more grit about them. Men died untidy deaths. There was an ongoing story about Johnny Red – a disgraced Spitfire pilot who found himself flying for the Russians; Blackie’ War  -about a lost sergeant who fought a particularly violent and bloody war in the jungles of the Far East, and Charley’s War, the ongoing story of a young private in the trenches of the First World War.

Over the last ten years the strips that made up Charley’s War have been republished in book form. A new edition has come out in October time and they have become a regular Christmas present. The stories were written by Pat Mills and drawn by Joe Colquoun and over the ten volumes build up in to a vivid history of the war. There are diversions into life in the navy and some of the experiences of the French Army, the mining that took place under the trenches (years before Songbird) and the near mutinies that took place in the British Army. A lot of the stories centre around the contrasting exeriences of the men and the officeresThere is no soft-soaping. Men, friends, die violent, horrible deaths. One story ends with Charlie have to collect the remains of his friend Ginger into a bag.

Driving home early from work on Friday I found myself listening to Radio 4 and an ongoing series on voices from The First World War. There were three r four men talking about their experiences fighting in the trenches. They must have been recorded more than fifty years ago but they sounded as fresh and as clear live on the radio and in their talk they brought back to mind stories in Charley’s War which must be a testament to how closely they got it right in the comic.

I moved office today and after eight years I now have a room with a view.

Up until now every desk I have sat at in the building has been next to a window but the glass has been inward looking into a large glass atrium meaning that the only view was a set of offices exactly like mine but with less paper and mess.

Now I have moved ten yards across the way and the window next to my desk looks out over fresh air. If I look over my shoulder I can a hundred yard stretch of The River Mersey, enough to be able to watch the boats and some ships come in then go out again, up a bit from there I can see the docks of Birkenhead and up from that, on the horizon, the trees of Oxton and St Saviour’s Church. Somewhere to the right of the church and hidden amongst the trees is home.

On a good day I will be able to see the hills of Wales and on a evening as the sun goes down the sky may light up a bright pink like it did last week. All from my desk.

It is just a pity it isn’t a view of Dunmannus Bay!