Confessions of a Wino

So, for all Tony Blair’s efforts to be remembered as a world leader of stature, the only true legacy he leaves behind is his controversial 45 minute claim, and a slightly more insipid and politically correct (in every sense) BBC.  Meanwhile battered PM, Gordon Brown, has just turned the world on its head with a well received financial rescue package that most countries are following.  Gordon has gone from zero to hero in one single policy announcement that took about 45 minutes to deliver, and press rumours have him auditioning for the new James Bond movie, The 600 Billion Dollar Man.

Time will tell whether the economic tankers of the world will be steered clear of the rocks of doom by midshipman Brown.  But oh how Tone must be wishing he was here to be seen to solve the defining crisis of our times, rather than his current brief to search in vain for an answer to yesterday’s problems.  I wonder if he rues the day he handed over to hapless Gordon, whose Falklands moment could only have been a financial holocaust.  And what of David Cameron?  Nero to Oh Dearo.

Memories eh?

I took this photo a while ago, but the place shut down before I got around to reviewing it.  Shame really.  It did have a sort of sense of James Bond’s New Orleans, but it has always been a bit of a graveyard site.

If Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond, named this his favourite restaurant, and Adrian Gill, erstwhile restaurant critic of the Sunday Times, also raves about the place (albeit that he is presumably on a retainer for writing about the history of most of the major restos in Caprice Holdings Ltd), then any self respecting wino has to visit.  Sunday lunch is just the perfect time to eat oysters, and my rocks were from Malden.  I am embarrassed, though, to admit I had to ask the waiter to explain that Essex is where these crustacea were reared.  I am such a northern oik!

The service at Scott’s is obviously superb, highly professional and (unusually) English.  However, our waiter was having an off day.  I had to ask three times for my wine to be topped up.  You may be thinking “lazy so and so” but I would have had to walk about 300 yards to get to my bottle of Pouilly Fumé from where they parked it.  Talking of which can you spot our car in the photo below?

No I can’t see it either.

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