Rime, Yorkshire tea, fish and chips

Does memory deceive us? My memory tells me that it used to be a common experience in winter to wake up on cold, still mornings when trees, hedges, grass, rooftoops were covered in rime or hoar frost as though with icing sugar. This seems so rare nowadays that it is, as this morning, worthy of comment, and celebration.

We've been drinking a brand of tea called, I don't know why, Yorkshire tea. The more I drink it the more it seems to me to produce just the sort of strong, cheering cup, that makes tea such an important feature of daily life.

Sankey's is an unusal pub/restaurant, in that it has as few rules as possible. There is a relaxed atmosphere and no hint of a brewery run by accountants planning every item on the menu. Where better I ask myself to eat cod and chips (Heidi had a generous Cornish crab salad), accompanied by a bottle of Sauvignon de St Brie.