Another ordinary day

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Jan wanted that bit….

Well it has been another cold and wet day.  We didn’t even leave the cabin contenting ourselvesby looking out the portholes at the wind whipping the surface of the canal.  Jan prepared a variation of the traditional family lunch.  This particular tradition was born in the early years of this century.  We were living in Adelaide, South Australia but had been up to Brisbane, Queensland for a holiday.  On the way back we stopped at Forster in northern New South Wales to spend a couple of nights with Jan’s family.  We left on the 24th of December and managed to drive the 760km to Wagga Wagga arriving in the early evening only to find almost everything closed.  Fortunately one motel had a vacancy.  The only open restaurant was the nearby MacDonalds.

On Christmas Day we headed west towards Adelaide.  About four hours into the journey Jan started to ask what we were going to do about lunch as we had no food.  I assured her there wouldn’t be a problem.  However every little town was closed and after 550km we eventually reached Ouyen in the middle of nowhere around 1pm.  There we discovered the dusty roadhouse had closed at 12.30.  I was just thankful we had two 20 lire jerricans of diesel in the back.  Jan wasn’t very happy.  No doubt she was remembering the Jones family doesn’t have much of a tradition celebrating Christmas lunch.  Actually my mother served tomato sandwiches one year.

Anyway we stopped and Jan managed to find some stale sliced bread.  She had a mamalade sandwich and mine was jam.  We then drove on making It back to Adelaide that night.

For lunch today Jan produced a variation on the traditional Jones Christmas lunch.  We had tomato soup and stale buns.   And I’m not complaining!