A wet lunch time in Folkestone

Went for lunch at the Smokehouse Fish and Chip shop in Folkestone with my friend John, whom I've know since we began secondary school 50 years ago. Having mostly travelled life's journey along pretty similar lines both of us and our wives are experiencing the same issues with elderly relatives so it is good to talk about common interests and share some ideas about how to deal with them.

John also experienced some challenging issues with his meat pie too. Strange he should have a meat pie in what is regarded as one of the top fish and chip shops in the country. His explanation was that he'd had rather alot of fish and plenty of chips over the summer at this place - and he had a full loyalty card to prove it, which he used to offset the purchase of one of the meals

The pie crust proved to be resistant to attack from above with a knife and fork. A pneumatic drill could not have made much impact. He had to turn it over and mine from underneath. He didn't complain at the time, but did when asked how he enjoyed his meal. They were apologetic but said that as it was a "free" lunch they couldn't offer a refund. Tongue in cheek I asked if a pudding was in order which they said would be fine and would I like one too? So we both had ice creams and they returned his completed loyalty card too. So in the end we were looked after well, but a shame the pie crust was so resistant to the fork.

It rained while we were in the cafe and it continued to rain as we left and walked along the harbour back to the car, turning what is usually a jolly scene, except when the tide is out, into a drab affair.

We decided to visit the Battle of Britain Memorial museum at Capel-le-Ferne but stopped only a short while as the rain kept coming down. We stayed long enough to find the name of W. J. Corbin on the memorial, one of the Few, who was a teacher in my first school who I knew throught rugby as well. He died recently in 2012 in his 90s and was honoured at his funeral by a lone Spitfire doing an aerobatic display over the crematorium finishing with a final flypast and a dip of the wings.