putted

The father-parent had a couple of shows today but I had none, though we had arranged to pop to the Vaguely Inspired by Spain exhibition at the main gallery complex on the Mound. Usually at this time of year there's a thingby whereby three, six or n exhibition-tickets can be bought at a saving on the basic price but as there's apparently only one paying exhibition on this summer the ticket thing has to be purchased at full-price, though father's age gets him a £2 saving. I was hoping that people had been paying attention when I had said that the place gets increasingly busy any significant time after opening-time and that in order to be able to get the most out of exhibitions without having to fight for space to read the information-cards and without having to wear earplugs to shut out the shuffling and babbling in order to be able to concentrate one has to get to the gallery the very second it opens and ABSOLUTELY NO LATER. I therefore became increasingly distressed as the time crept up to ten, especially when some people weren't even up and others had yet to be showered. We eventually left sometime slightly after half-past eleven; whilst the gallery wasn't exactly overcrowded it definitely required earplugs and received slightly less attention than it could have had there been less surrounding hubbub. Exhibition-wise it wasn't anything either particularly inspiring or irritating - the information-cards were at least sensibly-written (one even said "...but other interpretations are possible", a sadly too-rare humbleness of opinion in galleries these days) but there were only one or two things (one was Henry Moore's The Spanish Prisoner, another was noted but the note is not to hand) which demanded second or third viewings before leaving. As usual there were no postcards of the things of interest except one which was photographed from the least interesting angle and which completely failed to capture the interestingness of the original.

Father's first booking was for an afternoon-speaking at the Bookfest which left plenty of post-gallery-time for popping for coffee and cakes. When visited we tend to start poking at the List eating & drinking guide and had noticed e-tea-quette on Frederick Street getting a good review, especially for its cakes. The impression gained from having wandered past it in the past was that it was slightly overponcey but the coffee was tolerable if uninspiring and the others seemed pleased with their fancy pots of fancy tea, though the cakes weren't quite up to the new standard set by Falko on Friday.

We had originally been planning to try a nearby Japanese restaurant but heeded the online reviews warning that service during festival-time sank to near-negative levels; it can always be tried again at another time of the year, especially as parents will soon be able to visit far more frequently after next Saturday when my mother will join father in retirement. Though many places seem to be not bothering with table-booking at the moment the ever-reliable Buffalo Grill was and had a table free at the required time. It's had almost exactly the same menu for years but it evidently works, though there seems to be a slight loss of quality in the Stockbridge branch compared to the proper Chapel Street version. Sadly the Chocolate Dime Bar Cake on the dessert menu has changed at some point in the couple of years since we last went to Toffee Dime Bar Cake, unfortunately inedible in comparison.