Picture from Trip Advisor
For no reason whatsoever I always imagined the town of Arnold to be a bit of a shit-hole, there is no reason why I thought this and today I was delighted to be proved wrong - Arnold is a charming little market town full of small shops and plenty of places to eat and drink. It also has a fair amount of charity shops and I was delighted to pick up four Top of the Pops compilation albums (not affiliated with the BBC series of the same name, I am of course referring to the Pickwick Records series of albums containing cover versions of popular hits of the day) and two new clowns for my collection. Nobody suffering from coulrophobia has ever been to my house but I look forward to the day it happens just for the laugh, especially if it happens to be a bailiff or Jehovah Witness.
As today felt like a Saturday (despite it clearly being labelled Good Friday) I decided that I would have a breakfast in a cafe and we chose Re:Fresh (not sure why the trendy spelling, it wasn't a pretentious place at all) which sits on the market place within earshot of fruit and veg sellers yelling their wares to all who pass.
This could have been one of the best value fry-ups (although my usual criticism about the bacon being grilled rather than fried applies - it's political correctness gone mad) I have had for a long time. The 'Mega Big Breakfast' cost £3.95 although didn't come with tea, you had to buy that separately, when will they learn? For that price I was presented with two rashers of bacon, two sausages, two eggs, beans, tomatoes (because you should never be made to choose between beans or tomatoes), mushrooms, two slices of toast and a hash brown. Mandi had a brie and bacon panini (when did toasties become paninis?) and a mochachino and the whole lot only came to £9.55.
The cafe was clean and well laid out although there were perhaps too many tables as the floorspace was a little hard to navigate. Service wise I have no complaints as the staff were great but there is one negative element that I think made a lot of difference. There was a noticeable lack of background music, no CD or radio on and it gave the place a funny atmosphere. Even a bland daytime radio station such as Smooth or Radio Two would have helped.
Due to illness there is no edition of The Sunday Alternative podcast this week.
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April housekeeping
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