Smorgasbord Blog Magazine Weekly Round Up -8th -14th November 2020 – 40th Celebrations, Brad Mehldau, Relationships, Vichyssoise, Aromatherapy, Reviews and Funnies

Posted on November 14, 2020 by Smorgasbord - Variety is the Spice of Life.

Welcome to the round up of posts that you might have missed this week on Smorgasbord.

I hope you are staying safe wherever you are. Hurricanes, Covid, Civil Unrest and Political upheavals have been the focus of the headlines this week and in the global scope of events, the celebration of our 40th Wedding Anniversary tomorrow pales into insignificance.

However, for us it is an important milestone, and despite best laid plans of a wonderful villa and pool in Malta with my two sisters, and a weekend away when that was cancelled, we are going to celebrate in style at home with just the two of us. Which is okay, in fact more than okay.

On our trip to Ireland to meet David’s Family November 1st 1980

A few days before the wedding

Our whirlwind romance

September 16th 1980 David arrived as a guest at the hotel I was assistant manager of in Mid-Wales. I did arrange some meeting rooms for him but other than that he was Mr. Cronin until the night of his departure 27th September when he booked himself in for an extra night and asked if I would like to go out to lunch the next day.
On September 28th he took me out on my day off and we walked on Harlech Beach and then ate Chinese takeaway on the floor of my small living room as I didn’t have a table.
The next day September 29th he was returning to Liverpool and he arrived at my flat at 9.00 to say goodbye, or so I thought, but he proposed instead.
On October the 2nd when the hotel shut for the season David came back down from Liverpool and drove me to Portsmouth so he could meet my parents.
On October 5th we moved into a holiday flat in Dolgellau.
November 1st we caught the ferry from Liverpool to Dublin to meet his family with gale force winds and 12 metre waves.
On November 15th we married in Dolgellau registry office with both sets of parents and my best friend Joan Nicholson. With pouring rain and gale force winds.

Here are some of the surviving photographs from the day, most taken by my father-in-law Geoff Cronin which is why he is not in them…

These new fangled cameras…..

The weather here is gale force winds and driving rain, as it was forty years ago which is fitting!. As both our parents and my friend Joan have passed away, it is up to us to celebrate what was an amazing day, just the two of us which is perfect. We have already made a start with cards and roses, and the fridge is stocked, a couple of bottles of Champagne are chilling, and we have created a menu of all our favourite foods, many from the places we have lived and worked around the world.

We are very lucky.

Anyway.. on with the posts from the week and as always a huge thank you to William Price King, D.G. Kaye, Carol Taylor, Silvia Todesco and Robbie Cheadle for their amazing contributions this week.

Next week the Christmas Book Fairs begin for both the main Cafe and Bookstore and the Children’s Cafe. I will be including every author on the shelves so I need to get started to make sure I feature everyone. I hope it will give you some ideas for gifts for all the family.