Uistlady has returned- and Mr Mac has developed a love of tea
I’ve returned to North Uist from a six month hard labour sentence on the mainland. Enough of that already.
Mr Mac developed an interesting habit while I was away- tea. For the past numberless decades, he has hated the stuff.
Asking him to make you a cup of tea would inevitably disappoint. After a lot of mumphing and racket in the kitchen, he would emerge with a tepid mug of something foul and brackish. I think he made it so disgusting so you would never ask him again.
However he has now discovered he likes mint tea, and a great range of fruit teas, and he partakes of these several times a day.
So for a picnic under the Uist sun yesterday, I opened a brand new box of Lidl’s finest mint tea bags for him and packed a few in the basket.
With the kind of gay abandon that comes with absolute confidence, I placed him in charge of tea duty for the picnic.
Added to which we have new flasks in manly brushed steel, with a press-to-pour feature, so he is quite happy be in charge of them.
Where are the tea bags? he asks. (Why do they never know where anything is?)
I tell him where they are.
He delves into the picnic basket. Rustle rustle rustle. Silence. The kind of silence which shrieks: I’ve seen something I don’t understand and I’m trying to make sense of it.
You’ve brought the wrong tea, he finally declares. This has got string like a tampax or something.
Mmm. Despite his new-found enthusiasm, it appears Mr Mac had yet to encounter the late twentieth century phenomenon of the stringed tea bag. (You see he’s always been a Twinings man)
Incredible, isn’t it.
He’s still coming to terms with the new advance but I can tell he feels a little queasy about the string. It reminds him too much of the other thing.
Loverly! Made me smile anyway…