Low life
The sweet and the sour
Jeffrey Bernard Ihave got so ill recently that I can no longer prepare and cook the simplest of meals. It is not the end of the world because there is always plenty of bread and butter to go round, but I suppose one of the awful nuisances of my life is that I have now, after about four years, got slightly fed up with Marks and Spencer. Still, I suppose that some poor sods are getting fed up with Fortnum and Mason and Harrods.
I remember once chatting over a drink with my brother Bruce. It hadn't been all that long before that we were laying con- crete but there we were complaining about different aspects of Wheeler's in Old Compton Street. Quite rightly, too. The place has deteriorated so much that it is now infested by Japanese tourists and the kitchen staff are mostly Chinese. It is sad to see the wheels falling off places that have relied for years on a reputation, and there surely should be a law against refusal to serve people because they happen to be in a wheelchair.
My growing dislike of the Chinese, and admittedly I only meet them serving in restaurants, was capped the other day when the caretaker here translated a little note in Chinese stuck up in both of this block's lifts. It asked them kindly to refrain from spitting in the lifts.
Meanwhile, my refrigerator contains a Chinese meal which I shall have tonight. To lend it some of the Chinatown mood, I shall swear at myself and scream when I don't pay the bill. Perhaps one of the rea- sons I find the people who work in Chinese restaurants so objectionable is because they eat simply to stay alive and get no real pleasure out of it. If only they would try a bit more, it would be almost perfection because, at its very best, and I don't mean tourist restaurants, Chinese cuisine can be the greatest in the world. Anyway, tonight I shall attempt to eat an entire box — made for two — of sweet and sour chicken accompanied by another large packet of mixed vegetables and noodles, and I shall sit at a table to eat them.
This morning, my new home help, Nicky, brought me breakfast in bed. The top sheet was covered in egg yolk and marmalade so I crept into the sitting-room to avoid as much guilt as I could. All of this would be avoided if I had a friend to push me out to a decent restaurant at lunchtime. Surpris- ingly enough, though, most people feel slightly embarrassed at pushing a wheelchair. What they should feel embar- rassed about is being seen at the check-out in supermarkets unloading the crap they have collected over the past 20 minutes or so.
Most people have a disgusting taste for food or they simply don't care what they put into themselves. Secretaries who live on custard-creams — which I quite like and crisps surely only have to look into the mirror to see where they've gone wrong. I have only one mirror in my flat which is too high for me to look into, and it gives me the horrors, anyhow, just to look into the shaving mirror.
Last Monday I hit my lowest weight ever and clocked into the dialysis unit at 46 kilos. I really want my appetite back but all the hospital can do about it is to put me on a supplementary drip of protein and carbo- hydrate. And it amazes me that no queue is forming yet to pay me back physically for my past verbal insults. The meals I look forward to most in the week are a damn sight simpler than any form of chop suey.
On the mornings I go to dialysis they give us all a cup of tea and two slices of hot buttered toast. I take my own marmalade and, lying there surrounded by pumps and tubes, the awful toast makes the whole operation seem quite pleasant — for about three minutes, anyway.
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