I’m hanging out in the ‘Joy of Tea’ café on Achtergracht. Have been hiding in here for a few hours now. I am wet through and miserable, however, there is a pervading waft of butter and cake and coffee in here and when the coffee comes I am happy. It looks really good.
A couple of days ago the heavens opened up its sluice-gates and it hasn’t stopped pouring since. It’s a new thing for me in a way. Rain is usually ‘over and out’ like a flash. The flat lands just let wallow the windy currents that flow all over the land. The clouds literally race past up above and the sun peers through on more than one occasion. I’ve been on my bike this morning fighting the horizontal wind and rain and right now all I want is some hot coffee and a bit of food. Again, it seems Manchester has a true affinity with Amsterdam. I’m feeling the connectivity.
Once ‘the seal has broke’ it’s hard to stop the flow – says my friend Emily whilst in the midst of drinking glorious roasted rosemary rum-based cocktails. A few days ago we had turned our thirst towards “Hiding In Plain Sight’, a cocktail bar based on the ‘Speakeasy’ Bars of NYC in the 1920’s. It is petite but very comfortable. There are quantum physics equations on their blackboards. If you work out what it all means you might earn yourself a free shot. I made a furious attempt to delve into brain matter but unfortunately a guy beat me to it by suggesting some kind of (Max) Plank’s Constant, something to do with equalling Half of Plank’s Constant? The guy who owns the place was reading ‘Quantum’ at the time, a book on the relationship between Einstein and Niels Bohr. It certainly makes for an interesting tit for tat whilst slurping on an expensive cocktail.