Chocolat

Richmond is a fitting place to spend an aimless couple of hours on a bright wintry Saturday afternoon – the people are interesting to watch (quite a few are/have been on stage, in bands or on television), there's a good selection of shops, there are dozens of places to eat and drink, and it has the Thames flowing through it.

The reason for leaving the flat was to get the car valeted at the NCP near the station. However, the car wash man wouldn't have any of it, throwing up his hands and repeating the words "impossible today", so I decided to leave the car in the car park (seeing as it had already cost me £1.80 or something) and wander around with no agenda and no time constraints. I ended up seated on the bench pictured on the right of this picture, sipping a small hot chocolate from a new chocolatier that has recently opened. The little shop is filled with exquisite chocolates and tiny, handcrafted pastries. Expensive women sat at the small table in the window and ate expensive cakes, and the three distinctly unspotty teenagers behind the counter did disproved the popular view of their age group with their politeness. Bet they get more than minimum wage.

The lack of cleaning at the "impossible" NCP meant that I had to brave the car wash – £6.99 for a premium wash – that lasted five minutes and included the bit where the dryer comes down and you think you're about to breathe your last until the infra red thing kicks in to save it from crashing through the windscreen.

I went home and ate one of these. They used to be around all year back in the 1970s and 80s but now they seem to be marketed as Easter eggs, which is odd. And, yes, there's Easter stuff in the shops already. Sainsbury's had hot cross buns on its shelves as soon as it sold off the remains of its mince pies.