[From guardian.co.uk’s food blog, Word of Mouth]
Is cheese the only food where an overwhelmingly onerous odour is considered a virtue? And were the judges right, or is there another, smellier cheese?
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In 1891 Charles Cruft, travelling purveyor of fine dog cakes, decided the existing competitions open to compare British pooches were paltry in comparison to their European equivalents. So began the event that would grow to be the largest annual dog show in the world and would, to this day, bear his name.
Crufts. Even the word sounds like a well-bred puppy, barking. Drawing more than 150,000 visitors to the Birmingham NEC, and a million viewers to the television last year alone, there’s no business like dog show business, apparently. And yet, due to various good excuses - like not owning a pedigree dog, having more important things to do and annually forgetting that it is on - it is, sadly, a closed world to so many of us.
Which is why, for the next few days, News blog will be reporting from Crufts on behalf of all those who have ever wondered what it might be like to go to a dog show - perhaps after seeing a film like Best In Show, or simply after spending a couple of hypnotic hours watching preened pets march around in a circle as part of the show coverage. I’m here, hoping to lay my hands on some dog experts who can give us an insight into the inner workings of the competition and, when I can’t, tackling all the non-dog expert questions like: Do dogs actually look like their owners? (candid photography allowing). Are the best of the best trained to answer to their full kennel name of Chi Am Windows Vista Norbert Shake ‘n’ Vac III, or can you just call them Rex?
Does the entire Birmingham NEC smell of dog wee, or, after 17 years of staging the event, have they built some dog toilets to go with the male and female ones? Perhaps most importantly, at least in betting circles: is it possible for a complete dog novice - or “dovice”, as it may be technically known in show circles - to spot an out-and-out Best In Show winner from instinct alone?
My guess, especially for the last, would most probably be a pretty clear ‘No’, but I’m willing to give it a go - why not? Of course, this won’t be of interest to many, but it’s a big site, and there will be something that tickles them instead. Hopefully to some, it might at least be light relief, especially seeing as they couldn’t send any of guardian.co.uk’s dog experts, they were all busy, so they’re sending a blogger instead. And one who’s scared of dogs.
So, join us on News blog for reports from the fiercest competition between man’s best friends; for galleries, hopefully, of the most remarkable-looking dogs; for discussion, probably, of what dogs performing to music might or might not do for international relations; and on Sunday, join us for a live blog of the television coverage of the denouement of the whole thing - Best In Show, from 7-9 on BBC2.
In the meantime, do let me know if there’s something you’ve always wondered about the culture or convention of the great British dog show, and I will endeavour to find out for you.
To the dogs!
[For another week, TV Club is in session, this week watching a live ‘cookalong’ with Gordon Ramsey]
With adverts splattered all over the 4’s and commercial radio, it’s been trailed more than my uncle Barry’s caravan, Gordon intoning ‘Three days to go…’ in a voice that suggested we were all going to die rather than, say, do some cooking.
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Dinner party novice Anna Pickard learns how to cook a festive four-course feast. Well, in theory, at least …
[For Life & Style site, Guardian.co.uk, 1100 words]
The man with the very sharp knife is telling me - no, ordering me - that by lunchtime today, I will no longer be afraid of throwing dinner parties. In fact, I will be so comfortable with the concept that I will immediately leave here, call six friends, and have them dining on finest beef wellington in brioche with a simple red wine sauce before you can say ‘Blimey, that’s unlikely!’
Well, OK, Adam Byatt doesn’t quite promise that - we can’t expect miracles. But the idea is that by the time Christmas rolls around, I will be able to entertain a very small crowd with ease and even a sense of enjoyment. We shall see …
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It makes you work harder, better and for longer - and still we shun it. No longer. Anna Pickard goes on the hunt for the perfect working breakfast.
[for the Office Hours pull out section of The Guardian, Monday 26 November 2007]
Breakfast. The most important meal of the day. If we all had a cornflake for each time we’d been told that, we’d probably have enough breakfast for three lifetimes - with a few extra bowls left over for emergency snacks.
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[For Guardian Unlimited Travel, 1200 words]
Sitting on a converted shrimping boat that’s going to catch shrimp before a shrimp-and-salad supper gives you a chance to reflect on several things. Like how much people on the Gulf Coast like their shrimp, for one. Or how tame enjoying wilderness can feel, if that’s the way you want it. Dolphins rise and fall in the wake of the boat while I sip my iced tea. And then choke because it’s got about 900 sugars in it. Welcome to the Deep South.
A coastal wildlife tour wasn’t what I imagined when I thought of Alabama - but in a quiet, wooded and sometimes wet corner of the US, the state (mainly landlocked) cautiously extends its toe out to touch the sea. Examine that toe more closely and peel back the layers, and you’ll find it teeming with wildlife - offering not only a promising nature-tourism destination, but also a mangled metaphor that makes a very beautiful place sound like a dose of athlete’s foot…
Anna Pickard wonders just who will be enjoying the delights of London’s new sex museum
Last night, I was fortunate enough to visit London’s newest genital-based tourist attraction. Amora is, it says, an Academy of Sex and Relationships: which in the flesh translates as a weird half-house of erotica and education.
Based ominously next to the Trocadero, the universal epicenter of tack, a descent into the Museum of Mating sees your senses assailed by the heady scent of essential oils, the powerfully suggestive hue of lush pink and red walls, and the frankly laugh-out-loud voice of a woman whispering ‘Lurve… Ssssex… Relationshipsss… Marriage…’ in a 47 decibel whisper. For a timid church-raised girl, this is not a little terrifying. And maybe that’s the point.
Split into seven interactive - if quite small - zones, Amora promises a hands-on guide to fulfilling your sexual and romantic potential. But it’s quite difficult to imagine who the perfect target audience might be.
First dates
After an awkward ice-breaking dinner at a safe West End restaurant, why not top off the evening with a tour of The Academy of Sex and Relationships? That way, you can learn where the G-spot is before it’s too late (there may be questions later), and discover in the Orgasmatunnel - sadly an impermanent feature, which may say something telling about the state of the British orgasm, I don’t know - how to tell a faker from a real orgasmer. Then, moving quickly through fetish (it is a first date after all) you can discover in the very last room (’Wellbeing’) all the nasty STIs you can get from unprotected sex, with pictures, before leaving the exhibits, entering the bar and boutique area, and getting on with the rest of your evening.
Birthday parties and/or hen nights
Large groups of giggling women may not be the target audience, but the large wall of hen night props in Amora’s shop seems to suggest that they are at least expected visitors.
The “intriguing and striking” wall of “Amora Spice”, a set of 84 male and female genital plastercasts in various poses (”various” in this case encompassing both “at ease” and “angry”, if you’ll excuse the terminology) might be intimidating for young couples, who will invariably measure themselves up against the exhibits; though hopefully only mentally.
However, it in is this room with it’s “Wall O’Bits” (as it is affectionately known) that a small group of women, be they on a simple girls’ night out or perhaps celebrating the impending nuptials of another, could really come into their own. In fact, I’d go so far as to conjecture that someone may some day have their eye out.
Overseas visitors to London
Amora seems very keen to differentiate itself from more prurient and obviously more-intent-on-titillating sex museums in other major cities. But the need to inform, provoke discussion and to educate seems to necessitate an awful lot of written material. Walls everywhere are covered in complex biological reasoning - all in English - and though the level of interactivity is good for a museum on such a topic, it’s difficult to work out how deeply you could penetrate the subjects at hand without a solid grasp of the written explanations.
And there is still fun to be had in a non-lingual sense, of course. The pleasure of slapping a mannequin with a paddle can be had by all (over 18 and willing to pay the £12/£15 entrance fee), because the question of whether you’re spanking too hard or too softly can be answered with a glance at the simple colour-coded guide.
And the “create your perfect partner” computer-generated model needs no explanation at all. Simple arrows either side of a body part lead to fantasy heaven - for anyone whose perfect partner is sized between about a Britsh size six and 10 (with ginormous bosoms), and has a weird computer-generated face.
Lonely old men
I assume keeping them out is the reasoning for the quite extortionate entrance fee: porn is still cheaper, and doesn’t show you pictures of penile sores, afterwards.
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It is laudable that people are trying to promote open discussion and a proper grown-up attitude to sex, especially in a country that has traditionally prided itself on a ‘behind closed doors” mentality - and I should know, I’ve been blushing from the moment I entered the premises until this very moment. But something just doesn’t feel right about this chic and dubiously-sensual hole in central London that treads a very wobbly line between titillation, information and exploration.
Their hearts are in the right place. I’m just not sure where all their hands are.
Over the summer of 2006, I researched, wrote and recorded a travel guide to Nice for Guardian Unlimited. As part of a series of “Sounds of the City” shows exploring short city breaks around the Mediterranean, I explored this famous city and decided it was “like Brighton in a microwave”.
Click here to listen to the podcast, or click here for the picture-enhanced version.
Over the summer of 2006, I researched, wrote and recorded a travel guide to Marseilles for Guardian Unlimited. As part of a series of “Sounds of the City” shows exploring short city breaks around the Mediterranean, I visited this much-maligned city to enjoy the Festival de Marseilles and explore its hidden treasures.
Click here to listen to the podcast, or click here for the picture-enhanced version.
In the City Palace observatory at Jaipur, the clouds are gathering over the jumble of upturned triangles and collapsed crescents. The shadow on the centuries-old sundial will remain at its afternoon orientation for a while longer, but soon the sky will darken so much that the dial becomes more of a trip hazard than a timepiece. The heat is pounding, the humidity has reached a stifling level and the combination makes you feel like a piece of cheese left out in the sun.Twenty minutes later, fat drops of rain start to fight their way through the thick air and explode on the hot slabs below our sandals in the central courtyard. Huddled into a doorway with tourists, workers and pilgrims, we watch as an ocean is poured through a sieve onto Jaipur. A quarter of an hour later the storm has passed, and everyone splashes their separate ways.
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