Words, food, and going out.

Words are funny things. My friend Colin recently commented on the use of "the hystero-sphere", in the phrase "the hystero-sphere of Twitter and Facebook", in other words, I suppose, the tendency to over-react to events by commenting instantly, and sometimes rantingly,  in the social media. I gave him back the "cyber hive", which I found in an article urging people to give up their electronic communication devices for a while and to "de-assimilate from the cyber hive". Here's another one: "clicktivism". 

"Clicktivism" is basically digital campaigning, activism at the click of a computer mouse, I imagine. It seems that this is growing. There is an organisation called Change.org, a global website with headquarters in San Francisco. It launched in April 2012 and six million people in the UK have since then signed or launched a digital petition through this system. A further three million UK people are members of something called 38 degrees, a web-based activist organisation founded in memory Anita Roddick, of Body Shop fame. 

To some extent, I suppose, this is a way of getting people involved in expressing opinions, taking an interest in politics and in what's going on in the world. I wonder about the possible shallowness of it all though. Is it not perhaps too easy to blow off steam about something on Twitter and then feel much better about it and not actually do anything more about that cause. 

And yes, I realise the irony of my saying that, as a person who sounds off her opinions via her blog. But, hey, who said I had to be totally consistent? 

So, anyway, today I de-assimilated from the cyber hive in my own way, by going out to lunch with some old friends. We do this about once a month, catch up with the gossip and talk until they throw us out of whichever "eaterie" we have chosen to patronise. 

Today we went to Jamie Oliver's Italian restaurant in Manchester. I'm not sure what makes it specifically Italian. Yes, he serves pasta dishes and no doubt he has researched Italian recipes but can he claim to be Italian? Be that as it may, the decor is nice and the food was good. 

One of our party has a Gold Card for the restaurant (some kind of loyalty card) and qualified for a freebie. Turning down the chance to own a mug with Jamie's face on, she accepted a free bottle of wine to share with her friend. How kind! 

We also got a free mushroom soup starter. But just a very small one, served in a coffee cup! Very nice, yes, but I get bigger freebies with drinks in Galicia. 

As side dishes to accompany your main course you can order a "plank". This turns out to be a longish wooden board, rather like a cheese board, with a selection of tasters of different dishes on it. Interesting terminology. we did not indulge.

For my main course I had a "Superfood salad". Here is the description which I have culled from the reatuarant's menu online: "avocado, fennel, garden leaves, shredded asparagus and courgette with candied beets, cime di rapa, a mix of grains, nuts and seeds. Served with smashed cannelloni bean hummus, cottage cheese and fennel blossom harissa." 

I've just checked on the "cime di rapa". They are "turnip tops", in other words what the Galicians call "grelos". It's a very small world indeed. This was a very un-Galician use of the greens though. 

 I have to say that the "garden leaves" from my garden are nothing like what I had in my superfood salad. My garden leaves are distinctly inedible. These were good. Had I chosen to do so, I could have added chicken or fish to my salad but I decided not to. It was fine as it was and very tasty too. 

Another successful ladies-who-lunch outing!