FOOOOOOOOOOOD... and kayaking

18:44 the computer time tells me, almost two hours after dinner -- and I'm hungry!  Anyway, let us see how long this takes me to rattle out tonight.  I say rattle out... I put some thought into it during the day and then try and collect everything together at the end of the day, namely: now.  It is drawing near to the end of Saturday, which is still hard to grasp.  I either feels like I've been here much longer than that, or much shorter... the extremes swing two and fro unpredictably like a boom on a dead run.  At the moment it seems like I've been here much longer than just under a week even though the time has shot past.  Crazy.
And I'm still hungry, so I think I may talk about food tonight... Yep, sounds like a good idea to me.  I love the food here, but let me begin by describing how you get it.
The dining room has two long chains of tables running down its centre, with other tables off agains the walls, with chairs enough for for to a table.  At one end of the room there are wall-length windows and two large circular tables that can fit upwards of eight people around it and look out over the docks and boats.  At the other end of the room there is a serving counter, behind which is the kitchen.  The entrance is halfway down one of the walls, so that as you enter the windows are to your left and the counter is to your right.  On the right of the counter there is a big blackboard and this is used during the evening meal to right up the menu.  Underneath the blackboard there are trays of cutlery and underneath that are piles of trays.  Against the wall is a table upon which are the drinks and plastic cups. 
For breakfast you grab your own plate and serve yourself the food, which varies from day to day: full english breakfast, continental breakfast, scrasmbled eggs and bacon... all changing every day of the week, though perhaps it repeats each week.  Lunch is usually packed and so I'll skip over it here.  Supper/dinner/tea - whatever you want to call it - is slightly different as there are chefs behind the counter who have the pile of plates and serve you as you ask for it.  Generally there are three different options and a whole variety of vegetables.  I tend to randomly pick a main that sounds and looks good and then ask for a bit of everything when it comes to the veg section.  Then you head over to the end of the counter, grab a bowl, and help yourself to pudding.
The food is really good.  Tonight I had beef and mushroom pie, for instance, and lots of veg such as new potatos, carrots and peas.  The puddings are slightly more variable: some have been a little bland, but others have been amazing (I advise you to try rice pudding and cinnamon and currants) and I'm hoping to have them again sometime.  The only slight downside is: no seconds :( at least not as early on in the evening as we go... (Dinner is served between 5 and 7 and we go at 5) unfortunately at the end of a full day, at five oclock, I really want to eat.  And so, because of this, around this time of night I am left feeling a little.... peckish... not exactly hungry, but not contentedly full either... nothing to complain about, just a little annoying.
I can't understand the people who don't like the food here... but then, as someone said to me, "you'll eat anything, Dan" which is almost true.
So I've talked about food... yea... probably not good for me to do, only made me think of food... ah well... right let's quickly cram in the rest of the day, OBVIOUSLY to mimic how fast it passed.
We've done five days dinghy sailing so far with a number of instructors, but mostly Martin.  Today we had Martin again, and it was great to see him again, to catch up and regale him with the snapping footstrap and other such fond memories.  First of all we went into the small onsite swimming pool and went through a little bit of basic theory before pushing out the kayaks into the pool (which was lovely and warm) and splashing about a bit and practising capsize recoveries, paddle strokes etc.  A long, drawn out lunch and chat on the decking in the amazing sun and beautiful warmth and then we went out on the Medina (correct spelling? I mean the river that seperates West Cowes from East Cowes and leads out to the sea) and spent three hours or so paddling upriver.  Drysuits not suited to kayaking so was in my wetsuit for the first time.  All went well and when we were almost back at the UKSA we (substitute "I") had a go at paddling whilst standing up in a kayak.  If you have ever tried this then you will know that this was just for a bit of fun as it is near impossible to stand up in a kayak without it capsizing, let alone paddle in it.  Yes, I did go in, and it was lovely, the only part of me that felt cold was my feet :(  Apparently, and surprisingly, I barely feel the cold at all, another person was shivering when we got back, and he hadn't even been in the water...  A bit further on, as we were coming in, Martin made us stop and, partly as we had refused to do it on the first day, he made us - whilst in the kayaks - to do our favourite dance move.  I sussed out, however, that all he wanted was to see us in the water and so jumped backwards into the water as my "dance move" knowing that it would be enough because it got the result he wanted. :D simple.  And that was my day today.

Right, time to go, these are getting to long, I may try and shorten them.  Too short, too long just like a main sheet when you jibe.  My hands are really sore after the last day of sailing yesterday, but that is another post and may possibly have to include a picture.  Goodnight for tonight.  It is now 19:27 so 45 minutes... not bad, not bad at all.  And as an extra note: I don't edit these much beyond a spelling check before I post or this would take ridiculously long, so if it's a bit rough, random or crazy then it's not because I think it's good, it's because I don't have the time to polish it up :D