Peter, our winter painter, has finally finished his winter work.  We have worked with Peter over the last four or five winters to get on top of our redecorating work and he has just put the last drop of wallpaper up on the stairs today.  This means that we have done all the bedrooms and the hall, landings and stairs but as with all these old buildings it will be time to start again next November!

The look on around the hotel is getting much more contemporary without forgetting our classic roots, we are trying to make the hotel feel much lighter and fresher with much simpler designs and a cleaner look.  The task for Peter next winter will be to work on the Met Lounge, some of the premier rooms that we did first and I’m sure some of the new rooms will benefit from a touch up too.

We will leave the restaurant, lounge and bar for the moment as we have bigger plans for this area and may well need a larger firm to do this job.

One last job that Peter did, which provoked a tongue in cheek complaint from one guest, was to paint the window frames in the restaurant.  These have been crying out for some TLC for a while now and we decided we couldn’t wait until we do the big job next winter so we set Peter onto them and they now look great.  The complaint was that these windows had become so much a part of the hotel’s features over the last 15 years!

Very well indeed!  I was just chatting with Giles about the herbs he’s just bought and is putting in, we will have a really good selection for the kitchen this year: loads of marjoram, some thyme, flat leaf parsley and dill as well as different types of mint.

We will leave Miles to bring us in the more esoteric things that he forages but we should be able to grow all we need of most herbs that we use. 

Well, OK it’s blood donor day today not a Bramstoker Appreciation Society event.  Mel, Laura and I went along around 2pm, Cath and Tracey are going to go nearer tea time and I am hoping Joyce will be able to go today too.

That was the good start, I am now sitting here wearing my sticker but both Mel and Laura were sent on their way!  Not sure why, hope to find out when Laura comes back to work later on today.  I will update on the others when I find out but so far our average donation rate isn’t very good.

 Well I’m pleased to say that Tracey and Cath have done their bit and we now have a positive donation ratio.  The girls are both OK but Tracey did have a problem stopping bleeding - it is a long time since she’s given blood so I guess a bit more wanted to escape.  They assure me they haven’t gone to the pub to replace their lost fluid but…

I met a supplier called Miles this morning who has set up a great business selling wild, foraged foods.  He had a great range of seaweeds, wild garlic, sorrell and two sorts of samphire to show us.  Mark took a selection to try on tonight’s menu and I’m really looking forward to seeing what it is like. 

Some of it will be a salad or a vegetable part of the dish and others will just be for garnishing but it is really exciting to see these things on the menu.  Using local and sustainable produce is quite rightly all the rage at the moment and it is good for us to be able to play our part.

 Have a look at Miles’ web site to see what he sells http://mileslavers.googlepages.com/ towards the bottom are some thoughts and ideas about wild foods and then a couple of meat recipes, don’t worry - we’re not going this far!

I’ll let you know what the leaves are like later in the week.

April 22nd is the next time we will all go and give blood here in Padstow so we need to make sure our iron levels are good.  I must admit the Guinness is the most pleasant option above liver and spinach but I am happy to say I would happily have all three!

Cath is the team member who needs the most iron boosting ahead of the donor day but it wouldn’t hurt us all to build our red counts up.  I am hoping we will all be able to get appointments at a similar time and it would be reat if we can encourage a few more people from the hotel to go along.  At the moment there are at least five of us who go - it would look great if we could fill all the beds at the same time but that may be too much of a challenge.

I am going to let our local paper know we will be going - if it is a quiet news week we may make the middle pages!  Wish us luck and we’ll see how many pints we give between us.

While Amy was chatting with Matt in the kitchen about tonight’s menu she was asking about staff tea; tonight is pork stir fry which Amy likes but there is a perfumy taste which she’s not too sure of.

I went to see Matt to clarify a couple of questions I had and when I’d finished asked Matt for a piece of star anise to see if that was what Amy could smell.  We went through the changes and then I showed Amy the spice to ask her if this was what she could smell.  I must admit I did produce this quite quickly and she had to trun to look at it.  Her first reaction was to jump away very quickly - how am I supposed to know she has a phobia about spiders!

She has now calmed down, her pulse rate is back to normal and her eyes have stopped watering - I’ll know for next time - sorry!