What is it with the 'salad'?

For a long time I have eaten this 'salad' - once a week, sometimes more if I felt like it. It's not like anyone makes me do it, when choosing lunch I am my own man, and if anyone did try to force my hand I'd probably say something to them along the lines of "why are you trying to control me? Don't you know that you're bound to fail? Unless you choose a tack of incessant flattery, in which case you are quite likely to succeed. Oh. Forget I said that".

The thing about this 'salad' is that I have to use inverted commas when describing it as it doesn't conform to the saladic ideal as it has no lettuce in it. (This is something Laura makes me do.) What the 'salad' does have is potato, pasta and cous cous. It is like all different branches of the carbohydrate tree. Apart from bread. Which would likely go soggy if left in a polystyrene box for too long.

After going and buying this same 'salad' once or maybe twice a week for nigh on a decade, last week they changed the recipe on me. Not to suggest that I can remotely fathom why the fuck they want to do a spasticated thing like that, but it seems to have coincided with a change of management. Where a grumpy old Greek guy and his gay-as-you-like younger brother who whitened his teeth a way I wash my smalls (ie once a month) were once in charge, they have now gone and been replaced by a non-descript Greek guy who's decided things need to be shaken up a little and if it means ruining the only things the diner had going for it then so be it, cos, well, it's his fucking place innit!

The main innovation was to change the dressing on the potato part of the 'salad' from a paprika mayonnaise to a vinaigrette heavy on the vinegar. And not like white wine vinegar but vinegar made from the tears of Turkish orphans. I don't know if you've ever tasted that but, suffice to say it tastes like warcrime.

Such is the rapid rate of decline in my favourite and trusted eateries (the Lebanese bagel bakery - gone; Terroni's Sparsely Stocked Italian deli - gone) I have been forced to return and consume the 'salad' despite the changes. But I have also been confident enough in my own beliefs to let the new patron know quite what I feel about his changes, in a tone of voice he could not help but take seriously.

The latest instalment in this ongoing saga should, on the face of it, be a cheering one. I returned to the diner this afternoon to find the potato element a familiar rusty red. I knew then that I had not been mistaken in interpreting the look in the owner's eye; he had indeed taken my complaint on board. But willingness does not equate to competence: when I returned to my miserable desk to consume my lunch I found that, beneath the restored paprika, the vinegar lurked still.

More when I have it.

Who the fuck deleted all my posts?