Insane lack of decent food!

I'm absolutely shattered and need to be up at 6am to take the next leg of the 100 Faces circus from Newcastle to Carlisle. I'm aware that I don't smell very nice. My feet have been in the same shoes for 12 solid hours, and my arms have sweated into the same jacket for the same period of time.

Everything is running really smoothly, but what I'm not doing particularly  well at, is eating properly. It's almost impossible to find decent vegetarian food in Newcastle, particularly up around the BBC. We finish work too late to find anything in town and I'm slowly going mad because I can't find simple food like soup, or salads with dressings that aren't bottles of malt vinegar! I can't remember if I blogged my story of being given a bottle of Sarson's after asking for dressing in a cafe.

Believe it or not, the only thing which even approaches a vinaigrette at the BBC canteen up here, is a little sachet of... You guessed it... Malt vinegar! It is, of course, a horribly middle class preoccupation, particular after spending a day with people who have lost family members and had their lives literally fall apart! 

I'm making the 100 Faces project sound really dark, and it's not at all. There are a great number of hugely inspirational stories, and large dollops of happiness coming out of the good people of the North East and Cumbria. "My 55 year-old daughter got married... Finally..." said one woman today. Another had a baby after 4 years of trying. Some won awards, others literally danced their way through the year. A 91-year old we met today goes ballroom dancing four times a week! 

Time now, for some pasta, which I've ordered from the hotel at great expense.