In these times of lockdown, now being relaxed, so a sort of parole where the parole board are a bunch of people who should really be locked up, I’ve taken to fish.

I was used to buying fish from the supermarket, but as I’m not visiting these places any more and will try not to for many months now, I had to look for another fish source. Fish sauce? No stop it.

Some of the country’s best fish comes from Cornwall and I found a supplier who said they would send me a box of fresh fish and would deliver the next day. I was not disappointed. The fish was simply superb, and what we did not eat then could easily be frozen on the day. It came packed in a polystyrene box with ice bags and insulation inside, and it came the next day. I told my sister in law all about it and as a treat ordered a box for her. This is when this starts to unravel. She lives in Shropshire, not the dark side of the moon, but a bit out of the way. My order came as promised the next day. Her order did not turn up. She’d taken the day off work to receive it.

I don’t normally spend my days watching parcels on tracking ‘wotsits’ but was obliged to do this now. The fish, both hers and mine left Cornwall, drove past the end of my road in Gloucestershire, and went to Newcastle. That’s around 400 miles. Mine then turned around and swam back to Gloucestershire, another 250 miles. Hers stopped in Kidderminster for the night: 230 miles before its eventual delivery the next day to Shropshire, another 45 miles.

She, wisely, thought better of eating the fish. Our was fine, delicious. Despite this I have had second thoughts about buying fish from the same….source. The suppliers tell me they send fresh fish to Dubai, and that it arrives within 72 hours and is fine. Both these facts are madness really. I’m sure the fish they send to Dubai arrives and is edible, I know the fish sent to me has been superb, but I just can’t bring myself to make these fillets go all that way to get to me. It’s all just too far fetched.

I’m looking for another source.