Very Special Deal on Yorkshire Tea

If you live along the St Lawrence River stay up late tonight and watch out for a twin-masted sailing ship slipping out to sea. You will have to look very carefully because there will be no lights on board the ship.

On board the ship is Pugwash, the jolly old pirate who imports most of the luvverly British products on our shelves. Now I don't mean to impugn the character of the jolly old pirate, but just before he weighed anchor under cover of darkness during the night, he left some very strange instructions to the crew members who were on shore leave at his secret warehouse near Toronto.

Pugwash told his men: peg-leg Dick from Whitehead, pirate Panto John and cholicy Colin to release his secret stock of Yorkshire Tea at prices that only a real swashbuckling pirate could even dream of.

Frankly, I think Pugwash must have been getting more than his usual tot recently. Or maybe he has sailed through the Bermuda Triangle one too many times. His prices are crazy. But who am I to argue with the old seadog?

I rushed to the secret city warehouse today and bought up enough Yorkshire Tea to entirely cover the North Riding.

Subscribers to Blighty's weekly store newsletter will get news of this in their email inboxes Monday evening, but blog subscribers may read this notice early. I am posting this to the blog Friday evening to catch weekend shoppers.

So here is the deal ... and promise you won't tell anybody else ... you can buy a pack of 80 Yorkshire teabags for just $3.99 while stocks last at Blighty's. Ok, here's even better news: you can buy a pack of 160 Yorkshire teabags for just $6.99 while stocks last.

Each teabag is good for 2 cups of tea so that works out at just 2 cents per cup of Rosy Lee! Are you listening Tim Horton? (Tim, your tea price is just too "steep").

So where's the gotcha? Surely this stuff must be past its "best before" date yes? NO!!! The best before date is well into 2010!

What's that, do I see a line forming outside already?

St George's Day

Today is St George's Day. Hurrah! It seems that all the world remembers St Patrick's Day but few even know upon which day we celebrate the patron saint of England. It is the 23rd day of April. One of the greatest Englishmen ever to walk the face of the Earth - William Shakespeare - was born, and died, upon this day.

In medieval times, many a noble English knight rode into battle against the Saracens in the Holy Land and bravely fought and died wearing the red cross of St George on his tunic.

The government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland now denies the birthright of every true Englishman to declare his nationality as "English". Sadly, he must now be simply "British".

There is a long history of hard fought wars, rebellion and civil strife between the English, the Scots, the Welsh and the Irish. Proud nations together in a common peace and friendship now, but proud and separate nations they remain.

St George is a symbol of power - triumph in combat over the dragon - yet he remains an enigma. I told his story three years ago on this blog: God For Harry England & St George

The man who was born and died on this day penned these immortal and stirring words: "Summon up the blood, disguise fair nature with ill-favoured rage and upon this charge cry: God for Harry, England and St George!"

London Bobby at PawsWay

Maybe it's because he's a Londoner that entertainer London Bobby loves to sing about his home town.

London Bobby is appearing this weekend at PawsWay on Harbourfront in Toronto.

PawsWay is a dog-friendly facility (yes you can bring your own pet in to see the show) featuring English breeds, English entertainment and, oh yes, Blighty's Tuck Store, all this weekend in celebration of St George's day this coming
thursday April 23rd.

The Pirate at Bay

I woke up this morning to the BBC World News service announcing a court decision against a file-sharing website called the Pirate Bay (http://thepiratebay.org/). The Swedish owners of the site have been sentenced to a year in jail and an enormous fine.

I confess I had never heard of this website before so I checked it out. Although the site itself does not contain any material that infringes anybody's copyright, it is certainly guilty of aiding and abetting such abuse.

The Pirate Bay uses the bit torrent file sharing protocol that enhances download speeds and file availability by employing a network of user's sites as download sources.

The same file-sharing protocol is used by a service called UK Nova that I have been recommending as a source for downloading British TV shows.

There is some very intelligent discussion on the UK Nova discussion forums about the Pirate Bay legal decision. One contributor offered verifiable statistics to support the notion that peer-to-peer file-sharing runs hand-in-hand with an increase in the entertainment industry's revenues.

I am inclined to support the idea that file-sharing is an opportunity to level the playing field and allow less-well-known entertainers to gain an audience that is denied to them by the mainstream entertainment industry.

Should we shed a crocodile tear for multi-millionaire movie and rock stars who plead that file-sharing is unfair to them? My eyes are dry.

Whatever your opinions are, make the most of services like UK Nova while you still can!

Blighty's is going to the dogs!

On Saturday April 18 and Sunday April 19 Blighty’s will celebrate St.George’s Day at the PawsWay Discovery Centre, the world’s first canine educational centre, at Harbourfront in Toronto. And it’s free to the public!!

PawsWay is featuring all the English breeds of dogs, and also providing some fantastic musical entertainment. So you can enjoy all your favourite Blighty items and have music to boot!

There are more breeds of dogs that were developed in England than in any other country of the world. The English became the world’s premier breeders; even Queen Victoria kept a renowned kennel of show dogs. PawsWay will feature all the English Breeds, and experts will explain how the various breeds were developed to perform a specific function.

On Saturday, (April 18) the well known (and immensely funny!) English Music Hall star, London Bobby, will be your Master of Ceremonies. Sommerset, a talented group who plays antique musical instruments such as the Dulcimer will also entertain.

On Sunday, (April 19) London Bobby (he of the Pig and Whistle TV Show) will again M.C. and will be joined by a terrific Beatles tribute quartet, “Toby, Dawson and the Dandies”. In addition, the exciting Orange Peel Morris Dancers will get the toes tapping.

PawsWay is not only “dog friendly” (feel free to bring your favourite pooch) but it houses Toronto’s only canine friendly café, Williams Coffee Pub. PawsWay is also the home of the renowned Purina Hall of Fame.

So come down and meet the English breeds such as the Airedale Terrier, Beagle, Bedlington Terrier, Bloodhound, Border Terrier, Bull Terrier, English Bulldog, Bullmastiff, Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, English Toy Spaniel, Smooth and Wire Fox Terrier, English Foxhound, Greyhound, Harrier, Lakeland Terrier, Toy and Standard Manchester Terriers, Mastiff, Norfolk and Norwich Terriers, Old English Sheepdog, Otterhound, Parson Russell Terrier, English Pointer, Pug, Curley Coated and Flat Coated Retrievers, English Setter, Clumber, Field, Sussex, English Springer and English Cocker Spaniels, Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Whippet, and Yorkshire Terrier. (Whew! That’s allota dogs! And they’re all friendly!)

Pawsway opens at 11 a.m. on both Saturday and Sundays. Programming is completed at 6 p.m. on Saturdays and at 4 p.m. on Sunday.

PawsWay is located at 245 Queens Quay West, the next building west of Harbourfront Centre.

And remember, PawsWay is not just “dog friendly”, it’s free to the public!!

For more information visit: www.pawsway.ca 416-360-PAWS (7297)

Melton Mowbray Pork Pies

I received a strange phone call at the store last week. The caller was from the Toronto Star newspaper. "Can you confirm that you sell Churchill Brand Melton Mowbray pork pies at your store?" the caller inquired. "Yes indeed" I replied. But before I could launch into my high pressure sales pitch the caller thanked me and hung up the phone.

I thought nothing more about it at the time; I was preoccupied with preparations for the British Isles Show. On Sunday afternoon I was busy at Blighty's booth down at the show when a call came through from the store.

"It's crazy up here" I was told. "Blighty's got a mention in the Toronto Star - something to do with pork pies. We are going nuts here in the store; everybody wants pork pies and we don't have any left".

The British Isles Show was winding down at the end of its final day. I ran over to the Toronto Star booth and grabbed the very last copy of Saturday's paper just as the staff were packing up the booth.

The Saturday Star is a hefty pile of reading but we quickly sorted through the supplements until we found the "Weekend Living" section. There on page L9 we found a big article about Melton Mowbray pork pies and at the top of the list of stores selling them was Blighty's Tuck Store.

First thing Monday morning I telephoned our supplier and today (Thursday) the big pork pie truck pulled up outside and delivered a multitude of Melton Mowbrays. We're back in business!

British Isles Show 2009

The last few days has been very exhausting - but a huge amount of fun! And why? Because this past weekend brought the annual British Isles Show in Toronto.

Show organizer Brian Martin pulled off another great show and this year the weather cooperated.

The 2008 show was wrecked by a major snowstorm and this year's show was spared a similar fate by a mere 24 hours! The day after the show closed many areas in southern Ontario were hit with a heavy dumping of wet snow.

Attendance was high despite heavy rain on opening day. The entertainment from, among others,
The Toronto Shadows Club, MC Hugo Straney ("Cliff Richard", "Peter Kay"), Irish and Scottish Dancers and a Welsh Tenor was first rate.

For many people attending Canada's biggest British show, the higlight is the visit of a star from TV's Coronation Street. The guest this year was Michael Le Vell who plays the part of Kevin Webster on the show. Michael is a very friendly man who gave the fans all the the attention they craved.

Next year will be the show's 20th anniversary - and Coronation Street's 50th! Watch out for a very special event.