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Headline: Big Cheese festival apologises for running out of cheese
Normally, cheese gives a person bad dreams (or so the old wives’ tales go), but for me, it’s the lack of cheese that leads to nightmares.
A cheese festival with no cheese? That’s almost as bad as a beer festival—or even a pub—with no beer.
To be fair to the organizers though, the festival was taking place in the wake of the “beast from the east”—a snowstorm that crippled the UK in late February. But surely if the visitors could get there then so should the vendors have been able to.
Or maybe it’s not that simple.
One of Monty Python’s sketches involves a cheese shop that’s in a predicament similar to the cheese festival (the main differences being that (spoiler!) the shop had no cheese whatsoever and there was no snowstorm to blame). John Cleese goes through a list of forty-three cheeses—from the universally-available cheddar to the fictional Venezuelan beaver cheese—only to be told in a variety of ways that there is none available.
It has its fans, but for me, it’s one of Python’s less-amusing sketches. Perhaps it’s because cheese is a large part of my diet and I’m offended by the thought of there being none.
In the UK, there’s a radio programme called Desert Island Discs in which a guest celebrity chooses eight records that they could have with them if they were stranded on a desert island. The guest can also choose a book (the Bible and Shakespeare are thrown in for free) and one luxury.
My luxury would be an endless supply of cheese. This would serve a double purpose. It would sustain me, and at some point in the future it would kill me, presumably by which time I’d be fed up with being on an island with nothing but eight bloody records and the works of Shakespeare for company.
Another friend recently posted the following: “Happiness is a fridge full of cheese” (ain’t that the truth, Chris!) But one of her friends replied, “unless it used to be milk.”
Way to spoil a fantasy!
One thing that’s puzzled me for a long time is this: if cheese is such a wonderful food, why is it used so negatively in adjectival form? “A cheesy restaurant.” “Cheesy TV shows and movies.” “The gameshow host threw the camera a big cheesy smile.”
Cheese should sue the English-speaking world for defamation of character!
And why do we say “cheese” when we’re having our pictures taken? I can understand it a little better since Wallace (of Wallace & Gromit fame) associated big smiles with wensleydale cheese for eternity, but prior to that? Perhaps “say ‘cheese’” was the inspiration for Nick Park to have Wallace be a cheese-eating smiler…
But back to the festival. Judging from the BigCheeseFest’s Facebook page, the detractors and the organizers see things differently. If the organizers are to be believed, there was cheese to be had throughout the festival—just not the variety that they’d planned. If the detractors are to be believed, there’s more cheese on the FaceBook page than there was at the festival.
Once again, “cheese” used in a negative context, and by (presumably) a cheese lover.
But here, in the collected works of Kelvin D. Hatch, there’s no shortage of cheese, and no shortage of variety either. Now you’re here, take a look around and see what tempts your palate.
Enjoy!