Manayunk

Saturday 28th January

The only item to be seriously damaged in our sea freight shipment was our dining room table. As all you good friends can imagine we continue to negotiate a settlement with the insurance brokers (they are beginning to wish that they had provided us with a copy of the insurance terms and conditions before shipping our goods and not relied on a verbal explanation of our coverage - or at least provided an accurate verbal explanation!), but that aside a new table will be needed. Our insider informers had suggested that the independent furniture stores in Manayunk were the place to go. Manayunk is a historic Distric of Philadelphia nestled between the Schuylkill (Scookil) River and the Manayunk canal. It is billed as "like being whisked away to a European city" - I am not sure that I would necessarily agree but closer than a trip to King of Prussia Mall that is for sure. We added to the Europeanness by going in Mini. We spotted lots of good options which even our Heals furniture purchasing friends will appreciate, but the day was topped off by getting our first parking VIOLATION. Fortunately it was only a fine for exceeding the meter (time flies by when viewing furniture) and NOT the much larger fine it would have been for parking facing in the wrong direction had the friendly pizza chef not tapped on the window and explained the errors of our ways. How he must have laughed when we got a fine anyway!