The calendar has stopped being a calendar. It’s now a hydra. Every time I cancel one meeting, two more sprout in its place. I swear I saw an appointment scheduled for “3:07 a.m. – urgent festive catch‑up.” Who meets at 3:07 a.m.? The inbox has joined in, no longer content to ping or hum. It now roars, a low vibration that shakes the desk, rattles the pens, and makes the monitor flicker.

The drizzle has mutated. It’s not drizzle anymore. It’s a mist that moves with intent, curling around corners, slipping under doors, pooling in shoes left by the radiator. I found droplets inside the toaster this morning. The weather has become invasive, a damp parasite that refuses to be ignored.

And then there’s the driveway. Today’s deposit was not random. It was shaped. Sculpted. A duck. A perfect duck, wings outstretched, carved in poo. I stood there in the drizzle, staring at it, wondering if this was a coincidence or a message. A duck, on the very day I was scheduled to eat duck. The driveway has become prophetic.

Today’s sandwich is Quack & Crumb’s Duck & Plum Sauce Brioche.

Roast duck, plum sauce, lettuce, brioche.

The brioche is soft and golden, its sweetness framing the savoury filling. Inside, slices of roast duck are rich and tender, their skin crisped, their flavour deep and indulgent. Plum sauce cuts through with sticky sweetness, sharp and fragrant, clinging to the meat and bread alike. Lettuce adds a whisper of freshness, though it feels almost irrelevant against the richness of duck and plum.

The first bite is decadent, indulgent, overwhelming. The duck is heavy, the plum sauce sticky and bright, the brioche soft and sweet. It’s a sandwich that leans into excess, a bite of pure festive indulgence. Eating it while drizzle curls around the room and the driveway delivers prophecies feels surreal, almost ritualistic.

The Duck & Plum Sauce Brioche doesn’t solve the chaos, but it mirrors it. A sandwich that is indulgent, excessive, and strangely symbolic. The driveway waits, of course. Tomorrow morning, I’ll step outside again, and I know what I’ll find. But for now, the duck brioche offers a moment of indulgence — a sandwich that tastes like prophecy, excess, and December itself.