May Bank Holiday and Milton Keynes Marathon

May Bank Holiday Monday. Why is it that 1st May is a Bank Holiday in Great Britain? It never used to be such, although I recall the May Day celebrations in Ickwell, a village in Bedfordshire, not too far from where I used to live in Cardington, where they had (and no doubt, still have) a May Day Festival, with dancing around the Mayple, which is on the village green. Having now Googled the subject, yes, the Mayday celebrations do still happen, with dancing around the maypole and the crowning of a May Queen. It's been going on virtually uninterrupted since the time of the Tudors, but it was banned by Oliver Cromwell during the Commonwealth (miserable old so and so.) but reintroduced when Charles II became king after the Restoration.

So, we get a day off. Doesn't bother me one way or another, as I'm now retired, but I know Carol needs a rest from her efforts, working as a science teacher at Milton Keynes Academy.

After the last Milton Keynes Marathon a few months ago, when the route went past our house in Eaglestone (which meant we were locked in for a couple of hours and couldn't get out) and I vaguely mentioned the fact on one of my posts on this blog, it seemed to upset someone or other connected with this event. It seems you're not supposed to have an a opinion unless it's that of the mass. So much for the idea of the good old British thing called 'Free Speech' or 'Freedom of Expression.' I dared to suggest that the route went along the nearby Redway (only a few yards away.) It was almost as if I'd made some obscene remark, the reaction it caused.

On Sunday we were lead to believe that there was to be a marathon and that we'd be locked in to Eaglestone for several hours whilst this event took place. We saw the yellow signs along some of the Gridroads near Eaglestone, and, as a result, we wouldn't be able to drive to M.K.C.C. for either of the three services. As I'm involved in Better Together (see previous post.) I wanted to make sure I heard the message delivered. But I managed to be able to see this as services are broadcast 'live' via the internet and YouTube, which we can see through our SkyQ box. As it turned out we didn't have any runners come past our house, so whether the marathon (full, half or whatever) actually was diverted away from Eaglestone, I don't know. But on Monday (today) we weren't certain what was going on. We certainly didn't want to be stuck indoors and wanted to get out somewhere. It was a rather undecided day on the weather-front, but mostly it was sunny, although there was some rain during the day. We had talked about a trip to Rutland Water and we were considering taking Alfie. It doesn't take much to encourage him to go out with us and a walk around that stretch of water would have been good for all of us. I have visited before and it's certainly a good place to go to and plenty to attract attention. But then we changed our minds and decided on going to Bicester Avenue, a retail outlet and garden centre. It's very near Bicester Village and a good 40-minute drive just beyond Buckingham. We got away from Milton Keynes before the marathon began and intended getting back home after it finished.

So, we drove out of Milton Keynes and made for Bicester. On arrival at the retail park we had a stroll around the various shops and eventually went into the Wyevale Garden Centre there which is the central largest outlet within Bicester Avenue. We had coffee and scones and then looked around the plants and some of the bird-feeding paraphernalia on sale there with the eventual intention of adding to our bird feeder we already have set up in the garden at home.

We browsed in several of the other shops at Bicester Avenue, one being a pet shop where we actually managed to find Alfie another 'sound' toy (if you read earlier posts regarding the difficulty we've had finding a replacement for the Comic Relief 'laughing ball' which he loves so much, then you'll realise how great it was to find this toy. Actually we bought '2 for £5', which made it doubly great.) Then, into the Cotton Traders shop. We have bought quite a few items of clothing from this company, and get their catalogue in the post. From there, back to the car and home. The traffic going into Bicester was very heavy. Most seemed going to Bicester Outlet Village, another destination we've visited on various occasions, and then back towards Buckingham and Milton Keynes. As we approached Buckingham, the heavens opened and there was quite a rain storm. It didn't last long, but it's as well we didn't go to Rutland Water because we heard on the car radio that there were traffic hold-ups in and around that area, so we might have found ourselves held up on either the M1 or the A1 either outward bound or returning. We had intended visiting Aldi in Buckingham, which has a branch on the road going into Buckingham, but for some reason we couldn't find the exit and must have gone past, but then made the decision to visit the Aldi at Westcroft where we usually shop. The traffic was excessively heavy on the approach to Milton Keynes and, having done some basic shopping in Aldi for the evening's meal, drove home with the simple idea that the marathon had come to an end. How wrong could we be. The roads were chocker-block with very long queues of cars and we couldn't go towards Eaglestone along Chaffron Way and had to turn right along Grafton Street and then onto Standing Way. Completely grid-locked and it took a good deal longer to eventually get into Saxon Street, which by then had been opened up. Runners still running along some of the Redway system as we eventually drove into Eaglestone and home. 

Blackberry Picking and Autumnal Mists

It's a typical autumn's day. Misty first thing in the morning and the sun comes out later. It's beginning to get chilly but then it warms up considerably. A bit difficult to know what to wear, since you can never be sure that it's not going to rain. Particularly difficult as the windscreen wipers on the car aren't working. Must get them seen too soon as it can make long journeys difficult.

I've been out this morning and picked around a pound's worth of blackberries.  I went along the Redway behind the house and got most along the area immediately behind the hospital. There is a sort of clear space, a sort of path with lots of over-hanging brambles and really overloaded with berries. It seems amazing to me that people never seem to bother to go out and pick them. They are free and make good pies, jam and fruity sauces. I suppose I'm used to this sort of foraging as I lived in the countryside and we were always picking blackberries as well as finding mushrooms in the meadows behind Malting Farm where I used to live in Cardington village in Bedfordshire. You would think, with there being a so-called 'financial crisis' people would be falling over themselves to get something which is free, and ply yards from their front doors. But I hardly ever see other people picking blackberries and there are certainly plenty to go round. We still have quite a few bags left over from last year. We made some into a sort of sauce to have with ice-cream and pie. We got some really good bags in Sainsbury's, which can be re-used. They have a sort of fastener of them which are easy to open and made of fairly substantial plastic. Better than conventional plastic bags which are never worth re-using and can only be closed by knotting the neck. I think these are made to freeze homemade soup and stand up on their on when placed on the work-surface and make filling easy. 

I attempted to get Carol a doctor's appointment this morning. The surgery doesn't open until 8 a.m. and then you are lucky if you can actually get through. Just an engaged tone. Our old surgery used to have what they call 'ring-back' which means you press the '5' button on your telephone's keypad, and they ring back when the line is free. Then, after about half a dozen attempts, I got through to a human and was told that all appointments are booked for today, please ring again on Monday. Just annoying that you have to go to all that trouble and stress when they could surely allow you to book appointments a day or two in advance.

My Mum and Dad- Part 2

My father was a good engineer. I think he had to become a farmer because he was an only child, and a son, and his father had been a farmer. I don't remember my paternal grandfather. He died sometime in the early 1950's when I would have been far too young to remember him. The same for my maternal grandmother. My dad was forever working on something or other for the farm in his workshop. He was good with anything mechanical, car engines, boat engines, constructing the most peculiar gadgets in order to lift grain in one of the sheds during harvest-time. He constructed a sort of four-wheeled bicycle (if that makes sense. It doesn't, I know, but just let me explain.) It was for us four youngest brothers to ride and pedal, a sort of four-wheeled car with proper steering and with a sort of framework. Quite difficult to steer for what I remember. It was a bit like a tandem but with four wheels. I don't remember it being much of a success. I think it went out on the road around Cardington and then landed up in a ditch or something and then spent a couple of decades in the back of the garage and never went out again because it was damaged. I don't know what became of it or whether it was broken up for scrap but it must have taken a great deal of time and effort to build. He was extremely good at welding and finding ways to solve problems mechanically. If you had a way of solving a problem with your car he always knew how to fix it. If you were going to buy a car he was the best person to take with you when you were looking at what to buy and could always haggle and get a good bargain, not just with cars, but virtually anything. I don't think he ever bought anything without managing to get something off the price.

He was somewhat accident-prone. He would fiddle about with machinery on the farm, particularly during harvest when some machine or other would break down. He managed to get a finger cut quite seriously on the sharp knives in the bailer.  I think today he would have got into trouble with the Health and Safety Executive, but this would have been long before all the business you hear today about 'Health and Safety.' I reckon he would have had the book thrown at him, the number of  accidents he was involved in on the farm. On another occasion he was working on the horse box out in the yard somewhere. I think it was near enough Sunday lunch-time. He had to repair one of the tyres or a wheel on this horse-box and had the wheel off and the whole thing sitting on a few bricks or blocks of wood. The thing collapsed and so injured one of his fingers he had to have it amputated and always ever-after had one or two joints on this finger missing. He was profoundly deaf. This was caused during a time, most likely during the winter months when they used gas-guns on the farm to scare off pigeons from the crops. He would go to a field and take the entire gas-gun away in the back of the Land Rover and on this occasion presumably he hadn't put the safety catch on the timer and the thing exploded in the back of the Land Rover and the explosion damaged his inner-ear. He never recovered from this and was really deaf for the rest of his life. It must have completely damaged his inner-ear. He did wear a hearing aid, when he could remember to wear it, which was not very often, but he had real problems setting the thing so it wouldn't pick up extraneous sounds, such as background noise.

My mother was an excellent cook. Her shortbread was the best ever. I believe she had the recipe passed on by an elderly aunt on my father's side of the family. Scottish, of course. My own cooking abilities are due to her teaching and I think I can produce a good roast dinner, thanks mainly to my mother. In particular, the making of Yorkshire pudding. Her teas at around 4-5 every day were a real feature and people would drop in to sample her Victoria sponges, shortbread and a wide range of other cakes and pies. She was passionate about horses and was an excellent rider. In her later years she was involved with Riding For The Disabled and was very much instrumental in establishing this organisation in Bedfordshire. We had various horses and ponies around the farm from quite a young age. My brothers went to local gymkhanas and show jumping events and also, when my parents had mares from which they bred foals, these mares and foals were shown at local agricultural shows, such as the East of England Show in Peterborough over most years. She took a great deal of interest in all her children and went with me on several occasions when I had interviews when I was starting off in theatre. She went with me to the Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham for example, when I had my very first interview for a job in 1969 and she would never need much encouraging to go with me to the theatre or to see a film that was on in the cinema locally.

Swiss Garden