Northenden: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

As mentioned previously, we’re re-watching old series of Doctor Who, one or two, sometimes three episodes a day. I know how he/she feels when she/he encounters the Daleks yet again. I have the same feeling whenever I some across bindweed out in the wild. At least I no longer have to fight this particular alien invasion in my own backyard.

Many, many years ago, when walking through the woods in Guildford, we would pop the little white flowers off, like miniature shuttlecocks. Granny-pops-out-of-bed, we called them. Who knew that such an innocent, childhood pastime would result in total world domination by this weed?

Much as we love Northenden and the surrounding areas, the local authorities are never going to win an Oscar for best supporting infrastructure.

Potholes on roads are just annoying, a result of too much traffic and not enough investment, maybe. On the other hand, dumping your rubbish in the woods is not acceptable.

Looking on the bright side: at least this rubbish wasn’t ‘donated’ to the local Barnardo’s charity shop, as is often the case.

I wonder if the perpetrator of the fly-tipping was also responsible for this. Someone was desperate to get onto the golf course, by the looks of it.

As an antidote to the black bin bags blighting the landscape, I was desperate to see some colourful flowers but in the end, I just thought, thistle do.

The river Mersey was flowing quite fast in the aftermath of a lot of rain. I’m not sure whether this bloke was fishing was food or trying to pull up an old tyre for his car.

After the rain, you can see the water’s just a little higher than usual, due to its incursion onto the island.

My phone installed a new update this week and I didn’t realise at the time, but some of its operations have changed. That is the reason I have no footage of the geese having a good time. One was walking up the weir then sliding down on his belly. I filmed him a couple of times. Except I didn’t. But I do have some mad footage of me moving about in between those attempts, featuring some nice shots of my shoes and the grass and the sky.

I’ve mentioned the rain a couple of times. But you ain’t seen nothing yet! It rained all night again, and when we retraced our steps next time, this is what we encountered. Remember that baby pothole? Well, see what it’s grown into.

Remember the island? After a whole night’s torrential rain, the river was flowing as fast as we’ve ever seen it, and it had risen significantly.

Plans for scrumping in Kenworthy Woods have been made: we’ll just give these little beauties a chance to fully ripen.

Bin day is always exciting. Are we going to be woken up really early or not?

Despite walking around Northenden for several hours this week, we didn’t see a single person doing the hokey-cokey with their rubbish. I wonder if the fly-tipper was dancing under cover of darkness?

It didn’t take more than 24 hours before the river began retreating, revealing the island once again from its watery depths.

In fact, it was a Spring-like day, the Sun was out, you could feel its heat on your back, but it was ridiculously cold in the shadows. The insects seem to like it though, having been hiding and cowering away from all that precipitation. Flies, bees, butterflies, ladybirds, midges, you name it. No, not locusts.

Liesel joined in a Zoom call with her old WI chums from Chessington. I wasn’t eavesdropping, honest, I was just finishing my breakfast. But my ears pricked up when I heard Liesel ask if they were all doing penance? I was hoping to hear salacious details of the ladies’ sinful, sordid activities. But no. To mark and commemorate the current pandemic, they’re all making pennants.

In other, local news, Radio Northenden has received funding from Manchester City Council’s Neighbourhood Investment Fund! So it looks like our local, parochial, isolation station will continue broadcasting beyond the lockdown.

Thanks to and RIP Ennio Morricone who wrote the music for the film that inspired this post’s title. He composed over 400 scores for cinema and television, as well as over 100 classical works. This makes my 300 blog posts seem incredibly insignificant.