Meetings

I don’t know why, but out of the blue, I remembered a pair of bookends that I had when I was a child. They were wooden. One had a dog and the other had a cat and, when propping up books, it looked as though the cat was about to leap over the books onto the dog. Very cute. And I thought, you don’t see bookends much any more.

It’s always a bonus when you can walk home from a gig. On this occasion, I walked up the road to Northenden Theatre to watch an evening of comedy. Plane Comedy was one of the events that made up Northenden’s Arts Festival a year or so ago. Plane Comedy returned with six comedians. The only thing wrong was, they were all men. Out of six, I can’t believe they couldn’t drag at least one female comedian along to participate. Still, it was a very good evening, hanks to Mike Carter, Charlie Lewis (yeah, him again!), Jack Miller, Ben Hodge, Eddie Fortune, Stan Ridgeway and the MC, Lewis ‘Big Lou’ Jones. I was even able to enjoy alcohol during the interval.

The next day was Mothers’ Day, something that I was totally oblivious to until Liesel mentioned it in passing. She’s still in Anchorage with her Mom and I’m glad to report there hasn’t been any more snow recently. She’s coming home soon so I’ve got to tidy up a bit, and hide evidence of all the rowdy parties I’ve enjoyed.

The first person I met during a busy week of meetings was my GP. We discussed the results of my recent echocardiogram which showed that really, there’s nothing wrong with the old ticker, and I should go back in three years’ time for another echo.

Next up, in Didsbury, I met Chris Mitchell, DJ and entertainer. We met in Didsbury and I recorded our chat for this week’s radio show. It’s his birthday this week too.

Walking the back streets of Didsbury, and guess what I came across?

That’s right, bookends, in the form of two red Ford Fiesta Zetecs. What are the chances?

To conclude a busy day, well, busy by my standards, I attended a meeting in Wythenshawe for us volunteers at the local, community radio station. I’m slowly putting faces to the names and the voices.

It was my turn to collect the children from school this week, and I took them to Quirky Misfits, the coffee shop in Northenden. Martha was delighted to be able to buy the ‘Love Potion’ pendant that she’d asked for last time. Of course, it was only fair that William buy something too. I would never have guessed that he would choose… a pair of halloween socks. ‘It’s not halloween for a long time,’ I said. ‘In this shop, it’s halloween every day,’ said Lydia! Quite right too.

There are some games in the shop too, and William recognised Ker-plunk from school. His level of concentration while putting the device together was lovely to see, even when things didn’t quite go right.

Thankfully, they were both very well bahaved, enjoyed their drinks and snacks. William had a nice brownie, while Martha went for a slice of Cookie Pie. What’s in a Cookie Pie? Cookies around the outside, cookies on the base and  all filled with cookies. It was too much: Martha took half of it home in a box. A couple of days later, this advert appeared on Instagram.

Before taking them home, we went for a play in the Riverside Park playground. Yes, after all that sugar, their energy levels were maxed out. I’m not sure William’s quite got the idea of ‘slides’…

Nor of monkey bars…

Oh well!

After taking Martha and William home, I set off for Salford. Liesel and Leslie should have been with me, to watch Danny Baker again. The show was similar to the Buxton edition a few weeks ago, but as time goes on the stories change and morph. Another three and a half hours non-stop talking and pacing up and down the stage.

After the show, I asked a member of staff to take me ’round the back’ to meet Danny. He’d invited me (well, all listeners to his Treehouse podcast) to go round the back whenever we saw him.

We had a nice chat and he gave me a terrific voicenote/jingle thing for my own radio show. Tune in to hear it sometime! Of course, in the heat of the moment, I forgot to take his picture in the luxurious dressing room. And I forgot to show off my collection of the giveaways from various incarnations of his show over the years. And I think he is genuinely looking forward to retiring, to his third act.

And lo, it was my birthday. I feel I’ve had enough birthdays. So, treating it as a normal day, I went out for the second of three organised walks this week. Today’s was a bit wet. Light drizzle mostly but quite a downpour for a couple of minutes. So much so, that one of our number took a tram back to the Forum. The rest of us merely took a shortcut, missing out some potentially slippery woods.

William and Martha invited me out for a birthday meal, so I went round to their place and we all walked over to Gusto.

Very nice, very tasty, thank you.

Back to Wythenshawe next day for another walk followed by a coffee! In the afternoon, I witnessed the event of the week in Northenden. The official opening of the Little Library in the Riverside Park playground. We’d seen it there when we went to play after school, but I didn’t realise at the time that it had only been intsalled the previous day.

Anyone can leave, borrow or take books, so I hope it gets well used.

It was nice to see a few local celebrities there too, Dave the chief local litter-picker, Mary the ex-councillor and Pam the poet who recited one of her poems.

On this week’s radio show, I had a chat with Chris Mitchell (as mentioned before) and I also celebrated my birthday so if you missed it on Wythenshawe Radio, click here to catch up.