Bury Market was the venue for a grand WI day out. Liesel and Leslie had a good time, and they even came back with a famous Bury vegetarian black pudding, ideal for carb-loading before the next stage. I haven’t been to Bury since about 1976 when, on a day trip into Manchester, I lost my wallet. It was eventually found and returned by the police, but I’ve never used a proper wallet since then, preferring saddle-bags, whenever possible.
But I got to thinking: something you don’t see much of these days is celebrities with fried eggs on their collarbones. I wonder why?
Gulliver’s World Warrington was visited by our grandchildren and their parents, and they had a lot of fun. Does it compare with Disneyworld though? Well, Martha climbed her own Mont Ventoux, defying gravity.
Australia’s Hunter Valley was the venue for a weekend away for Helen and Brent and their team-mates. They had a good time too, despite the recent flooding.
New Zealand was the destination for our newly-weds, nephew Rob and Cristy, all the way from Canada. Congratulations again! And indeed, châpeau!
Meanwhile, I was just freewheeling along, enjoying other people’s adventures and antics vicariously. Still fighting eBay and Freegle trying to get rid of stuff. Still cranking out the miles on foot around Northenden and beyond. Still attending more medical appointments than having hot carb-loaded dinners.
Summer arrived in style. We had a couple of heatwaves, just a few days when the temperature approached 30°, and of course, this made falling asleep harder than riding up Alpe d’Huez with a single-gear. So I reversed the polarity on our electric blankets so that, instead of warmth, they provided a nice cool sheet to lie on.
While Liesel joined the breakaway on an alternative walk with a different group of ladies, Leslie and I joined the usual Friday route which, in the end, was an even shorter stroll than usual. Due to intimidation by a peloton, a veritable herd of geese, we didn’t walk around the lake: we took a shortcut. And, yes, I do mean ‘herd’. This was not a small, harmless flock or gaggle of geese.
Over the weekend, we enjoyed some of the acts (I wonder what their riders were?) from Glastonbury and I think I am unanimous in thinking Pulp deserved the yellow jersey. I don’t know why some artists were so hard to find on the BBC iPlayer: the routemap was very badly marshalled.
The highlight of the weekend though was Martha and William’s school’s Summer Fair. We helped out of the raffle ticket stall. At one point, I gave William a fiver, asked him to fetch me a cup of tea from the feed station, and then he could keep the change. Quick as a flash, he retorted, “I’ll keep it all, then”. That’s my boy! In the end, there were no hot drinks available so I made do with a bidon, a bottle of water, in one gulp.
What a beautiful day and, to keep cool, a couple of teachers volunteered to be the target for wet sponges hurled by their pupils.
From the podium, Martha and her dramatic arts group put on a performance of songs from such musicals as Matilda and Beauty and the Beast.
You can drive around your neighbourhood many times and still see things you’ve not noticed before. I’m not sure whether this message is new, but Royal Mail as a business needs all the help it can get, right now.
As if the Glastonbury Festival didn’t have enough competition, this was also the weekend of the monthly Didsbury Makers Market. So, after bashing Himalayan balsam in Fletcher Moss Garden, with the WI, and without falling into the water, Liesel and Leslie made their way there. I joined them a bit later and was greeted with a piping hot samosa.
As we walked back to the car, we passed another vehicle which had lost a battle with a tree. Fair to say, it’s a DNF.
I hope nobody was inside when this happened.
I mentioned medical appointments earlier, and it is that time of year when I go for my annual sight test, in Didsbury. I arrived a bit early, so I thought I’d support the local economy by having a coffee in FFS, which must be a Front For Something. In the window, I was delighted to see this hand-painted portrait.
And of course, it’s always good to come across homespun philosophy in Didsbury.
There are many campaigns on right now, attempting to save the pollinators from extermination by pesticide. So I gave this bumble bee some words of encouragement from the roadside.
And now, the Tour de France is underway: it’s time to clear the calendar and settle in for three weeks of GC drama, solo breakaways, sprint finishes, and mountain massacres.
Mick and Liesel's Antics 