Something to smile about

Well thank goodness that’s all over. Back to normality (well, as normal as normality gets). Just as well this Jubilee malarky only happens once in a while. As nice as it was to watch all the barges and boats on the Thames on Sunday it was far more entertaining watching the Royal College of Music Chamber Choir gaining ‘hypothermia’ whilst singing Rule Britannia at the top of their voices. Apparently the girls in the company had just had their hair done especially. Certainly looked like they’d just stepped out of a salon, even though they were only halfway through the rinse.
A wee bit of rain and everybody in England thinks they’re hard because they went out in the bad weather to see their Queen. The London Ambulance Service told of how they treated around 560 people who, because of the bad weather conditions, said they were cold. Bless.
At least it was dry for the concert on Monday.
A concert which veered from the rubbish to the surreal, to the rubbish, to the half entertaining, to the actually quite good, to the, wow, lots of fireworks.
In all, pretty entertaining, if you were drinking, and that was without Rolf even getting to finish his song. Scary Grace Jones’ skills with a hula hoop were particularly impressive. I’m lucky if I can manage ten seconds nevermind the length of ‘Slave to the Rhythm’.
We had been standing at the foot of that statue, the Victoria Memorial, in the sunshine, only a few months ago with Ann holding Adventure Ted aloft in order to get a decent picture of her before Buckingham Palace (the bear that is, not Ann).
Little did we know that by that time, the next afternoon, things would be a little bit different.
It was a cloudy Saturday March morning in London. Grey, unlike the previous days, and and as the rain had slowly started to fall, Ka and myself hurriedly took shelter from the Strand and ran through the large archway entrance into Charing Cross Railway Station. Not only were we after temporary shelter from the gathering rainclouds above but we were also after a loo and since this was a railway station this would mean digging into the pockets and coming up with 10 and 20p pieces. At least I was hoping it was only 10 and 20p pieces - this was London after all. I wouldn't have been surprised if the railway stations of the capital ventured into the 50p regions. After a brief scout around we found the required restroom archway and Ka ventured forth, leaving me sitting on a plastic bench outside, before a small card and souvenir shop. Even back in March there seemed to be more Union Jacks knocking about than usual. I sat waiting whilst eyeless members of the Royal family smiled at me from the circling stand in the shop's doorway opposite me. The Queen’s eyeless mask was particularly freaky. Without eyes behind them, these masks looked like a Royal version of Village of the Damned or, with the light of the shop behind, like Nicholas Fisk’s ‘Grinny’.
“I hate that Grinny book!” Chaz shouts at the top of his voice, his shout echoing up the corridor behind the short, striding form of Mrs. Boyd.
The teacher had laughed on previous, probably quieter, occasions in the school corridors, but this time we were walking in the vicinity of the Head Master’s office and she wasn’t amused by the echoing shout that had burst out from the corner of the corridor behind her. Mrs. Boyd spun on her heels, in mid chew of what looked like a particularly chewy piece of chewing gum, and flew at Chaz with pointed finger. Mrs. Boyd had been championing Fisk’s ‘Grinny’ for the past few weeks in her English class, much to our displeasure as we slumbered and struggled to stay awake over it’s pages, listening to the unfortunate that had been chosen to read on that particular day. Chaz had took it upon himself to voice his opinions on the chosen literature on more than one occasion in the corridors of Saint brides High School. Mrs. Boyd had always replied with a smile and a warning of how he’d be the next lucky reader, but on this particular occasion she’d obviously grown weary of the joke. As Mrs. Boyd closed in, Chaz couldn’t seem to move, frozen to the spot by that twisted, pointed finger, but the rest of us managed and darted to the safety of the nearest common room, leaving him to his fate.
The Queen grinned at me the same way the Alien Granny of that book used to grin, easily dominating the adults’ minds but unable to infiltrate the kids’ which eventually led to her downfall.
A busker strummed at a guitar in the corner of the Railway Station. A cleaner was sauntering around, lazily sweeping at the odd piece of rubbish, either mumbling, grumbling or humming to himself under his cap. A couple of guys, obviously on their way out to the Saturday of some kind of drunken weekend break, ambled up the to shop and spun the mask stand as an old couple picked a birthday card from the shelves in the small shop behind them.
We were heading to the Ambassadors Theatre in the West End to see the matinee performance of Stomp that afternoon and Ka had voiced an interest in seeing Russell Grant in ‘The Wizard of Oz’, an interest I chose to not hear. We still had more than an hour or so to while away, just as well really considering the time Ka was taking in the Station’s loo.
The guys decided on a freaky Royal each, fighting over who was to be Kate. One of the guys was verbally bullied into it and took the other guys’ masks of Philip, William and Charles up to the small counter where a bored looking girl took them off him. The old couple chuckled over a card and then nodded in agreement, handing it over the counter to the lady behind the till once the guys had moved back out into the Station and immediately started unwrapping the cellophane.
Ka eventually appeared through the shadows underneath the archway leading down to the toilets. Looking a little pale, she walked over the train station waiting area towards me and produced the short white stick she had been harbouring from somewhere within her jacket.
“I’m pregnant!” Ka handed the white plastic stick to me with a shaky hand. Looking down at the small screen on the pregnancy test I seen a feint but definite indication of lines in certain positions and compared them with the details on the crumpled up instructions Ka handed to me in my other hand.
“Are you finished with that?” the Railway station cleaner suddenly interrupted us, almost moving between the two of us gesturing with his pick-up stick.
“What?” I almost blurted at him as he continued to edge forward.
“Are you finished with that?” he asked again nodding at my hands. Confounded I was about to give an answer when Ka confirmed we had indeed finished with it and told the guy to go ahead. The cleaner then moved in and just as I thought he was about to swipe the crumpled paper and test from my hands, extended his pick-up stick and lifted a rolled up McDonalds bag that had been lying behind my feet. I quickly agreed we had finished with it and then corrected myself for taking responsibility for someone’s rubbish and informed the man the McDonalds wasn’t even ours. I don’t eat in McDonalds and I never discard litter in such a fashion even if there is a distinct lack of bins in London Railway stations. When we arrived in London on the Thursday I had to trail a whole carrier bag full of rubbish from the train around Euston with me until I eventually found a bin in the Shaftesbury Paddington Hotel. Okay, bins are maybe handy for bombers but it’s not an ideal situation when you’ve got some rubbish to dispose of and there are no weird cleaners hanging about.
Anyway, Ka’s latest bombshell was enough to make my head spin, without any form of explosives, and as the Railway Station cleaner leaned in and picked up the obvious emergency situation that was his crumpled up McDonalds paperbag I couldn’t help but wonder if he’d noticed what was going on before him.
Had he realised he had disturbed a teary eyed woman revealing to her husband, after coming out of the loo, in the middle of Charing Cross Train Station, that she was pregnant? Surely the white stick, the urgent quiet discussion and the look of bewilderment, confusion and then mixed emotions on our faces was enough to illustrate the point.
He could have at least congratulated us to ease the tension. He could have grabbed us at each side and happily shouted a massive ‘Alleluia!’, turned and told the shop keeper, the blokes behind the Royal ‘Grinny’ masks and the old, chuckling couple with the funny card. They could have replied with smiles and happily waved over to us. The volume of the busker’s guitar could have suddenly became much louder. A passing brass band could have joined him with a nod, a smile and a wink. The cleaner would then start up a song and dance routine, skipping and jumping with his pick-up stick, and all the passing pedestrians, who suddenly all seemed far more brightly dressed, could have suddenly started dancing transforming Charing Cross Railway Station into a floor of colour, dancing, waving and smiles. Grace Jones could have appeared with her hula hoop, a helmeted Russell Grant could then have been shot out of a nearby steam train’s chimney in a shower of glitter and stars whilst Flavia circled underneath on the platform and the Station announcer could have made the announcement over the tannoy.
Obviously that would have been asking too much, of course. The cleaner didn’t give us any congratulations. He was far more interested in the dropped McDonalds wrappers at our feet, mumbled something under his breath and then slouched on with his slow trail around Charing Cross.
That was thirteen weeks ago and Baby Reid 2 is growing well. Obviously it is quite early and happy thoughts are always going to be tinged with sadness as we think of Baby’s big sister, Lucy but fingers crossed things work out a little better this time around.

A long train journey and the benefits of chainmail

During the first fifteen minutes of our East Coast six hour journey down to Birmingham New Street on Saturday morning a couple of young Irish dancers, who were sitting in the seats across the carriage’s aisle from us, chatted, argued and passed crisps and juices back and forth to their Mum and their Gran who were sitting in the two seats ahead of Ka and myself. A large group of girls all sat further down the carriage decorated in various birthday attire, one girl draped in a 30th banner, squawking, laughing and howling.
“There’s no way she’s 30!” Ka scoffed under her breath, as the birthday gaggle started, Ka drinking her coffee that had been hastily purchased on the way for our soon to be departing train in Glasgow Central from a girl that asked us how to make a Mocha.
After having looked forward to a quiet journey down to Brum it looked like those chances were dashed as the tinny tunes of JLS started ringing out from one of the girls phones. It had taken four hours to go down to London in a Virgin train at the end of March with Adventure Ted but if the chatter between the family members around us along with the shrill, tinny versions of JLS songs emanating from the girls’ phones was going to last all the way down to Brum this was going to be one long journey.
As it turned out the journey wasn’t too bad. As the journey progressed Ka ascertained, with her uncanny knack or earywigging, that the family were on their way down to Newcastle for an Irish dancing competition. A girl lying over the two seats in front of the two kids, whilst comparing phones and exchanging dial tones, told the Irish dancing girls of her trip down south to see her husband who was currently spending time in Durham. When the kids got a little more wrapped up in their iPhones the girl started chatting with the Mum and Gran revealing that her husband was in fact presently residing in Durham at Her Majesty’s pleasure. He ‘had been naughty’ apparently. Whether ‘naughty’ means murder or drug dealing I’m not sure, unsurprisingly she didn’t go into that much detail.
A loud unpleasant, liquid like cough started gurgling out from the seats behind us after Edinburgh as the train coasted along on it’s journey. As we travelled over and through the fields of the East Coast on our way down to Berwick the bright sunshine glittered over the sea on the horizon, a sign of the great weather to follow on our week off. Just as we were about to start eating our lunch, a picnic, prepared earlier by the ever organised Ka, the gurgling cough was almost spat out from it’s corner of the carriage.
At one point one of the happy girls from the all female birthday party stopped to chat to the source of the gurgling throat which made the irish dancers suddenly suspect the cougher of being famous. The cougher was an elderly, tall man with an enormous grey beard, sitting quietly, observing. A lot like Gandalf, except with more of the catarrh problem. The irish dancers inquisition continued and they asked him if he was a singer. Not with that throat, I thought. Although I’m sure he could have had a go on X factor, belting out the old classic “While my catarrh gently weeps”.
Another guy then started harping on about independence to the Grannie and the Mum in front of us, ranting about what the British Government don’t want us to know and how independence will be a bed of roses. This rant as he travelled down to York for work.
Upon arrival in mid afternoon we met Colin and Heather outside the Upper Crust in Birmingham New Street Station and headed up the escalators into the darkness of the Pallasades Shopping centre.
When I left Birmingham, back in 2004, New Street station and the surrounding Pallasades shopping centre was being renovated and modernised.
Not much has changed. Unfortunately the place is still a state. Lighting and wires hang down from the dark tileless ceiling over the drab surrounding shops and cracked old floor tiles. We walked out into the light, just off New Street itself, to an old pop tune crackling out over an ancient tannoy system, which, Colin informed us, usually played Rolf Harris, and then made our way down Stephenson Street. A lot of the work in progress that had been going on when I left approximately eight years before, was now hidden by wall boards, each with their own wonderful, colourful illustration depicting what the station will look like in some far and distant future, perhaps when we’ll have hover trains and flying cars.
Other areas have shown some signs of improvement though. The Bullring Shopping Centre is now at least twice the size it was since I had last milled around the end of New Street. What was a temporary ramp made of cardboard and wood which stretched from the end of New Street down through the old St. Martin’s Square to the large indoor market and Upper Dean Street was now a large, open, curving, clean, town square surrounding the still standing St. Martin’s Church. Looking out from a viewpoint, high up on one of the balconied steps of the town square, at the foot of the statue of Lord Horatio Nelson, a good view of the south eastern side of Birmingham stretches out before you. The brown brick and spire of St. Martin’s Church looks a little ill at ease amongst the modern, pale tiles and brick of the new square unashamedly contrasting with the form of the weird, gleaming silver, bulbous architecture of Selfridges on it’s left.
Colin and Heather took us home to Yardley Wood where we had a good catch up over tea and chocolate cake before we freshened up and headed out once more to the Mailbox back in the city centre.
Another piece of Brum that was only really just kicking off when I left the Mailbox was a location I visited only once or twice. Considering it’s main attraction was a large Harvey Nichols store at the time I didn’t have much reason to go. The most expensive shop I could go to back in those days was Solihull Morrisons. Along with many designer shops and companies, including BBC Brimingham, the Mailbox now houses many restaurants and bars one of which, Bar Estilo, in which the four of us enjoyed some brilliant tapas and a bottle of red, annoying the waitress by ordering up seconds. We then went on to the lively bars outside on the canals of Gas Street, struggling to fit in to some of them through the crowds watching the Cup Final on the big screens. A little later we took a short walk up the canal eventually ending up in the Pitcher and Piano where we managed to get a seat (a very important factor when your on a night out and getting on a bit). There we settled for the majority of the night, enjoying cocktails, beers and southern comforts before heading out on to Broad Street to seek out a taxi, but only after meeting a friend of Heather’s from work who decided to take us on a wee mystery tour around the bar, apologise and leave us to get on our way again. He had been looking for their boss, I think, but neglected to mention the fact he was four hours late in meeting him.
Broad Street, the Sauchiehall Street of Brum, hadn’t changed a bit. Still full of hen nights, folk in whacky outfits and rows of police cars waiting for trouble. Just before midnight in the taxi home, Heather was interrupted by a call regarding work, and whilst the rest of us were hassling Heather to tell her colleague where to go she remained patient and polite as always trying to give reasonable, polite answers before a squeaky voice started emanating from somewhere. At first I thought Beaker, the Muppet, had popped up somewhere whilst Ka thought I was throwing my voice, presumably attempting to be the voice on the other end of heather’s phone. It turned out to be the taxi driver asking for directions. Directions which Colin gave and the driver ignored with another indecipherable squeak. After arriving back at the Main residence, and being charged double the fare we paid to go into town, we settled down for the night with a night cap, or two, not counting the large amaretto, which would be three. Which then turned into three in the morning.
Colin woke us up the next morning with a good dose of tea and rolls and sausage before we decided to head out to see some Hobbits in Sarehole, a place with an unfortunate name if said in a Scottish dialect.
The local park, The Shire Country Park, was holding a Middle Earth weekend in it’s Sarehole Mill, which I talked everyone into going along to, at least for a walk and to see some sights.
Sarehole Mill, along with Moseley Bog, were childhood hangouts for JRR Tolkien when he lived in Brum in the very late 19th century as a kid and provided the writer with his inspiration for Bilbo and Frodo’s home, Hobbiton.
Though I can’t recall seeing any blacked up Morris dancers in Lord of the Rings. We were met by this merry bunch of decorated dancers as we entered the park. Whilst the drums beat and the bells jangled, Colin, Heather, Ka and myself sauntered in and around the park among the milling crowd, in which a few folk wandered around in Wizard and Elf costumes along with one or two Hobbits. I was half expecting to hear a familiar catarrh shredded spluttering cough from somewhere.
A lot of the attending kids were dressed up in cloaks and hoods, awaiting the dragon parade at 2, running around whilst their parents chatted with neighbours. Tents were set up, some selling pottery, traditionally made food, wood works, crafts and jewellery. In one tent a lady was going over various attendees costumes in fine detail, asking one lady where she managed to produce her lovely elven cloak to which the lady replied the Bull Ring Indoor market. At one stall a man was selling and showing the benefits of wearing chainmail to a rather unconvinced audience. Other larger tents hosted face painting, stalls and stages for performances which, unfortunately, we did not manage to see. We had a train to catch.
So after another drive into Brum town centre and a ridiculous treat in a cake shop which successfully made the four of us feel ill for around an hour or so, we headed back through the Pallasades Shopping centre, Rolf Harris singing ‘Two Little Boys’ over the tannoy behind us, to get our train at 4. Thankfully there were no irish dancers, Gandalfs with throat infections or prisoner’s wives this time round although unfortunately there was a guy sitting across the aisle who liked to sit with his hand down the front of his shorts vigorously scratching himself. Unfortunately, again, I think we were halfway through our Sunday picnic dinner when Ka noticed this.

Going Underground with Adventure Ted

5 minutes to midday late on a Thursday morning and I’m standing at the bar ordering a pint. Possibly the earliest pint for a long while.
Ka and myself were in the Arrol Bar in Glasgow Central awaiting our train, due to leave at 12.40. It was the start of our holiday weekend in London so we thought we’d while away the half hour awaiting the arrival of our Virgin train with a pint and a glass of wine. Adventure Ted came out of the handbag for a tipple too. She came out for a sip of Ka’s wine as we sat in the pub’s front window watching the early afternoon world go by.
Yep, I did say ‘she’ as Adventure Ted is a girl. Her usual abode is, of course, the ELU Nursery, Ka’s work, but as one of the current projects for the kids involves London, the Queen and all things Jubilee, Adventure Ted thought she’d make the trip to London with us, her weekend goal to get her picture taken outside the gates of Buckingham Palace.
We perched Adventure Ted on the stool at the side of the table, moving Ka’s glass of wine to within her grasp, and snapped a photo of her with the phone, texting it to Vicki, who was hard at work back in dreary old Hamilton in the Early Learning Unit. There were a few fellow early drinkers in the bar around us but none seemed to even bat an eyelid at the appearance of a medium sized teddy in an all in one red polka dot outfit and sunhat perched, smiling on the barstool close by. Then again, perhaps the appearance of a bear in polka dots drinking at the next table is not a particularly strange sight for some of the folks that drink around midday in the middle of town.

As the announcement was made over the Central Station tannoy, we made out way out and up to Platform 1 where Adventure Ted obediently posed with our luggage, sitting before another of Richard Branson’s wonderful machines, one of the 390 Pendolino’s, which would deliver us successfully, in around 4 and a half hours, to our destination of the country’s capital.
Once we arrived in London Euston it was around half 4 and by the time we got down into the Underground to make our way to our hotel in Notting Hill it was the height of rush hour as we shuffled our way through the London crowds with our two cases.
Tuts, sighs, conversations, murmurings, all in various different languages, circled us as we made our way through the claustrophobic tunnels and trains of the London Underground, all with their own fantastic fashions, faces and furrowed brows. Singing and guitars echoed along a few of the more acoustic tunnels with the occasional announcements from the tannoys overhead as escalators struggled to ascend to the various different warm station levels carrying the massive crowds piled on top.
It always takes a few wee trips to get back into the London Underground mode when you visit the capital but nothing much has changed.
Spinning adverts and movie trailers on digital screens have now replaced some of the Underground’s escalator posters which follow your ascending or descending to the next level which I thought was quite a cool change though a pretty pricey one, I would have thought.
Never mind the aged track and train replacement, let’s get some 50 odd flashy digital display screens installed on this one escalator.
That can’t be very cost effective surely?
Anyway, after finally arriving at the Shaftesbury Premier Notting Hill Hotel we were helped up into the reception with our cases by a concierge and greeted by a friendly receptionist who got us to fill out our accommodation form and then informed us that we could not stay.
Ka and myself had been ready for a spanner in the works. We had been gearing up for it. Something had to go wrong.
Apparently there was a problem with the air conditioning in our room and, as a result, we would have to be moved to a sister hotel. The receptionist swiftly called a taxi.
A large merc soon pulled up and swept us along to the Shaftesbury Premier Paddingstion Hotel and after a short ten minute drive, in which we seen a biker get his moped trashed after braking too heavily at a corner infront of a car following it from the rear, we were dropped off in the middle of the far busier Westbourne Terrace, five minutes walk from the Paddington Underground station and it’s surrounding shops and restaurants.
The room, and hotel in general, was very nice and we had been promoted to a higher bedroom and would now be welcomed to breakfast on the three mornings of our stay, for our inconvenience.
After quickly unpacking and getting ourselves settled, we hit the streets of Paddington for dinner, ending our walk in the Villa Rosa restaurant on Craven Road, greeted by a pair of stinking armpits and salads with no lettuce. The cannelloni was good though. Ka, however, was put off by the mince being a suspicious grey colour. In retrospect, perhaps not one of our best choices of restaurants.
After our wonderfully average meal we jumped on the tube and headed into town, aiming for Covent Garden. Unfortunately I mistook the Victoria line for the Piccadilly line and we ended up disembarking at Oxford Circus surrounded by shoppers heading home. Moving onwards we ended up in Carnaby Street eventually finding a small bar and a couple of seats for an after dinner beverage.
Another short walk later, we ended up in the bustling Piccadilly Circus where we were to return on our first stop the next morning on our trip to the Royal Academy where we would meet Ann in the sunshine filled courtyard, see some David Hockney, whilst battling pensioners, go out on a tourist quest to see as many sights as possible with Adventure Ted, annoy many a policeman, watch battling ducks, argue over whether it was a pelican or a stork, stand in red telephone boxes and come across more than a few Easter eggs on our way.

Getting moving again

Ka and myself are in York today, checking out the local architecture, walking the city walls, experiencing the ghost tours, taking a stroll along the Real Ale walk and checking out the view over the River Ouse.
Or at least we should be…
Thanks to the current batch of storms, spinning trampolines and transport disruption we spent the majority of our morning sitting, shivering, on the cold hard metal benches of Central Station, watching the large clock hanging from the rafters, the pigeons circulate overhead and the various Central Station Rail attendants milling about, having a good old laugh at all the waiting commuters sitting around.
After watching, supposedly, funny videos on youtube of Scottish blokes filming trampolines spinning down the street in the wind and storms before Christmas, it wasn’t particularly pleasant to wake up on one of those days finding yourself having to go somewhere, even if it a wee two night trip away to York.
On our first visit to the station, at around half past nine, there was a reasonably sized crowd of expectant passengers moving around the Station’s innards, going from shop to shop, buying coffees, taking seats on the metallic benches to await further news and queuing in the various ticket offices to try and find out more information. A looping recorded message was continually playing over the tannoy, as Ka and myself took our seats to wait.
A few hours, we thought, then everything will have calmed down and will return to normality. Like the festive season, all the fuss will be over before we know it and things will all get moving again.
The recorded voice repeated something along the lines of “all rail journeys are now suspended until further notice”, as pairs of reporters circled around arriving and leaving commuters, one reporter with a large mike and the other with a giant television camera perched on his shoulder (I’d have thought those would have shrunk a little by this day and age?).
My stomach was grumbling before I was about the trains.
We left, had a large breakfast round at The Social on Royal Exchange Square and relaxed a little before heading back to the station to catch our, now hopefully operating, train.
As it happened, the only thing operating was the 30p machine to get into the loos.
Dad had drove us in after we had stood at the bus stop for around twenty minutes in the strong winds. He had called before we had left, offering his driving services, but we had refused, underestimating the craziness of the weather that was to meet us outside, as we forced our way through the winds towards the main road. I pulled Ka’s two day supplies and my two shirts and boxer shorts in our silver case behind me.
My suspicions should have been aroused, before leaving, by the paddling pool lying vertically outside our kitchen window.
As we left the flat, it was like entering some kind of war zone. A greener Libya. Wheelie bins lay over the entirety of the street, potato peelings and lidl carrier bags ferociously circling the surrounding roads like angry animals. Things, objects, stuff that certainly wasn’t leaves, flying past your face as you walked.
As we battled through the wind we passed a large, half obliterated, giant trampoline, lying over the pavement, poles spread and shaking, netting twisted and ripped, having obviously blown from a garden somewhere in the vicinity. I briefly considered filming it but decided it had probably carried out it’s best ‘You’ve Been Framed’ moment already.
We then inadvertently stepped on to a large, jagged half sheet of glass, laid across the pavement. Moments later we came across various other debris such as blocks of wood and more shards of glass. It wasn’t until we made our way further along the street that we noticed that one of the blocks of flats had lost half of it’s close entrance porch. It looked as if it had been half demolished. One side of the close box and it’s door remained standing along with it’s security entry code box, it’s wires flapping and flailing wilding in the wind.
One of Calderwood’s biggest trees was lying sprawled over a pavement, blocking our way to the main road, it’s ripped edges still spawning shreds of splinter like a giant fresh wound.
After seeing the devastation and realising there wasn’t going to be a Number 20 along any time soon, we called Dad. He had offered, I shrugged.
Following a quiet Hogmanay with some Morgan Spice and Jools Holland, we spent New Years Day at the Leckie household for dinner, where Mum had volunteered herself as driver. Angela and Steven worked hard in the kitchen feeding the McGarvas and Reids a large dinner followed by various games and quizzes, including Pictionary Catchphrase and a 30 question 2011 quiz, cobbled together by yours truly.
Ka, Morgan and myself won the Catchphrase with two winning sketches of ‘Wearing your heart on your sleeve’ and ‘Cloak and dagger’, these whole two points fending off any competition there might have been from the other assembled teams.
The 3 Wise Men were the triumphant team in the 2011 quiz. What you may have thought to be an ironic turn of phrase for Dad, Colin and Steven’s team, turned out to be more than fair play as they beat the Christmas Belle’s, Betty, Jillian and Lynsey Ann’s team, by a whole one point. This one point may or may not have been down to the fact that the girls didn’t know that Paddington bear preferred marmalade sandwiches to Marmalade itself. An unfortunate mistake, and one that cost them dearly, causing a little dispute, a bit of an argument and a lot of noise, and any noise made in Angela and Steven’s high ceilinged living room can’t be good for the neighbours. Voices just gather in those giant, high walled rooms, accumulating at the ceiling and rebounding off the walls just like a large rubber bouncy ball of noise.
The noise was made worse by Dougie’s complaining about the handing out of bonus points for Kevin McAllister’s full name and no such point for Silvio Berlusconi’s, which he hadn’t even got right anyway.
All fun and games.
As was today, rearranging our trip to York in the Central station ticket office.
It’ll have to be a mere one night stay now, and that’s if we get there at all. We should jump on to one of those spinning trampolines! They might get us there quicker.

Trains, Cowboys and Picasso

Seen 3.10 to Yuma last night and quite enjoyed it. Solid performances from both of the main players, Christian Bale and Russell Crowe but although Crowe was supposed to play the main bad guy, a outlaw named Ben Wade, it was his right hand man Charlie Prince, played by Ben Foster who for me was much more menacing. Basically the whole storyline centred on Bale's character acting as prison guard in taking the outlaw, Wade, to Contention, a small town where he will be put on the train to Yuma to go on trial and Prince leading the remainder of Wade's forces after them to rescue their boss. On the journey Wade and Evans build up a relationship and end up understanding each other. Don't worry though, it's not a soppy, hollywood type ending...

Talking of trains and catching them I had fun yesterday going back to Uddingston from Glasgow. Basically, I got the wrong one and ended up in Hamilton. So I then had to get the bus back to Uddingston. Fantastic... It kind of made the whole 'getting the train as it's easier' motive kind of pointless especially when your carrying a large box of Picasso biography under your arm! The definitive biography, apparently. Kelly-Ann bought me a Borders voucher for my birthday and that's what I got. The guy was a true genius and I've been meaning to get a book on him for decades and now I finally have done thanks to my lovely fiance. It's true he has been kind of popularised over the years and some would say he's definately one of the more 'commercial' of artists but there is no denying the guy's great skills as an artist. Anyway, looking forward to having a read of that.