7 June 2010 (Monday)

1 July 2010 (Thursday) - Still Dull....

Shopping. How dull. I suppose in retrospect it was rather obvious that Asda didn’t sell Tesco’s own brand shaving gel. I had to go to Tesco to get that. Also Asda don’t do big bags of Alpen. Tesco do, though. I also got an air pump from Tesco – after all these years I’ve finally got my own pump to inflate my beloved’s air bed when we are camping, rather than puffing into the thing for over half an hour. I had planned to get a bag of Tesco’s cheap tent pegs which I’ve seen there so many times over the last few months. But when I went to buy them, they’d sold out.

As I drove to work I listened to the radio. I know I shouldn’t – it only winds me up. As far as I am concerned, the so-called recession is officially over, and the country is back to being rolling in cash. How else could we afford to have an official poet at the Wimbledontennis championships?

Home to find someone had tried to deliver a parcel. Not for me; I’m not expecting anything. But if I was, I’d tell them to take it back to the sender. Rather than using Royal Mail, the sender had used DHL, who have left a note saying I can collect the parcel from their office which is some thirty miles away. Stuff that!

SightSavers phoned, and it was very obvious that Alexandra was reading from a script. She tried to be very knowledgeable about tropical blindness, but failed. She asked if I would increase my monthly donation to them by the small amount of fourteen quid. That’s not “to” fourteen quid; that’s fourteen quid on top of what I already shell out. I wasn’t keen, so she tried Plan B. She got out the script on liver flukes, totally failed to pronounce the big medical words in said script, and then asked if I would be happy to pay a greatly reduced increase in my contribution. I wondered how much “greatly reduced” would be. She said eleven quid more a month rather than fourteen. In the end I agreed to increase my payment to a total of a tenner a month, and everyone was happy.

Or that is, everyone was happy until she announced that whilst SightSavers thinks that I am wonderful and that they can only stay in business because of my generosity, she said she was obliged to tell me that worked for a company employed by SightSavers, and she gets 30p for every successful phone call she makes. I wonder how much she donates to charities….

2 July 2010 (Friday) - Stone in Oxney

I had my annual appraisal at work today. In many ways the thing is a waste of time, as I see my manager on a daily basis, and any problems get dealt with as they occur, rather than saving them up for a once-a-year whinge fest. In any event, most of the gripes I have about work can’t be sorted by anyone lower down the chain than the minister for health, so once again I kept my trap shut.

After work me and ‘er indoors ^TM went for a walk. We started in Appledore, and followed the canal for a mile or so. On the way we watched a slow worm going about his business. We saw a few woodpeckers doing whatever it is that woodpeckers do when not pecking wood. And we found a wonderful tree which seemed to be sprouting both blackberries and raspberries. We decided not to eat any; just in case.

We then left the canal and walked up into Stone-in-Oxney, scaring a few sheep, rabbits and horses along the way. Once in the village we found a pink pub. How cool is that? We deserved a pint of Larkins (on gravity!), before walking half a mile along the road to the Ferry Inn where we had a pint of Hopdaemon’s Golden Braid. Very nice!

And then we took the footpath back to Appledore where we scared a frog. If only all footpaths were that well marked. All things considered a very good walk. It took about three hours – and with a little judicious tweaking, may well make a good walk for one weekend in the not too distant future…

3 July 2010 (Saturday) - Pond Life

A hot night, so we had the window open, and so were woken by the drunks shouting at each other at 3am. Why do they do it? I regularly drink to excess, but never feel the need to roam the streets bellowing my head off at silly o’clock.

I spent a little while over brekkie putting together a presentation on the solar scope for the astro club whilst waiting for “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” to arrive with the “rear admiral”. Regular readers may recall I’ve joined a syndicate which has obtained the fishing rights to a small local pond. The clarion call had gone out for people to help with a general pond tidy-up, and today was the day. The “rear admiral” and I arrived at the pond armed with long-handled secatuers, saws, and an axe. And we waited for everyone else to arrive. Matt & Richard had been dispatched to the Bat-Farm to obtain the Bat-Boat, and once they and everyone else were on deck, we all made a start. The idea was to have various gangs pruning back the brambles to make more fishing spots available, and anyone who was stupid, gullible, and/or dumb enough would be launched onto the high seas in the boat to conduct pruning operations that couldn’t be done on dry land.

Needless to say, “Yours Truly” and the “rear admiral” were afloat within minutes. Our first assignment was to tie a rope to the dead sheep which was floating in the pond. It was a tad ripe, but I tied a noose in a rope which the “rear admiral” successfully looped around a limb of the unfortunate ex-sheep. We then hoiked the rope at the land-lubbers and let them deal with the carcass.

Our next task was to uproot as many bulrushes as we could. We started pulling out the bulrushes, which was easier said than done. With both of us pulling at rushes on the same side of the boat, we came within an inch of death as the boat nearly capsized (we measured it!). Not that we would have drowned; the water was only two feet deep. But had we sunk the Bat-Boat we would be killed to death by the boat’s land-lord.

We soon figured out how to alternately extract rushes and distribute weight to maximum advantage. We pulled out hundreds of the things, and chucked them at Matt who was assigned to put them in a heap at the top of the bank. Chucking the rushes was hard work, and so one of our crew had a genius idea that if we put the extracted bulrushes into the boat we could periodically sail to the shore to unload our cargo. In retrospect I know it’s patently obvious that bulrushes which grow in a pond, and are 90% submerged are going to be somewhat waterlogged, but it seemed a god idea at the time. And so as the boat filled with water we found the fatal flaw in our genius idea. And rush extraction went on hold for five minutes whilst we bailed out rushes and water. Our next idea was to leave all the pulled bulrushes floating and let the land-lubbers bring them ashore using their grappling iron. Yes – grappling iron. We weren’t messing about today – a fact which became painfully obvious as the boat was nearly sunk when it was bombed by the grappling iron.

In the end, the grappling iron proved to be a failure in that it didn’t actually grapple. It just skidded over the top of the floating rushes. So I had this genius idea (we had lots of those today!) to shove the grapple underneath the rushes and tie it in place. Have you ever smelled uprooted bulrushes? If not, then take my advice and don’t try to. Oh, they stink. And I was wrapping my arms all around the things. But my idea worked, to the amazement of all present, and soon we had a pile of rushes which was four feet high.

Talking of stinking, just as we thought we’d finished with the rushes, one of the land-lubbers found another dead sheep floating in the pond. And so, singing “Almighty Father, Strong to Save” those with a nautical bent rowed off up the pond to rope the carcass. And seeing how the “rear admiral” had roped the last dead ‘un, it was now my turn. You may recall I described the first dead sheep as “ripe”. It was quite obnoxious, but as Albert (Einstein) once famously remarked, everything is relative. The first sheep was quite sweet and was in fact a breath of fresh air compared to the second. We had a slight problem trying to decide which end of this animal to work with. Seeing how it’s head had fallen off made orientating the thing problematical. But realising the thing still had two limbs attached, I roped up to one of them, threw the rope at a land-lubber, and set sail before the “rear admiral” blew. After such unpleasantness, towing out an oil drum was a piece of cake.

We then tackled up with saw and secateurs, and sailed around the pond trimming back hedges, trees and assorted pond-going shrubbery, and despite nearly capsizing a couple of times we finally got back to dry land safely, if a tad odorous. With the boat cleaned out (as best we could) we said goodbye to the rest of the workers, and four of us went to the Kings Head in Shadoxhurst. Most of our land-lubbers didn’t want to go to the pub with us smelling of pond scum, which I suppose is understandable. A minor hiccup happened on the way when the lighting board fell off the back of the boat and got dragged for a few hundred yards, but that’s nothing that can’t be fixed. And over a pint of Late Red and a cheese ploughmans we congratulated ourselves on a job well done.

And then having done such a good job of tidying the pond, I went back for an hour or two’s fishing. Having caught loads, including quite a few big enough to need the net to be landed, I eventually came home just before 10pm. Oh, I stink….

4 July 2010 (Sunday) - Folkestone to Dover

The drunks were later with their shouting this morning: they started saying goodbye to their friends at 5.15am. I need to identify exactly which house they live in. I’ve found that when people have done this in the past, waking them two hours later to explain that from now on they will be continually be woken two hours after they go to bed (until the noise stops) works wonders.

‘er indoors ^TM was up at silly o’clock to flog candles, and so I was awake and on the Internet earlier than usual on a Sunday. Did you know that eight people had been on my blog before 6am this morning? As well as a couple of international readers, there were six hits from UK-based readers. It would seem I’m not the only one with insomnia….

After a quick bout of brekkie, I kissed goodbye to ‘er indoors ^TM who was off on her travels and I set off to the railway station. Braving the swarms of French student who were also going to Folkestone (for no adequately explored reason), I was met at Folkestone Central, and soon four of us were on the bus to the Valiant Sailor at the far end of Folkestone. The first stretch of the journey from Folkestone to Dover is seriously uphill, and so getting a bus for that bit wasn’t really cheating. We soon met up with the fifth member of our party, and the first port of call was the Battle of Britain memorial. I had no idea this existed, and it had been done so well. I liked the wall displaying the names of everyone who had taken part in the battle – however it was rather embarrassing that the names of the combatants had been laid out in alphabetical order, and clearly a couple of names had been missed and had been added as an afterthought at the end.

From here we walked on to Capel café, and sat on a pavilion on the cliff edge where we munched a sandwich and admired the views (or were terrified by the views), before heading onward. We followed the village road for a few hundred yards, and then we took the cliff path. There’s no denying this path was narrow in places, and was rather close to the cliff edge. But we managed not to fall over the edge, and I for one realised we were in one of the most scenic parts of the world. We found an old Second World War audio reflecting dish thingy, and we stopped to have a look-see, and posed for more photos. It was at this point that my mobile rang – the last member of our group had just parked his car and wondered where we were. I described our position relative to local landmarks. We both agreed where we all were, and we knew we weren’t far apart. So we all carried on walking along our respective paths, confident we would soon meet up.

We found an old army rifle range, and some ex-military buildings which are now cowsheds. And we found some old gun emplacements. My mobile rang again. Batty hadn’t met up with us. Where we we? There had been a slight confusion. Somehow I had told him that we were walking from Dover to Folkestone; and not from Folkestone toDover. Having been only a hundred yards apart at one point, we were now a mile adrift. So we agreed to stay put until he found us. And then we saw a hole in the ground…

Being just big enough to climb into, “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” flatly forbade me to climb into it. Stevey climbed into it, and I sulked and demanded it wasn’t fair, and threatened to hold my breath until my face turned blue. Eventually I got my own way, and I was allowed into the hole. Now I think it fair to say that we all expected this hole to be big enough for a couple of us to squeeze into, and then we would need to be pulled out. However this tiny hole was actually the entrance to a subterranean complex which was featured a corridor probably a hundred yards long, and some rooms coming off of this corridor. We managed to see some of what was down there by use of flash photography, and the light from the flame of a cigarette lighter. However for most of the way I must admit I couldn’t actually see a thing, and I was dependent on using my walking stick to find my way. We need to go back with some decent torches to see what is down there. I have a plan to present something to the archaeology club based on what I find the next time I go.

We climbed out of the hole to see Batty in the distance, so we got our breath back, met up with him, told him how wonderful it was down below, and we all climbed back into the hole for another look-see. I say “look-see”. I actually mean “fumble in the pitch darkness”.

We then carried on along the top of the cliffs, admiring the view of Samphire Hoe, and calling in at all the disused and abandoned Second World War batteries along the way. I must admit I had a bit of a rant at this stage. It’s scandalous how much money English Heritage and the National Trust spend on some of their properties when the coast between Folkestone and Dover is awash with relics from the war which have (frankly) been left to rot.

Pausing only briefly to be told off for being too close to the cliff edge, we found we had reached our destination – Dover. We took our lives in our hands when we ran across the A20, and then puffed or way up to the Western Heights. This is somewhere I’ve never been before. It was wonderful. As welll as the Napoleonic defences, there was an entire fort up there. Not some tiddly little thing – an entire fort - probably as big as Dover castle. You can walk around the thing, but you can’t get inside it. I had no idea it even existed.

By this stage, all six of us were wilting, and so we staggered down the hill into Doverand, after a pit-stop at the fags shop, we made our way to the local Wetherspoons for well-earned ham, egg and chips. And three pints of ale for me (hic!)

I’ve had a really good day out with friends, I’ve learned loads, and we will be going back to investigate the tunnels in the not to distant future. If any of my loyal readers would like to come along of this expedition, please let me know….

5 July 2010 (Monday) - My Old Boots...

Being on a late start, I was at a loose end for an hour or so, so I thought I’d catch up with various jobs about the house. I put a dash of polish onto my walking boots. They deserved it after yesterday’s excursion. I’m very pleased with my walking boots. I bought them in Hastings Old Town back in the 1980s when I used to help with a hiking competition run by the local Boys Brigade. Whilst I can’t put an exact date on when I got the boots, I can remember wearing them whilst holding a month-old “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” at one of the hike checkpoints in 1989, and I’d had the boots for a few years then. I’ve very little else (apart from ‘er indoors ^TM) that has lasted so well.

I also needed to review the beer requirement for next weekend. I brought home twenty bottles of beer from Teston kite festival, so I’d better get in a couple of gallons more to add to what’s left over (as well as some port) for the forthcoming festival in Brighton.

Then I thought I’d check my post. Regular readers will know this is a job I don’t do anywhere near often enough.

I was offered up to 20Mb Broadband. That’s cheeky. They rely on people reading the 20Mb bit, and not realising the “up to” bit, only to find that 0.5Mb is “up to” 20Mb.
The power company told me how much gas I use, and offered to help me cut down. Presumably by showing me how to run gas powered central heating on batteries?
A letter from the kite club confirming my details: they had my email address wrong. That hopefully explains why I got no emails from them last year.
A letter from Wyevale, advertising their national chain of garden centres. They actually suggested that when on a long journey I might call in to one of their places rather than use motorway services. A novel suggestion!
Yet another bank statement about the defunct snake club account. How many times have I said that I must do something about that?
My mobile phone bill. Which was much less now I’ve stopped texting Twitter with it.
A letter from the building society asking me to vote for their board of directors. I know nothing about any of them. They might be financial whizzes, they might be total dumbos. I have no idea.
A letter confirming my household electricals are insured against breakdown, and a letter (from the same people) advising me that they are not.

Shopping – for beer, as it seems I haven’t got enough for the weekend. Lidl’s were allegedly knocking the stuff out at a quid per bottle. I got there to find they didn’t have a single bottle of beer in the place. They’’d sold out, and as is the way with Lidl’s, they had no idea when they would be getting more. Ho-hum: such is life. I’ll just have to put my hand in my pocket and pay the going rate in Sainsburys or Tescos.

And then work. Following on from my appraisal last Friday I’m feeling rather pragmatic about the place. Whilst my appraisal last week went (very) well, I’m bored with my job. I’ve been doing the same thing for so long, and when you consider the really active weekend I’ve just had (like most of my weekends, come to that!), settling down to the dull routine comes hard. But at lunchtime we got the solar scope out again. Tim, who I’ve worked with for twenty five years, had an attachment which allowed us to bodge a camera into the telescope. A shame the clouds were so thick, really (!)

And in the meantime following on from yesterday’s wonderful day out, I’ve been exchanging messages with our native guide. If any of my loyal readers are feeling adventurous (or have a very bright torch they might lend me), we’ve planned to return to the tunnels on Sunday August 15. If anyone’s up for it, please let me know…

6 July 2010 (Tuesday) - Stuff

Up with the lark to iron shirts. And to do the washing up which the first fruit of my loin said he would do last night. He also said he’d pull up the bindweed in the garden today, and he didn’t do that either. Then to the petrol station. I still only fill the car once a month - my new car seems to do twenty miles more than the old car did on a tank of petrol. Another saving can’t be bad. And so to work, which was the same as ever. One day I shall spit my dummy out, and have a rant at a vanishingly small minority of my colleagues. But not today. Instead I shall content myself with a general observation: it never fails to amaze me that the people who believe they are the hardest working are usually those who actually do the least.

Home, and on to Folkestone. Firstly to visit that quality supermarket which is Morrisons. You know a supermarket is a cut below the rest when you realise you have to pay a deposit to use the trolley, and there’s no denying that the clientele were best described as being “a bit council”, but after all was said and done, their beer selection was second to none, and in my book (and this *is* my book!) that’s what counts.

And then on to a friends house for the weekly Sci-Fi night, as we have had pretty much every Tuesday for the last seventeen years. Tonight we went back to our roots and watched some good old Star Trek. Tonight’s episode was an old favourite – you can’t beat a bit of Ferengi. Which has made me think - bearing in mind the sixty-second Rule of Acquisition (“The riskier the road, the greater the profit”), could there be gold underneath them thar hills?

7 July 2010 (Wednesday) - All Packed Up

I took some doughnuts in to work today. People like them, and so do I. I thought I’d celebrate the start of a long weekend. I’ve been looking forward to this weekend for some time.

My plan for the evening was to get the old sleeping bags out of the loft and give them to who I’d promised them to, and I’d then do some serious slobbing about. I’d intended to leave the rest of the lugging the camping gear about until tomorrow. But seeing how the most recent fruit of my loin was home, I thought I’d get her to help me with the two heaviest bits of camping gear. She started carrying out some camping chairs, one thing lead to another, and within half an hour we’d packed ninety per cent of the camping stuff into the car. All that remains to be loaded is some of the kitchen equipment and my personal effects. In fact it’s fair to say that were it possible, I could have been setting up camp at 8pm this evening.

Meanwhile a good friend is doing a sponsored go-kart race. If anyone is feeling generous, you can find out more here. And then as my beloved went out flogging candles, I was left home alone, so I found a dangerous looking sword in NeverWinter…

8 July 2010 (Thursday) - A Day Off Work

An odd sort of a day. The idea of taking today as a day off work was so’s I could load up the car ready for a prompt getaway to the kite festival tomorrow. But having loaded up last night meant that today’s job was done. I *could* have cancelled the day’s holiday, but getting leave is so difficult; if I’d not taken today off, I’d struggle to get another day off later. And I did need to top up the water level in the pond – a job which takes a few hours and is best not left unattended too long. I’ve flooded the bathroom before when the hose has sprung a leak in the past.

So as the pond filled I got the last few bits into the car, including three more gallons of ale I’d overlooked. And I sorted out my smalls for the weekend. I then did a bit of gardening – I dug out the grass growing between the paving stones in the front garden. The cement between these stones really needs replacing, but I don’t want the aggro of lifting the stones and repositioning them. I wonder if I might bodge it with decorative filler. The jungle from next door is beginning to flood over the fence again – I’ll take the electric shears to that another time.

And then I popped up into Ashford. I can remember a month ago at Teston Kite Festival realising that I needed to sort out the problem of the poles piercing out through the tops of the banners. The tops of the poles we use are very fine and quite sharp, and I said that I needed something to put on the tops of the poles to stop this happening. I shopped around looking for something to do the trick, and I bought some erasers. I shall chop them up, and stick a lump of rubber on the top of each pole. Let’s see if that works. I also mentioned a few weeks ago that I could do with a new penknife for fishing purposes. New penknives don’t come cheap, so I might just rough it with the old one. I also had a look in the DVD shops – the Ashford branch of CEX is now open, and I picked up some DVDs. With the most expensive I bought being £2.50, and some as cheap at 75p, I think I’ve got a bargain or two.

Home for a bit of KFC for scran, and to watch one of my new DVDs – “Orgazmo” – made by the people who make “South Park”, it’s the story of one of the saddest super-heroes you’ll ever find, and it is described by a top film critic as "callow, gauche, obvious and awkward, and designed to appeal to those with similar qualities". I loved it (!) I then wasted an hour or so in NeverWinter before going on a mission to Asda with“Daddies Little Angel ^TM ”. She wanted some moisturiser and some Fridji (and a lift). Whilst there, I bought her an airbed (she deserved it - she has scrubbed the house this week) and I got myself an aluminium table to go in my new tent.

I then revamped the constellation game we do as a fundraiser for the astro club – I was running out of the pre-printed sheets of paper, and thought I’d do some new ones. But as the old format looked a bit dull, I thought I’d jazz it up with pictures of the constellations. But they had to be small pictures or they wouldn’t fit on the page. In the end they turned out to be too small to actually be seen. So after an hour’s fiddling about I contented myself with a change of font size, adding a club logo to the top of the page, and giving the whole thing a pinkish hue. There are those who will take a stance against the pinkish hue, but I (for one) was never confused.

I’m off on my travels in the morning, so there won’t be any updates for a few days. “My Boy ^TM ” is being left in charge at home. I wonder if he’ll do the washing up? See you all on Monday….

9 July 2010 (Friday) - Off to Brighton

Once the troops had arrived, we set off to Brighton at 9.15am. I drive to Brighton a few times every year. And every time I wonder which is the quickest route. All the on-line route planners tell me the motorway route is faster, taking an hour and a half. Personally I prefer to take the cross country route which I’m reliably informed is thirty miles shorter, but fifteen minutes longer to do. Once again I took the cross country route, and after fifteen minutes I stopped to phone home to ask ‘er indoors ^TM to fetch the bottles of gas I’d forgotten and had left in the shed. We popped into Middle Farm – we’d had a request to pick up some cider, and we picked up some ale as well. Will I never learn? The cider was fine – but the ale was like vinegar (again). Middle Farm is *the* place for cider and perry. But ale – no.

We then negotiated the road works round Stanmer Park to get to Asda for fags, and were on site and setting up out tents by midday. As always we drove past where everyone else was camping, and set up our base slightly up the hill. Not to be anti-social, but for the view, and to be above the normal people who crowd the place during the weekend. Most people camp at the bottom of the hill in Stanmer Park, and when the festival is at it’s height it is swarming with normal people so that all you can see is the swarms. Being up the hill is so much better, albeit a long way to walk to the shower block.

Despite having a prolonged sarnie break, and a minor calamity when we discovered the washing up liquid had leaked and had gone everywhere, we had camp all set up by mid afternoon. I’m rather impressed with my new tent, even if I had got the groundsheet in the wrong way round. If nothing else, I’ll know better next time.

We met up with old friends, we had a crafty pint or two, and then we had cream scones. The cream was a bit runny, but you can’t have everything.

Yesterday I mentioned my plan to pop a bit of rubber into the top of the kite banners to stop the poles from poking out. It took ages to push the rubber into place, and when it did get into place, the poles still ripped out through the top of the banners. In theory a stroke of genius: in practice a total failure. So I had another beer to commiserate, and then we had tea – a wonderful bit of lemon chicken. We might be based in tents, but we don’t rough it at all. After tea I carried the washing up to the gents toilets and used the hot water there to scrub our dishes. I’m amazed no one else has come up with this idea – it saves carrying a lot of water up the hill, and also saves loads of gas too.

After a little bit of kite flying, one beer led to another, and in the same vein one bottle of port led to another, and I finally staggered off to my pit at 1am.

10 July 2010 (Saturday) - Brighton Kite Festival

Despite having polished off over a gallon of ale and a decent portion of port, I was up and in the shower block at 5am. I had this plan to get washed before all the hot water went. I think I wasn’t the only one with this plan, as the hot water had all gone. Oh – it was icy. I trudged back to the tent through the fog (it was foggy at 5am), and went back to bed where I shivered for a couple of hours.

I got up at seven am and watched the kiddies playing in the kite buggy. Our kite buggy only ever comes out of the lock-up once a year, and that is for the kiddies to play with at Brighton Kite Festival.

We had a rather leisurely breakfast, starting with coffee, followed by melon, and then a fry-up. And time was getting on, so leaving others with the washing up, I set off with the shopping crew. We missed Asda, but found Matalan, and so stocked up on some decent shirts before braving Asda (once we found it). Asda was heaving with normal people, but we got most of the things on our list. And I maintain that not only were marshmallows not on the list, no one had said anything about buying marshmallows anyway (!)

Back to camp, and just time for a bit of bread and cheese before I was on duty. I’d volunteered to help with the kiddies workshop. Children of all ages had the opportunity to make a kite of their own, under the expert guidance and tutelage of experienced kite flyers. I told some of the children that came through the workshop that I knew nothing about kites, and that I’d just found the kite club T-shirt lying on the floor. I explained that if anyone caught me I would be in trouble, and I asked these kiddies if they would keep my secret. Some of them smiled and agreed. Most of them stared blankly, and one or two cried. I told other children that in the wild, kites live up trees, and it would be a kindness to let the kites go back home into the trees. I told these children that their mothers were all expert tree climbers, and could rescue the kites if and when they got stuck. And again for every child that responded to me, there were a dozen that (quite frankly) were pushing their intellectual limits by staring into space with a digit up the nostril.

The kiddies workshop ran for two hours, and we never stopped the entire time and, as always, we had to turn away kiddies at the end. Perhaps a tad harsh, but those of us running the workshop want to see the festival too. Having had a quick look round the various stalls earlier, I went back to one to pay for some line ‘er indoors ^TM wanted, and to buy myself a new kite to which I’d taken a fancy. I took my new kite back to base where I set the thing up, and flew it straight into a tree, to the amusement of the assembled spectators. And needless to say I was soon blabbed upon. It is a kite club tradition that any so-called “experienced kite flier” who gets a kite stuck in a tree has to pay a fine of a quid (which goes to charity). And so I was duly reported and fined. In retrospect I could have taken issue – compared with many of the “experienced kite fliers” who were at the festival, I am a rank amateur. But it’s all good fun.

I looked plaintively at my kite in the tree. I shook the branch, I gently teased the line. The kite remained stuck fast. So in desperation I gave the line a strong yank, and the kite came fell out of the tree, utterly unscathed by its adventure. I tried to fly it some more, but the wind was blocked by the trees near our camp. I could have walked further down the field, but it was a hot day, so I packed up, and sat and watched everyone else flying. And then an amazing co-incidence; some friends who were camping with us had a visitor. The girlfriend of the mother of some ex-cubs has a new girlfriend who lives inBrighton, and she and her partner had come up to visit. A small world (!) We chatted and reminisced for a while, whilst watching the kiddies hurtling down the hill in the buggies.

Batty arrived shortly after 5pm – it was odd with his not being there. This was the twenty fifth kite festival we’d been to as a group, and the first at which he wasn’t there for the entire event. But with him present we had a few beers. As Terry and Irene went off to the festival barby, we decided that it must be tea time. We’ve done the barby before – it’s very good, but the weekends away can get a tad expensive. So we stayed at camp and Lisa did some wonderful tortilla wraps.

We washed up (in the shower block again), visited friends who were at the barby and then the girls went collecting firewood. We thought we’d put the metal fire pit to good use. It was at this point that we discovered we had no marshmallows. I deny all responsibility; no one said anything to me about marshmallows. However to be helpful I offered my bag of haribos. Unfortunately during the heat of the day, they had melted into a huge congealed lump. “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” scoffed it quite happily, and as the light faded, our fire grew. Many friends came up the hill to our fire pit, and beer and wine flowed freely. With floating lanterns being launched, and illuminated remote controlled planes flying around, at one point there were over twenty people chatting round our camp.

Again I didn’t get to bed till gone 1am.

11 July 2010 (Sunday) - Brighton Kite Festival

This morning the water in the showers was warm at 5am. But I didn’t get back to sleep after my shower today – the morning was turning out to be a hot one. I finally gave up trying to sleep at 7am, only to find that a lot of our crew were already up and drinking coffee. I should have got up earlier.

Our fire pit was still smouldering, so we emptied five gallons of water into it, and gave the ashes a good stir. And left it soaking for an hour (periodically giving it more stirring) to be sure the fire was extinguished. Whilst it soaked we had brekky – at least an hour earlier than yesterdays’; it was so bright and so hot that no one could sleep. And so, with brekky scoffed and fire truly doused, we emptied the fire pit into a convenient hole in the woods and got on with the washing up. It was at this point that the heavens opened for half an hour’s torrential rain.

Fortunately the rain soon passed, we put our drying-up away, and I chatted with an old kiting friend for some time until our day-visitors arrived. As I sat in the sunshine I could feel my head nodding, and I slept for an hour or so before having a quick bite of lunch. Again I was on duty in the kiddies kite making workshop.

If yesterday’s children were a tad thick, today’s were truly dim. Maybe one in twenty had the ability to speak: most just stared and didn’t even move until pushed by an accompanying adult. But I made the most of it; despite most of the kiddies being unable to hold a piece of string, I enjoyed myself for a couple of hours. And when we were finished I walked across the field, and chatted with the parents of some of the less stupid children about how well their workshop-made kites were flying. I must admit that the kites we made in the kiddies kite making workshop don’t (at first sight) appear to be anything special. A lump of carrier bag, with two bits of bamboo for spars, an old VCR tape for a tail and a cheap line on a winder. But they flew so well.

And talking of flying well, I got out my new kite, and a much longer spool of line, and my new kite went up. And up. It was really good. Flying my kite with everyone else made me realise that I actually want to do this more often. I need to add some of the BKF fly-ins to my list of diary dates: after all I’m a paid up club member – why shouldn’t I go along?

My brother in law was calling me. I’d won a prize in the festival raffle. I’d won a kite in the shape of a shark. Perhaps I was biased by the facts that the tail spar was broken and that I couldn’t get the thing to fly at all. But on reflection, that kite was rubbish. I may see if I can fly it off the line of another kite as a form of line laundry.

By now many people were beginning to pack away. I took the banners down, and said goodbye to Batty, Terry and Irene who weren’t staying for the night. Whilst everyone else prepared the evening meal, I scurried together a bowl full of things to be washed up, and set about getting those scrubbed. And after a smashing bit of tea we said goodbye to the rest of our party who had to go home too.

With the last of the evening’s washing up done, we packed away as much as we could, and said our goodbyes to people going home until there were only a few groups left. We then wandered down to the bottom of the hill where fifteen or so of us who were staying the night sat and chatted and listened to charming traditional Norfolk shanties about ladies who hail from Fareham; said ladies having dubious morals and calico drawers.

12 July 2010 (Monday) - Home Again

If I had to choose the one thing I detest most about camping, it would be being inside a tent listening to the sound of rain. I woke at 5.30am to the sound of rain. And I lay in my sleeping bag with a heavy heart listening to the rain getting heavier. I eventually got up at 7am, decided against a shower, and got on with the packing. We made good progress, despite the weather. After all, there’s always rain at some point at Brighton Kite Festival.

Pausing only briefly for a spot of brekkie we made good progress with breaking camp. There was a minor hiccup when I saw clouds of smoke pouring from a bush up the hill from us: some twit must have emptied their barby into the undergrowth yesterday, and having smouldered overnight, the thing was ready to burst into flames this morning. Fortunately we had water to spare, and so I was able to put the fire out.

The rain did ease off during the morning, and by judiciously reversing my car into “Brown and Smelly” we got most of the gear away dry. But by 10.30am we decided that we were going to have to resign ourselves to having to take the tents home wet. We could have stayed for a few more hours and hoped that they would dry out. But the rain might have come back. So we took the things down wet.

Home to unpack, where “My Boy ^TM ” was in high spirits; his photo has been used on the website of where he holidayed a few weeks ago. I knew he was in a good mood because he helped me unpack the car. And before too long stuff was unpacked, and back into sheds and lock-ups. “Green and Smelly” (our turdis) was been dried, as has my new tent, and Tony’s tent, and my provisional plan is to get “Brown and Smelly” (our communal tent) dried tomorrow. Once dried I shall struggle to be able to fold it away in the limited space in my back garden, but I expect I shall manage somehow.

And so, as I sit, aching from the exertions of unpacking, and with my sunburned face glowing, I find myself reflecting on the weekend’s kite festival. This was the eighth time I’ve been to Brighton Kite Festival. I loved it; roll on the next one!!

13 July 2010 (Tuesday) - Another Day Off Work

The plan for the morning was to get the canvas of “Brown and Smelly” spread across the lawn and dried in the sunshine. And then I was going to rummage through the lock-up to sort out the gazebos. A few weeks ago I gave out spare gazebos to anyone who wanted one, only to find that I was actually distributing bags of poles with no gazebo material. The material must be in the lock-up somewhere. But I woke to find it was raining, so I went shopping instead.

First of all to the fishing tackle shop. Last week I’d ordered a spring balance, and had agreed to pay eighteen quid for it when the shop got one in. Today it had arrived, and I bought the thing together with some floats, weights and hooks, and paid ten quid for the lot. I’m not complaining (!) And then to Timpsons for some engraving. I now have the two trophies which will be awarded for the Pooh-Sticks contest we’re planning for the kite festival in Teston. The contest will be on the Saturday afternoon and will be quite straightforward. More details are on Facebook (because their software is there, and saves me having to re-invent it on other web space), or here. There’s already eleven people who are interested in the thing, and fifteen quid has already been promised for the charity we’re supporting.

Home to find the rain had stopped, so I spread the canvas of “Brown and Smelly” across the lawn to get it dried. I then started a bit of tidying up around the house. It’s amazing what rubbish I found; so many copies of the same book, so many copies of the same DVD. With no re-sale value at all on eBay, they all got chucked. I managed to get four bin bags full of tat and rubbish. After all, the bin men are coming tomorrow.

By late afternoon “Brown and Smelly” had dried out, and with a rain shower forecast for the evening, we got the canvas packed away. With the camping gear away for another month, I’m wondering if we might be able to make our camping trips somewhat more streamlined. In the first instance we need to get rid of the cardboard boxes and foldable boxes and get some stacking boxes which would pack into the car better.

Also I can’t help but feel we take too many chairs. Over the years we seem to have accumulated loads of camping chairs, and we drag the lot along every time. At least half of them stay in their bags, and then go home unused. I’ve half a plan to find out who all the chairs belong to, give them back and instead take half a dozen camping benches like the one we got from camping international the other week. Each bench seats two people and when packed takes up half the space of a camping chair.

Despite the filler cap of our new three litre kettle breaking within minutes of being taken out of the box, it still worked fine. Its larger volume was useful: we need another of those. And our water containers need new taps. I wonder if we can get new taps, or if we have to buy whole new containers?

The kite buggy needs some attention, having had two separate accidents over the last weekend. Not only has it lost a foot peg, one of the foot rests has been forced into the socket so firmly it won’t come out. I told the child who did it that the foot peg was fine as it was, but he smiled at me as he ignored me and wedged it in place. I then challenged him to get it out, and it was at that point he realised what I’d been saying to him for the last five minutes. Whilst the thing is still perfectly useable as a buggy, it’s now rather more difficult to transport, seeing as it doesn’t come apart as completely as it once did. Perhaps I might squirt it with some WD40….

14 July 2010 (Wednesday) - Stuff

I rarely blog about work. Let me give an example of why this is:

Regular readers of this drivel will realise that there are certain annual events in my life. Bonfire parades and kite festivals. Duck races and ice cream trips. One such event is the Canterbury Beer Festival. Running for several days, I always go on the Friday afternoon, which leaves me the Saturday free for a headache. Another such event happens over the August Bank Holiday when we go camping on a friend’s farm for a long weekend. Because I know about these events in advance, I am able to arrange my holiday, and I actually booked days off work for these. I did the booking of leave for these two outings, and had the leave approved before last Xmas. It was with a sense of disbelief that I returned to work today to see the Saturday morning duty rota had been published with me due to work on both of these Saturdays. I’d booked the working days off – not the weekend days. I only work one weekend day in five; I’ve never thought to book those off…

Fortunately for me I was met by a colleague before I met anyone of management grade. Whilst I was on leave over the last few days there was a works staff meeting. Management, once alarmed and concerned with the low staff morale, are now fed up with it and have formally ordered the whinging and griping to cease. Low morale is (apparently) the fault of those doing the grumbling, and such grumblings will no longer be tolerated. I shall keep quiet.

And then to the in-laws for a birthday party. It was the father in law’s wife’s birthday and we had a minor bunfight, made polite conversation with people we barely knew, and I chased children round the living room until they were sick. I’m not feeling too perky myself now either……

15 July 2010 (Thursday) - Little Bit of Politics

I might have mentioned the election in a previous blog entry….

“Vote for us” said the Dribbling Democraps. “We’ll give a free university education to anyone”. On the strength of that, a lot of people with vested interests in reducing costs of university educations voted for them. And once the votes were counted, principles were dropped and integrity was firmly thrown straight out of the window. And so it’s a different story in today’s news. “Pay up, dogbreath students” is now the party policy.

But it’s not just the dribblers who are not to be trusted. The Con-servatives are no better, if their new MP representing the town of my birth is anything to go by. In her first speech in parliament she rattled on about how the town of Hastings needs better road and rail connections with the rest of the universe. Yesterday she was interviewed on Radio 4’s pm program. When asked why she was asking for a massive investment in public transport which was in direct conflict with her government’s policy, she was very quick to point out that she was a Con-servative, and the Government wasn’t hers, but was a coalition.

This morning’s news tells how during the last year (under a government of the only party who didn’t abandon its principles to grasp power) the nation’s crime rate fell to thelowest in thirty years

. And the same news also related the frankly unbelievable tale of the Con-servative Home Secretary rubbishing the official figures. As a party who claimed it was going to be strong on crime, the Con-servatives (and associated dribbling puppets) presumably wanted to start their tenure from a high crime rate?

I know – I shouldn’t keep up with current affairs. It only winds me up. So some news on a lighter note. Workmen painting white lines on a road left a gap for a dead badgerbecause they said it was not their responsibility to move it. The local council’s response was that this was an entirely appropriate thing to do because the person doing the painting of the lines was not trained in the highly skilled art of kicking the carcass of a dead badger out of the way. And who runs this council? – yes the Con-servatives.

I’m going to lie down now…..

16 July 2010 (Friday) - Laundry, Diary..