grumpyf1

We certainly got lucky with the weather over the Bank Holiday weekend. This allowed me to indulge in my emergency game – Car Boot Bingo. Do any other countries partake of the peculiar ritual that is the Car Boot Sale? Monday’s one featured a cricket pitch with a circular formation of cars, making it look like some kind of wagon train of affordable hatchbacks attempting to defend themselves from the invading masses with piles of baby clothes and unloved shoes. Evolution had occurred since my last visit to one, with many of the wares spread out on old bits of plastic sheeting on the carefully mown grass. I can only assume that the nation’s supply of pasting tables were either broken, or had been called into action for a particularly big wallpapering job. It didn’t affect my chance to play my favourite version of Bingo. If you find yourself forcibly made to visit a car boot sale, this might help you to survive with a shred of sanity, even if you do come away with something yo...

Now that royal babies and general elections are out of the way, it’s safe to come out from behind the sofa. Hopefully. As a child, I vividly remember sneaking the TV on and watching Doctor Who whilst my mum had a chat with a neighbour (Yes, it was in black and white, you cheeky wotsit). I was so terrified by the Daleks that I didn’t want to go near the TV to turn it off, and tried to drown out their frightening voices by hiding my face in a cushion. I have pretty much the same experience with those most transient of TV journalists, the royal, and political, correspondents. Happily, someone conveniently decided to invent the TV remote control since my short trouser days, so the cushion isn’t troubled by me screaming into it any more. Unless you count ‘Talent’ shows and Big Brother. With the recent General Election, they got more and more screen time, with their swingometers, bar charts and on-screen wizardry, until it started to get dangerous to pop out for milk, in case you ...

Right now, 15 people are having a little run round a pond. Well, maybe not a pond – Windermere. And not so little – a marathon distance. 10 times in 10 days. I’m pretty impressed with my motivational levels if I manage to resist eating a whole packet of chocolate HobNobs in one sitting. In the very distant past, I ran a half marathon (although ‘run’ probably isn’t the correct terminology if you walk some of it). I was so shattered, I was barely able to drink three pints in the pub afterwards, and had to turn down the offer of celebratory pork scratchings too. I’m not convinced I could even walk 26.2 miles, let alone run that distance. And yet, by the time you read this, 15 people of varying ages and abilities will have completed their 8th marathon in as many days, with the prospect of 2 more still to go. Their final ‘lap’ around England’s largest lake will be celebratory in a great variety of ways, and they will have the support of a huge number of people, as their last c...

It has admittedly taken me a very long time to discover this, but going out for a nice meal does seem to be an excellent time to discuss all sorts of important stuff in an informal setting. With alcohol. I should point out that this probably wouldn’t work out well for those dining alone, and you may need to temper what you talk about, depending on your dining companion. For example, discussing how good you new partner is in bed when having lunch with your prospective mother-in-law is almost certainly not going to get you much past the bread and artistically sculpted pats of butter. It may be a handy opening gambit if you’re interested in sampling hospital food, though. A scrumptious meal out with Mrs G, at a posh (by our standards – we consider Tesco’s “Finest” range pretty exotic) restaurant on holiday recently resulted in some interesting topics being covered, aided by a nice drop of wine and further enhanced by some additional dessert wine too. Is there a starters wine? Aski...

Yay! A Bank Holiday weekend! Three whole days off work to relax and unwind... or 72 hours of fear, loathing and DIY. I’m lucky enough to be the current owner of a charming terraced house, on a quiet street, built lovingly from local stone by craftsmen over 100 years ago. Some delightful period features, a dash of quirkiness and a rugged exterior means I’m quite similar in many ways. Unfortunately, the craftspersonages who put it together seemingly didn’t own a tape measure, for every door is a different size, the ceilings slope gently (which works OK, because the floor does too) and they had clearly never heard of right-angles or straight edges. Even their best efforts have been surpassed by a century’s worth of amateur DIY (Damage It Yourself) enthusiasts giving their all in the name of top notch corner-cutting, bodging and disfiguring. To give you an idea of what we’re up against, we once foolishly thought it might be nice to double the number of plug sockets in the be...

Here’s a tricky question to answer – Why are speed cameras painted bright yellow? I’ve ruled out “hiding place for canaries” already, by the way. On my morning tootle along the A591 recently, I was just becoming aware of a van parked in the lay-by some way ahead when the chap in front of me braked hard down to 28mph, having identified it as one of the speed detector variety by it’s hi-vis markings. I had to do the same to avoid going in to the back of him. What multiplied my irritation was that we were in a 60mph zone at the time. I’m also frequently irked by berks dropping to just under 30mph for the camera at Ings... which is in a 40mph zone. Here’s a bit of starling news for these motoring morons – not all speed cameras are set to go off at 30mph. They are, surprisingly enough, tied to the speed limit area within which they languish. And it’s not like you ought to get caught by surprise by one, either. Painted in a shade of yellow so bright you can get a tan from half a...