Happy Days

At 4am this morning the kids depart for the Leeds Festival and L displays getting up skills that I didn’t know she had, twice.

We'd both love to be a fly on the wall this weekend, just to see how they get on, rather than for the bands. There are not many that bands we would want to see, well not ones that we haven’t already seen indoors, apart from the Libertines reunion. Would like to have seen that.

I can’t decide how to train today because I have squash tonight. Should I rest, cycle or run? In the end I run, a not so brisk four miles but I still needed a pub lunch to get over it. At least I didn't pick up any new injuries and I didn’t pull anything. Well unless you count that girl who woke me at 4am this morning.

After all the dilemma about what to do this morning, squash is cancelled. Apparently my opponent has a bad wrist. At least it wasn’t the dreaded washing up that did for him this time, it was even less rock ‘n' roll than that. He cites 'over and incorrect use of the mouse'. The mind boggles. I ought to make him play left handed.

Well, I suppose I should take the opportunity to do the gym instead. I need one last monthly session to qualify for my £50 council bribe. As it’s the 26th August already, I best get in with it.

Apparently it's not raining in Bramham Park, yet and there are some nice photos on the BBC website of early arrivals at the festival. L says she quite likes the fishnets and wellies look. Isn’t that the sort of thing I’m supposed to say? Though, can’t say wellies do it for me. Quite like the fishnets though...

L says she daren't be the anxious parent, bombarding them both with texts. So I text Daughter myself, in an unconcerned sort of way.

All this takes me back to the only time I camped on site at a festival, at Reading in, errr ummm, 1987.



Check out that dodgy line-up. Reading in the 80’s never could quite decide just who their target audience was and bands being bottled off was a common occurrence but that was all part of the experience back then. Though Zodiac Mindwarp and his band started throwing them back, not sure they’d get away with that these days. Bad News you may recall were a spoof metal band consisting of three of the Young Ones cast and were joined at Reading by Brian May of Queen.

We went primarily for the Gothness of Friday, though Spear Of Destiny didn’t turn up. Kirk Brandon whinging about a broken leg or something. The rest of the weekend was more heavy rock orientated. In fact we only paid for Friday but got to camp and got into the arena on Saturday unchecked and all for a tenner. Life was so easy then. We came home before Sunday though.

It seems like only yesterday.... My mate and I pitched our tent between two tents belonging to two pairs of attractive young girls. Good strategy we reckoned. Then we were treated to the sounds of them repeatedly putting themselves about, as they worked their way around the campsite, ignoring us.

We had to reconstruct the tent several times each night as someone always fell over it as they drunkenly tried to find their own canvas abode or the ones of our popular neighbours. We fared better than another chap who had one of his poles nicked, just the one you understand, which presumably was funnier than nicking all of them.

You learn such life lessons at these places, such as never to accept a plastic bottle of drink off anyone you don't know, not with toilet queues the lengths they were. Happy days.

(Thursday 26th August)

Bewildered, Confused and Shattered

I should have mentioned yesterday that I was party to an interesting discussion last night on the way home from dog training, having picked L and Daughter up on the way. They were discussing surviving the Leeds Festival, with particular regard to the toilet facilities. There followed a debate on weeing into a tomato ketchup bottle. L claims it's not possible, Daughter claims it is. Daughter seemed all up for a head to head challenge. In the garden I tell her, this could get messy.

Thankfully I don't think it happened. Unless they staged it under cover of night. If any results come to light I'll let you know.

L’s been trying to persuade one of us, Daughter or I to go see ‘Elliott’ with her. That’s Mr Example to you or I. Neither of us are, shall we say, over enthusiastic. I suggest we flip a coin to decide it. Well anything method really that doesn’t involve a sauce bottle.

Though I’m happy to do the honourable thing here, and I have got form in this department. I’ve done Mika and lived to tell the tale.

L’s not had the best of days all round actually. She reported a minor cat problem this morning, which is probably underplaying it by a very wide margin. Nothing is ever minor with MD. I’m sure she meant a major cat problem. Yep. She says she’s beginning to hate all cats. She’s beginning to sound like MD.

Then later she reports feeling totally bewildered, confused and shattered at work, brought on by boss fatigue. Had to include that, just for the great title.

Her email though spooked me out a bit, as it illuminated my computer screen just as I was breaking the seal on the box of biscuits that she asked me to take into custody. Oops caught! It was if she was watching me...

Her solution for bewildered, confused and shattered is of course a glass of wine or two. It’s a good job I have the biscuits.

The wine is unnecessary in the end as there's Salem Porter on in the Globe, where she joins me after squash. Ah yes squash, it’s good to be back playing after a few weeks off. I even booked the hot weather especially to try and make it more challenging for my opponent. How did it go? Well, lets just say... I’m bewildered, confused and shattered.

East European Retro

This morning I get the bus into work and gain first hand experience of Derby’s new bus station. I suppose you have to expect teething problems but it took us fifteen minutes from arriving at our usual dropping off point in Derby to getting to the bus station though all the lights/traffic and then queuing to park in the bay. Hope these are problems they can iron out or else it’s going to play havoc with the Red Arrow’s desire to always be early and where will they stack up all the Red Arrows when they arrive in pairs. Sometimes they even arrive in threes and when they up the frequency to every ten minutes, as they intend to, it could be in fours.



The bus station itself is a bit cramped inside but might be better when (if) it gets finished. Not that they seem to be even working on it any more. Rumour is there’s no rush as they can’t fill the shop and business units that will come with it.



Architecturally, it’s a wonderful piece of 1960's East European retro, in the style so favoured by the dictators of that era. Just what Derby needs; more grey metalwork and cladding. You half expect to see someone painting over the sign saying ‘Stasi’ and painting ‘Bus Station’ over the top.

There’s no dog training tonight, so the dogs get a run on the park which is now open until a staggeringly late 7.30 where it rains on us, of course.

Whilst I’m out I miss the fun as Leeds and Reading Festival tickets go on sale. Probably wise. I leave Daughter sat at the computer with her eyes and fingers on several ticket websites. I almost say ‘make sure you buy the right ones’ but I think to myself, don’t be stupid, she’s almost an adult, she knows what she’s doing...

Then half way around the park it dawns on me that she may be an adult but she’s still female (no offence) and she has recently gone pure Essex girl bleach blonde... but I’m sure she knows what she’s doing...

So it comes as no great surprise when I get back to find out that she has got a bit over excited and now is the proud owner of not only a ticket for the Leeds Festival but one for Reading too. It might be a tad difficult to keep her eye on so many stages, given certainly fairly obvious logistically problems.

She wonders why I’m not annoyed... you kind of get used to little setbacks like this after sixteen years. So if anyone wants a Reading ticket, click on the email link above.