memories, memories, memories.

Dear Blog,

 Thank you for your concern and enquiry about how my ribs and big toe are progressing. I do think that a ‘with sympathy’ card was going over the top a little and I certainly did not appreciate the black border. Still it was the thought that counted. You left the price sticker on the back. I didn’t know that you could buy cards so cheaply these days. If Mr Osibourne finds out, he will slap a ‘special sympathy tax’ on all future sales. So how am I coping??? Three sleepless nights in the chair sat upright and counting, that’s how!! …. So brave.(Not the well-known phrase or saying my wife uses)

My mileage for the last three days has been a big fat zero with a capital ‘Z’. I certainly didn’t count the walk down the Lane litter picking as training mileage. Straining mileage perhaps. Yes. But there was no litter picked as it was too painful to reach or bend down to pick up any stray pieces of flotsam and jetsam. I did however have considerable difficulty kicking the 2p piece that had been dropped, into the grass at the Lane side. Hiding it under some earth caused me some distress but I was happy in the knowledge that it will still be there for me when my ribs and big toe have healed and I am able to reach down or bend again. I don’t think any passing walker will spot the coin. At least I hope not. If they do, I will be most disappointed. You can never tell when you will be placed in a situation where you will need a 2p piece as a matter of urgency. I have heard tell of people being a tanner short of a bob so I will be nearly prepared for such an eventuality. (NOTE:-To you Blog, that is 2.5 ‘p’s’ short of a five ‘p’ piece)

Tomorrow I shall take my kit out of hiding and wear it all day as my wife has threatened to wash it. I do not think she appreciates my present condition. Such an action would undoubtedly have dire consequences. It could push me back days on my road back to full health. The irony of my fall is that:- On Tuesday night, I had nearly finished plumbing the new washing machine in, when I went training with the promise to my dear wife that the job would be completed on the Wednesday afternoon. Of course in the morning of the said Wednesday, I had my tete a tete with the all-weather surface at the University of Warwick all-weather track. Anyone would think I fell over on purpose to hear the way my wife is ranting and raving. I told her my ribs will only take about six weeks to heal and I will finish the plumbing in of her new washing machine then. Not as if she has to wait seven weeks. Ok, I will admit that catching two buses to the nearest laundrette is a bit inconvenient, but she has her bus pass. What more does she want? She can use my garden barrow to wheel the bundle down the Lane to the bus stop; she can think of the 800m between the two buses as part of her weight training regime. AND she will have a rest while the washing is being done before she has to trek back with it. Between you and me Blog, I am a little concerned about the cost. OAPs don’t get a discount at the nearest laundrette, but they do at the one in town. I shall have to pick my moment to broach the possible change of laundrette with her. I shall take the tack that a change of scenery will be as good as a rest for her. The bonus will be that she will meet a different class of person. I am not by any means a snob, but in some of these laundrette places, the class of client is more of your lower class types. Not that there is anything wrong with them in their place, but one does have to have some standards in life. Still, if that is the sacrifice we have to make while we are washing machineless, then so be it. I am not one to complain about that sort of person. I have told my wife, however, that the first thing she must do is to be sure to change her clothes when she returns home, you can never be too careful. Of course it will add to the weight of her next load of washing, but I told her that she must regard the increase in weight as a modern form of progressive weight training. I said to her that she was lucky that it was not a growing bull that she had to lift on a daily basis; Achilles damaged his heel when he started on that lark. He was never the same athlete again after that injury. I have also been most insistent that my wife does not spend all day on this washing lark; she must remember that she will have to fit into her usual chores,  mowing the lawns, planting the potatoes, cleaning the cars, chopping the wood for the fire, emptying the cess pit and rebuilding the cowshed wall. She must acknowledge that she has quite a responsible role in our marriage now that I am laid up. No place for slackers at the homestead.  

I think I might have mentioned to you Blog, that I spend some of my time researching the History of Athletics in the Coventry Area in the Last 135 years. The 135 years is not the time I have spent; that the period of history being investigated! One of the pleasures in the history delving is the interviewing of old athletes and / or their relatives. Today I had the delightful task of entertaining six fellow club members for a couple of hours, made even more pleasant be being able to sit out in the warm sunshine.

Photograph Quiz:

Photo no. 87 (taken outside the servants’ quarters):- Take me out of the frame and the average age of the group is 90 years old. Blog, I kid you not. To look and talk to the group, you would never suspect what their respective ages were. One of the 90 year olds had driven up from Devon to Coventry!!! But which is the oldest at nearly 96 years?

                              Colin

FACT:- did you know, Blog, that Gene Pitney used to baby sit my cousin?? Blog, I kid you not.