Football Finale

In the last four years my final game of the football season has involved three trips to Wembley for the FA Vase or Trophy final (and the other was watching Brazil playing in the Olympics), but last night I signed off this year by heading in the opposite direction and to the opposite end of the stadia spectrum, in the shape of the Doctor Pitt Welfare Park, Bedlington, where in the last game of the Northern League, Shildon needed to beat Bedlington Terriers to become Champions; the game was fast and furious as Shildon pressed hard, only to lose a breakaway goal, which they pulled back with twenty minutes to go but were then unable to force home the winner, handing the title to Marske United in the final twist of a very good and competitive season.

A68

With a big Northern League game at Bedlington this evening I decided to make a day of it with a trip up the A68 to Corbridge to visit the Roman Site, before cutting cross-country via the B roads to Morpeth for some tea ahead of the match, by then just down the road; and on a bright day with high clouds scudding over the north Pennines, the drive was a delight, mainly as the few trucks were all heading south leaving the road  open, with swooping hills, Roman road straights and sweeping bends, through stone built villages with gritty houses and gritty names – Toft Hill, Crook, Tow Law and Kiln Pit Hill – so at times I seemed to be in a car commercial.

Salad

As the son of a butcher my early exposure to salad was infrequent (usually when visiting a relative for afternoon tea when I would just spear a couple of hard boiled eggs) and it is only in recent years that its possibilities as a meal rather than a garnish have been appreciated, with a chicken Caesar salad (to include bacon, croutons, anchovies and parmesan shavings) now a firm favourite; I couldn’t produce one of those today but I did make a tasty lunch by adding some leftover slices of ham and pork to a mixture of lettuce, tomato and onion, topped off of course with a couple of those hard boiled eggs.

Driving Seat

Another day spent mainly sitting down, but a good part of it in the driving seat of the school minibus shuttling between A and B, or to be more accurate from A to B in the car, then back to A in the bus to pick up the kids and take them to C, back to A for a couple of hours (watching snooker) before returning to C to pick them up, back to A to drop them off, then back to B to return the bus, and finally back home to A; eight trips of eight miles, but along country roads on a bright crisp spring day, so no complaints from me.

Figure Work

Unable to exercise my bad-foot-encumbered body I instead put my brain to work on a couple of puzzles: a killer Sudoku of the highest level (four beads of sweat) proved predictably difficult but was overcome in a couple of hours, whereas compiling the household budget for 2015 (shamefully delayed) took a bit longer but happily also had a successful outcome (i.e. solvency).

Sitting

The plan today was to sit down to rest the poorly foot, not too much of a hardship with the World Championship Snooker wall to wall on the BBC, although so as to be not completely useless I did do the ironing perched upon a stool.

Hop-along

I appear to have somehow damaged my left heel such that it is painful to put any weight on that foot, which makes for an inconvenience to say the least, although with the support of a walking stick unearthed from the under-stairs cupboard I managed to get around the house, and beyond thanks to other aids such as my wife’s semi-automatic car (no clutch foot needed) and the shopping trolley at Bolams which I used like a Zimmer frame on wheels.

Moving House

We have used Freecycle a few times to successfully pass on unwanted stuff but have always found any items we coveted to have already been snapped up, but for once we were first in when a doll’s house came up yesterday, and today I was able to go and collect it – tucking it into the back of the Juke made it the easiest house move I’ve ever been involved in.

Rubbish Donation

The Great North Air Ambulance donations centre and the local tip being in close proximity enabled me to fill up the car with donations for the former and rubbish for the latter, the donations being mainly carrier bags of good quality clothing and the rubbish including a bag of waste material - filthy curtains used as dust sheets, the old ironing board cover and a few oil-rags; the first stop was the GNAA where the lady was very grateful for the significant haul, which gave me a warm glow of self-satisfaction that lasted all the way to the tip, when realised I had also left her with the bag of rags.

New Ground

Though not an avid ‘ground-hopper’, in the course of following non-league football I do like to visit new grounds, and tonight I belatedly added my first this season with a trip to Meadow Park, the Ryhope home of Sunderland RCA, which is a homely ground, little more than an enclosed playing field tucked between a modern housing development and an ancient cemetery, with minimal covered seating and standing but a friendly clubhouse supplying beer, hot drinks and hot dogs; the visitors were Shildon who need to win all three of their remaining matches to become champions, and step one was duly completed with a 4-1 win here tonight.

Rebus Resurrected

The start of the week and an important decision to make – which book to start reading – and with fifty plus unread titles on the shelf the choice was wide until I narrowed it down to a few tried, trusted and not too taxing authors producing a short list of Kate Atkinson (Started Early, Took my Dog), Mark Haddon (The Red House), Ian McEwan (Solar), Donna Tartt (The Goldfinch), and Ian Rankin (Resurrection Men); I plumped for the last one, which had quite an appropriate title as it has been a year or two since my last dip into the remarkably resilient Inspector Rebus series.

Summer Suitcase

With more clothes in our house than wardrobe and drawer space, a system has evolved known as the summer suitcase, involving an oversize piece of luggage (too big to lug on holiday) kept in the cupboard under the stairs and used to store clothes that fall into one of several categories: clothes that don’t currently fit but may again one day; old favourites now un-wearable due to changes in fashion, changes in waistline, or just wear-induced shabbiness, but kept for sentimental reasons; and seasonal wear – woolly jumpers over summer and holiday togs over winter; and because of the latter there are biannual changeover days, like today, when it was judged that winter was over and summer was on its way, and then the process escalated into a complete and ruthless wardrobe review – and a couple of big bags for the Great North Air Ambulance charity shop.

Food Festival

We made our annual trip to the Bishop Auckland Food Festival today, an enjoyable afternoon in the spring sunshine wandering through the stall of exotic, prosaic (and all shades in between) produce, and although our main focus was on cheese (five varieties bought) we also sought out the Spicy Monkey Curry man, the Tarte and Berry cake girls, and a new purveyor of cordials; lunch was a prize-winning sausage bun (or more accurately a bun over-filled with three fat tasty sausages) washed down in my case with a cask beer from the Yard of Ale Brew Company, the latter located in the Tipple Tent – a new, and popular, feature this year – and to round off the day we took our pre-booked seats in the town hall theatre for the Battle of the Bakers where three ex-competitors from the Great British Bake Off put on an entertaining show with Glen compering a mini-bake-off between Cat and Kimberley featuring fruit tarts and the inside track on the hit BBC TV show.

Food Fight

Today has been a bit of a battle with food which, through no fault of my own, has pressed itself on me all day, such that my stomach appears to have grown and grown: it is not really porridge weather any more but the box of Quaker Oats needed finishing off, so a big bowl was consumed for breakfast; at lunch time I felt I ought to eat at least some of the bacon dying in the fridge along with two aged eggs, so I combined them in a delicious (if weighty) toasted sandwich; at tea time the boy was absent so the normal three portions of chicken breast was split just two ways, in a tasty curry; added to all that was the normal Friday treats of a pork pie and a custard slice – and there will be no respite tomorrow, as it brings the Bishop Auckland Food Festival.

Toys for the Boys

The opportunities to include a bit of kinaesthetic learning in GCSE maths are limited, but today the mirror on a stick to explore line symmetry went down well, as did the Lego bricks to aid working out volumes; and as regards the latter neither of the learners (male, fifteen, cool-image-conscious and generally un-cooperative) could resist the temptation to have a ten minute play to see what else they could build – bless! 

Corporate Induction

Just over a year into my second local government career I attended my compulsory corporate induction at the Town Hall and heard all about the corporate strategy, corporate structure, corporate health & safety, corporate safeguarding, and the corporate need to save money, a point driven home by the lack of corporate refreshments during the three hour session, although the location of the corporate vending machine was pointed out to those with 50p to spare.

Meaningful Games

There were meaningful games aplenty tonight with Middlesbrough needing a win to stay in the Championship promotion race, Hartlepool needing a good result to continue their great escape from League Two relegation, and Spennymoor needing a victory to secure their play-off place in the NPL Division 1 North; my choice ended up goal-less but Spennymoor v Lancaster City (managed by ex-Premiership pros Darren Peacock and Trevor Sinclair) was competitive and entertaining enough and a point keeps the Brewers’ season alive, as does Hartlepool’s draw and Boro’s win. 

Routines Re-established

The other (human) members of the household’s return to school and college left me on my own with the cats, a state I will endure without complaint for the next five weeks, so it was a case of re-establishing my routines: clothes were washed and hung out to dry, grass was cut, pages were read, and in a novel development the gym was visited.

Completed Projects

Two important projects were completed on the final day of the Easter break: the ottoman had its lid first fitted with a lining (tacked into place using upholstery pins -never used them before) then attached to the base with cleaned up hinges and new screws, to complete a rather good up-cycled piece of furniture; somewhat later (technically Monday) the holiday jigsaw was finished after a week or so of puzzling – at least as finished as possible, there being two pieces missing, but the other 998 provided enough value to persuade me not to seek a refund from the Age UK charity shop whence it came.

Darlington 1883

The non-league football season in these parts is coming to an exciting climax, and the last few Saturdays I have been following the four way battle for the Northern League title, however the next higher league (Northern Premier League Division 1) is also boiling up with Spennymoor in the play-off places and Darlington 1883 locked in a head to head battle for automatic promotion with Salford City; so today I took in Darlo’s penultimate home game against Mossley, which was not a classic but the home team’s downwind 3-0 first half lead proved sufficient with only a penalty goal conceded in the second.

Ottoman

My wife’s new project, commenced today with typical gusto, is to up-cycle an old inherited ottoman that had been relegated to the barn for many years, by re-upholstering the lid and applying decoupage to the body; my role, treading the fine line between enthusiasm and practicality, is to advise (as always) on colour when buying paint and fabric, to remove the rusted in hinges, and to hold down padding while ensuring my fingers remain clear of her red hot staple gun.

Meals and Music

The music round at the Vane Arms quiz is a bit of a stumper with only a few bars played of each tune, and the tasty nibbles are understandably also of limited quantity, however tonight we got full helpings of both food and music as we booked for a meal on the live music night; the food was excellent (starters of Guinness & leek Welsh rarebit and home cured salmon & potato salad, mains of a trio of pork and a steak & ale pudding) and the music, featuring three separate turns, created a cosy, folk club-like ambiance, making for an enjoyable evening all round.

Shakes and Ladders

When my dad was 62 I probably told him he shouldn’t be climbing ladders, but now I’m that age I happily shin up them when necessary, like today, to remove vegetation from the gutters and give the upstairs windows and frames a good wash; however the ladders do seem to shake a bit more these days, whether due to their age, or mine, I’m not sure.

Smalls Shopping

Amid a day of retail therapy for my wife I took the opportunity to stock up on smalls, although purchasing underpants is always a trial due to the bewildering, and ever changing, choice of construction and fabrics (A front, Y front, button fly, keyhole, boxers, briefs, hipsters, cotton, jersey, elastaine) that generally drives me out of the shop, but today a process of elimination was adopted – nothing with holes in the front (more trouble than they’re worth), nothing too big (not that old yet), nothing too brief (not that young either) – and this left me with items acceptable in all aspects apart from the small woodland creatures printed thereon.

Local Derby

Joined a good Bank Holiday crowd at the King George in Guisborough for a match not only between local rivals but also featuring the top two teams in the Northern League, and in an entertaining game the home team’s early goal was eventually overhauled by Marske, closing their deficit at the top to just a couple of points with an extra game to play; the result was also good news for Shildon and North Shields who are both in with a shout providing they can win their games in hand (a big ask for the latter who also have a date at Wembley for the FA Vase final).

Wollerton

A more leisurely stroll today, around Wollerton Country Park, popular on an Easter Sunday but quiet enough around the lake, and the Hall itself wasn’t busy enabling the paintings and more curious contents – mainly dead animals (not stuffed but reconstructed apparently) – to be inspected closely; around the corner the Wollerton Pub and Kitchen provided an excellent Sunday lunch, setting us up for the drive home back up the A1.

Holme Pierrepoint

Took a stroll along the river to the Holme Pierrepoint National Watersport Centre where an alleged open day appeared to be just a day when it was open, but it was still interesting to see, including the white water facility and the two kilometre long six lane rowing course; as the stroll turned into a six mile hike we worked up quite an appetite, partly assuaged by a buffet lunch of cheese, pate, meats, bread and crackers, and finally satisfied by a good Chinese meal at The Oriental Pearl restaurant.

West Bridgford

On a dismal, drizzlely Good Friday we made our way down the A1 to the desirable Nottingham suburb of West Bridgford to spend a few days with the younger daughter and her fiance (newly upgraded from boyfriend) to catch up on their exciting developments, demanding a day by day account of their recent trip to Barcelona, a blow by blow account of the proposal, and a puddle by puddle walk in the rain to see the house they are planning to buy.

Done and Dusted

There is a three phase plan for the Easter holidays - work on the house and garden, a visit to Nottingham, and then a few days relaxation back home - and so far so good with phase one completed today, carting off the detritus of a few days gardening to the tip in six or seven blue IKEA bags, and replacing the contents of the snug, newly wiped, polished and dusted, back into their freshly painted little room.

Imperfect Porridge

The perfect bowl of porridge requires careful preparation, mixing the right proportions of oats and milk, slowly simmering to the optimal consistency until ready to serve in a bowl (previously warmed by filling with boiling water) and then topping it off with crunchy Demerara sugar and a splash of cold milk; however a novel twist this morning (not recommended) was to fail to empty the hot water from the bowl before adding the cooked porridge, although fortunately the latter floated on the former long enough to salvage an edible, if imperfect, breakfast.