An Hour In Ambleside

I know I went quiet for a bit there! But a lot was going on in March, so here's the first of a few articles to let you know what was happening.

We'll start with the second week in March which saw us heading up into the Lake District for a day with Gill and Grace to celebrate Fran's birthday. We stopped off for a quick coffee at Lakeland in Windermere before heading up the side of the lake to Ambleside.

The weather was being very kind for March - not warm, but very sunny. We left the pram in the car and Grace walked, stepping out very proudly with Mum holding onto her reins for safety. She must have been exhausted with all the walking we did but I only had to pick her up once when she decided it had just got too much as we were about to cross the road. The cars stopped, the green man lit up and Grace sat down...

So we went into the Apple Pie Bakery for some lunch and a rest and the prospect of a proper glass with a straw had her wide awake and ready for something to munch. I had a sausage and egg on a brown barm and I'll be back for another as soon as I can! Absolutely yummy!

The Apple Pie Bakery is the first shop you come to walking into town once past Ambleside's most famous sight...

...which is The Bridge House, a tiny two storey building built over the River Stock. Fran went to look round the pottery shop and came back with another little cottage to add to the sprawling conurbation that her collection has grown into. Happy Birthday Miss Franny!

Return to Lake District and Cumbria Index

Holidays on Blackpool Beach

I've delved into the big plastic box that contains Miss Franny's life secrets from before she met me... I've selected a couple from the late 1950s or early 60s, that show her on holiday with her parents and brother, Bob. Sorry about this Bob... I'm sure Mary might possibly have a good laugh though...

Fran thinks both of the photos may be of Blackpool. It was a regular holiday destination from Rochdale - I know because my parents did the same thing with my brother and I.

Even if we had a week in Great Yarmouth, we nearly always had a few days in Blackpool aswell.

We think this is Blackpool because you wouldn't be able to make sand pies like that in Great Yarmouth!

Bob and Peggy (on the right), Fran's parents, would go with an extended family group to Blackpool and would choose the same spot on the beach so that if any children wandered off or any adults wanted to spend some time doing their own thing, it was easy even well before mobile phones were thought of, to find the family again. Well... relatively easy. The beach, as you can see, used to be pretty tightly packed with deck chairs! Mobile phones! Ha! At the time of this photo you were "posh" if you had a telephone in the house!

The preferred spot was just south of the Central Pier. Here I presume Bob is taking the photo and young Bob, then known as "Rob" has joined his mother and sister. Ice cream has been secured by the looks of things!

Return to Blackpool Promenade and Beach Index Page

Miss Franny Leads the Way!

The delectable, ever-sexy and kind-hearted Miss Franny (I think I got in all the things she told me to...) was in the local newspaper last night.

No, she hadn't created a rumpus in the chippy or been dragged off by the police for staggering around the village centre, swearing and swigging lager from cans, throwing her empties at passers-by, although it can only be a matter of time...

Instead she was shown displaying a number of alternatives to plastic bags as Blackpool has "declared war" on plastic carrier bags. A shame the photographer failed to spot that she was holding one of them upside down, but not to worry!

In the battle against plastic the weapons on display include cardboard bottle carriers, hessian bags and ... er... plastic carriers... Oh! They are the re-usable type Miss Franny assures me. Would it not be easier if shops just bought paper bags like we had in the 50s and 60s and like in modern day America?

And why has nobody the guts to declare war on the real bane of every shopper whether bothered about being green or not - the blister pack!!! You need a pneumatic drill to open those things and they are always several feet long and wide even to hold a toothpick! Put a tax on the suppliers and manufacturers and importers though - not on the public who don't have a choice... Or just ban the bloody things! I'd be quite happy to buy my razor in a carboard box or even a paper bag!

A Cold Day by the Canal

I've reverted to black and white. I have loads of black and white negatives and as I came to the end of scanning a file of colour negs I thought I'd have a change and whittle a few out of the black and white collection.

These go back to a cold day in November 1978 when we had gone visiting Fran's parents and took her mother out for a ride in the car. We ended up at Marple in Cheshire where I wanted to take some photos of the canal. The canals of England have a special interest and affection in the hearts of fishermen, walkers, countryside lovers and boating enthusiasts these days but their original purpose was to provide a quick method of transporting goods during the Industrial Revolution. As towns turned into larger cities not only was there need to move goods out of the city, but food and raw materials needed to be brought into the cities.

The canals changed the shape and nature of the country. Not only was England now criss-crossed by canals but it had to cope with large numbers of immigrants who had come into the country as cheap labour to help dig the canals - which of course, in those days meant digging with spades. You can imagine the freedom of movement it opened up. Journeys that took days over rough ground, bumping along over rutted roads on the unsympathetic springs of a stagecoach could now be taken in the comfort of a barge travelling over the calm smoothness of water.

Some innovative ways were thought up to solve some of the problems. Here the canal comes to a T-junction. The tow path - for horses towing a barge on a long rope - approaches the junction on the right but the horse of any barge wanting to turn left needs to cross the canal. If the horse were to cross a bridge and then carry on in the same direction the rope would pass over the bridge whilst the barge needed to pass under. So the path over the bridge was built into a spiral so that the horse could cross the canal and then pass under the bridge with the barge in tow without the rope getting snarled. The building of the canals was an undoubted engineering marvel. Yet within less than a lifespan, they were obsolete. As steam power was discovered, the coming of the railways meant that the movement of goods in bulk soon became possible by rail and the canals were already in decline.

Here from that same day and canal path are Fran and Gillian, who was just 19 months old!

Return to Curiosities: Buildings and Infrastructure Index Page

Gone To The Birds

Poor Fran. She had a bit of a testing day yesterday whilst I was "enjoying" myself in London for work.

Every year around this time we have a couple of weeks where birds nest in next door's roof space and raise their young. So for a fortnight we are woken early and there's nothing we can do about it but wait for the birds - thrushes I think, certainly not an owl - to rear their young and then they fly off and all goes quiet.

Anyway this year they have managed to get in our own roof space on the back corner and Fran was woken and was thinking the noise was louder than usual when Jess, one of our two cats, appeared from the hallway at the kitchen door with a bird in his mouth.

Cue screams, during which a very disappointed cat suddenly realised he wasn't going to be applauded for being clever and went to hide the evidence, reappearing a moment later with empty mouth and an expression that said "You just imagined it,Mum! Me? Catch a bird?"

Our cats are house cats - they don't go out, so the bird must have got in somehow. No windows were open. The attic hatch was closed... Fran phoned me to let off a few hysterics. Well, shock more than hysterics. Then she went off to search the house looking for the tiny bird that was certainly going to be terrified and possibly injured too. Jess, by now, was sitting quietly on the settee, ears flattened, waiting to be shouted at...

The bird was found in the toilet, cowering behind the toilet brush. Fran gathered it up and took it outside where it managed to fly off. All was well until later when she had sat down in the living room with a coffee to settle her nerves when TWEET!... from somewhere in the living room.

The cats politely raised their heads but were not going to budge after all the fuss of before. Two birds had managed to get in. The one from the toilet had been a second one and the one that Jess had managed to catch was now in the corner on the floor under my desk. So Fran had to get on hands and knees under the desk, banging her head as she jumped each time the bird fluttered anywhere near her.

She caught this one as well, in a tupperware box, took it outside, opened the box and watched in dismay as it took a brave leap - into the fishpond... The box was used to scoop it out and she put it somewhere as safe as she could to let it dry off and recover.

When I got home last night all the drama was finished with. I suspect the birds have nested on top of the wall of the house and the two small ones had fallen down the wall cavity and forced their way through a vent in the toilet which has a loose corner.

After the initial shock had worn off, Fran had been really brave and level headed about it. Not sure I'd have been any calmer actually!

Large versions of the photos: owl, ostritch (no large one of the vulture available) The owl and ostritch were photographed at Blackpool Zoo, the vulture at Chester Zoo.

Dinner Party

Great night last night. We hosted a dinner party to celebrate Fran's birthday which falls within the week.

We had Gill and Eddie, Mum and our great friends David and Jeannie.

The table had to be dismantled and taken into the front room to fit us all round it but it was well worth the effort!

Fran and Jeannie had decided (in advance I hasten to say) to be twins for the night and we had a very laughter-filled night with a brilliant meal - starters: chicken liver pate with toast, onion relish, green salad and cherry tomatoes or melon with summer fruits coulis or prawn cocktail. main course: chicken marinated in white wine with a white wine and cream sauce with choices of potatoes au gratin, boiled new potatoes, cubed roasted potatoes with green bits on (fancy names?!? what do you want fancy names for?) and a choice of veg with sliced carrots, asparagus spears, peas and mixed cauliflower and broccoli. Sweets were mandarin orange cheesecake, chocolate gateaux or an assortment of cheese and biscuits and we finished with coffee and mints. All complimented with pink cava, chardonnet, or decanted merlot - hey, can be good with chicken if you're not that fussed!

Me and my little girl!

Photos courtesy of David the click monster, great hilarity ensued when he announced in a shocked tone that the camera's storage card was full... It did already have a fair number of photos stored when he started. But even then it was after 100 photos of the night...

Creeping Bentgrass Gig

Last night we played a gig for Garstang Light Opera Group's annual fund-raiser out at Claughton.

We had a great night there, with lots of comments about how tight we sounded as a band and how we get better each year.

Someone even went as far as to say he'd never heard me play a bad note and his guitar teacher had told him he had a good ear for music. Well, I suspect he wasn't listening closely enough - anyone who can get through a full night without at least one bum note is either a superb musician - or just isn't drinking enough...

No... before I get in trouble with the others, I should point out that we tend not to drink alcohol very much on a gig. Shandy is about the most virulent substance to pass our lips and once on stage, water is the staple diet!

Anyway, we had a number of new songs since we last played for GLOG - Kenny Rogers' The Gambler, Creed's Have You Ever Seen The Rain, Quo's Rocking All Over The World, Smokie's Living Next Door To Alice - hey you, keep those lyrics clean! - The Shadow's Foot Tapper, The Ronnettes Be My Baby, The Dave Clark Five's Glad All Over, The Beach Boys' Then I Kissed Her, The Bee Gees Words, The Turtles Happy Together, Billy Fury's A Thousand Stars...

It was a great night. Oh... and Fran got completely squiffy... She had us posing for a photo for ages whilst she kept pressing the on-off button...!

Large Versons of the Photos: on stage, posed photo

The Golden Age of Rock 'n' Roll

This tidy up lark's not all bad is it? By which I suppose I mean it's not always all that effective either...

I found these...

A set of six triple CDs with some great early rock 'n' roll music on them. Yes ok, I already had much of it but there were some gems I've had to stop tidying up to listen to and then I had to rip them to the PC so the CDs can go back up in the attic (which at least stops them cluttering up the spare room a bit).

How do we acquire so much stuff???

And how does a week fly past so quick? I mean - it's Thursday already! All I've done is tidy up, rehash the website, realise how few of the lost websites I can find the original photos of to scan them larger (film huh?), go into town, upgrade my phone (still same number for those who know what it is), take Fran looking for a craft shop in Preston (small - hardly worth the trip), watch DVDs (Kingdom of Heaven, Sing As We Go, That'll Be The Day, Stardust), take Fran to work (heh!), taken Fran to lunch, plan to meet Alex and Jackie for lunch in Liverpool...

I don't feel so bad after reading Jackie's email which goes along similar lines to my own experience. She writes:

"Mr W is off on hols this week and we've been having a de clutter fortnight instead of a holiday---- -great... So far I've only suceeded in moving clutter around and forming new attachments to it, much to Mr W's dismay."

I can relate to that...

AA Telephone Box 487

It's Fran's birthday today!

To celebrate I took a day off work in lieu of working on Saturday and took her on a day out.

We went to look at this magnificent antique AA telephone box. Now before anyone takes a dim view and starts thinking of berating me, I should point out that not only is it rare these days but it is an icon of Britain's motoring past. Any birthday girl should be proud to have been taken to view it. When I was a lad there were many of these telephone boxes. They could only be opened by AA members (that's the Automobile Association, by the way, not Alcoholics Anonymous) who were issued with a special key that fitted all the telephone boxes. It meant that in the days before mobile telephones any driver who suffered a breakdown in a remote area would have to walk no more than, say, fifty miles or so before being able to call for rescue!

This box seems to have been fitted with a non-standard lock. Had I still carried my AA key about with me I could have tried it out, but:

1) I threw it away years ago
2) The lock definitely looks to take a large Chubb type key
3) After all the rains we've had the ground around it was boggy and waterlogged to a depth of several inches
4) I wasn't technically broken down

Anyway, Fran really enjoyed her trip out to see the telephone box, although I was a bit disgruntled when she stayed in the car and only got out when we stopped in places like Keswick and Kendal in the Lake District. Even then, she insisted on looking at boring things like shops, instead of searching for old telephone boxes. Women... just not easily understood...

Return to Lake District and Cumbria Index

Trials and Tribulations

We've gained a new backing singer!

David's wife Jeannie joins us for a bit of help on the chorus of Be My Baby. Which is a good thing because my falsetto is not was it used to be...

We were round at our house last night for another run through of the new stuff and to see if we can revive a couple of numbers that have fallen by the wayside a bit. A good time was had by all, helped by Fran's cubed chicken in white wine and garlic which was just a bit yummy!

At the same time though we've had a gig called off this weekend so are going to console ourselves with a trip out to Frankie & Bennie's!

Toy Record Player

We had a short run out to Bygone Times, an old mill converted to an antiques centre with three warehouses filled with assorted old stuff of all sizes. Bygone Times, in bygone times, was bigger and probably better.

A lot of the fun stuff, that they knew would never sell but was there to bring people in, has disappeared and it is now just like any other antiques warehouse. If you like antiques though it's still a great place to go but I used to enjoy all the huge model aircraft, the old pinball machines totally beyond any attempts at restoration and the old architectural antiques - bar fittings, dentist chairs and so on, that used to litter the place to great effect!

We were walking around and Fran said "Oh there's a record player for you there!" It was a "toy" 78rpm record player and whilst I resisted purchasing it did make me reflect that ever since CD players came out there has been no such thing as a toy record player or any other sort of music playing equipment. There were toy cassette players that were aimed at children but these days with iPods and MP3 players which are so small anyway, there's no point in producing them just for kids.

I think there was a Barbie recently with an MP3 player built in but all kids have a mobile phone these days and they can play music now. It's not the same is it? What's the last kid's song you can remember? They are few and far between now aren't they? Vic Reeve's Shaun the Sheep theme tune may have been the latest but before that? Where's Max Bygraves when you need him?

Return to Record Players Index Page

Return to Toys Index Page

The Drifters at Sainsburys

Fran works as a supervisor at our local Sainsburys and seldom comes home with tales of superstars dropping in for a packet of washing powder.

In July though (we've only just got the photo) the Drifters were appearing in Blackpool and (complete with guitar) dropped in to see Anne who was a big fan and who was retiring from the store.

Fran managed to get an autograph and has promised to try to get our band, Creeping Bentgrass, a high-profile gig at Sainsburys...

Bygone Blackpool

Here's a photo from our own family collection of a Blackpool guest house with all its visitors from 14 August 1958.

In those days photographers used to visit the hotels but then got everyone to congregate at the front of the hotel and took just the one photograph so you could remember who you liked, got on with and hated from the week!

Here is my wife, Fran (with the hand pointing at her) held by her mother Peggy and with brother Bob standing next to her. Her father, also Bob, is in the centre of the back row in the very dark pullover.

Return to Blackpool Attractions Index Page

The George Formby Grill

Couldn't resist this...

Fran's been fancying one of those "healthy" grill gadgets promoted by ex boxer George Foreman.

What she actually said was, "I'd like one of those George Formby grills..."

You can just picture the Wigan Warbler pulling a steak out of the grill and saying "Eeh! Turned out nice again!"

No George... oven gloves, not boxing gloves...

Wedding Day Arrives

Gill's wedding day dawns and as I face the prospect of being a father-in-law (Eddie is a solicitor after all), I thought it could be a time to remind myself of the day Fran and I married in March 1976.



Only six of the people pictured above, apart from Fran and myself will be at today's wedding, although I'm sure several of them will be gathered somewhere looking on!

Fran was twenty minutes late - long enough for the vicar to clap me on the shoulder and say "I don't think she's coming, lad...!" Though he knew she would because a few rellies had turned up from the house muttering about hems becoming unstitched and frantic repair work going on.

Ours was an older church with a fascinating legend of a were-rabbit haunting the churchyard. Gill's church is small and modern but with a nice "feel" to it, if you know what I mean. St Nicholas Owen was a carpenter in the 1580s who, at his own cost, travelled all over the country, building secret hiding places for catholic priests in houses. Catholicism at the time was being suppressed under the rule of Elizabeth I; a catholic priest who had been ordained abroad could expect torture and death as a traitor, if found.

That was Nicholas Owen's own fate in the end. He was arrested in 1606 and tortured on the rack for 6 hours at a time day after day until he died under torture.

And on that cheery note, we are getting ready for the day! Fran and Gill are upstairs, with tubes of make-up being batted or carried off by the cats, who know something is "going on" and are both highly excited! We were given some extra flowers by the florist and Tigger has claimed and chewed those as her own...

I'm standing by ready to rush Fran off to the hairdresser. Gill is having hers done here. I'm having the usual spit and polish...

Happy Birthday Mum

Mum had a birthday yesterday and the family all went out for a meal last night to celebrate.

We went out to the Miller's Arms at Singleton and it was an excellent meal. Mum had salmon with what she said was Hollandaise sauce. It looked a bit like custard to my mind, but tasted very nice with the salmon - I had to struggle to get both Mum and the custardy salmon in the shot but never mind. It also matched her dress - in that it didn't quite cover all the pink bits - dear me, Mother, pull yourself together...!

The rest of the family seemed to spend the night desperately looking the other way whenever I picked the camera up, although Heather had the grace to at least draw a substitute face with tomato sauce on a plate to hide behind...



For the rest of the family - this is how it's done! Fran and I at ease, posing happily, no shyness, trusting to the point of stupidity..

For those who thought they had got away with it... tough!

Sunday in London

Well I got to London on time - Virgin Trains actually got in a little early although it was a long journey compared to the more usual weekday one! We went via Coventry and all round the houses it seemed.

Met up with Fran and Gill on Trafalgar Square where they were resting their feet and getting splashed by the spray from the fountain every time the wind blew their way. They didn't have a great deal of time with me as they have to get over to Stansted for their flight back. Why oh why are Ryanair stopping their Blackpool/Stansted flights? Doesn't seem to make sense, every time I've been on them they have been very nearly full and over the past few years I've used them quite a bit!

When you consider the cost of train fares if you have to book close to the date of travelling, being able to get a flight and then be in London by 10:00am was brilliant! Even considering the train to and from Stansted-Liverpool St station, it was still less than half the price of Virgin's fare.

We had a trundle up Regent Street and into the big HMV on Oxford Street where I was delighted to find at last a DVD of "Prehistoric Women", a Hammer film starring the lovely Martine Beswick as a queen of a tribe of women stumbled upon by Michael Latimer. I've met Martine several times over the last few years, she was a Miss Jamaica, a stunning beauty in the 1960s (and not at all hard on the eyes now!) who starred in several of Hammer's films and a couple of Bond films; "From Russia With Love" as a fighting gypsy girl and "Thunderball" as one of Bond's doomed helpers! Anyway, I've never watched this film before so I will enjoy that once I get home again!

A relaxing night in store I think - chance to finish my book, the 10th in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. And yes... I did bring No.11 with me!