Unplaced And Underground

L heads to Beeston parkrun as Forest Rec is closed for the Goose Fair. I’m at a dog show at Catton Park.

MD goes clear first run and comes 3^rd. So it’ll be all downhill from here. Which is a pretty fair assessment as his paws don’t go anywhere near a contact are all day long but all his jumping runs have been good. We do get another clear in Jumping but we’re unplaced.

L is also ‘unplaced’ of sorts. She celebrates because she thinks she’s gone under 33 minutes, and she has, but the organisers disagree by three seconds. Clearly she was not on the front row at the start. e.g. when they start the timing. I keep telling her...

Tonight we are in the back room of the Nottingham Playhouse known as the Neville Studio for the

Underground Man. This is loosely based on the life of the Fifth Duke of Portland who lived locally at Welbeck Abbey.

It is, without doubt, an interesting tale about an eccentric recluse who has a mania for building elaborate tunnels under his house (hence the title). In the play he is followed around by an apparition of a floating boy and at one point tries to drill a hole in his own head before eventually being gunned down while roaming his estate naked on all fours.

It sounds quite a riot does it not? 

It is performed with by a cast of just two and you might figure from the synopsis that it would be a touch hard to follow and you'd be right.

Sadly a lot of it is taken up by the old man moaning about his largely imagined illnesses and the tunnels, which you would expect to be a major feature, are barely mentioned. The thing that baffles me the most though is that the reclusive Duke meets up with an impressive range of characters all played by his on stage colleague. He debates with his butler, goes caving with the vicar, has conversations with his driver and other servants, sees his local doctor and seeks out other experts for help with his ailments.All giving the impression of him being actually quite the socialite and leaving me a bit confused. 

It's all very well acted though.

(Saturday 8^th October)

Goose Fair

I continue my half marathon training by bike.

L has the day off with the boys and has the ordeal of taking them on the park for the first time this week. Which entails much sniffing and weeing to catch up on.

Interesting news in Mansfield with them planning to reopen the Mansfield Brewery. Bet they wish now that they hadn’t demolished it three years ago. It sounds like a good idea though. I don't think there's even a micro brewery in Mansfield. I was going to say what they really need to do is get the Mansfield name back from Marstons, the ones who stole it, but it appears they've already thought of that.

The vet calls with Doggo's test results. His lump was benign, just a mass of overgrowth of collagen and fatty cells. Which means little to me but it's obviously excellent news. Now who’s going to tell him he didn’t need to have the operation.

We celebrate by leaving him at home, still convalescing obviously, and going to the Goose Fair because L says she’s never been. 717 goose fairs and she’s never been? I can’t believe I’ve never taken her but I’m happy to oblige tonight. I went a few times in my younger days but it wasn’t me then, less so now.

One thing’s for sure, it’s got bigger. It now takes over the whole of the Forest Fields site and even spills over into the local streets, which didn’t used to be the case. It's actually nice, in a ‘it’s nice to have a big festival’ sort of way but it’s still not for me.

There are certainly more rides than ever before, over 500 apparently, and even more evil ones than before. Were they really swinging people around in a ball thing on a piece of elastic, fifty plus metres above the ground? Although what seems to account for most of the size increase though is the increase in food outlets from which the smell is not that appetising at all. A kind of burgered candy floss aroma prevails.

It’s also all terribly terribly expensive but this doesn’t appear to be stopping people. Recession? What recession? It stops us though, that and fear. We move on through the attractions onto Mansfield Road and the bars.

First the Forest Tavern and then the Lincolnshire Poacher where Woods Wonderful from Shropshire is accordingly wonderful and much cheaper than a ride in a bungee ball.

(Friday 7th October)