Bad Call

A bit of trek today up to Arley Hall, Northwich for this weekend’s dog show entertainment. It’s very muddy underfoot but at least it’s not raining. Getting on the paddy field that doubles as the car park was a bit of an event, as I’m sure getting off it again will be.

Meanwhile L stays local and does one of the many Wollaton Park 10k’s, in one hour and two tenths of a second. Oh dear, how frustrating. She’s not happy.

We’re not happy either. In his first run MD has pole 16 of 19 down. He also broke his ‘wait’ but somehow we got away with that and made it around to the fourth last. So not bad really but not good enough.

His second run however, a qualifier, was just embarrassing. He should apologise to Doggo as that was the main reason we chose this dog show, where there is no Veterans class for Doggo as opposed to another show elsewhere where there would have been. Our third run is less embarrassing but still not worth mentioning. Time to take our training back to the basics I think.

We’re all done before lunch. So we head home whilst there’s still some grass on the car park.

We drop in on my folks, as its Father’s Day tomorrow and also to get my Dad to wear the boys out, so that L and I can go out on the town tonight while they sleep.

We go to the Ropewalk for tea, where my meal choice is off and so too by association is L’s, as she picks the same as me. Bad call. They twice try to serve me the wrong beer and on the second occasion succeed, so it’s a rare bad night in there. We move across the road to the Borlase and the Everard’s Original.



We’re well settled until the barman tells us the gas has gone. On a handpull? Really? I think he just wanted to go home early. So back across the road to the Hand & Heart for one for the road.

(Saturday 16th June)

Rewriting The Pre-Race Manual

I finish work at lunchtime so that we can get an early start to get up to the Lakes. We wouldn’t normally bother leaving before 6pm but they’ve installed barriers at the camp site to keep the late arriving riff raff out. So I thought we best get there before 9pm. Which is the time when the razor wire is rolled out and the watch towers become manned.

I head home via Sainsburys for some pre-race bananas. Then I pack. As I check my emails at the same time one pops into my inbox from L asking whether I’ve been out training for the April Madness 10k with Motor Mouth yet, it was formerly the Wiggle 10k but we’ve renamed it. Erm, not yet. I had mentioned I might start training with him today. I can see that L doesn’t think I’ll do it, does she?

I have the usual problems getting him started. E.g. a lot of lead biting but then we’re off. His nose in the air looking for trouble as we head onto the park. I choose to go on the park, purely to maximise distractions. Which was ok, until we met a distraction. He had a quick lurch at the first dog we met but that was all. The second one warranted a bark and a lurch, at which point we momentarily lost focus and went back to the lead biting. We stopped, had a team meeting, discussed strategy, decided who was boss (I think) and then carried on with focus returned. So it went well. We only ran about 2k but it’s a start.

Then I load all the gear (and the dogs) in the car and head off to collect L. We arrive at Great Langdale to discover the barriers are still not in operation, so we needn’t have rushed. This also, unfortunately, gives us extra time in the Hikers Bar of The Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel. Where L insists on following her usual three halves of beer pre-race strategy. Unfortunately they appear to be serving the beer in out-sized half pint glasses tonight, which to the untrained eye might look like pints and it's doubly unfortunate that the beer is 5.6% Old Peculiar.



After the three, there’s the one for the road, which is the narrow lane we have to walk down to the camp site, it’s a long way, 200 yards perhaps. So three and a half out-sized halves of Old Peculiar then. L's rewriting the pre-race manual here.

I like her style but I’m far more sensible and water down my Old Peculiar down with a Cumberland Ale. Which is cunning of the highest order I believe but we’ll see who has had the best strategy tomorrow.

(Friday 15th April)