Hit Me with Your Best Shot

Today I am the WAG as L attempts the Grimsthorpe Castle Sportive whilst I hold her coat and the collies. I did this one last year so it’s her turn really and I also wish to rest my injuries ahead of the mere 100 miles required by next week’s Great Nottinghamshire Bike Ride.

I’m not the only male WAG (or HAB, which I assume is the correct term), one lass is telling her other half that she’ll be a long time, a very very long time. Where have I heard that before? They’re all the same these girls.

She adds that she’s going to be that long that she’d go to the pub if she was he. I bet she wouldn’t actually but there you go mate she’s giving you carte blanche.

L is actually on the 40k route, a mere blast, and before long she’s texting to say she’s almost done. So the dogs I head to the finish to cheer her in.

We celebrate later in town with a couple of Tucks in the Falcon before me meet Daughter off the coach because bizarrely there is no late train back to Sheffield. She is town because of Stacee Jaxx. Yep we’re off to see the Arsenal, its Rock of Ages tonight.

Rock of Ages is, of course, several dozen US rock anthems from the 1980s strung together end to end in search of a plot. There are the songs you know from the likes of Journey, Whitesnake, Extreme, Bon Jovi, Pat Benatar, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts etc along with the ones you probably don't remember or have tried really hard to forget from the likes of Night Ranger, Styx, Warrant, Quarterflash and Asia. Back in the 80’s we’d been largely successfully in keeping these acts a fair sized ocean away from our shores but now here they all, Trojan horsing their way in thirty years on. 

The songs themselves flow in quick succession from a real live band up on stage and are generally performed well from a cast who are clearly well up for it. The music that is but then again... If the music is from a time we thought we’d forgot then so too are some of the sexual morals. It’s a long time since I've seen so many barely clothed breasts and bottoms up on a theatre stage and that’s just the men. The way some of the men are manhandling their near naked female co-stars makes me fear for the court cases in thirty years’ time when the moral high ground has shifted even further than it has now.

The tale itself, such that is, is about sweet Sherrie, a girl dreaming of movie stardom, who meets Drew, a boy dreaming of rock music stardom. They end up sweeping floors/serving drinks together at the downtrodden Bourbon Bar, what we’d call a venue on the ‘toilet circuit’. He has, naturally, been waiting for a girl like her and she ditto. Cue Foreigner duet. If they get really serious they’ll be branching out into REO Speedwagon next. OMG.

Then Stacee Jaxx turns up with his curiously named band Arsenal to play a farewell gig at the Bourdon and Sherrie’s head is turned. Consequently she spends the rest of the first act either wrapped around Jaxx or around a pole in her new job at the local strip joint.

There’s also a side story of a German geezer who wants to concrete over the whole strip (that’s American for street) but that isn’t going to happen because they built this city on rock and roll you know.

It’s nothing but a good time. A pleasant and enjoyable evening, naked flesh apart naturally and despite the shows unhealthy reliance on slightly obscure Twisted Sister songs. Afterwards I head home for the England v Italy game while L accompanies Daughter to her bus.

The match produces England’s best performance in years but still they lose, although they are very unlucky to do so.

(Saturday 14^th June)

Out To Tender

MD has obviously seen the half marathon training plan that L has left on the worktop and is gradually increasing the pace of their morning walk. Well, perhaps actually not that gradually and that’s just a warm up before she runs into work.  

L asks if I can take her to see West Side Story AND Rock of Ages in the SAME year. Blimey, two musicals, she’ll be asking for new boots next. Oh, she already has done. I’m happy to take her of course but I do mention that I wouldn’t feel offered if she offered it out to tender to other likely companions first.

I run myself this evening, part of the way home and L walks the boys up to meet me. For me, anything that reduces the distance is welcome. For her, it’s less a case of wanting to see me and more a case of getting out of a ball chucking session in the garden. MD, of course, will expect both. 

(Friday 21^st March)

The Inquisition

I’m back at work today but first I’m at the local Medical Centre for a health check. They wrote to me a few weeks ago implying that now I’m old they’d like to check that I’m still breathing, so I take them up on their offer.

As the nurse sticks a needle in my arm I warn her that I might faint as she draws blood. She just cackles manically and tells me to look away. Somehow I survive that ordeal although now my arm feels completely dead, so it’s a good job I wasn't on the bike.

The rest goes smoothly - height, weight, waist measurement, blood pressure etc and then comes the inquisition. Personally I thought she was a bit harsh on the alcohol units front because she insisted that all pints of beer were 5% alcohol and therefore 3 units each. If only! Clearly not a beer drinker.

She also didn't believe that I did three hours walking a week, on top of the three hours cycling I'd already confessed to, as well as the three hours ‘sport’ e.g. my running / swimming / squash. Three was actually the top box of the five she had, so I couldn’t give her the real figure and she hadn't even got a box for dog training. I did score a big fat zero in the hoovering box though and I was surprised she hadn’t got a sex box, as I thought that was supposed to be good exercise too. Certainly more so than hoovering.

They will send me the results in the post apparently and may call me in for a 'chat' or more tests if deemed necessary e.g. they’ll probably crucify me over the lack of hoovering.

After a morning at work, I then drive to Sainsburys. Big mistake, its total hell on four wheels again. It took nearly an hour to get there and back, and I only went for a sandwich.

Then after work I do a solid half hour of lengths in the pool, despite the numb arm.

Back home we do our usual Friday night in, only with Daughter and L’s brother as guests. I still cook the usual Thai Red Curry but we do scale back the romance. Instead I am subjected to Rock of Ages which as you probably know is a musical rom-com. It actually features some good fun acting performances particularly from Alec Baldwin and Tom Cruise who is superb.

Unfortunately it features the cast covering all those American soft rock power ballads that you had forgotten that you used to sing in the shower during your youth before you knew any better. I think it’s a parody but I’m not absolutely sure.

(Friday 27^th December)