The Futureheads

The last time I saw the Futureheads was six years ago at the Rescue Rooms, so I’m curious about why we’re at Rock City tonight. It’s only about half full, with the balcony closed and just one bar open. I hope they got a good deal. 

There are two support bands with the opening slot given over to a local band each night. Tonight, it is Nottingham’s Cucamaras who self-describe as ‘post-something’. Sadly, I am too late to catch anything but their last song which sound great with it’s fuzzy riffs and post-something-ness. Damn, I should have got her earlier.  

Then there’s a very quick turnaround before we get Du Blonde which is the stage name of Beth Houghton. She’s from Newcastle Upon Tyne so I hope she gets on with our Sunderland based headliners. 

Houghton is no solo artist and is fronting a six-piece band tonight with some seriously strange outfits going on.  

 

A mix of a bit of glam and a bit of ‘what I just got up in’ but never mind what they look like just feel the music. Which is a decent poppy guitar fare that they certainly put their heart and soul into. I shall try not to insult them by comparing them to Echobelly from the 90s. 

Rock City has now filled up a bit with middle-aged folk like me as the Futureheads take to the most minimalist stage setup I’ve ever seen. I mean who needs gadgets, gimmicks and fancy backdrops. All they need is their guitars and a drumkit. 

Then we’re into the first chant-along of the night with the ‘The Beginning of the Twist’. 

The band have the already converted crowd in the palm of their hands as they quickly rattle through ‘Struck Dumb’, ‘Decent Days and Nights’, ‘Radio Heart’ and ‘Meantime’ barely taking breath. 

The set is largely a nostalgia trip as you would expect as there’s only been one new album in the last thirteen years. This was ‘Powers’ in 2019 from which we get just the one track ‘Good Night Out’. 

 

There’s a mid-set breather where the band down their instruments and go all acapella. I didn’t show much interest in ‘Rant’ the acapella album they did in 2011 but ‘Beeswing’ tonight is excellent. 

Aside for the ‘hits’ there’s plenty of banter, mostly between themselves but occasionally they involve the audience usually when over-explaining the reason behind the next song.  

 

Sadly, were all too soon at the end where the brilliant ‘Carnival Kids’ leads us to the closing ‘Hounds of Love’. They are tempted back for a three song encore before after ‘Man Ray’ that is really is out lot. 

Monotony

Perhaps it was the monotony of being dumped in the boot of the car at Sainsburys but was there really any need for the Lad to jump out of the car and attack a passing Saluki once he got home? I don’t think so. 

Monday cycling is spent behind a real live Derny motorbike and is therefore very fast and bloody hard work. 

L spends two days WFH but is then duped into going into work on Wednesday and is annoyed when her boss doesn’t show up until gone 2pm. I am out in Derby later in the Alexandra and the Viceroy where I force myself to have a milder curry as the spicier ones seem to be too much for me these days. 

L is counting down to her final PT session at JD Gym. She has two sessions this week and then two next week, then that’s it. Well, apart from the fact he’s taking the sessions online and she said she’d give that a go but I think she’s just being courteous. 

She is in Derby as usual on Thursday while on Friday I take my Dad to a hospital appointment where they think his lack of mobility could be a stroke in his lower back. They say they will book him in for a scan while making it clear there’s not likely to be a magic cure. 

On Saturday we Parkrun at Forest Rec which is my 199th. Then there’s a match at 12:30 against Millwall. I pop over to see my Dad, who isn’t going so I’m back in my usual seat, and put the match on TV for him. I then go back afterwards after Derby lose in the last minute. In the evening we’re in the Plough. 

On Sunday we do a training run at Colwick where we run the parkrun course and a bit more with the Lad, a total of 6.8k. 

(Sunday 23^rd February) 

Administrative Marathon

This week I go to cycling for the first time in a month and for the first time in a long while without my Dad. Which means I’m also without a scotch egg and a pint of Dark Drake at the Exeter afterwards. Instead, I go round to visit him and to share a bottle of beer. 

On Tuesday I’m at the match on my own as evening games are just going to be too difficult to get my Dad to. However, as I’d already swapped seats into the wheelchair spots, and can’t swap back, I watch the match against Gary Rowett’s Oxford from there. It’s 0-0 draw. 

L does an administrative marathon in Derby on Wednesday – getting a death certificate, lunch and meeting the funeral celebrant. I do dog training via a visit to my Dad. 

Friday’s away match at QPR is on Sky so I go over and watch it with my Dad. It is the first match for John Eustace, the new manager who has only been in charge for a day, and they lose 4-0. Not a great start. 

We are on the parkrun tourist trail again on Saturday and we head to Black Rocks which is between Cromford and Wirksworth. Afterwards we get breakfast in Cromford. Then it’s the Plough in the evening, of course. 

We see a film at Broadway on Sunday after getting first in Pho. The film we see is September 5. 

This is the story of the hostages taken by the Black September group at the 1972 Munich Olympics and the subsequent massacre that happened. Yet it is shown from the viewpoint of ABC TV’s sports crew, who by chance found themselves in sole charge of broadcasting the event to the world. It is a great insight to not just what happened behind the scenes but also to the technology, or lack of it, available at the time in a film that is uninhibited by the politics of the occasion. 

 

 (Sunday 16^th February)

Finally, Bolsover

I have my car booked in to the local Middleton Garage on Monday to have some new tyres and the annoying rattle it's developed fixed. Then I skip cycling again to go see how my Dad is getting on with his carers. 

Wollaton Park is locked on Tuesday morning, we have no idea why. L is at PT then has lunch with her Mum before a meeting with Co-Op Funeral Service. I’m at dog training. 

I have lunch in the Brunswick with my ex-colleague on Wednesday. They have a new offering of Steak and Stilton pie which I wash down with Cherry Stout. Very nice. L is then at yoga with Daughter. 

L keeps up her Thursday's in Derby and has lunch with her Mum just without the trip to the care home, who seem to have misplaced her Dad’s false teeth. 

After three days of trying, I finally get through to my Dad’s GP in Alvaston who claim that he’s now no longer in their area despite being with them since they relocated there in the 1980s. They do reluctantly send a doctor out to see him while telling us we need to find a new GP. I drive over to meet the doctor. 

In the evening L and I run 6.5k with the Lad, managing to get part of the run on the park before it shuts. We are still in training for the Bolsover 10k because it hasn’t happened yet after being postponed in December. It is now this Sunday.

On Friday, Derby County sack Paul Warne after eight defeats in a row. Maybe they still have time to save themselves from relegation. 

We do a new Parkrun on Saturday at Vicar Water. It’s a ‘nice’ tough course. Then I’m over at my Dad’s as usual as Derby draw 1-1 at Norwich. 

We have a rare AF Saturday night in as Sunday is at long last the Bolsover 10k for which we leave Lad at home. It’s an ok run but it’s always been a dull course which is why we’ve only done it two or three times ever although I was 3rd Lady Vet once (long story). We celebrate finally getting it done in the Plough that evening. 

(Sunday 9^th February) 

Sad Times

We return home to our ageing and ailing families. L spends Tuesday afternoon with her Dad who isn't breathing very well and doesn't seem to know anybody is there.

She is back there on Wednesday while my brother and I are meeting a Care Coordinator to discuss my Dad's care. I take the Lad with me with his tea and his dog training gear just in case we don’t get home but it doesn’t take as long as we expect. I get time to head over to pick L up from the care home and take her home before doing the A50 again to dog training. 

L spends the rest of the week, off and on, at the care home. The prognosis for her Dad is grim. Things don't get any easier when on Friday we get my Dad back from my brother. He now has bad diarrhoea because he’s been on laxatives. That’s not pleasant to deal with. 

I do manage to get my Dad to the match in a wheelchair place as Derby lose their 7th game in a row. It is there that L calls me just before kick-off time, although I can barely hear her due to the crowd noise, to tell me that her Dad has sadly passed away. 

Later that evening the whole family toast the great man in their own homes with wine or Guinness and\or a dog if they have one. 

Daughter returns home elated from her skiing trip to be greeted by the sad news but we do finally get to meet her elusive mate. We have Chinese takeaway all round to go with the toasts. 

On Sunday I drive my Dad back home where carers will now start coming to look after him. L and I then go and get slaughtered in the Plough.

(Sunday 2^nd February) 

Bucket List Experience

Super fit L runs 5k on Friday morning, I don’t. 

Daughter departs for skiing in Bulgaria which is her first ski trip in about 15 years. Then we transfer my Dad to my brother’s house and head off to the Lakes. Originally, he was supposed to come with us but clearly that’s no longer possible. We were also supposed to be having some friends staying with us but they've been called away to see his estranged brother who has been given weeks to live. 

With all the doom and gloom of the assorted health problem of family and friends we settle in our too big for the two of us cottage and head down to the Wainwrights where the Settle Plum Porter at 5.3% isn’t too bad a way to start the weekend. 

As high winds whistle around the cottage it becomes apparent that all the local Parkruns are going to be off. In fact, the nearest one to be on is in Ulveston. I offer to drive us but instead we decide to chill in bed as it would be an hour’s drive. 

We do our own run instead, running 5.8k around Chapel Stile and Elterwater followed by lunch on the go from the Co-op as Slates café is frustratingly closed. We do a walk to Skelwith and Colwith before a beer stop in the Eltermere Inn for a Bowness Bay Swan Black at 4.6%. We eat in Lanty Slees in the evening while trying their own gin and whiskey with more Swan Black. 

We repeat the same running route on Sunday but extend it down to the Sticklebarn which has now been rebranded Lanty Slee’s Langdale for breakfast which is just a breakfast roll as sadly they don’t do a full English. It’s also a shame about the name change and I’m not sure it will stick. 

Then, as it's already lunchtime, we have a lunchtime Old Peculier in the Old Dungeon Ghyll for old time’s sake. It never changes in there and they’ve had the same chap on the bar for twenty years. Then L has a bucket list experience as we get the local bus back to the cottage as it’s now raining. We are back in the Wainwrights later. 

We would normally conclude a trip to the Lakes with a visit to the Hawkshead Brewery’s brewhall in Staveley but this has now closed and the brewery has moved to Flooksburgh in the south of Cumbria. There is good news though. Some local people are in the process of buying the Jennings Brewery back off Marston’s and are going to reopen it. 

Instead, we go for breakfast at the Force Cafe in Ambleside that we didn’t know existed, down a road we didn’t know existed. Then on the way home we drop my brother’s daughter’s passport to her at Lancaster Uni.

(Monday 27^th January) 

More Paramedics

My Dad has stayed with us all weekend as it appears he has a badly bruised hip, despite not admitting to having had any falls, and can barely walk. I cancel cycling to stay in with him and I cook my apparently legendary Lasagne much to Daughter’s delight, who clears her diary for the occasion. 

On Tuesday we call 111 who take his details and promptly call us back. They refer him for an Ambulance which was supposed to take six hours to arrive but comes in less than half an hour. The paramedics take a good look at him and conclude that his hip isn’t broken, suggesting that it’s probably just that his knee problem has got worse. He’s not taken into hospital as they it’s not worth the ten hour wait in A&E for an X-Ray that probably wouldn’t tell us anything useful anyway. 

There is an evening match which I go to on my own again. Derby play well but lose 1-0 to Sunderland. 

L is in work on Wednesday and is shocked to find that they've moved office without telling her while I've got my Dad sleeping in my office while I'm trying to work. 

Despite the upbeat report from the paramedics on Tuesday, my Dad’s walking is still getting worse or rather he seems to be unable to walk at all. We now have the wheelchair from his home, the one he's been avoiding using but now has no choice. It makes a big different. Then lots of calls are made to doctors and local councils looking for care services so that he can go back home. 

(Thursday 24^th January) 

Unexpected

L starts the week not in work but in the gym and then at Derby Book Club who are meeting at the Dubrek Studios on Bridge Street after being kicked out of Quad which no longer opens during the week. I’m also in Derby for my cycling. 

L’s Mum rings at midnight to say she isn't very well and has called an ambulance but it’s going to be three hours. So L drives over but when she gets there the ambulance has beat her to it. The paramedics diagnose stomach pains and L drops her at A&E where she is until lunchtime when she is given a clean bill of health. 

I’m out on Tuesday night for a few beers in the Alexandra with my old school friend, then we’re at the Viceroy for their £20 meal deal. Meanwhile I’m not showing much interest in Derby losing on penalties at Orient in their rearranged FA Cup tie meaning they miss out on a nice payday against Manchester City in Round 4. 

L is actually in work on Wednesday but then at yoga. In between she goes on a successful Markies hunt as Sainsburys’ no longer sells them. The Lad will be so pleased when he gets home from dog training.

Thursday is L’s usual unpalatable day in Derby. 

The weather has warmed up a bit from last week and the snow hasn’t stuck around but there is still one solitary Snowman / Snowblob hanging on there on the park. Just. 

On Friday L heads to Stockport on the train for some tests for Biobank, the long-term medical study we got involved in. I drive up in the car after work. We have booked in overnight at the Duke of York pub and I meet her there. It’s a nice cheap room with no breakfast or evening meal on offer but an ample supply of Robinson’s 8.5% Old Tom Barley Wine on hand pull. That’s L's night sorted. While I opt to dilute mine with a few pints of Cumbria Way, L has hers straight. We then walk the Lad to the local chippy for tea and bring it back to our room. 

Naturally we are here not just for Biobank and the unexpected Old Tom but for Parkrun which is at Woodband. It’s a nice course, if a bit hilly e.g. downhill with a dog is not the best. It also scores highly for having a nice cafe, that does breakfast, takes dogs and has real mugs. Then we drive home. 

My dad seems to have had a fall, not that he's admitting to anything, and is not very good at all. He decides to skip the match, which he never does, and I watch Derby lose 2-0 to Watford on my own. Everyone asks about him as it’s so rare for him to miss a match. I then bring him back to Nottingham where it’s warmer, e.g. although we don't describe our heating system as 'State of the Art' like he does it was at least installed after 1970, and we can give me a decent meal. He stays over. 

L goes out for another run on Sunday morning covering 7k consisting of the parkrun course plus the distance there and back. We do a joint gym later. 

(Sunday 19^th January) 

Doing My Duty

L rings her boss on Monday morning and finds out he has no plans to turn up at work so she stays at home and joins me at Sainsbury’s. Cycling is back on as the pantomime is over but the curtains are still up making visibility difficult. It also takes a while to get there as there’s been a lot of rain overnight and the road through Thulston to my Dad's is flooded. Afterwards the Exeter is quiet and has stopped doing food by the time we arrive. It shuts totally at 9pm but we are done by then. 

L is at PT on Tuesday and then in work for the first time in three weeks. It’s nice and crisp on the park but then the weather descends into some crap snow/sleet/hail/rain. The Lad has a good night out as dog training restarts. 

On Wednesday morning it’s -5 degrees outside, so I save L from herself and from breaking something by doing an early run on the ice by throwing my body on top of hers. I feel it is my duty to protect her from such harm. She supposed to be at Wollaton Book Club this morning not in A & E. 

It stays very cold and icy all week but L manages to 7k on Friday morning. That’s heroic.   

We expect all of Saturday’s Parkruns to be iced off and they are apart from Wollaton. This means there are over 500 there. I take it easy on my comeback after my latest injury, tiptoeing around the ice and finishing in a leisurely 31 minutes. After which I am in Aston to visit my Dad where we can’t watch Derby’s FA Cup game at Leyton Orient because bizarrely it’s been scheduled at 6pm for North American TV or it was because it is then postponed due to a frozen pitch. We are in the Plough later. 

Sunday is a leisurely family stroll on the park. Yes, Daughter joins us. Then we all go for breakfast cobs at the Wollaton. 

(Sunday 12^th January) 

Customer Service

On Monday we go for a walk that was featured in a recent edition of Country Walking. We cover 10k around the Shelford and Radcliffe area mainly along the River Trent. Later Son and his wife pop over for a belated Christmas present exchange. 

On Tuesday morning we do a family gym session as Daughter joins L and I. Daughter has now joined our gym as it's closer to her new job that she starts next week. I have ordered a rollator for my Dad who is struggling with his walking and that arrives in time to present it to him on New Year’s Eve. He is over again because we are all at Mr Man’s Restaurant for a meal. He pays for us all and stays over. Daughter heads off post meal to spend New Year with her ‘mate’. 

We see in the New Year with the fireworks on the BBC News rather than with Jools, who seems to have pretty much the same line up yet again. My keg of Buttermuch is a good accompaniment to the celebrations. 

L starts 2025 with the traditional whinge about being grossly unfit despite a few weeks ago being elated with her fitness at the Sherwood Pines 10k. New Year’s Day Parkrun to the rescue. 

Initially we intend to head to Wollaton Park until we realise that they aren’t doing one. We quickly divert to Forest Rec. The Lad and I don’t run as I’m still injured from Saturday’s run. After Parkrun we take my Dad back home and visit L’s Mum. Derby lose 4-2 at Sheffield Wednesday. Then we do another family gym session with the Lad pissed off because he’s left sitting in the boot of the car in the car park. 

Everything is back to normal on Thursday. In that I’m back at work and L’s back in the Derbion in Derby. 

On Friday the allegedly ‘unfit’ L does PT, a walk with a friend, a swim, a gym session with Daughter and then another walk with me and the Lad. So not too unfit then. As for me… not only have I finished the keg of Buttermuch, I’ve also finished one of Cocoa Noel. 

Saturday is yet another Parkrun and this time we are at Wollaton, which goes ahead despite the paths being quite icy. The Lad and I spectate again as my glute is still not 100%. When we walk over, we are surprised to see a marshal stood by the Harrow Road gate. Apparently, they have yet another different winter route after the Golf Club complained that the Lime Tree Avenue route prevented them crossing on to the other side of the course. I’m not sure that’s really a valid complaint. It's not even their land. 

Derby lose 1-0 at Bristol City and then in the evening we walk to the Johnson’s Arms because the Plough’s beer range looks naff. This is our first visit to the Johnson’s in ages and they have Krubera on which is excellent but then the barmaid tells us they are closing in half an hour at 8pm. WTF. It’s a Saturday night and there’s about a dozen people in the pub, which the Plough would regard as packed. In fact more people keep arriving but this only slightly delays her plans. Clearly, she has a hot date or a hot party to go to. 

We manage to get a second drink out of her which she gives us only ten minutes to drink or she says we can have a plastic glass to drink it on our way home. This is not quite the customer service that would make us come back. 

We decamp to the nearby Boat, the larger person’s pub of choice. It’s busy but not the best for beer. We have one drink and head home for L’s pre-cooked chilli. 

Sunday is a lazy day, just a walk on the park and not much else. It’s also Daughter’s last day on Response then she starts her new job.

(Sunday 5^th January)