All Aboooaaaaaard!

Suddenly this past two days all of Borchester is bathed in sunshine. It feels as though summer might actually be going to put in a somewhat tardy appearance, just on time for the annual Famille Jeste pilgrimage to the land of King Mark. Yes indeed, brothers and sisters, despite having been already absent from this desk for two weeks during what has till now been somewhat ironically termed the “Summer Holidays”, we have yet to travel more than 30 miles from home (saving one very soggy excursion to Legoland—the only Theme Park in Blighty the cadet branch of the family will tolerate, and none the worse for that…).

So this morning, in anticipation of this fact, I have been to the train station in Borchester to book my train ticket for tomorrow morning. You see our travels are to be a two stage process this year through the vagaries of cat care. The advance party leaves by car, well our Big Red Bus actually, this afternoon whilst I am still slaving over a hot surgery. I shall return to an empty nest tonight, ready to crate up our two untamed panthers (well they think they are, and who am I to disabuse them…) ready for their hol’s at the cattery, and having deposited them at same first thing tomorrow morning,* I shall be making my way south to join the remainder of the family on the train.

This weekend, as well as being the first truly sunny weekend in living memory, is a Bank Holiday weekend here, and the last gasp of the school summer holidays, so all of England will be on the move. Indeed form the look of the station first thing, the diaspora has already begun. I pulled up on the concourse to be greeted by a scene from the “Golden Age”. Long-nosed Tourers with vast sweeping wheel arches and running boards a yard wide were dropping off ladies in billowy dresses and improbable hats. Small boys in sailor suits, and girls in pinafores darted up and down the platforms to a clatter of marbles falling from pockets and hoops being batted along with sticks. Blue uniformed porters huffed along behind two wheeled trolleys piled high with hampers and trunks. Then I realized I had turned up at the Severn Valley Railway station by mistake and went next door to the “proper” one.

I even managed to book a ticket on the train I wanted, at the time I wanted, and be in and out of the station inside five minutes (leaving plenty of time to sit and ramble before surgery gets going as you can see). So whilst I am away for the week, once again I donate this space to you gentle readers to comment as you will, and also, this year, to set a hare running.

In a comment on the previous post the charming Orchidea has asked me to write on how it feels being a “Harbinger” where there is bad news to be imparted. I intend to give this some thought over the week and to post a reply soon after. So is there anything else you “always wanted to know about GPs but were too afraid to ask” ? **

Oh, and whilst I'm away would you all mind keeping an eye on Jest Acres for me, the Green Recycling Bin needs to go out on Thursday if it's not too much trouble, and there's a wee bit of milk left in the fridge if you want a coffee or anything...

Much obliged.


* I should probably have pointed out that I won’t be crating them up until it is time to go to the cattery, and not leaving them boxed up all night as my appalling sentence construction might have implied.

** with an affectionate (as in please don’t sue me) nod to the genius of Woody Allen.