Out and about, we were. Pete has always maintained that a chap needs only three pairs of footwear – Docs for every day, black lace ups for formal and decent walking boots. He simply doesn’t understand the need for shoes, although thankfully does not attempt to limit my collection.
However, on Saturday he was muttering about “not having any light footwear for warm weather”, so we sallied forth to Hornsea Freeport, a rather posh name for a collection of outlet shops. Sandalish items were purchased,, with the assistance of the emergency fifty pound note; this was given to Pete years ago as remuneration for going to a focus group at Colston Hall, and has sat in a drawer in my office ever since as an emergency fund. Read on to see why we needed it this weekend.
We also bought him a pair of flipflops, something I have been trying to persuade him to do for years. He’d never tried them, and doesn’t like them, but these were in his favourite shade of green, and only a fiver, so he said he’d give them a go. He wore them to nip (or pop) to the CoOp, and is now undecided as to whether they are the spawn of the devil, or the best thing after bare feet. Time will tell.
From there, we drove down the coast, stopping at a beach or two, until we arrived at Burton Constable Hall and Gardens, a house of completely barking decor and Things, with a lovely park and lakes. Remarkably good value at £6 a head, we went round the house, and then a longish walk around the lakes. Most enjoyable. It’s part of the Historic Houses Association, which we shall be joining; we’ve let our National Trust membership lapse, as they don’t have much in this area, where HHA has quite a few houses.
Saturday evening was Doctor Who, The Beiderbecke Affair, sausage baguette and tea.
On Sunday, we’d planned to take the bikes over to Holderness and do some exploring, but a) it was far too hot, and b) I have pulled a muscle in my chest, and it’s remarkably painful. So instead, we went and did the Paull Heritage Trail (which is actually just a walk of about 3 miles around Paull, but very nice nonetheless), and then had lunch at the Royal Oak – blue cheese burger. I had a pint of mild beer which knocked me out completely, so I slept for most of afternoon when we got home. The rest of the day was just slumping, really, because it was just Too Hot.
The preceding week has been a bit meh; I lost my wallet on Tuesday – I had it when I walked into Tesco Express, and it was nicked from my bag by the time I got to the checkout. I never have liked Tesco. So we cancelled bank and credit cards, walked over to the swimming pool to get a new card, drove over to Ennerdale to get a new gym card, realised I couldn’t get a replacement driving licence because I had no cards, phoned the insurance company (who never have phoned me back – bunch of shysters), reported it to the police.
On Wednesday morning someone phoned, who had picked the purse up on Beverley Road! £55 in cash gone, of course, but everything else intact. We whizzed over to North Hull to collect it, and they wouldn’t take a penny for their trouble, so that was nice. Phoned the police again, phoned the bank but too late to cancel the cancellation, so we were without cards for the weekend. We cashed a cheque (how quaint) on Sunday, but it didn’t cover Pete’s newly discovered shoe buying habit, hence the break out of the emergency £50.
Then on Thursday, we heard that Pete’s mother had died. I never knew Lea, as she had succumbed to dementia just as Pete and I got together, and I only met her once, after she had gone to live in a nursing home. She hasn’t recognised Pete for years, and he had said goodbye to the woman she was a long time ago, but it’s still a shock when it happens. We’re just waiting to hear now about funeral arrangements.
We took a nice round trip, making a walk of just under five miles in all, in weather so hot and humid we were practically steaming! I bought a gel saddle in a bike shop on Anlaby Road, where they had an extraordinarily stylish men’s bicycle with cream tyres, a leather saddle and a wooden rear carrier – really quite splendid. If only I’d had the sense to make a note of its manufacturer, I could share it with you.
