Driving in to work has become a lottery.
It used to take around 30 minutes in rush hour. If I left 15 minutes earlier it could be as little as 20 minutes (although that didn't happen often!).
Then something happened to the traffic - I think it may have been due to the reduction in Humber Bridge tolls. There must be more people working on the other side of the Bridge to that where they live, now they can afford the crossing.
Be that as it may, the end result is that I can no longer predict the journey time. Usually it's more like 40 minutes, so I leave a bit earlier but it doesn't make any difference to the length of the trip. Some days take longer.
Like today.
I left around 15 minutes ahead of the deadline, but never really got above 40 miles per hour. The speed limits most of the way are 50 or 60, but someone in the queue ahead wanted to drive at 40. Well, although that's a bit irritating, I wasn't in a hurry so I pootled along in the queue.
Then we got to a stretch of 30 mph limit. What did the car ahead do? Carried on at 40 - or more - it just disappeared into the distance.
Now I don't know about you, but I find that REALLY irritating. Almost as bad as the fools who sit on my bumper when I observe the 30mph speed limit, then just before the end of speed limit sign they suddenly spot a clear patch and zoom past me. Seems to irritate them when I catch up shortly after.
Is it me (as the sainted Terry Wogan used to ask), or are the latter fools almost always young and usually men? What is so difficult about observing speed limits? They're there for a reason.
Perhaps it's because they are young, male and driving a big car, and the woman in the small car ahead has silver hair and they don't like being behind me.
I have been thoroughly "brassed" this weekend!
Friday night was the first event of Barton's Ted Lewis Jazz Festival, starring Snake Davis and the Steve Walker Milestones. I've heard Snake play lots of times, and he's an amazing saxophonist in lots of genres, so I was very pleased to be asked to help out as staff - I could hear the music without paying!
Steve Walker and Snake Davis
The great Snake Davis himself 
As it turned out, I certainly did, but I've paid for it - didn't get to bed till midnight, which as a Grumpy Old Woman is a bit of a shock.The music was great though, and the festival stocked Jack Carter Ale - a special brew by Tom Wood breweries, and definitely one of the best brews I've tasted.
On Saturday there was just time to get a little shopping in, before we staff turned up for the second day of the festival. Julie Edwards Quartet was followed by Ron Burnett's Mardi Gras Band. Again, I've heard Julie and her friends play on several occasions, and I love their sound. I hadn't heard Ron Burnett play before, and I wouldn't normally like that kind of jazz, but they were lovely guys and very professional. Ron Burnett played in Ted Lewis' Unity Jazz Band, and they had a guest trombonist, Alan Dickinson, who also played with Ted.
My role as staff was basically serving in the cafe area. We were serving locally made food - meat pies from a local butcher and vegetarian chilli bean casserole, made by my cheffy husband. I couldn't object to being thrown out of the kitchen when he makes food like that! Everyone seemed to enjoy it, especially many of the band members, which was nice.
The evening kicked off with the Wendy Kirkland Quartet with Pat Sprakes and finished with Will Robinson’s Southside New Orleans Band. Will had been around for much of the day, listening to the other bands. He was a very nice bloke and it was a shame that Barton couldn't give him as big an audience as earlier in the weekend. I wasn't much help, because after being around all weekend I didn't have the energy to clap! However, we enjoyed the music and after helping everyone cart their equipment down the stairs, we staggered home for another late night.
Sunday's brass came from the Remembrance Day events. As a Town Councillor, I was on the march to the Cenotaph, remembrance service there, then back to the church for the church service. The Salvation Army and Barton Town Band members provided the musical accompaniment, and it was very moving to see all the young people - army cadets, St John Ambulance cadets, scouts and guides of all ages, and many others who had just come with their families. There must have been around 400 people at the cenotaph, which is wonderful. My family was lucky and we didn't lose anyone in the Great Wars, but some of the previous generation fought and they are now all dead, so it is a good opportunity to remember them all.
To round off the weekend, I've just got home after undertaking the Ted Lewis Walk - a guided tour around Barton, explaining the sites with links to Ted himself. If you haven't heard of Ted, he wrote the book which became "Get Carter" when the movie industry found it. Michael Caine played Carter in a film where the locations were moved from Scunthorpe to Newcastle. The final scene, which should have been on the Humber Bank according to Ted's book, was on a beach in the northeast, but the film has apparently lost little of Ted's style. I haven't yet had time to read it, but I'm looking forward to doing so. Ted sounds to have been a pretty charismatic lad, and his friends still remember him with affection. He died young, which is a great sadness.
So - a weekend in the life of a Grumpy Old Woman! If any of my colleagues are reading this, don't expect too much next week ;)
Recently we have been partaking of entertainment.
I know! Not something a grumpy old woman should be doing, but there you are. We've seen storytellers, folk musicians (of a kind we wouldn't have gone to see earlier), I've even considered an evening of poetry, but I'm already booked to hear some jazz and can't do both. Who'd have thought that storytelling would be good when you're not only grown up but getting older? Yet the grown-up stories are fascinating and hold you spellbound. Try Three Voices at The Ropewalk soon - stories, folk and poetry all in one. And amazing entertainment!
This is something you never expect when you're younger. You try different kinds of music and find that actually it's very enjoyable. I would never in the past have thought of going to see Morris dancers, but they are a restful kind of entertainment, which you can walk into and out of if you find it's not for you, and nobody minds. We stayed for a while in Lincoln a few weeks ago, where there was a competition going on. We hadn't realised it was happening, but it was fun to see the different styles. Who knew that there are modern Morris dancers dressed in Goth outfits? Very alternative! And lady Morris dancers with big sticks!
We got into the folk because of Bellowhead, who we first saw on TV one Christmas and thought 'what on earth is that?!' Then we got into the music, and now they're heading towards their last performance so we've tried them out in smaller versions like John Spiers on his own, and Faustus. It's foot-tapping music you can dance to, or it's quiet ballads, and it's not that 'thump, thump, thump' stuff that blasts out of young men's cars, although it can still be pretty loud.
Next weekend is the Ted Lewis Jazz Festival in Barton on Humber. Ted Lewis was a young man from Barton who dabbled in art and wrote books. His pictures are displayed occasionally around Barton, but he is famous for one of the books he wrote, which became the movie "Get Carter" starring Michael Caine. The book was actually set in Scunthorpe and Barton, but as they do with movies it moved, to Newcastle, I think. Nevertheless, there is a movement to celebrate Ted's work, so as he liked jazz and played in a band, the Festival is to celebrate that side of his work. There will be a specially brewed real ale available as well, courtesy of Tom Wood brewery, as well as other memorabilia.
I never used to like jazz either, but I find a fair amount of it is now to my taste. Snake Davis will be opening the Jazz Festival. What's not to like about a bit of cool sax? Lots of other acts over the next few days should provide something to most people's taste, and there's even a Brolly Parade! New Orleans Jazz in Barton - whatever next?!
