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Jun. 16th, 2007 10:54 pmGosport Carnival day. A few weeks ago I'd had the idea of trying to flog some of the poetry books at the Carnival, giving the Gosporteers all the proceeds; eventually I approached the Gosporteers with the proposal, and they agreed. Thus it was that at 7.45 this morning Ken called in his vintage car to give me a lift to Walpole Park. No sooner had we arrived than Ken tried to get me to join the Gosporteers, as he has been for months.
Lynne, the carnival organiser, had given him the 8 am time for me to show up, but when we got there I was among the very first arrivals. There was a full two hours of people coming and setting up before anything started to happen. For a little while during that waiting time, Dot the nonagenarian fundraiser engaged me in conversation, mostly about her family, and I popped over to the Gosport Amateur Operatic Society's stall to have a quick look and say hello to their people.
I was allowed to share a tent with Ken's wife Beryl who had a stall with various second-hand oddments for sale plus a lucky dip. Before proceedings began, Ken brought up the issue of whether I'd join the Gosporteers again, but never mentioned it after. They asked me if I'd look after the game where there are 100 keys in a box, and one of them opens the safe with a tenner in it.
It was just as well that they did, as that gave me something to keep me busy all day, since the poetry books attracted next to no interest :( Things got off to a tricky start, when a bunch of five boys didn't seem to understand the concept of only taking the number of goes you'd paid for, and kept on taking more keys out of the box and trying them in the lock. After they'd had about ten free goes between them, and were starting to get lairy, I simply shut the box and took it down from the table. I half expected some aggravation, but they just went away cursing.
We had a lot of rain on and off during the day; fortunately I'd brought my raincoat and we were in any case under cover of the tent. Ken, on one of his periodic visits to our tent, asked if I'd brought anything to eat. I confessed no; I'd thought the whole thing would be finishing at 2 pm - it was only on the way there this morning that I'd found out we wouldn't get away until about 4.30. So he and Beryl invited me to join them going to Burger King at lunch time.
We had a sandwich (in their case a Chicken Royale each, in my case a Whopper) and a coffee each. Ken spent nearly the whole time in BK waxing lyrical to me about what a wonderful lady he thinks my mother is. While we were there, we saw it absolutely pelt down with rain outside. By the time we left, after nearly an hour, it had blown over, prompting Beryl to comment that the two people who were filling in for us would think we'd waited for the rain to stop before emerging.
All day, I sold a grand total of one poetry book. That was to a Gosporteer named Jennifer, a wonderful lady I'd met at their Christmas dinner last year. In fact, Julia came over and dropped off the nine books she hadn't managed to sell from the twenty my mother had given her last month, so I went home with eight more books than I came out with (and the cover of one got soaked with rain during my lunch break). Julia did give me the £11 she'd raised from the books she did sell, but the Gosporteers wouldn't see that; the deal on those books was that the money would go to my mother's adopted charities from last year.
ExCrush's sister is doing another year as Carnival Queen. I contrived to pass by her a couple of times, but she either didn't notice or didn't recognise me.
During the final hour, a boy who looked like the mini-me of Kemal from BB6, only with vivid red and black face paint, became crazed by the thought of winning the tenner on the safe game. He kept sorting through the keys trying to find ones that looked likely to be the winner, and constantly pleaded with me to "tell me which make the key is" or "please let me have a free go" (when I gently explained to him that he was not acting in the spirit of the game, he claimed "I'm entitled to privileges, I've got a bad leg, a bad knee, a bad head" and pretended to keel over). I came to groan inwardly whenever he approached my table YET again for more of the same and eventually said things like "Can I borrow the safe?" and "I'll bust the safe open", and tapped a plastic cup against the safe saying he was looking for pressure points. Several kids during the last hour enthusiastically played the game, and pestered parents for money for more goes. There was one friendly little lass I really liked; twice during her five goes I could see her hand was touching or very near the winning key, and in my head I silently urged her to pick it, but she never did :( In the end nobody won the tenner, much to the delight of Roy, the Gosporteer who'd donated it and now got it back.
When I'd packed my stuff away I saw ExCrush's sister standing quite near so went over and said hello. Cindy, the Gosporteers' chairman, thanked me for helping out and gave me two boxes of Cadbury's Fingers that Sid had packed but they hadn't eaten. "You can eat them during Britain's Got Talent," Beryl quipped (she'd initiated a conversation about BGT while we'd been on the stalls). In fact, I'm doing OK with my 'eat less, especially chocolate goodies' regime lately so I'll take the Fingers in to work for the nibbles table on Thursday.
Ken dropped me home; when I'd dumped my stuff I walked up for The News. Bad news on the sports pages - half of Hawks' first team look set to leave the club this summer in search of higher wages, and Ian Baird was quoted saying when it comes to any new signings, the Hawks budget just can't compete with several bigger-spending clubs. Looks like a season of struggle ahead. I put the paper down, groaning, and wearily went to water the plants.
I voted for Crew 82, a genuinely original and talented act, in BGT tonight, but they didn't make the top three. I had a sinking feeling that 6-year-old Connie was going to win, as the act that performed last had won both previous semis, and so it proved. Was she really better than Tony? Hmm. None of my own favourites from any of the semis got through. If I vote for anyone tomorrow, it will be Paul the opera singer. Not that I'm a fan of opera but I do think he's the best performer of the final six.
Thank goodness for Tiswas Reunited, on straight after. Nothing like a jolly bit of nostalgia for a TV show you loved when you were a kid for lifting the spirits, especially when Sally James is involved - she is STILL a goddess. I just wished they'd nixed the pretence that they were going to finally disclose the Phantom Flan Flinger's identity, only for the removal of his mask to reveal...another identical mask, followed by Chris announcing 'we'll unmask him in another 25 years' time'. I do remember reading in 1994 that the Phantom has never revealed his real identity, but can't recall whether there were legal reasons for that, or if he simply prefers it that way. Either way, that was a gag that just didn't work. And, alas, none of the ad breaks was heralded with "Telly Selly Time!" Apart from that, though, top programme.
Lynne, the carnival organiser, had given him the 8 am time for me to show up, but when we got there I was among the very first arrivals. There was a full two hours of people coming and setting up before anything started to happen. For a little while during that waiting time, Dot the nonagenarian fundraiser engaged me in conversation, mostly about her family, and I popped over to the Gosport Amateur Operatic Society's stall to have a quick look and say hello to their people.
I was allowed to share a tent with Ken's wife Beryl who had a stall with various second-hand oddments for sale plus a lucky dip. Before proceedings began, Ken brought up the issue of whether I'd join the Gosporteers again, but never mentioned it after. They asked me if I'd look after the game where there are 100 keys in a box, and one of them opens the safe with a tenner in it.
It was just as well that they did, as that gave me something to keep me busy all day, since the poetry books attracted next to no interest :( Things got off to a tricky start, when a bunch of five boys didn't seem to understand the concept of only taking the number of goes you'd paid for, and kept on taking more keys out of the box and trying them in the lock. After they'd had about ten free goes between them, and were starting to get lairy, I simply shut the box and took it down from the table. I half expected some aggravation, but they just went away cursing.
We had a lot of rain on and off during the day; fortunately I'd brought my raincoat and we were in any case under cover of the tent. Ken, on one of his periodic visits to our tent, asked if I'd brought anything to eat. I confessed no; I'd thought the whole thing would be finishing at 2 pm - it was only on the way there this morning that I'd found out we wouldn't get away until about 4.30. So he and Beryl invited me to join them going to Burger King at lunch time.
We had a sandwich (in their case a Chicken Royale each, in my case a Whopper) and a coffee each. Ken spent nearly the whole time in BK waxing lyrical to me about what a wonderful lady he thinks my mother is. While we were there, we saw it absolutely pelt down with rain outside. By the time we left, after nearly an hour, it had blown over, prompting Beryl to comment that the two people who were filling in for us would think we'd waited for the rain to stop before emerging.
All day, I sold a grand total of one poetry book. That was to a Gosporteer named Jennifer, a wonderful lady I'd met at their Christmas dinner last year. In fact, Julia came over and dropped off the nine books she hadn't managed to sell from the twenty my mother had given her last month, so I went home with eight more books than I came out with (and the cover of one got soaked with rain during my lunch break). Julia did give me the £11 she'd raised from the books she did sell, but the Gosporteers wouldn't see that; the deal on those books was that the money would go to my mother's adopted charities from last year.
ExCrush's sister is doing another year as Carnival Queen. I contrived to pass by her a couple of times, but she either didn't notice or didn't recognise me.
During the final hour, a boy who looked like the mini-me of Kemal from BB6, only with vivid red and black face paint, became crazed by the thought of winning the tenner on the safe game. He kept sorting through the keys trying to find ones that looked likely to be the winner, and constantly pleaded with me to "tell me which make the key is" or "please let me have a free go" (when I gently explained to him that he was not acting in the spirit of the game, he claimed "I'm entitled to privileges, I've got a bad leg, a bad knee, a bad head" and pretended to keel over). I came to groan inwardly whenever he approached my table YET again for more of the same and eventually said things like "Can I borrow the safe?" and "I'll bust the safe open", and tapped a plastic cup against the safe saying he was looking for pressure points. Several kids during the last hour enthusiastically played the game, and pestered parents for money for more goes. There was one friendly little lass I really liked; twice during her five goes I could see her hand was touching or very near the winning key, and in my head I silently urged her to pick it, but she never did :( In the end nobody won the tenner, much to the delight of Roy, the Gosporteer who'd donated it and now got it back.
When I'd packed my stuff away I saw ExCrush's sister standing quite near so went over and said hello. Cindy, the Gosporteers' chairman, thanked me for helping out and gave me two boxes of Cadbury's Fingers that Sid had packed but they hadn't eaten. "You can eat them during Britain's Got Talent," Beryl quipped (she'd initiated a conversation about BGT while we'd been on the stalls). In fact, I'm doing OK with my 'eat less, especially chocolate goodies' regime lately so I'll take the Fingers in to work for the nibbles table on Thursday.
Ken dropped me home; when I'd dumped my stuff I walked up for The News. Bad news on the sports pages - half of Hawks' first team look set to leave the club this summer in search of higher wages, and Ian Baird was quoted saying when it comes to any new signings, the Hawks budget just can't compete with several bigger-spending clubs. Looks like a season of struggle ahead. I put the paper down, groaning, and wearily went to water the plants.
I voted for Crew 82, a genuinely original and talented act, in BGT tonight, but they didn't make the top three. I had a sinking feeling that 6-year-old Connie was going to win, as the act that performed last had won both previous semis, and so it proved. Was she really better than Tony? Hmm. None of my own favourites from any of the semis got through. If I vote for anyone tomorrow, it will be Paul the opera singer. Not that I'm a fan of opera but I do think he's the best performer of the final six.
Thank goodness for Tiswas Reunited, on straight after. Nothing like a jolly bit of nostalgia for a TV show you loved when you were a kid for lifting the spirits, especially when Sally James is involved - she is STILL a goddess. I just wished they'd nixed the pretence that they were going to finally disclose the Phantom Flan Flinger's identity, only for the removal of his mask to reveal...another identical mask, followed by Chris announcing 'we'll unmask him in another 25 years' time'. I do remember reading in 1994 that the Phantom has never revealed his real identity, but can't recall whether there were legal reasons for that, or if he simply prefers it that way. Either way, that was a gag that just didn't work. And, alas, none of the ad breaks was heralded with "Telly Selly Time!" Apart from that, though, top programme.
