A (mostly) quiet day

From my window - still and beautiful!

 Monday was a lovely quiet day, with lots of unwinding time. Bingham has town status, but the centre still very much has a village vibe – an open space on which the weekly markets are held, the surrounding local shops, the Butter Cross at the centre of the town. We walked 10 minutes through little back lanes and through the church yard to reach the market place – Steve had to pick up new glasses from the opticians, I wanted something to kick my cough into submission.  There are a couple of little grocery shops, but S&G prefer to go a little further, to Lidl, to do serious grocery shopping, and Mum always preferred to go all the way to Gamston to shop at Morrisons.

Bingham Butter Cross

Sunday’s rain had largely blown away, but there was still a lot of cloud.  We stayed in for lunch;  Gill had prep to do for a training session at Samaritans and I wanted to watch Wimbledon; I’m no tennis player, but I do enjoy watching them!  Izzy wanted my attention, but is very bad about giving up her toys to play.  She’s calmed down a lot since two years ago, when she bit me! - she knows the consequence of barking behaviour, which is time out.

Cockerpoo - Izzie

Steve and I had dinner together – Gill had gone out – and then we walked around to the Butter Cross again, and up Station Road. By the time we were halfway up it, we were greeted by dance-band music; the (very good) school band from Toothill School had effectively been frozen out by the music teacher (who, I think, wanted things more classical) and they had reconstituted themselves as a community group – two-thirds youngsters, and the remaining being older more experienced players, as mentors. They already did quite a lot in the way of community engagements, and took trips to their twin city of Wallenfels in Bavaria. My niece Rachel has been involved for years and met her husband Nathan through band; Nathan is now one of those professional trumpeters who gets called in as a sub for London shows, evenings at Ronnie Scotts, gigs in Birmingham or Dublin – he really gets around!

The end of Birdland - and the end of the rehearsal!

Their son, my great-nephew (!) Zander, is 16, and a trumpeter as well – though I think he’ll keep his trumpet-playing as a sideline to whatever he decides to do.  He’s going for sciences at A-levels.

Proud Dad & Grandpa!

Anyway, we enjoyed watching their rehearsal, and then joined them and some of the other players in the pub afterwards for a quick drink, before walking home.