Island Paradise

Now to business, right away. The destination for last weeks little venture was the olde English stately home called Tatton Park. Buried in the Cheshire countryside just past Mere, the house offers the whole Pride and Prejudice view of everyday life 200 years ago, if you were really rich and looked quite similar to a horse. We went on Easter weekend and that is always a mistake wherever you go on Easter weekend in this country. I don’t know why so many people go out on a bank holiday weekend compared to a normal weekend. Is it because it is out of the realms of reason to think that you could actually go on a day trip on any day? What makes Easter Sunday different to any Sunday? But there you go, that is the way it works, and who are we to question the age-old unwritten by-laws of this land.

Due to the festivities, the park was packed with like minded people, and we shuffled around the place in droves looking at the signs for the Tuck Shop, the Restaurant, the Stable yard, the Farm, the House, the Country Garden Shop, the Gift Shop, the Garden Furniture shop, and the McDonalds. Well, the last one was made up, but still you get my meaning. There was about as much connection to our historic past as when Portsmouth put up the Spinnaker Tower to reflect a glorious shipping heritage.

The whole feel of the place was one of mass marketing. Normally, the English take things the other way and keep it quaint and small, and probably go out of business. But this is probably the future, as the controllers look to America to see how it’s done and make as much money as possible from each natural resource. The particular thing that gave me the hump from the beginning was, after joining the National Trust to get free parking at these types of places, having to pay £4.50 for parking because the grounds are run by the council, not the trust. Surely that is what my taxes are for, heaven knows I pay enough of them.

In summary, I strongly recommend that this could be one of the most disappointing places ever to visit in the UK, and it would be more fulfilling to sit at home and stick pins in my eyes than to even contemplate going to Tatton Park again.

We also had to leave in a hurry because Sophie was in pain due to a water infection, this involved Claire going to the hospital with her but luckily they both came home later that night.

We are in the land of my fathers this weekend, sunny Southampton, and so we thought that we would take the opportunity of going abroad. So, yesterday we travelled to the Isle of Wight and the kids first ever trip overseas. Okay, it doesn’t include passports, visas or jabs, but still a boat trip and a holiday feeling.

The Isle of Wight is a lovely place where even though it is so close to the mainland it has a completely different feel about it. The way of life seems so much more relaxed, and especially out of season, the people tend to just potter around. Coming into Cowes yesterday reminded me of the way that you enter Sodermalm in Stockholm, as the buildings hang to the edge of the incline, each trying to clamber to reach a view of the sea.

The same calmness that Stockholm has, because of the water surrounding it, is felt on the Island. You instantly relax and this may be for two reasons that were noticeable yesterday. Firstly, the quiet is deafening. There are not many cars there and so that normal level of noise pollution is absent. All that is left is the rolling of the waves and the odd seagull looking in vain for some discarded fish and chips. The second difference that we noticed was the trust that was on display. There was a milk float at the side of the road, fully laden, unattended for a long time, and no one would even dream of doing a Bob Geldof. There were doors left open, and signs in shops saying “Back at 3.45”. It all adds to create a nice atmosphere. Imagine doing a bank job on the Island, and then having to wait an hour because you’ve just missed the ferry. It’s a little bit more expensive over there, but sadly isn’t that the case now for a level of niceness.

So, 10/10 for the Isle of Wight, it just sits there and says “come over and enjoy me, take me as I am, I’m not changing for anyone”.

Natural Born Swimmers

As another cold front came over from Scandinavia this week, March became colder than January and February. Could this be as a result of Global Warming, or just a cold March? We will never know. It snowed last night and there is still an enchanting feeling when you wake up and see a familiar vista covered in white.

I wonder if the same feeling is experienced in a place where snow is more common. I wonder if the Eskimos would feel the same if they woke up and saw rolling fields of green, and a sun high up over everything. The ice hole that they had once used for fishing had now become a babbling brook meandering through the landscape on its way to the estuary. They would probably be too concerned with the fact that their house had become a puddle around them, and the reason that they had woken up so early was the fact that they were wet and their possessions (some furry boots, a furry hat, a stick with a spike on the end, and a 1973 edition of The Kayak Annual) were floating around them.

I think it probably best on that scientific evidence to leave the meteorology to the experts and to just plough on (get it) with the rest of this blog. But as a last point on the matter, if this Global Warming thing does take off and is as successful as people are predicting, then it will be commonplace to see young Inuit’s washing up on Mediterranean beaches in nothing but furry Speedos. I hope that the G8 Summit have planned for this catastrophe, but I’m sure Bono will be all over it. Praise the Lord for St. Bono. But I have just realised that this would be horrendous as it is an anagram of Nob Tos.

Anyway, I have digressed far from my chosen path. The introduction and enlightenment of the kids first ever swim. We have waited for a year, due to one reason or another, and the most practical point is that Claire cannot hold them both up at the same time. I was off work for a couple of days, and we seized the opportunity much like our ancestors would have seized lunch.

We rang to check on Wednesday morning that Stockport Pool was open for small people, and after confirmation via a recorded message, we set off with this destination in mind. On an aside, have you ever considered how ahead of his time Stephen Hawkings is? 20 years ago he started talking like a Speak and Spell, and now he has influenced probably 50% of all telephone calls and rising. How long before people begin to speak in this way to each other, face to face? It will save energy if you can pre-record conversations that you are going to have with people, and for teachers, they could record lessons from the National Curriculum, and then finally the Government will be able to control minds. Hawkings is a prophet in biblical proportions, and like 1984, this fictional material is becoming a reality. Watch out.

So we set off for Stockport Pool, only to get there and not be able to park anywhere within a midget tossing distance of the place. So we turned on our heels and headed for Cheadle Baths. A smaller, private leisure centre type affair but we had incredibly timed it perfectly with a Tots session, which was just about to begin. Claire and I thought this might be a bit too much, you know, an instructor on the kids first ever visit to a Pool. I’m all for encouraging them but this sounded a bit too “Pushy Parent” for us. But considering that we had driven around all morning I was reluctant to then go home without tasting even a morsel of concentrated Chlorine.

I took Dylan and Claire took Sophie, and we met on the other side of the footbath transformed. It always reminds me of an episode of Mr. Benn, where you leave someone dressed quite normally and then see them again in a couple of minutes as if you were on a beach, busy pinning things to your person. I quickly noticed that I was the only Dad there, which instantly made me feel a little awkward. Once this would have been a dream of mine, but now everything was so much different. We slowly walked into the little pool with them, and showing their breeding, they both absolutely loved it. Claire and I were both keen swimmers in our former years, and so any offspring should really have some kind of attraction for weird acoustics and chemistry lab smells.

We have a little inflatable chair that we put Dylan’s legs in, and he enjoyed the kicking around under the water, like an over excited duck. Claire then tried to get him out of it, and to her surprise, she had found that he was stuck. After some struggle, which in water is always harder than if on terra firma, we finally managed to free the boy from the boat. Which then instigated uncontrollable laughter from Claire, which made others in the pool turn around and stare in our direction. She told me that his nappy was still on under his new baby Speedos, which at first I did not realise was the reason for the humour, until I then looked at it and realised that it had blown up like a bike tyre. How was I to know that you weren’t meant to take a disposable nappy into the pool? After a bit of thought I probably should have worked it out, but there you go, that’s life.

I then had to perform the walk of shame, carrying Dylan out of the pool, past all of the other Mums, back into the changing room. Only to then appear again a minute later with a leaner, meaner version of Jamie Oliver in trunks. After that it was plain sailing, and the instructor was not from the Dave Heathcote School of instructors, but more just a co-ordinator that sang some songs and we all stood in a circle around her. Very nice.

But now another milestone has flashed before us, and equally important is that it happened without any real major incident. Tick.

Last week, Claire did not have her pick of day trips because of a birthday party that we had to attend for one of our friends, but today we are going to go to somewhere mysterious. Like I said before it has snowed so it should be great where ever we go. I know you will all be on the edge of your seats, so hold tight and I will update you next week.

One more point of interest is that Dylan has made his first ever card from Nursery. A lovely rabbit, which looks as though, it has been hopping around close to Chernobyl. But it is the first present that we have received from either one of them, and this made me feel very proud.

Grand Tudor Design

The inevitable anti-climax of the birthday week has finally passed and we have now resumed normal service. Sophie has had a few episodes, and Dylan has a cold that seems like it has come from the very depths of Siberia, but with this aside we appear to be winning. So much so, that I am writing this from about 20,000ft above the North Sea on a Swedish adventure that has actually gone ahead as planned.

Similar suits surround me, reflecting the type of person that I might become if I don't do something about it. These trips are great for my own personal ambition of getting out of this life and doing something else that fits me better. Although something has just amused me, a soulless face asked the Air Steward," is there a choice?" when asked if they would like the meal. He clearly meant if there was a choice between Beef or Chicken, or something, but the Air Steward just replied, “It is either Yes, or No.” This amused me because the guy’s reaction didn’t even change; he just nodded his head and took the Beef.

Anyway, on Sunday we decided to travel to the oldest Timber-framed, moated country house in Britain, Little Moreton Hall. I thought that it would take about half an hour to get there, so I kept it a mystery to Claire whilst hilariously pretending that we were going to approximately 50 other venues along the way. Although Claire didn’t rise to any of these pretences, I thought they kept getting funnier and funnier. Eventually, it even tried my patience and when we finally turned up after an hour I started thinking, “this better be worth it.”

But surprisingly, it was beautiful. It stood alone as a quite humble, Tudor house amongst green fields and farm buildings. It was exceptionally uncomplicated around it and presented the property with a certain amount of reverence. It was built 500 years ago at the time that Elizabeth I was being crowned, and boasted one of the first examples of bay windows. There was intricate glass windows everywhere that must have given the house an amazing brightness inside compared to other houses of the era, much like the modern houses made with walls of glass. The Tudors were on it, even if they didn’t have the technology at the time.

We tried to go on a tour of the house, until Sophie thought that she clearly knew more than the guide from the National Trust and after a number of frustrated looks round from the audience, we thought it best to wander around on our own. But this allowed us to get in to the coffee shop that was actually in the house. A strange experience, having a spotted dick with custard in a room that is half a millennium old, and still being able to pay by card at the end. It makes you wander about the events that have taken place in that room alone.

This house was being built, as an example of new architecture, at the time that Shakespeare was writing Romeo and Juliet. Isn’t that incredible. We take for granted the amount of history that we have in this country compared to other places. Of course the anorak types, the National Trust lifers that seem to permeate all of these buildings, surrounded it. But I think these buildings are cool. They offer a glimpse through another life, and considering Cinemas are crammed with people experiencing that 2nd or 3rd hand, you would think that these places could be given a promotional push to a different market.

Sweden should be a few degrees colder than the UK, but pretty close. I am going to take the opportunity of visiting where I used to live and meeting up with a friend that I met when I was there. These trips are always a conflict for me between looking forward to the freedom that they offer, but conversed with the guilt I feel of leaving Claire with the kids and the anxiety that something will happen while I am away. But I did just read a quote that said, “ that this day will always be ‘twenty years ago’ one day.” It all passes. These are just moments added up together in some random fashion. And a bright one will eclipse a dark moment, because that is the way.

The First of Many

As a wise old Chinese man once said, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” This can be equally said for a lifetime of many years beginning with one year, and what a year it has been.

It was a year ago last week that we were rushed in to the emergency caesarean situation at Stepping Hill Hospital after receiving the news that Sophie, or Twin 2, had stopped growing in the womb. From that first initial shock, through the exceptional anxiety of the first two weeks, through the 3 months that we then spent in hospital every day watching Sophie grow as much as she could, through the scares that we have continually had since she has been at home (and also one scare with Dylan), and the ongoing struggle to give each of them the support that they need – I think that it is safe to say that Claire and I have changed infinitely.

I almost class myself as naïve and carefree a year ago compared to the man that I have now become. I know that through the tests that have come our way I can cope with most things that life can throw at me, and this has given me a sense of invincibility. It has helped me to put life into perspective and understand what’s important, and what really isn’t. Southampton struggling in the Championship is still wrangling with me, but it is under control and pigeonholed in the slightly irritating box.

Life is something to be grasped at immediately, because you never know what is coming up, and the biggest tragedy of it all is if you do nothing. If you give something a go and it doesn’t come off, then at least you’ve tried.

Anyway, after the year that we have had we thought it would be nice to have some friends round to the house to celebrate their first birthday, and the future. But in true neo-Holley style it all went pear-shaped and we had to tell 40 people that it was off due to Claire feeling as rough as some heavy-duty sandpaper. So in the end the celebration was kept low-key, with just a couple of friends coming over to have a cake.

But we did manage to get out on their actual birthday, which was on Thursday, and we travelled to Chester to the Blue Planet. Unfortunately this was not a museum for Pornographic material, or a tribute to Blue Peter, but an Aquarium. It had one of those tunnels that you walk through and can see Sharks willies and stingray mouths. But the kids loved it they were looking wide-eyed at the fish probably thinking that we had taken them to, literally, another planet. It must be quite astonishing to experience fish for the first time, no-one ever knows what that feels like because by the time we become adults we have erased all of this memory. But imagine trying to work it out in simple terms. They’re in the bath but they don’t come out for air, they don’t have any arms or legs but they still move, and strangest of all, they live in a television set. Crazy.

So we blew their minds for an hour or so, and then came back to reality. But it was a really nice day.

This gave Claire and I the catalyst for another one of our ideas. We would try and have as many day trips as we could in order to visit places around where we live that we have never been to before. The rules are that every Sunday one of us picks the destination and we then take off and explore. Only conditions are that one of us has not been there before, and we have to go where the other person wants. There is no negotiation.

Then, in a Bill Bryson manner, I will report on the trip in the following Blog entry, reviewing all aspects of the place and giving any funny anecdotes that have occurred whilst on the journey. This will provide the reader with a better insight into the beautiful world of the Northwest, and also stop being bored so much with your heroes’ incessant philosophical rubbish that ends up being written each time in the absence of any real content. So, today is the first day of this new plan, and as I won the toss in a strict ECB rules flip, I will decide the first destination. Now, as usual, it is raining in Manchester, so I must come up with somewhere that will not dampen our spirits as much as it dampens our clothes. (Brilliant)

Little Moreton Hall is the venue for the first day trip. It was built in the 15th Century, and is apparently the best example of a timber-framed moated country house in Britain. How can we possibly never have been there before? How can anyone be expected to carry on living without seeing the best example of a timber-framed moated country house in Britain?