Now back in Hastings to searing heat. Hot, hot, hot and hotter. Yes, we had a mixed weekend. More good than bad, but we had a terrible day on Friday – totally failed to get to Monmouth due to traffic chaos. Trapped on the M25 in the heat – oh what fun… When we got up there our old friend Jackie’s do was good, and it was great to catch up with old friends. Then had a nice trip to Bristol to see Anna and Gareth, did very little because it was so hot. Back here in Hastings, all social arrangements seem to be falling apart because of the heat… and then, Keir Starmer has resigned, presumably now enabling Mr Smug Burnham to swan into his job in via a ‘coronation’.
This is a photo of the sunset in Monmouth from Jackie’s beautiful garden. I wrote a bit about visiting Jackie when we went on a trip to Symond’s Yat in 2024 – here is the post about it – but will write lots more this time.
First, then, Friday. Everything started out fine. Niece Harriet came to stay – she arrived on Thursday and we left her with Digby and free access to all episodes of Rivals on telly… But then… we got down onto the M25 just too late for me to see the traffic warnings. It was stop/crawl from our junction to A22. Accident. 2 hours delay… no escape. We decided to stop at Clackets Services to see if it would clear, but it didn’t – and then couldn’t get out of the car park. Took us another hour to get out… then more traffic further up the M25, diverted onto M3… more traffic. We realised that realistically, we were not going to get to Monmouth that day without making ourselves ill with fatigue. To cut a long (and expensive) story short, we ended up at the Travelodge at the Chieveley Services on the M4 near Newbury. I booked it in desperation so had no idea what it would be like, but actually it was fine, tucked away to the side of the services in a wooded area, quiet, cool etc. Am usually a bit snobby about Travelodges so relief all round. Services wasn’t too bad either – at least it had a Pret and a M&S.
Monmouth is a nice little town, with, as I said before, some really excellent shops. I had booked us into the Kings Head, which is a Wetherspoons Hotel – had heard good things about them, and booked out of curiosity even though on principle, I disapprove of Wetherspoons. Of course we lost the money on our first night. It is an old, rambling place and much rambling and scrambling was required to get up to our room, which was tucked well away from any noisy bits – just as well, the bar stayed open until 1am!
What was it like? Hmmm – OK, nothing more than that. Our room was quite small, but well-equipped and with good air-con. The bathroom was also small and the shower leaked very badly all over the floor. It was just about clean enough. Downstairs, the bar staff seemed averse to clearing/wiping the tables, and it was hard to find anywhere free of grot to sit. But, as usual, the bar/food prices were unbelievably low.
We had a good shop cruise, and then a bit later on my old Brum friend Pete and his partner joined us for a pre-party drink. I wore this Frida Kahlo robe thing I got from Turkey last time we were there. I thought Jackie deserved nothing less…
As I have written before, my old friend from Brum, Jackie, has fallen on her feet and turned her life around. She lives in a beautiful Georgian house with a garden running down to the river, owned by her cousin, who apparently only lives in it for a couple of weeks each year. The house is full of art works and antiques. Jackie is just emerging from her year as Mayor of Monmouth, and was celebrating a big birthday. Here she is in her Mayor’s robes!
Jackie now works for Catherine Fookes, MP for Monmouth, who was at the party and a very nice woman. She described Jackie as her ‘Chief of Staff’. When I Googled her up I saw that Catherine is a PPS to Keir Starmer, which can’t be a very comfortable position to be in right now. She was telling me that she is a friend of our MP, Helena Dollimore, and she took a selfie of the two of to send to Helena. Oops Helena, very sorry but I have resigned my Labour Party membership… (Throughout my adult life, have been in and out of that party more times than is decent. With current developments, I can’t see me rejoining any time soon…). Needless to say, the party was stuffed with local Labour big-wigs and activists. Jackie’s three daughters were there, and at least two of her grandchildren, who are now teenagers but I hadn’t seen since they were babies. They did all the catering – yummy Brummie curries and great cakes.
The weather was fabulous, the garden was lovely, and the party was good. Even so, we didn’t stay late, we don’t these days, and were in bed by midnight. Here are a few pics. The birthday celebrant is in the bright gold/yellow dress.
Next day, on to Bristol. Only about an hour to drive. Anna and Gareth were in good form, and took us for lunch to Wai Yee Hong, a big Chinese dim-sum place with a massive supermarket below. We have been several times before – here’s last year’s blog post about it. It’s good, but the menu is slightly glutinous and chickenclaw-ish, so you have to be careful what you order. It was too hot to want to eat much, but of course being me, I ate loads… In the afternoon and evening we all just lay around watching telly and eating ice-cream. Too hot to do anything else. It was lovely to see them both but three different beds in three nights is pushing it for us, and we both felt pretty tired when we got home the next day.
So, here we are back in the heat in Hastings. I am not happy about the Starmer/Burnham business, as you might expect. The capacity of Labour to shoot itself in the foot is apparently unlimited. Sure, Starmer made some terrible mistakes but he was stitched up by the right-wing media and the shallow perfidy of too many of his own MPs, who seem to think that Andy Burnham is the magic answer to their prayers. Well, take it from Battleaxe, he just so isn’t. Anyone with half a grey cell can see that a mile off. I’ll finish with this nauseating photo I posted on Facebook, of Burnham taking selfies in Westminster Hall amid a horde of grinning MPs. Fools…
