Thursday 4 June

Tina at work today ie school visits. I had a quiet organising/catch up day. Very peaceful in Cleethorpes – quite relaxing. After working out how to lock the back door I drove back to where we finished our walk last evening, parked and walked a bit further but abandoned this after a short while as it was very cold on my bald head with the wind coming over the North Sea from the north! Tried to line up the two Humber forts in one camera shot but failed by a long way ie I would have had to walk a lot further. I did see the little steam train and a caravan park – big, attractive permanent caravans with decking built around them. When Kate came home she took me (in her Mazda MX5) to the Fitties (a community of what we would call baches [North Island]/cribs [South Island]). Fitties is the local word for the salt marshes on the coast.

Next Kate went to vote (local and European) and the polling booth was very different to our experience. It was a shipping container with a door cut into the side!

Dinner was at the locally famous Steels Corner House where we had haddock, chips and MUSHY PEAS (Tina insisted). It was a huge meal. Dave followed up with a Knickerbocker Glory which came in a tall glass with a long spoon. The layers were cream, ice cream, fruit, jelly, ice cream, fruit, jelly and fruit.

Then on to Willys, a local micro-brewer. Had a lovely beer called One Off, the standard. Speciality beers have names like The Last Resort and The Old Groyne.

Drove down to the pier and over many judder bars/traffic calmers. Kate called them “sleeping policemen”.

Now 26 different beds for me/25 for Tina. Since last report Calais, Ufford Park and Dave and Kate Esmonds (no Ufford Park for Tina).

Two items from today’s Guardian which caught my eye:
1. A trial is going on in Plymouth. It features Wendy, Barry and George. Wendy and Barry get married (ohhh, isn’t this nice; I do like a nice wedding). But the VERY NIGHT of their wedding they have a fight in their flat (not the greatest start to a marriage). Wendy sets fire to some property (always a good conflict resolution strategy). Wendy then flees (and why not; she wouldn’t want to hang around and burn herself, would she?). Wendy goes to the house of “friend” George, where she spends the night (sleeping on the sofa no doubt). Barry goes to George’s house (how did he know?) and Wendy lets Barry in (probably not a great idea). George tries to hit Barry but misses (damn). Barry is one angry camper by this stage (wedding day fight, arson, wife fleeing, wife away for the whole night at George’s house and then George tries to hit him – it’s not been a good last few hours for Barry from Plymouth). Barry punches George “with full force” in the face and then kicks him in the head when he falls. Barry then picks up an oar (I do like a story set by the seaside, don’t you?) and repeatedly hits George until the oar breaks. AT THIS STAGE Wendy gets Barry to stop (why not earlier???). George suffers 38 separate injuries. Barry and Wendy do nothing (now there’s a surprise). George is still alive at this stage but not when his body is discovered 3 days later.

2. On to the sports pages now. There is an article about the role of football (soccer) player liaison officers and how some highly paid footballers have “an absolute inability to do anything for themselves”. Here are some examples:
- an emergency call from a defender asking why his goldfish were swimming in the wrong direction
- a high level investigation when a star player rang and asked why he went to sleep but kept waking up with a wet head. It was discovered he was sleeping with his window open when it rained! And he couldn’t work this out!!!
- a Latvian player had to be rescued from London Underground’s lost property office (should have left him there)
- explaining that electric guitars need to be plugged in
- sawing a player’s new snooker table into a wedge shape so it would fit into his living room (I wonder how many games of snooker were played on that table?)

Lastly, there was a WAG of one player who outlined what she is doing in the global financial crisis. She is now only getting her hair blow-dried twice a week and she is doing her own nails!