A Fery good day!

Sophie and I were very excited about our day at Wimbledon, and although we had been a little disappointed that Sinner wasn't playing (he was on Court 1 anyway on Tuesday), we were delighted that we'd be seeing the Fery-Cobolli match instead. Arthur Fery was a British wildcard and had done brilliantly at getting through to the quarter-finals. We were hoping for a fantastic match, and knew that there would be a huge amount of interest!

Sophie had frozen a bottle of German white wine (she thought we would be seeing Zverev) and chilled a bottle of Cava for tipples while we watched. Keith had spent yesterday morning making sausage rolls for us, and these were all packed into a cool bag. We took the two plastic Wimbledon glasses Sophie had acquired on her previous trip, and we were all set to go!

Keith dropped us off at Northampton station, and we bought drinks and pastries to eat before we boarded the train. It was already warm, and we were hoping we wouldn't be too hot later in the day. We had dressed in loose trousers and tops, and I took the hat I bought in France with me.

We grabbed seats on the train and chatted. As we drew near Euston, the train became more crowded, and a young woman standing next to me sank to the floor to try to sit down. I offered her my seat, but she wouldn't take it, even though I offered it twice. The sun was shining relentlessly out of a clear blue sky outside, and the glare from the cars and glass on the buildings was intense.

At Euston, we had a few minutes of difficulty locating our pre-booked Addison Lee car. We found him in the taxi rank with one of the station staff talking to him. We jumped in, and he set off straightaway, thank goodness, but the air conditioning certainly wasn't very strong, and I nearly had to ask him to cool down the car as I was so warm!

It took us over an hour to get to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club (a.k.a. Wimbledon) through a maze of London streets teeming with cars, cyclists, pedestrians and scooters. The driver dropped us off a short walk from the entrance, and we joined a throng of other people heading into the grounds. We had to show photographic ID and then our tickets on our phones, which Sophie had sorted out for me. 

Once into the hallowed grounds (it was so good to see the familiar ivy-covered Centre Court), we made our way past The Hill (formerly Henman Hill) to get a glass of Pimms.

The grounds were very busy, and there were long queues for drinks and food. I managed to grab a seat in the shade while Sophie bought the drinks - £13.45 for a glass! While we sipped our drinks, we munched on Keith's sausage rolls, watching other people eating expensive sandwiches and salads!

Our next-door neighbours, Vince and Sue, had kindly lent us their hand-held fans, and they came in very useful today! One of the things that I noticed was the lack of shaded areas to sit at Wimbledon and the lack of seating itself. Seats under an umbrella were hugely coveted!

We finished our drinks, put the plastic glasses into a bin for recycling (we could have had a £1 back, but you can donate to charity) and decided to have a look around. It was very crowded and hot, and the idea of going to look at the outer courts didn't appeal. There were matches taking place on these, but I hadn't heard of any of the players. I was so pleased we had managed to get Centre Court tickets; you can get a Grounds ticket, but that definitely didn't appeal!

A wheelchair match was taking place here

As it was getting close to the 1:30pm start time, we made our way into the underneath area of Centre Court. Here, there were big display screens with all the previous winners, some going right back to the late 1800s!

We found the correct entrance and walked up a flight of steps, where we had to show our tickets again. We then turned right, went up to Level S and along to our seats. We had a fantastic view!

Gradually, the seats filled, and we had a row of people in front of us who had Hospitality lanyards around their necks. I could tell that they were wealthy just by looking at them, but they didn't seem interested in the tennis at all when the Ladies' Quarterfinals started between Marta Kostyuk and Jasmine Paolini. They were solidly engrossed in their phones, checking emails and messages (I could see clearly from where I was sitting) and showed no emotion at all.

We watched avidly as the spectators in the Royal Box arrived, and I spotted Queen Camilla immediately. She had a lovely blue dress on! We also think we saw Roger Federer and his wife (I later found out that Jason Isaacs was there, as well as Dominic West!).

The Royal Box

Sophie and I thoroughly enjoyed the Women's Quarterfinals and predicted that the Ukrainian player, Kostyuk, would win. She did so in two sets. There was a short break before the Men's Quarterfinals started, and we finished off the sausage rolls and the Cava!

Luckily, our seats were in the shade the whole time we were there, and I did feel for the spectators opposite who were sitting in full sun. The people were using fans to cool down, but it must have been so hot.

Shaded seats, thank goodness!

We were looking forward to a great match between Cobolli and Fery, and I hoped it would have some drama and tension. Fery won the first set 6-4, and there was a tie-break in the second, with Fery winning. The crowd went wild whenever he won a point, and Sophie said she felt a bit sorry for Cobolli, as he was definitely the underdog. This is a huge thing for Great Britain, though, as we don't seem to produce winners at tennis (I sometimes forget that Andy Murray is British, as he seems so passionately Scottish first and foremost!) in any great number!

We both thought that Cobolli gave up in the third set as he lost without winning a game. I couldn't believe the great roar of noise when Fery won the last point, and everyone stood up to cheer and go wild! He will face Zverev in the Semifinals on Friday, and Sinner and Djokovic will play as well. Who will be in the Final on Sunday?

We stayed for the interview and then made our way out with thousands of other people. Sophie wanted to visit the shop to buy a towel (£40), and she also bought some hair scrunchies as well. We then went in search of the loos and stopped to buy a bottle of Evian water on the way. We had consumed two bottles of wine over the four hours and hadn't drunk any water at all, so we needed some desperately. We had no choice but to buy a bottle for £5 each; if we had bought them earlier, they would have been filled again for free.

After using the loos, we made our way out of the grounds, but left a different way. Sophie tried in vain to get either an Uber or an Addison Lee car, but a lot of the surrounding roads were closed, and hundreds of people all had the same idea...

I had to stop and take some tablets for a thumping headache (I only had myself to blame), and we started going up a long, steep hill. It was utterly horrible and still relentlessly hot! Sophie then said we were going the wrong way, so we turned around and went back towards the grounds. We spotted a taxi rank queue (horrendous) and one for the bus to take people to the train station.

Some people were being picked up by sleek, black Mercedes and cabs, but it was fruitless searching for an Uber, and we were quoted £120 for one to Marylebone. Sophie descended into a bad mood after the elation of the match, and I tried to cheer her up by saying we would sort something out, but we might have to forego a nice dinner!

In the end, we had no choice but to join the bus queue, which cost us £4 each! People were also queuing for the Park and Ride, and they looked fed up as well! It took us about an hour and a half from leaving the grounds to get to the station, and thankfully, the bus was air-conditioned, so we had a pleasant journey. On the High Street, we saw lots of lovely restaurants and every other person seemed to be carrying a Wimbledon bag!

We used our debit cards to buy tickets and took the District Line to Victoria, where we could change. At first, the train was quiet, but at Southfields Station, a huge swarm of people boarded, obviously all from Wimbledon, so there was a huge crush. I was glad the train was air-conditioned as well!

A lot of people disembarked at Earls Court, which gave us some room. At Victoria, we took the Victoria line and had three stops to go before Euston. We had given up on having anything to eat as we didn't want to be too late back to Northampton.

Unfortunately, the underground train we were on was hot and stuffy and at Oxford Circus, the train stopped, and there was an announcement that there would be a slight delay. I was already uncomfortable being on the Underground (I hate it), so we decided to go and get a taxi. Standing on a hot train was not my idea of fun, and we had no idea of how long the delay would last.

Up at ground level, we hailed a black cab that took us to Euston. We were able to board the 8:56pm train immediately, and made the mistake of sitting next to a very strange man who reached out to touch Sophie's Wimbledon bag. We rapidly found another couple of seats!

On the way to Northampton, we chatted to a woman in the opposite seat who was very interesting, and ever so slightly mad! She was three years older than Sophie and told us all about her job and how she gnawed at her fingers when she was anxious!

Keith was waiting to collect us and take us home. Driving back, it was still registering 27c! Phew! Sophie spent some time outside with the cats while I had a drink and made myself cheese on toast. We watched a few bits of the matches today, and then it was definitely time for bed!

Awkward situations...

I was in the kitchen at work making myself a coffee this morning when our MD walked in, saw me, and looked very awkward. I presume he knows I'm leaving, but he didn't say a word, not even to wish me good luck, and scuttled off to his office, not even holding the door open for me as he went. I was very disappointed, to be honest, as I've worked for the company for almost nine years, and had a close association with him when we sold our soft play business eleven years ago. 

I spent the rest of my shift writing the moan report and catching up with emails. I also mentioned to Nicola that the school holidays are looming and that I've had no holiday activities to put onto the system or swim camps... I don't have long left!

As we were leaving, Angela and Jo mentioned my puffy ankles, which was a bit embarrassing... Gabriel, my physiotherapist, had urged me to contact the doctor about them, as he thinks I'm retaining water. They have been bad in the summer ever since I started working eight-hour shifts three times a week. In the good old days, I finished at 2:00pm so I could go home and potter about.

I went straight home and made an appointment with a lovely nurse called Angela for Thursday morning. On holiday, they were fine because we were drinking gallons of water and I was in the pool every day. I was also moving about a lot more, but working for eight hours at a desk in the heat does me no favours at all.

Sophie had watched some of the Sinner match at Wimbledon today, and said he'd won in three straight sets, so it was a bit boring.!

Before Sophie came home, I started on the dinner, cooking the chicken first and gently frying the leeks and garlic. I felt so hot! Doing this put me in a bad mood, and when Sophie came home, she insisted on taking over. I went upstairs and had a long, cool shower before trying on a new dress for tomorrow. It was a beautiful, long, flowy dress, but it gaped at the cleavage, and I knew I'd be forever fiddling with it. Sophie forbade me from wearing it!

Sophie had finished the preparations for the meal and popped it into the oven when I reappeared. We sat and chatted over a glass of wine and had it confirmed that tomorrow we'd be seeing Arthur Fery play the Italian Flavio Cobolli on Centre Court! Woohooo!!

Freaking hell!

I woke up twice in the night to check on the football scores. The first time was 2:05am, and I learnt that the game had been delayed and had only just kicked off. The second time, at 3:17am, the score was 1-2, and then I had a dream that England lost 5-3. When I woke at 6:00am, I was astounded to see that England had beaten Mexico 3-2! I was totally gobsmacked and kept saying "Freaking hell!"  What a result! I can only imagine the atmosphere in the pubs and clubs when they won!

At work, one of our directors came and sat with Kathy, and I and we chatted about the game. That was a nice touch, I thought, and he told us how he'd gone to bed, but then woken up at 1am, saw the game had been delayed and snoozed on the sofa until the start. I should think a lot of people did that!

The heat is due to build this week, and it was already warm in the office in the afternoon. Milena, one of our finance bods, came in and said she had heard I was leaving and said she'd miss me, which was lovely. We don't work closely together, but have become closer since moving to this new office as we bond over coffee in the morning!

Back home, we all watched Wimbledon, and we were delighted to witness our only British hope, Arthur Fery, beat Dimitrov! What a great double for us today! We're hoping we will see him when we go on Wednesday!

Supper tonight was chicken wraps. We are having the Tangle Pie tomorrow, when it's due to be even hotter. Not a great idea!

Sunday sport

Sophie had an appointment for an eye test at 11:15am this morning, and asked me if I'd go with her. We needed to get some bits in Tesco anyway, which was where Vision Express had an outlet. While she had her eyes seen to, I sat and enjoyed a coffee in Costa, accompanied by a very crumbly flapjack that I almost ended up wearing!

Sophie texted me when she was about to choose her new glasses, and the pair she was wearing when I arrived looked lovely on her. Sophie has an "accessory face" as every single hat she tries on suits her, and now the same thing happens when she puts on glasses!

She placed her order, and we did some shopping. Originally, we had planned to have The Hairy Bikers' Tangle Pie with chicken and leeks, but, as so often happens, we had changed our minds due to Sophie making an appointment to see someone at VW this afternoon. She really didn't fancy preparing the meal later in the day. I think, to be honest, it's better if we eat at lunchtime on Sundays, and during the summer, have something very light! We had a small bickerfest about dinner and wandered around, not knowing what to have. In the end, we settled on chicken wraps with salad and put a tub of hummus and some crisps into the basket as well.

Back home, we unpacked, and I hoovered the kitchen and conservatory, which is rapidly turning into dead fly city as it always does at this time of the year. It doesn't help that we leave the windows open, so all manner of insects come in. I also ran some very hot water into a bucket and mopped all the hard floors downstairs.

Glad that we had done a little housework, we drove to Subway on Brackmills to order lunch before we went to VW. Sophie was able to order the food in advance, and it was ready to be picked up when we arrived. I enjoyed a turkey and ham sub with loads of salad, accompanied by a bottle of water. Now that we are back at home, my water intake has fallen again, and it's due to get hot again next week, so I must try to get into the habit of drinking more!

We drove to VW via our new Brackmills gym to see how busy it was, but there were plenty of spaces in the car park. Unfortunately, our management team chose not to install air conditioning in the building, and it's bad timing that the gym has opened with such a spell of hot weather forecast.

We were a little early, so we sat in the car park of VW and watched an RAC van unhitch a 2022-registered VW Arteon from a low-loader. I felt for the poor couple whose car it was! It was only four years old.

At our appointed time, we went in and saw a woman called Yasmine. She was already familiar with why Sophie had come in, but really didn't have any good news for us. Sophie, quite rightly, said she no longer trusted Olive and that the faults she was having with the car were getting more serious. Yasmine was sympathetic and understood what Sophie was saying, but as it had been a used car, and not a brand new one, the only thing she could do was buy another car, but it would mean upping her monthly payments or putting down a larger deposit.

We left feeling very disappointed, and I said how much I hated buying a new car. It's never an easy process; the value plummets the minute you drive it off the forecourt, and there's always disappointment involved. Sophie said she felt penalised by VW for having a car that was obviously faulty.

Back home, Keith was in his element watching the Grand Prix from our very own Silverstone and the Women's World Cup cricket final. In the early hours of Monday morning, of course, Engand play Mexico, and a lot of pubs are opening at midnight so people can go and watch. I will be tucked up in bed!

Sophie and I sat at the kitchen island, and I did very little, which I now feel guilty about! We stuffed our faces with crisps and hummus and then decided we didn't even want the chicken wraps for dinner, much to Keith's annoyance! We ended up having fish finger sandwiches later in the evening!

A day in Nottingham

We had arranged to see Mike and Abbie in Nottingham today, and go out for lunch. After a bit of wrangling, this had been arranged at a pub in Beeston, where they live. We left home at 11:30am and made good time to their house, which is situated in a quiet residential area of the city. It felt strange to see them in Nottingham when he had got so used to travelling down to Southampton!

Both of their beautiful cats were in the house, so we had a lovely cuddle. Huge was a monster compared to our two!

We drove to Beeston, a suburb of Nottingham, and finally managed to park the car a short distance away from the pub that Mike and Abbie had chosen. It was already pleasantly busy, and people were making the most of the fine weather and sitting outside. I chose half a pint of Biscoff Stout, which was delicious!

We had a good chat and then returned to the car to park closer to the pub we had chosen for lunch, The Commercial. This was a large, busy pub with a beer garden where people were enjoying drinks and food. This time, I had a half pint of Plum Porter, which was good, but I did prefer the first stout I had! 

We'd already checked the menu online before arriving, and placed our orders with the barman after a great deal of dithering on Michael's part. He couldn't decide between the fish and chips and a burger! In the end, he chose a burger along with Sophie, while Keith, Abbie and I opted for the fish and chips. We shared a huge platter of nachos, chicken goujons, beef chilli and halloumi fries first, which filled me up! 

For once, Keith was delighted with the crispy batter on his fish, and he was glad he'd chosen it! Hooray! The food was very good, and there was a lot of it! None of us had any room for puds, Keith paid the bill, and we walked back to the car. Mike and Abbie wanted us to go to a shop called Essen, which specialised in wine and cheese, so we left Keith in the car and walked to Beeston High Street.

The High Street was busy and bustling with Saturday shoppers, and Sophie spotted a couple of charity shops! We went into Essen, and I had a good look at the eclectic mix of wines, all of which I had never seen before. On each bottle was a chalked figure, which I thought was the location of the bottle elsewhere in the shop. But, no, this was the price! One bottle of wine from Jura was £125! I was astounded! These are the sort of prices you'd pay at a wine merchant such as Berry Bros & Rudd in London. I didn't see one bottle under £14, and we certainly weren't interested in buying any after the wines we had brought back from France.

We made a hasty retreat, and Sophie eyed up the charity shops, unable to resist going into a couple to hunt for bargains. Mike suggested we move the car to a nearby road, but Sophie said she was finished, even though I knew she wanted to look at a couple more!

Our last stop was at a pub called "Somewhere", which served quirky craft beers. We left the Sainsbury's car park and drove the short distance to another parking space, just around the corner from the pub. We were lucky to grab an empty table, and everyone ordered a beer, except me. I was still full from lunch and couldn't face another drink!

The pub was very quirky and had row upon row of both soft drinks and craft beers with colourful designs.

We sat and chatted, but the time was getting on, so we left and drove back to Abbie and Mike's house before saying goodbye and having one last cuddle with the cats.

We had a good journey back and decided to stop at The Red Lion at Thornby for one last drink before going home. I pulled off the M1 at junction 20, and we wound our way through beautiful countryside to the charming pub on the main road. There was a jovial atmosphere inside, and we took our seats by the window after ordering drinks. Keith and I used to come here a lot when the landlord had a huge Great Dane dog called Lulu.

We sat and chatted, and the pub emptied out. It appeared that a lot of locals use the pub, which was good news. We only had one drink and left to go home, driving through our stunning countryside. In the distance, we could see Hollowell Reservoir and all the tents for the Hollowell Steam Rally that was taking place.

Back home, it was time to relax and watch a little television before bed!

Trepidation!

I was a little bit apprehensive about going to work this morning as I didn't know what reaction I'd get to my resignation on Wednesday. Sara is now off until the 13th, but Nicola is in as normal, and I was anticipating a barrage of questions from her.

Kathy already knew, and when Nicola came in, she was very pleasant and wished me good luck, as Kathy had done. I think that both Sara and Nicola knew I was going for the job, as one of my colleagues had seen me at my old workplace and had tittletattled! 

The shift passed pleasantly, and it didn't feel too hot today. However, when I got into my car to drive home, the temperature was registering as 29.5c! Phew! Not as hot as France, but warmer than I had expected!

Sophie and I went with Keith to the pub tonight, to see John and give him a bottle of Gin for helping out with Keith while we were in France. We were grateful to him for giving Keith a lift to the pub and down to the VW garage. The men drank pints while Sophie and I had an Aperol Spritz that was more soda water than anything else and was not pleasant!

We left them to chat and went home to have our own version of the drink (far more delicious!) and to watch the second episode of the French Netflix drama about the L'Oréal heiress who had befriended a photographer and had lavished him with money and gifts. The financial matters then evolved into possible tax evasion, including top politicians at the time.

Keith returned home, and we had dinner of cold meats and salad. I didn't fancy the Netflix documentary anymore, so we had a real treat and watched The Cure at the Isle of Wight festival for the rest of the evening. It was fabulous!

A little mooch!

Keith went to Tesco this morning, while I stayed at home and caught up with housework. When he returned, I suggested driving to Market Harborough to wash the VW, which was dusty and dirty after the trip to France.

The weather continues to be beautiful, warm and sunny at the moment, with no sign of any rain. Our garden needs some serious work, but this will have to wait until it cools down a bit. We had the car washed, and they did a fabulous job, as usual. I wondered how much the car wash machine cost, since it uses a conveyor system where you sit in the car and it moves along the track through different washes. The end bit, where long furry arms dry it, is especially good! I should think it was a significant investment, but the car wash is always busy.

After the car was restored to a gleaming state, Keith suggested we drive to Sutton Bassett to see if a pub we used to go to had reopened. The Queen's Head was always a favourite place to go for a drink or a meal and had stunning views over the Leicestershire countryside. We passed by in 2017, and it was firmly closed, but when we drove past today, it had gone altogether! In its place was a new house!

How it used to look

It was a shock, to be honest! We drove on to Weston-by-Welland and made sure that The Wheel and Compass pub was still open! We weren't out for drinks today, but it was lovely to mooch about the countryside and enjoy the gorgeous weather.

Before going home, we passed through the village of Braybrooke and noted that The Swan was still doing business. Maybe on a Wednesday in the future, Keith and I will revisit our old haunts!

I went to see my Mum in the afternoon and sat with her for a good while. One of the carers was in the room when I arrived and said she'd been taking part in more activities, which was good news. The chocolates I'd taken in last week had all gone! I was looking forward to having one!

In the evening, when Sophie arrived home, we booked our train tickets and a taxi for next Wednesday, when we have tickets for the Quarter-finals at Wimbledon. An anytime return ticket from Kettering was £100! We don't know when we'll be returning in the evening, so we couldn't book advance timed tickets. In the end, we booked tickets from Northampton to Euston for £43. It was crazy that two train tickets from Northampton were less than one from Kettering or Wellingborough!