Early-morning bike ride in Tatton Park

I'm trying to get fit by cycling through the park. But as I have to stop every few yards to take a photo I'm not sure how effective it's been. Never mind, it was a beautiful morning.


And here's the trusty machine that got me there. (No, I didn'tg mean "rusty" ... that's me!)


Cheers
Mike

Words are not enough - please help the Burmese People

Venerable U Uttara, General Secretary, International Burmese Monks Organization.
Photograph: courtesy of Aavaz.org.

Please consider making a donation to assist the Burmese people following the devastating cyclone. Just click on the Aavaz.org link.

Many thanks
Mike

Still the same after all these years (?)

Not for the faint-hearted, eh? The "Tattonland Jotter", aged umpteen ... before the beard and baldness had really kicked in! By jove, I was a handsome devil, was I not?

And just to prove the family connection with the Royal May Day, here I am again in several cunning disguises:

These were both taken in our back garden (but in different years, obviously) prior to the May Day festival. First as a Farmer's Boy; then as a "Cranford Gentleman" - with my mate Steve, who that year was a Coster (AKA "Pearly King").


In the procession; and on The Heath, after the trek, with sore feet, some kind of novelty toy and cousin Joe (right of picture).


Believe me, this really was me as a "Beefeater". Honest.

Cheers
Mike

Another fine Royal May Day in "Cranford"

And the sun shone - in spite of dire predictions to the contrary.



Above: the (shortly-to-be) May Queen in her carriage, attended by her Ladies-in-Waiting. The two small gentlemen up front are Pages. Later in the afternoon, the May Queen will receive her crown. And here's the lucky lad who'll be officiating - The Crownbearer:



The "Queen" has an entire "Court" to attend her every need. This consists of numerous colourful characters, such as "Will Scarlet", Forresters, Yeomen of the Guard ("Beefeaters") ...



Heralds, "Robin Hood", "Maid Marian" (I'm not sure why, exactly!)...



"The Royal Falcon-Bearer" ...



Court Ladies, Trainbearers (similar to Pages) ...



Maids of Honour - and yet more Train-Bearers ...



In addition to all these there is a rich panoply of other splendid characters, portraying not merely traditional English culture, but also representing just about every country in the world! Far too many for me to do justice to, in a blog post. (It would take me all night uploading photos!)

Here are just a few impressions:

























And here (above) are some of "King Henry VIII's wives" accompanied, as it happens, by my (only) wife, Caroline. She's the tallest one, by the way. Actually, she's a steward - one of several adults enlisted to attempt to keep order (some hope!). The procession meanders through the town, eventually ending up on The Heath (ie the common), for the crowning of the May Queen. The whole journey takes well over an hour, and as there are something like 450-500 children taking part things can tend to get a bit fraught. So the stewards are a necessary addition, acting as chaperones and givers of moral support; no doubt issuing such helpful encouragement as: "we're nearly there now". That sort of thing.

I remember (just about) pounding the self-same route myself as a little lad. The one thing that you never forget is the aching feet.

For those who aren't familiar with Knutsford's "Royal" May Day festival, incidentally, it got its regal title from the fact that (so the legend goes) it was once attended by actual real royalty.

Now for some video of the varied forms of entertainment en route:





The last clip above depicts a scene, and characters, from Mrs Gaskell's novel Cranford, which was adapted and broadcast by the BBC as a highly successful costume drama starring Judi Dench as famous local heroine, "Miss Matty". The novel described daily life during the Victorian era (late 1800s) in a fictional small market town that was in fact based on Knutsford: my hometown; one with which Mrs Gaskell had a particularly close relationship, and wherein she is buried. It is just such a great shame that Knutsford itself could not have been chosen as the location for filming. (That honour went to Laycock Abbey in Wiltshire which, while unquestionably a splendid location, is not even close to Knutsford geographically). There were all sorts of reasons for this, including the fact that Manchester Airport is less than 10 miles away, thus on many occasions, when the wind is in a particular direction, hardly a minute goes by without a low-flying aircraft scraping the town's roof tops and donating some 98dB of unwanted sound. Also, our town has changed out of all recognition since Miss Matty's days; for one thing, it now appears (at least to me) to be virtually gridlocked with traffic for much of the time.

A well, c'est la vie! Still, hopefully the subtitle to my blog will now make more sense to you (assuming you hadn't already worked it out).

You can see more about this year's Mayday festival here, on the website of The Knutsford Guardian.

And finally, for previous postings of mine relating to the Knutsford Mayday, try this link; or this one.

Bye for now.

Mike

A more serious post - world food crisis

It can't have escaped anyone's attention that world food prices are spiralling out of control.
The situation is in danger of becoming critical, with many millions more people facing the prospect of starvation, especially in the poorest countries of the world, several of which are already suffering the effects of famine as well as armed conflict. I hope you'll join me in signing this motion submitted by Avaaz.org, to be presented to G8, UN and EU leaders.

Please be assured that Avaaz is a bona fide, and well-respected pressure group.

Thanks for your support,

Mike.