Zig-Zag

   So another week passes by, another wet Bank Holiday Monday due, another government fiasco regarding GCSE results - did they or didn't they influence the Examining Boards? Another Royal embarrassment by all accounts but I'm still puzzled by what the BBC described as a "naked photo". What on earth is a "naked" photo? I presume it is something different to a photo of a naked person - or am I just being my usual pedantic self?

   To top it all, yet more idiot drivers throughout the week parking on zig-zag lines and one in particular causing mayhem on Saturday. Some things change for the better, some things for the worse - some things never change at all but when an accident happens and someone gets seriously injured or even killed on the pedestrian crossing on South Street, don't say you weren't warned. See The Highway Code Rule 191.

Jubilee

Prince Charles was on TV the other night in a documentary for the Diamond Jubilee. In it he claimed to have a vivid memory of his mother wearing the heavy crown whilst practising for the Coronation. That may well be so but personally I find it difficult to remember anything at all from when I was just four years old. One thing that does stick with me from infants school was when someone had a birthday. Friends were chosen to stand in front of the whole school holding candles aloft whilst "Happy Birthday" was sung. I dreaded being chosen as I hated the hot candle fat running down my fingers. Another early recollection from my childhood was as a six year old but even then I only have vague memories of a visit to the Festival of Britain in 1951.

I suppose if your mother is the Queen then perhaps it is possible that you will remember grand occasions from when you were a young child. Having said that for many years, I had a vivid picture in my mind's eye of a fire in a row of garages off South Street in Ilkeston and my uncle and my dad pushing cars out of the flames. As far as I can ascertain, if such a fire did occur, it was about a year before I was born and there's no-one left in my family to ask anymore. One suggestion that has been made is that I overheard a conversation whilst at an early age and this has been transformed into a memory. Maybe the same happened to Prince Charles but maybe he does in fact remember. Who am I to say?

Tradition

August Bank Holiday Monday afternoon. The Erewash Museum. Ilkeston Brass. It's become a tradition. Need one say more? 

Happy, Happy, Happy

Research has revealed that yesterday was supposed to be the happiest day of the year. With lighter nights, flowers blooming and looking forward to summer holidays, people in the northern hemisphere are at their most joyful on this day in June.

The researchers obviously didn't factor in the England football team who have been dire in their last four games - two friendlies plus two group matches in the World Cup - and were abysmal last night giving their fans no cause to be happy at all.

Resisting Temptation

On the second Bank Holiday Monday this month, Bath Street once again became an illegal car park but having photographed it many times before I resisted the temptation today. I can assure you though that there were more vehicles on the pedestrian only part of Bath Street than on this resident's car park.

It really is getting beyond a joke now and it's time something was done about it. Today there were toddlers and young children running down the street as well as adults wandering about but the vehicles were still speeding up the hill as though they had every right to be there. If someone doesn't get seriously injured or worse soon, it won't be for the want of trying!