Another day out

13 September

Yesterday we had a day out, up at 6.30 and on the road for 8 o’clock heading for Southampton. Why there? Simple really, we had never actually been to the town before apart from getting the Red Funnel ferry to Isle of White. We won’t be going again! There were areas we didn’t go to of course but in general we were not impressed. Even the Crazy Zebras standing all over the place didn’t lift it much. These Zebras are the idea of Marwell Zoo. They had them manufactured and got local schools to decorate them. The schools jumped at the chance, or should I say the teachers did. They are very clever at getting their kids to get involved with such projects and making them feel they are the ones who came up with the idea. Whatever, a lot of publicity for zoo along the way.

From there we set off west along the coast road to see what we could find, and ended up in Bournemouth. By the time we got there it weather was dank and grey, so we set off into town looking for a decently priced drink. We found a Whetherspoons pub and we were sat in there it started raining. I had decided on fish and chips in Harry Ramsden as headed back to the car, but Jan isn’t keen and only eats the fish, not even the batter. So we decided to eat in the pub, and I had the cod and chips; Jan had their all day brunch, and did well in eating as much as she did.

However, I had also ordered a sweet for both of us too, something I don’t do very often. So two knickerblockerglories arrived. I finished mine, Jan left half of hers, so I finished that one too. That was more food than I had eaten in one sitting for a very long time. My sugar levels must have been sky high after that lot. Surprisingly though, my weight was down again this morning, which really surprised me, I thought I would have put on a good bit over the last few weeks. Not complaining though …

There’s an old saying about there being any coppers about when you need one. Yesterday was no exception, in fact, the cops I saw all day was as we were driving out of Bournemouth. We really could have done with one later on the A338. A car was dragging its arse slowly in the outside lane of a dual carriageway. Jan flashed the headlights at him and he ignored it, so she undertook him, yes we know, naughty Jan. That angered the male driver, so much so that after Jan had pulled out to overtake a truck the other guy raced paced on the inside. At that point he just acted the prat he is.

He slowed right down forces Jan to an almost stop; she indicated to go back into the inside lane; he stopped her by moving over, and back again into the other lane. This went on for some time before he went off onto local roads, with huge great smug smile on his face. He won’t be looking so smug or smiling when the cops turn up at his door with video footage, or if he sees it being posted on Facebook later today.            

So all in all it was pretty disappointing day really. However, we did enjoy it, simply by being out and about together. We arrived back here at around 9.40 and were pleasantly surprised to find we could park right outside our flat. A day out was over and my camera was home too with a few shots on it, but not as many as usual. So for today’s photo …

One of the Crazy Zebras.

Today’s funny …

How many journalists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Three. One to report it as an inspired government program to bring light to the people, one to report it as a diabolical government plot to deprive the poor of darkness, and one to win a pulitzer prize for reporting that the Electric Company hired a light bulb assassin to break the bulb in the first place.