We’ve been back in the UK for about a month, which has literally flown by, largely because I’ve dedicated most of that time to finally putting a stake in the ground and declaring the book that has taken me around two years to complete finished. Well, in my eyes anyway.
I still need to find an agent and ultimately a publisher willing to take it on, hopefully without too many changes. The feedback from the small group who have kindly read it has been encouraging, so let’s see where it goes.
We’ve also managed to catch up with family and friends, including a long weekend in Wokingham with Christien and Cami. Much of our time was spent walking Cami’s two dogs, Charlie and Lilly. They may be small, but boy do they have great engines! Cami also treated us to a superb banquet, which Rachel and I thoroughly enjoyed.
I made a trip into London to see a doctor friend in Wandsworth. We’d spoken many times over video calls, but this was the first time we’d actually met in person.
We also took Mum with us to Leeds to meet Seb and Ally for lunch. Well, technically it was a ladies’ lunch with Ally’s extended family, so Seb and I took ourselves off for our own lunch instead. It was great to spend some time together, eating and then wandering around Leeds, a city I’d only visited once before.
We travelled by train, which, despite one of them being cancelled, was still considerably less stressful than driving.
As I normally do when we’re back, I caught up with Paul for brunch at Wellington Farm Shop. I’d been too poorly organised to get the rest of the guys together this time, so I’ll have to get my act together when we’re next back.
St Ives is only about a ten minute drive from Hartford, so we decided to take Mum to the Jazz and Blues Festival. It’s a four day event with some quality acts playing across the town. We went on the Saturday, arriving for the first performance at the Corn Exchange at 4pm before moving between several other venues.
As for me, I spent much of the evening watching a jazz funk quartet doing a pretty good job of working their way through a number of tracks from my youth. Rachel prefers music she can dance to, so she and Mum eventually moved on to find something that scratched that particular itch.
By the time we headed home at around 9:30, the girls were beginning to feel the effects of an evening’s dancing. Mum I could understand, but Rachel really needs to step it up.
It’s been good to be back. There’s been family, old friends and familiar places, but this time there has also been the satisfaction of finally reaching the end of something I’ve been carrying around with me for the last two years.
Whether anyone wants to publish it is another matter.
