Hang on, 263 miles? Out of the several thousand miles of road. Hardly a significant proportion, is it? Not really worthy of front-page headlines.

On the A9, 99 miles are covered - and road deaths dropped to six last year, from an average of eight in previous years. Hmm, not sure that is statistically significant. If the number of “previous years” is three, the average is still 7.5 – or 8, when rounded up.

If I were to drive at 80 mph for that entire 99 miles, would I be committing one offence or several?

A shepherd asked his dog to go and count the number of sheep. The dog ran into the field and came back a few minutes and said “there are 40”.
“That’s odd, “replied the shepherd, “I only bought 38”
“Yes, “said the sheep dog, “I was rounding them up”

Family party last week was good – most of my uncles, aunts, and cousins were there, so a bit of a catch-up. Small World moment too: one of the guests, a friend of my uncle and aunt, was someone I knew from uni. “Have you visited this village before?” he asked (after the more obvious “what are you doing here?”). Er, once or twice. My mum was brought up there; my grandfather lived there until he died; my uncle has lived there for over forty years. So probably on average at least once a year for all my life. I even cycled there once.

We had the customary walk round the village, and to see the house where my mum was lived. “Are you sure it’s that house, you’re not just taking us down a narrow path for the fun of it” asked CGF when I pointed it out.
“Yes, I’m sure … oh hang on, it’s the next house”

CS3’s comment on the village was “It’s so peaceful – just the place for a horror movie”.

It was a Bank Holiday weekend just gone, so the weather should have been miserable but amazingly, it wasn’t. Even the forecasted “rain heavier than when Noah but the ark” didn’t materialise – wall-to-wall blue skies.

After parkrun I cut the grass and went round the edges with the shears. In the afternoon we went to Ikea and bought three shelf units, which CS2 and I put together in about 90 minutes, which is pretty good for Ikea furniture. We only went wrong twice – putting pieces in the wrong way round – but luckily noticed before it was too late.

Sunday I was first aiding at an event in Smalltown – fancy dress pub race. No I wasn’t in fancy dress – SJA uniform doesn’t count. There were some quite imaginative costumes, and some of the participants performed song or dance routines as they went round. Because the roads aren’t closed to traffic (the borough council doesn’t want the event, but the town does it anyway cos hey, we’re rebels and outlaws in Smalltown), this gave some quite surreal scenes as the performances took place in the middle of the main junction, with traffic still moving round them.

A visitor to the town remarked on the costumes as she saw participants heading for the start point and asked whether this was an annual event as she’d seen the same thing when she visited last year. I was so tempted to reply “No, this is a normal Sunday in Smalltown”.

Bank Holiday Monday I did a bit more garden tidying. I did the “dental hygienist” clean of the brick paving in the drive, cut some of the edges I hadn’t done on Saturday, and cleared and re-laid some bark chippings. I also made a new cover for the gas meter box – well, half made. I cut the wood to size; I just need to fix it together.

parkrun was a “naked” run. No, not without clothes – without watches or timers or iPod etc. The challenge was to estimate your time. I was eight seconds out, which was pretty good; I thought no one could get closer that that but in fact about six people did – including one who was spot on. Ssh that I run without timers etc. every week (to keep down weight and wind resistance) so it wasn’t that much of a challenge for me.

I went for a run on Monday too, and a fly flew into my eye. It wasn’t until I woke up on Tuesday morning that I managed to get the carcass out of my eye.

Eight seconds faster than predicted, btw.

I’ve had a week off work this week. Well, what with the bank holiday and a non-working Friday it was only a three-day week so it seemed silly not to.

The Aged came down for a couple of nights so we’ve been entertaining him. Tuesday evening we drove two cities away to see my nephew, before he heads back to Kiwiland later this month. His place in Europe will soon be taken by his younger brother, who has won a two-year scholarship on some prestigious racehorse training course – described as “ten years’ experienced condensed into two.”

I’ll tell you more about how we entertained the Aged another time. We heading up north for a CGF family gathering tomorrow, so I need to get this wrapped up and go get packed.