Roots and Routes.

Got back yesterday from a brief visit to the UK for the OEs’ annual dinner. Like last year I had a good time staying with Mike and his wife, Pam. Unlike last year I managed to get to Stansted in time to catch the flight home and Mike managed to book his ticket for the dinner in time. I got to Mike’s at half-past twelve on Saturday and Chris arrived around three. Fortified by Pam’s homemade soup and cake and Mike’s Irish whiskey, we were given a lift to School by Geoff (Dwarf) Beynon. Most people seemed to have had a reasonably ok time at the dinner, the food and company were good; one person had a very good time. We learned the following day that, having consumed four bottles of red wine, one of the OEs - not Geoff I hasten to add - was violently ill covering most of the first floor and staircase of his host’s house with vomit. Mike, Chris and I -  as befits those from forms a couple of years senior to the paralytic puker -  contented ourselves with sitting up till three having a heated but good-tempered political debate. It was very like arguing with Vic, my late father-in-law. Vic was somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan, and our discussions were similarly lubricated with scotch. Pat and her mother worried needlessly about our sitting up late disagreeing about every possible topic. Most people you like have similar views to yourself, which is comforting but a little dull; and most people who have opposing views are complete arseholes. But a political argument with someone you like and respect is altogether different: it’s a source of pleasure. 

   If going back to my roots was fun, the routes there were not. I don’t usually travel with check-in luggage, but needed to on this occasion because I had to transport a dress suit. Now that RyanAir make all their passengers check-in on-line I’d thought that depositing your baggage would be a much simplified operation. It is at Stansted but not at Ancona. I stood in a not very long queue for over half an hour before my bag was checked in, leaving me very little time to get back to the car-park to pick up my cabin luggage. By the time I made it through Security passengers were already boarding thereby making my priority boarding pass rather a waste of time. Coming out of Stansted I managed to take the wrong exit from a roundabout and found myself heading south to London rather than north to Candy’s. After a very pleasant evening with Candy and Quinn, I set off Saturday morning for Bristol. Everything was fine - in two senses of the word -  until I reached Birmingham. To get from the M6 to the M5 you have to travel along the M42 which happens to be the route to the NEC. It took over half an hour to cover two miles - and it started raining. However I thought I’d have no problems getting back to Candy’s - there shouldn’t be a hold-up on the M42 on a Sunday. There wasn’t - but it took half an hour to travel two miles in a queue of traffic when I came off the M6 at the M1/A14 junction. And it had been raining heavily since half way up the M5. The trip to Stansted from Candy’s was straightforward apart from the heavy rain and strong winds; and I got back to Ancona a little ahead of schedule. To a warm Italy still bathed in sunshine as it had been when I left. And people sometimes ask me why I live in il Bel Paese!