15 - 21 Oct

Sat - We wanted to vote in the Cambridge Chancellor elections, so put the bromptons in the BMW and drove up to Cambridge, parking on the outskirts.  Lovely clear sunny day, chill in the air.  Cycled in to Senate House and were given gowns to enter to vote.  We had thought to vote for Brian Blessed but he was such a buffoon in YouTube about it that we were sensible and went for the establishment desire for Lord Sainsbury.

Together in gowns at last!

Very nicely organised, and afterwards we had coffee/cakes in the Senate Combination Road.

Then we took nephew Henry out to brekka in "Bills Cafe" in the nearly church.

Brompton & Kings Chapel in bright blue sky

Then up to Hillington for lunch with Pete and Mo before they go off to Antigua till December.  They had booked at White Heart at Brancaster Staithe, and we had a drink before there with Robert and Lucy and family.  Table with view over marsh & sea, good meal and lots of wine. ..... lets forget the new diet regime for once!

Pete then showed us his factory unit at Faversham, some new barn conversion to buy (very tempted!!!) and Snettisham sailing club where we helped Rob to load up his kids boats for winterising.

Cup of tea then drove back - long day but excellent outing.

Sun - W5/R1 (3*(5R,3W)) early in cold mist on Common.  Drove (oh dear didn't walk) down to vill for shopping as Lulu coming home for lunch.  Jon also popped back for eats and chat, lovely to see them both.  Lulu made iced buns....too tempting!

In evening, took Nigel to local concert at St Pauls Chipperfield for Mozart Requiem - great acoustics in church, fantastic orchestra and soloists.  Quick drink in Two Brewers afterwards, worth going there to eat sometime as it was a hummy atmosphere.

Watched Downton Abbey on sky player to avoid adverts.   What a load of obvious tosh it is!

Mon - Nipped to Hemel Homebase and bought and fitted new ceiling lights upstairs, how exciting is that?  Then took Granny to an appointment at Hillingdon which was also not exciting and dampened the rest of the day.    But Mrs M brightened it up by suggesting buying 25% off wine at Waitrose and going out for a Tamarind Thai in Ricky.  Which we duly did, and very yummy it was to.

Tue - Attended Speed Awareness course at Burnham because of my crime of going 37mph in a 30 zone. Was OK, but rather laboured to make the point that going faster than the road conditions is either illegal or more dangerous.  I did learn however pointers to decide what was the speed limit, and some things to be more aware of.  Then home for W5R2 (2*(8R,5W)) on Common in bold but sunny air, and to wait for Mrs M's iPad to arrive which it duly did at 2:30.  Played with that till Mrs M arrived home when I cooked dinner.  Walked up to choir for AGM and a bit of singing, whilst C and G went to see RMS Drill:

Wed - Took Suzuki into Boxmoor for service & MOT, with bike in back, early for 8:15.  Cold and clear, around 5 deg.  Cycled back 8.8miles in 38minutes, avg 13.6mph, felt good.  Then went back to collect at midday, taking 15 seconds quicker!  A good workout for a rest day.
 Played around with Mrs M's iPad trying to fix the double Apple ID/iTunes login conflicts.
In evening popped into London for dinner with Jon and Jamie at Cay-Tre (french-vietamese) on Dean Street and ice screem at Scoop on Brewer Street.  A nice evening, trains worked well so we were back at 9:30pm.

Thu - W5R3 (20R).  The first long run, and it felt hard.  I have a long way to go, only managed 2.6k.  Then down to vill with Mrs M for coffee and shopping, and generally pottering around the house the rest of the day.  Nigel came for a yummy diner of liver and bacon casserole, topped off with Mrs M's lemon drizzle cake (not on the same plate at the same time I must add).

Fri - Up to Barbican in evening, met Wendy, to see:

Dmitri Hvorostovsky

Songs by Faure, Liszt and Tchaikovsky

Good stuff, but rather hard work.  Nice to have the translated poems to read in a free programme.