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  1. #11
    Turner Landscape English Champs

    My week leading up to Turner Landscape had been less than ideal and I’d even contemplated not doing the race. I’ve been on nights and sleeping during the day had been troublesome to say the least. The continuing hot weather coinciding with one of our neighbours having an orangery built hadn’t boded well for kipping.

    For you Yorkshire folk: an orangery is like a fancy conservatory, or if you prefer...a posh greenhouse. There’s no reason why you couldn’t let your pigeons roost on its apex if you so fancied.

    Nothing much happens on our street in quiet suburbia and as you’d imagine the orangery is causing quite a stir. The last time there was this much excitement was when Jimmy from number 10 started wearing a neck brace.

    It’s early friday afternoon and I’ve not been up long after another interrupted sleep. I bump into the window cleaner as I’m collecting the bins at the end of our drive, he’s a talker and there’s nowt he doesn’t know. In no time our conversation revolves around the orangery....Jimmy’s neck brace is now old news, facet joint pain apparently.

    The window cleaner tells me the only time he uses his water fed extendable pole is when cleaning the roofs of conservatories and orangeries. If he ever branched away from domestic windows and veered towards industrial he’d use his pole more often. For now he remains a stickler to the old values and still favours the hands on approach to cleaning as he’s a traditionalist and perfectionist...his words, not mine. He then starts to educate me on the best ways to avoid water streaks when cleaning windows in hot weather.

    By this stage I’m losing the will to live and blurt out in a panic stricken manner, “shit, I’m sorry mate I’ve left some peas on the boil”. He looks perplexed and checks his watch and from his watch gazing antics I’m getting the vibe he doesn’t believe me. His suspicion is understandable as mid afternoon is an unusual time to be boiling peas as it’s too late for dinner but it’s too early for tea. I can appreciate his confusion but I play along with my pea boiling charade as there’s only so much window cleaning chat I can take.

    Back in doors I crash out in front of the TV and watch Countdown. Things start to look up as I get my first ever 9 letter word....then the phone rings. I was going to ignore it but my mum still rings the house phone, no matter how many times I’ve told her to go mobile. She rang up only yesterday to tell me she’d bought another pair of Skechers shoes. She’s also gonna buy my dad some for his arthritic big toe...she's seen a pair in navy blue, “ your dad really suits blue”. I don’t feel the purchasing of Skechers warrants a phone call but it made me smile all the same.

    I answer the phone, it’s not mum with tales of thriftiness, it’s some bloke from Chorley council asking if I can spare a few minutes to answer some questions on the pedestrianisation of Chorley town centre. I use my “peas on the boil” line again and settle down with Nick Hewer and Rachel Riley. I’m playing along with the contestants on tv and they both comfortably beat me...my 9 letter word was a fluke.

    Race day and it’s become the norm this summer that it’s going to be another warm sunny one, Great Lakes and Kentmere being the exceptions. Turner Landscape is a fitting name for this Lakeland medium as pretty much the full race landscape can be seen from the start at Turner Hall.

    The track up towards Seathwaite Tarn has me generating a mixture of sweat and sun cream that runs into my eyes and it’s not pleasant, bloody uncomfortable if truth be told. Relief is close by as there’s a lovely breath of fresh air whilst running across the dam.....and that’s exactly what it is, a breath of fresh air. Once the initial climb of Grey Friar is reached the rest of the route is reasonably runnable with the descent off White Pike being a highlight.

    Many thanks to all involved and lovely to hear Joss praising all the efforts put in for the Alzheimer’s Research funding.

    Oh I nearly forgot, my 9 letter word....Limestone.
    Last edited by Tindersticks; 12-08-2018 at 12:17 AM.

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