BYE BYE BABIES, BAND ON A BOAT AND PLAYING (FOR) LUDO!!

OK, OK, OK, it's been a couple of weeks - but it has been an emotional time!! However, I've composed myself enough to give you all a little bit of an update on the crowded happenings of recent days! Where to start..............

Star Date - Saturday 28 August: massive leaving "do" for 3 "children" - Lucy Jane, Nick and Rosie (with total respect to her Mum, Rosie is almost one of the Morrissey family as well!) - Rosie on her way to Welsh Wales to continue her quest to be the best Geographer in the world (PhD in Aberystwyth no less!!); Nick off to Aldershot, not to join HM Forces, but to embark on a "journey" that will see him becoming the youngest CEO in history, while at the same time consuming his own body weight in beer each day, and Lucy on her way to the Antipodes on the first leg of a round the world trip that could see her back here in a year's time or, alternatively, meeting Prince Charming (probably pronounced Chaarmin out there!), settling down and talking the hind leg off every adjacent kangaroo! Notwithstanding all that, we had an absolutely brilliant evening - first time we had played together for about 6 weeks, so we had that lovely warm feeling again (oo-er missus!); Lucy got a chance to sing with us - first time her sis Anna (and her Mum!) had heard her, so there were lumps in several throats (this was before Anna got really tired and emotional!) and all was good. Of course, when everything wrapped up, the youngsters went on to party in Macc until the small hours, while we sloped off for hot chocolate around 02:00! A selection of photos - we'll miss you kids, come back soon! :'((

Star date: Sunday 29 August: Well, that hot chocolate was a good move, because at 09:30 the same day, the mighty D&C embarked on a cruise! Now, before you start getting the wrong idea, this was not in the Med or the Caribbean (even though Dave was there!) - it was a "leisurely" jaunt down the Macclesfield Canal from Bollington to the Fool's Nook at Sutton and back! What a laugh - the Tiller-men varied in ability from the vaguely competent (Dave) to the downright dangerous (Andy)! In fact, whoever let Andy take the helm after several bottles of cava, much beer and other things, ought to be shot - thing is, nobody can remember who it was! The boat was officially sized for 12, but there were 13 of us on it, although our defence was that there were only ever 12 on board at any one time! I'm going to try and post a video of Tweed Meister Matt's attempt to join the merry crew (we arranged to collect him at the Puss in Boots, but it took about an hour longer than we thought, so he started walking towards us!) - let's see how it goes!

Matt's day job is designing web and phone games and, during the day, we came up with a great idea for a new game for all ages - Grand Theft Narrowboat - if you want to leave the game, you just get off! A great day, with great mates - here's some more pics (the last one is our boat after Andy had parked it)!

Finally, Star Date Saturday 4 September: A 60th birthday party for Ludo - we played at his daughter's wedding at the wonderful Sandhole Farm in December and, amazingly, he asked us back! Now, you Latin scholars will know that Ludo means "I play", and he certainly did that night - in fact, I think he's lying about his age! Great audience participation and, thanks to Dave's forward thinking, we split the set into 3, so that the older members didn't run out of puff too early (that's the band, not the crowd!). Finished about 12:30, got home around 2:00am, so must have been a good night!

Next gig is a new one for us - The Cock & Pheasant in Bollington on 1 October, and I'm 100% sure that we will have more people watching us than we did the last time we hit Bolly (anyone remember The Spinners?). So, if you want to see the Autumn in in style, toddle on down to Charlie's gaff, and swing your pants!!