A WINDMILL AND A WALK - ALL IN ONE WEEKEND!

Well holidays are over for the time being - except for Dave(!), so it's back on the road after a few weeks off - with a vengeance!! The next 2 weekends see us gigging on Fridays and Saturdays and, even though some of us will probably be close to expring by the end of it, we're SO looking forward to it! Who would have thought you could get withdrawal symptoms from playing music?!

Tonight (Friday 29th) has us back at The Windmill in Whiteley Green near Adlington; now, this always threatens to be a very sedate affair, because folk are having a very civilised meal in the dining room, and they view our appearance while they are eating with a mixture of astonishment and mild amusement! However, after a short while, and not least because there are normally some D&C diehards among them, feet start tapping and before too long, the mood overtakes them, and riotous behaviour rapidly ensues - let's just hope tonight is not the exception! If you've never been before, why not start the weekend in style - good food, good beer and EXCELLENT music! So good, that we even get celebrated astrophysicists/astronomers throwing some shapes (see below) - we'll withold his name to protect his reputation!

Assuming we survive tonight's festivities, tomorrow night (Saturday 30th) we will be the "warm up" act for the massive Midnight Walk in aid of the East Cheshire Hospice! We did this last year, and it was great fun, even if it was difficult to persuade some people to strut their stuff just before they embarked on a 10km walk in the middle of the night! This is a fantastic cause, as I'm sure many of our readers know - the Hospice needs more than £6000 a day just to keep going, and less than a quarter of this comes from Government funding, so the rest has to be raised through fundraising, donations etc., and the Midnight Walk is the biggest event of the year. If you are one of the 600+ folks that have registered for the walk, come and give us a shout, and don't be afraid to stretch those muscles - you know it's good for you! We'll be on stage around 10:30pm, and will be attempting to whip folks into a frenzy in time for big start at midnight!

Next weekend, we are playing at a wedding on Friday and a Private Party on Saturday, so I guess we'll need to be on our best behaviour - fat chance of that!

SHE'S ELIZABETH THE SECOND AND SHE'S HAVING A JUBILEE - JUBILEEEE, JUBILEEE!!!

It's been pretty quiet on the D&C front for a couple of weeks - ever since Injector Pete's party, in fact! One reason may be that we're still all recovering, but more likelyh is that holidays, Jubilees and other such stuff has just got in the way!

Pete's party was brilliant - a positive festival of good music and bad dress! The theme was "Leather & Lace" and, while some of us went for the subdued "I'll just wear a leather tie" approach, others (notably the Birthday Boy!) went for the whole Village People, lock up your daughters (or more likely, your sons!) approach - see photographic evidence below!








Anyway, back to the music - Pete wanted all his musical influences to be there, so the fantastic Kontaani Djembe Drum Band kicked off proceedings - I'd forgotten how many of them there were, and they don't half make a loud (and good) noise! There then followed one of then high spots of the evening - the "SooperGroop" featuring most of D&C supplemented by musicians fromn Pete's other bands - Bobby Rocket and Dr Mick from the Injectors and Tim from Voodoo Juice. We'd "practised" a number of tunes a couple fo times, and these were unleashed on the ususpecting punters - in no particular order "Running Down a Dream",- "Rock the Casbah", "Never Lookin' Back", "Teenage Kicks" and a suprisingly tight version of "Moves Like Jagger". All seemed to be well received, and I think it will be a race between D&C and the Injectors to see who can put what in their sets permanently! Pete did  a few numbers with the Injectors, and then we applied the coup de grace to the evening's proceedings. A great night was had by all - and there were a few sore heads the following morning!

So, as 2 of our number are off on hols for a couple of weeks, the quiet period continues - however, we are back in harness at the end of June with a double header weekend! Friday 29 June takes us back the The Windmill in Whiteley Green for our 6 monthly dose of aiding the digestion of those that have eaten, and we hope to see our favourite astrophysicist throwing some shapes, as he always seems to do there (more of that in a future blog!). Saturday 30 June will see us at Macclesfield Leisure Centre warming up the participants in the East Cheshire Hospice Midnight Walk, as we did last year. This is a great event for a very worthwhile cause (who could resist a 10km walk round the streets of Macclesfield in the middle of the night?!) so, if you haven't already registered why not do it now - via the ECH webite (just click on the Fundraising tab when you get there, and you'll see the Midnight Walk link)?

Until then - enjoy yourselves, and don't have too many nightmares about Cheryl Cole's performance at the Jubilee bash!!