Tag Archives: gandey’s circus

Saturday 10th January 2026 – THE NEW COMPUTER …

… has arrived. And I can see that I’m going to have to be very careful with it. Not only is it lightning-fast, but it’s also very sensitive. You only have to let an action key have a whiff of the cursor anywhere in the vicinity and it goes into action, whether you want it to or not.

In fact, I wish that the cursor would come within whiffing distance of me so that I would go “into action, whether you want it to or not”, because I’m feeling rather lethargic at the moment — not that anything usually does come within whiffing distance of me. Well, not more than once anyway.

Last night was another late night, due in the main to the steam-driven computer taking just about forever to perform a few simple tasks. However, it was 23:50 when I finally crawled into bed and pulled the covers over my head.

And there I lay until all of 06:29 when the alarm went off, and this was another one of those mornings where I had a great amount of difficulty leaving the bed.

Still, with no dialysis today, I didn’t have to pretty myself up … "a hopeless task anyway" – ed … so I could move on quickly for my hot honey, ginger, and lemon drink and my medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

Nerina and I were living in some modern apartment block like the Cronkinson Oak estate in Nantwich. There had been something going on and we had been attending it. Then we walked over to the door of the building, just to go to stand by the door. It was late at night. There was a kind of double door entrance to it like an airlock thing. We noticed that there were three policemen there at the door, manhandling two young men. One of them they propped up against the wall in between these two doors and one of them brandished his machine gun at him and then walked off and left him. Nerina said “he shouldn’t go brandishing his gun like that at people”. I replied “it doesn’t really matter”. Then she said “look at the guy. He’s obviously drugged to the eyeballs or something”. We opened the door for him to come in but he just stood there against the wall with a vacant stare on his face, so we left him. I began to give Nerina a cuddle and in the end, we decided that we’d go back to our apartment.

–
Despite what people might think, it is nice to see Nerina. After all, you can’t live with someone for nine years and not like them at all – at least, I can’t. We could have made beautiful music together but it was the wrong place at the wrong time, unfortunately. And I did once nearly live in an apartment on Cronkinson Oak, which would have been lovely, but they sent me to Elm Terrace in Crewe which was not so nice.

I’d taken a bus out to Chester, and I’d walked from Chester out to Queensferry one Saturday afternoon. What I was doing was going to Queensferry Auctions to see if I could pick up a car. When I arrived, the auctioneer was announcing to everyone that if they were to buy a car and drive it home, to make sure that they would have an insurance certificate for them and the car. I seemed to remember thinking that it would come in handy later on. I didn’t remember what happened after this except that I was in a grey Ford Cortina MKIII estate, one of the early ones with the sloping dash but I can’t remember how come I came to be in it.

Many a time I’ve walked in the opposite direction, from Queensferry to Chester when I was dropped off there hitchhiking back from the Wirral when I lived in Chester. I always drove out to the Auctions at Queensferry though. At one time, I did have a grey MkIII estate, a “J” registered 2,000 cc one, one of the first, and with the sloping dash. But I’m “dashed” if I can remember what happened to it.

An electricity company was selling a Renault Trafic van so I went round to have a look at it. It wasn’t in all that bad condition for the money that they wanted for it, so I decided that I’d give it a go and arranged to buy it from them. While I was there, I asked them a question about their PA system but I saw that they were busy trying to mask off a part of it so that we could paint it, presumably to paint out the previous owner’s name and business. He had to go to answer the telephone. While I was talking to him as he was answering the ‘phone, the ladder fell over and I was clinging on to the gutter by my fingers. Luckily, I wasn’t too high off the ground so I could drop myself down. I asked him a couple of questions about the group’s PA system, and he showed me a quick connector on the rear valance, just above the rear bumper that was normally hidden when the door closed. What I liked about that too was that there was another button on there that you pulled. It was a remote starter and I thought to myself that it’s going to be useful. I thought that the interior of the van needed painting but I could soon do that. Then he began to talk about a few other problems that he’d had with the Inland Revenue over a car that he’d bought from a well–known Vauxhall supplier who had gone into liquidation because Vauxhall had begun to invest in a member of their family who had set up business on his own. He was telling me this story and I was agreeing, but I had no idea how much truth there was in his story or not. It sounded quite far-fetched to me.

This sounds just like me, falling off a ladder when there’s no-one around. Been there, done that. I’d have no interest in a Renault Trafic van either. Renaults are not my favourite vehicle, and by a long way too. The question that I was asking (I can still remember it now) was that if the impedance of the PA speakers is eight ohms, would an on-stage monitor passed across both left and right channels be four ohms or sixteen ohms?

The rest of it is the usual meaningless jumble of nothing.

Isabelle blew in like a gale this morning, which was a surprise seeing as the wind had now disappeared completely. And she blew out just as quickly too. She’d been held up on her round and there was someone waiting at her office for a blood test, so she didn’t have time to chat.

Once she’d left, I could make breakfast. Just a small breakfast today, and I managed to eat everything.

After that, I came back in here and had a few things to do. And then I finished off writing to notes for the radio programme on which I’d been working.

At 12:03 precisely, the postie turned up with the new computer. It took me a while to unpack it and then set it up – I had to restart it a couple of times. But to my dismay, the taskbar is locked at the bottom of the screen. I can’t unlock it, rotate it around vertically and pin it at the right-hand side. And judging by the hundreds of posts in the appropriate forum, I’m not the only one by any means who misses this facility.

But nevertheless, we carry on, and I’ve been uploading programs all afternoon. Waterfox doesn’t seem to want to run on it, but a couple of the other stripped-down browsers seem to manage just fine.

At 16:30, I knocked off to make some pastry. I’ve run out of vegan pie and there was some more pie filling in the freezer so I made pastry and filled it. It’s all in the fridge now, waiting for the baking session tomorrow when it will be first in the oven.

Tea tonight was baked potato, veg and one of those breaded quorn fillets that I like. It was the smallest meal that I’ve ever had, and yet there was still some left on the plate.

And that’s the trouble. I was feeling quite well today up until 17:00 when I felt myself beginning to slide downhill. I fell asleep I don’t know how many times in the dining room eating my meal. So here’s hoping that cleaning up tonight will be quick with the new computer and I can go to bed promptly.

A good lie-in will do me good.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about lemons, tax collectors and all of that … "well, one of us has" – ed … where we lived in South Cheshire, about eight miles away, was the winter quarters of Gandey’s Circus. When they came off the road in October, they would park up there in Arclid and stay until Easter.
One day I was chatting to the circus strongman, who told me a strange story. One of his tricks was to squeeze a lemon in one hand until there was no more juice coming out. Then he would challenge anyone in the audience to improve upon his efforts.
No-one ever did until one day, a weak and weedy little man in pin-striped trousers and bowler hat, put down his briefcase and came to have a go. Sure enough, half a dozen drips and a couple of pips emerged.
"Good grief!" said the strongman. "Are you a circus strongman too?"
"Oh, no" replied the weak and weedy little man. "I’m an Income-Tax collector."

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Wednesday 21st August 2024 – "ONCE YOU START …"

"… the dialysis procedure, all your problems will be over."

Yes, and we’ve all heard things like that before, haven’t we? If something like that could really solve all my problems I’d have done it a long, long time ago. Long before this.

In actual fact, it might solve one or two but I’m not expecting a Damascene conversion where I pick up my bed and walk. That’s being rather optimistic. But what we have learned from all of this is that it appears that dialysis is very much on the agenda.

Well know more after the 28th of August. That’s when everything is being inspected. They’ll make a decision very shortly afterwards. So if you see me leaping around like a two-year old, you’ll know that it’s done the business.

But for the moment let us return from our flights of fantasy back into the Real World.

After I’d finished my notes I wandered into the bathroom and there I put my puttees in the bowl to soak. The other pair I rolled up and put them ready for use in the morning.

Eventually I managed to make my way into bed, hours later than intended, and fell asleep almost immediately.

Something else awoke me at some point but I’m not sure what and I’m not sure when. This “not wearing a watch” is embarrassing but I’m scratching myself to death when I do.

The alarm summoned me to my feet at the usual time of 07:00 and I headed to the bathroom for a good wash and scrub down followed by a change of clothing. You never know – I might get to see Emilie The Cute Consultant this evening.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. This is another dream that involves some kind of panic attack. It was at one of these fairground places and there was a lot going on that didn’t seem to work correctly. There was a human cannonball who was fired from a cannon but the cannonball wouldn’t fire. It just rolled out of the bottom of the gun. It rolled over to by I think my youngest sister’s husband so what they had was this guy and this girl who had to climb inside the cylindrical thing where my brother in law was sitting. He was going to do something with the cannonball and they were going to intercept it but it was a terribly confined small space and I was there expecting some kind of panic or riot as the people concerned were unable to effectively escape from this claustrophobic environment. Luckily it passed off without any major incident. I certainly didn’t want to have to do it again with anyone and go through what was potentially a panic-stricken routine to extract them from this cylindrical tube thing while someone does something silly with a cannonball which seemed to be totally superfluous and ridiculous to me but that’s how it was

It goes without saying that I’ve no idea what’s going on there with that. The last thing that you’d expect to dream about is a human cannonball

A bunch of white track suits with a slogan on them were found to be mistyped. The slogan was wrong when I examined them as such and were counterfeit. They were able to test that by using a blob of chewing gum on the dragon’s head that was part of the label. There was a special technique for testing whether they were correct or not, in using chewing gum. This test failed so all the track suits were seized and were donated to refugees who were held in one of these detention centres

That sounds much more plausible. Forged sports equipment is quite a racket and I’m sure that we’ve all heard stories of famous mistypes in counterfeit sports goods. Without them there wouldn’t be famous sporting quotes like
"She was only the football supporter’s daughter
But she liked her ‘Uddersfield and her Arsenal"

When the nurse came, she moaned about my puttees losing their elasticity and asked me to arrange for a new pair. And on top of that there’s another issue. She has an electronic key to enter the building. She had it from my neighbour who has now moved into a Home and so wants her electronic key back

This will upset the nurses as the will then have to ring to be let into the building. And it would upset me because a couple of times now the nurses have intervened in my health issues when I’ve been unable to respond.

Consequently giving them unfettered access to the building is essential from my point of view and from theirs. Could I oblige?

So after she left and I’d had breakfast I put wheels in motion and made a phone call or two

Once more the Welsh lesson passed off well but I was still glad that it was over. In the pauses I’d chosen the missing track and written the notes ready for dictation so that’s that all done now.

The taxi came early for me so I was in a hurry to prepare but I ended up having everything to hand, for the first time ever, and we were there in plenty of time.

It wasn’t Emilie the Cute Consultant which was a shame, but her sidekick. And he tells me that he’s become a faithful listener of my radio shows. That means I have an audience of at least one.

We ran through everything and he told me that his Social Services department is on the trail of this Clinic in Avranches. He’ll let me know how it pans out.

Apparently my doctor had written a new prescription for me on 13th August. Where it’s gone, I don’t know but he printed it off, all … gulp … 19 items of it. And he added on an additional prescription for some new puttees, which will please the nurse.

He thinks that this dialysis will solve all of my problems, but he doesn’t even know what problems I have so he’s a very brave man

Back here my cleaner, who had been tidying the apartment, was waiting for me and she helped me upstairs where we sorted out the paperwork. We’ll check the medication on Friday and order some more.

Tea tonight was a delicious leftover curry with naan bread, cooked to perfection. But that’s the last of that batch of naan dough. I’ll have to make some more.

Now I’m off to bed. I have the heart specialist tomorrow morning so will he find a heart? Or am I turning into a politician? Watch this space.

But talking of human cannonballs, we had Gandey’s Circus who used to winter at Arclid near Sandbach. I had a friend who worked in the Crewe Employment Exchange who told me "Gandey’s are looking for a human cannonball. Do you fancy the job?"
"I thought that they already had one" I replied. "What happened to him?"
"Apparently he was fired last week" she replied.

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