Flower Power

Photo's: Andrew on the return leg of the 100 yard dash, and some shoes mixed up for the show race.

The end of the summer is also marked with the last of the village flower shows. I always like to get along to them to see whose got the biggest marrow in the village and whose dog looks most like their owner (a genuine category in the dog show). They are good fun and it will be a sad day when they stop happening.
Oldhamstocks Flower Show has the added bonus of a fell race. Well it's a fun run really over a distance of approximately 1 and half miles. It is preceded by the '100 yard dash' and the 'shoe race' (where you have to find your own shoes in a pile of many others), and a few other fun things. I won the race last year, only because of a shortage of competitors, and this time was going to be the same...except one of the few adults (and he's hardly that at 17) was national distance runner Andrew Crichton. It's a shame more people don't run it and make it more of a race as I felt a bit wrong taking the £15 prize for 2nd place. Our Andrew won the kids race again, pocketing a nice £10. It was good to see a lot of kids running it this time as it makes for a bit of an occasion.
So farewell to my trophy, but it is nice to think my name sits alongside a prospective 2014 Commonwealth games champion, which is what we are seriously expecting for him.
Next year I am thinking about entering some of the less physical competitions like the jam making. Me & Stuart have been rustling up some great blackberry varieties recently, or the dog show where Trefor is bound to win the best lipstick or moonwalking dog prize.
After the show, I decided that I'd run home. The route from Oldhamstocks via farm tracks takes you into Aikengall Farm, Emma's old family farm. It's been years since I have been in that side of the farm and much has changed, notably the amount of green stuff growing. There are no sheep in the glen anymore, so bits that used to be parched and exposing interesting rock formations are now covered in grass and bracken. I imagine the farmer is getting paid a shed load of money to leave it that way too. Anyway, it was a good run (9-10 miles) and rounded off my Saturday afternoon nicely.