I can't believe I forgot the earthquake

My life is so boring and uneventful I cannot believe I forgot to mention this. We had an earthquake the week before last. I appreciate this is a frequent, dreadful and unfortunate event in some countries but I can only recall two in 61 years in England. I was lying in bed just before one in the morning reading about the life of John "Rumpole" Mortimer (not apparently as nice as we might think) when the bed, house walls and windows started rattling and rumbling like nothing I had experienced before. Apparently old Mortimer's bed is alleged to have rumbled quite frequently during his life, but not I believe caused by earthquakes. Anyway I digress. I could not think what it was, it felt like the house was falling down. My initial thought was that there had been an air crash somewhere nearby, but fortunately not. I was cared witless and jumped out of bed and started downstairs. My wife was coming up shaking like a leaf. I had a look outside and strangely noone had come out onto the street. The epicentre was as is now well known about 30 miles from here in sleepy Market Rasen in Lincolnshire. Apart from horse racing this will probably what this small country town will henceforth be famous for.

Bob Marley and the Unwanted Gift

The "Unwanted Gift" aka Honda Express sold on Ebay yesterday for £165. Much more than I thought it would go for. However there has been an ominous silence from the purchaser despite my sending him or her a number of emails. The persons Ebay moniker and perhaps even real name is Bob Marley and as a fan of The Wailers I am particularly irked to be let down by a namesake of their leader. I don't suppose it could have been a Bidder from The Other Side? No, Bob would never have been seen dead on a moped. So I have a feeling I am going to be the victim of my first "timewaster", I have been lucky so far. The problem is how long do you leave it before you try to sell the item to one of the other bidders? If you take this course of action too soon then the "timewaster" will probably complain that they were away from their computer for some legitimate reason and leave detrimental feedback to this effect. If you leave it too long the remaining bidders will have bought a similar item elsewhere or gone cold on purchasing the item you had for sale.

And that's not the only bad thing, we've got an OFSTED inspection at work tomorrow, and I've a blood pressure and cholesterol check on Friday.

Right off to the gym now and chicken for tea.

What you could buy at Newark Autojumble today

Spent the morning at the 'Normous Newark Autojumble. It is not always 'Normous but it was today, the queue to get in was about four times longer than it usually is. Any way here are some examples of what could be bought. Two Lambrettas, a lovely Francis Barnett, a sidecar and a mangle just like my mother used to use on a Monday. I just bought three light bulbs and some paint. I am sure everything I am searching for was there, if only I could have found it.

I've come to the conclusion there are two sorts of bikers go to these things. One lot are older earnest blokes who probably worked as skilled engineers before they retired, doubtless smoked a pipe at some time in the past and spend their time trying to keep an unreliable pre 70's Brit bike on the road (probably at great expense). They are often there with their friend of many years.

The others are younger and do unpleasant things to, and with, foreign machines. These guys may be accompanied by women and children who may well also be bikers.

One group dines on the fast ........er......food available from the many vans and the other has sandwiches the wife made, kept fresh till dinnertime in tinfoil. I'll let you decide which is which. No stereotyping here then!

Oh and by the way dinnertime for us working classes is about 1.00pm