Icingcakeesque

I've just noticed that the last comment over in the box to the left there is one from me, looking forward to a 'chilly scooter ride over to Manchester's fashionable Westside come January 4th'.  Nothing of the sort happened because both the scooter and myself had fallen foul of the Big Freeze.  So the first working day of the New Year saw me shivering indoors under every available blanket,  while the scooter stood equally forlorn in the back yard, its battery as flat as the icingcakeesque four foot covering of virgin snow that had transformed Levenshulme, and indeed the whole of Britain, into a Victorian Christmas Card Scene.

The scooter has refused to move since, and indeed if I have interpreted correctly the hideous death-rattle that emanated from its poor frozen insides when I attempted a kickstart, it is unlikely to consider a commute to the fashionable Westside, or indeed anywhere else, until the temperature in Levenshulme approaches that of somewhere properly fashionable and a little more European.  Palermo, perhaps, or Valencia.  I don't blame it in the slightest and am only prevented from adopting a similar stance myself by the suspicion that the munificence of the Human Resources Department at  Statutory Agency X does not extend to the granting of extra paid leave to employees who have been caused by the Big Freeze to develop a Latin Temperament.

All of which meant that early last Tuesday morning I was to be found in an unworldy icescape that on closer inspection turned out to be Piccadilly Gardens.  A number 203 bus, its destination plate reading rather optimistically 'Glossop', inched its way out of the concourse, outpaced by businesslike types in heavy-duty North Face kagouls, who were busy making ominous pronouncements into the mobile phones clasped to their ears.

'Wythenshawe?  Wythenshawe is a complete no-no, don't even try it'

'I've just had Paul on the line.  He's been stuck on his drive since five this morning. We're going to have to cancel Eccles'.

Forty minutes later a slow Liverpool train, running exactly to schedule as if in rebuke to those fancydan upstarts the icebound Metrolink trams, dropped me off outside my offices in the Westside.  Only three other people had made it in, and just as we had exhausted our nightmare commute-across-the-city-in-the-snow stories we were joined by the manager, brandishing in the style of Clement Attlee an extraordinary communique from Head Office granting us the afternoon off 'on account of the unprecedented conditions'.  By three o'clock I was back at home.

And what with the continuation of the Big Freeze and the cross-county school closures that was about as much work as I did all last week, and I even got to spend Thursday wandering around a deserted Science Museum with Frankie, inspecting the insides of steam trains and surreptitiously eating our own packed lunch in the overpriced, overmanned cafe.  All of which would expain why today, having put in a full day's work with not one but two meetings and approximately several emails, some of them concerning actual matters of statutory vitality, I'm absolutely knackered and need to go off to bed for an early night, and hope that the Big Freeze continues to thaw into unsightly sludge.  With which warming thought I bid you all Happy New Year, and Good-Night.

Comments

[Michael]

"My husband's car's a BMW and that's crap in the snow."

Made me chortle. As I trudged through ankle-deep slush for the Metro.

[Forest Pines]

That steam engine they have cut open in the Manchester Science Museum, the Isle Of Man Railway one, is rather cute as far as steam engines go.

[Cocktails]

All this snow business is making me very cross. I am sick of having to wear the thermals I bought for walking in the Alps at home in my lounge room.

On the positive side, you did get to go to the excellent Science Museum. I could spend ages in that place...

[jonathan]

Michael, I heard exactly the same comment about BMWs from someone giving me a lift into Manchester the other day, so along with your overheard coment in the snow I think we can save ourselves the trauma of visiting Top Gear's website, or wherever it is petrolheads go to get their kicks, and just agree right here and now they're probably rubbish.

Forest- I remember you when you were a completely different blog, that was of course in prehistory or as it is otherwise known 2004. And I know exactly which steam engine you're on about, in fact I conducted a frank assessment of its insides on my visit and can report that there was a lot of Victorian pipework in there, none of which I could explain the necessity of at all. I do love the Engineering Museum, but often think I would get a hell of a lot more out of it if I understood the first damn thing about what pistons were for and so forth. Damn humanities-based education.

And Cocktails, I'm not surprised you're cross, if I were you I'd be damn well livid, and I don't imagine the news that southern Australia is experiencing a record heatwave is doing too much to cheer you up, either. Don't worry, I have it on good authority it will all be over by July when we can expect a heatwave ourselves, or failing that two months of light drizzle.

[Abby]

Eeeee, I'm glad to hear that the snowy weather is continuing over there and that you are getting proper snowy days off. I hope you managed to make it to the top floor of the science museum so that Frank could turn the crank and make the car go up the wall.

[jonathan]

I can confirm that Frankie not only sent the Mini up the wall but back down again as well, thus empirically proving, like thousands of tiny Mancunians before him, that gears really do work and the Victorians weren't just having us on with their pesky so-called Industrial Revolution.

All most educational, and if the schools had been closed for another day I might have considered a trip to Stockport's perennially deserted Hat Museum, where there is another Mini, incongruously parked in the middle of the floor surrounded by a display of early 20th Century headware. It is accompanied by some sort of spurious plaque explaining how the rise of car ownership led to the chronic decline of Stockport's once-proud hat industry, which never seems to me quite enough excuse for the lowering of a full size hatchback into a cramped former machine-room two floors under the A6. Personally I suspect the origial mini intended for Manchester was delivered to Stockport by mistake, and, out of bitterness at the loss of their traditional artisan hat-making livelihood to the all-conquering internal combustion engine, they have been keeping it hostage there ever since.

[looby]

Oh no! Eccles got cancelled!

[Dan]

"surreptitiously eating our own packed lunch in the overpriced, overmanned cafe" - I think I'll wait to hear Frankie confirm the aforementioned food achieved 'Packed Lunch' status before believeing this tale... we've been here before Jonathan!

[John]

Christ! I very much doubt this Jonathan fellow's ever written a dull sentence in his life!

[jonathan]

Dan, I can confirm that the packed lunch was subjected to the sort of thorough inspection normally undergone only by promoted non-league football clubs hoping that their dishevilled amenities will pass muster at the higher level of competition to which their on-field exploits have earned them access. And I can reveal that the addition of a number of improvements- such as a seated enclosure for visiting supporters, and a peanut butter sandwich- are going to be needed, before we can hope to entertain luminaries such as Northwhich Victoria.

And John- ha! I think we both know we did allow a dull sentence to get past our own strict inspection procedures on one occasion- but it was a long time ago, and we don't think anyone noticed. We shall never speak of it again.