Late Junction to start the new week. There was a great tribute Jah Shaka. It was just what I needed to get fired up for the morning.

Liège-Bastogne-Liège catching up followed. I managed to avoid the race result yesterday. My RSS feed is full of headlines from the race which I blanked out. It was worth avoiding the outcome and catching up with a five minute highlights package thank to GCN+.

Daisy and Dotty spent the early morning sunbathing together in the garden. It was quite sweet seeing them together.

Daisy has slimmed down so much that she looks like the sister of Dotty once again. Its quite incredible how she’s managed to lose the weight. It was getting close to a dangerous situation to manage.

I spent far too long looking at the Surrey County Cricket Club Annual Report and Accounts that were sent out ahead of the AGM. This was a real page turner.

The attendances across all formats of the game was bleak reading. It looks like The Blast has suffered at the hands of the silly Hundred.

Surrey use to sell out The Blast for every game, year in, year out. Crowds ranged from 11,363 to 20,801 last year – still short of the 26,000 capacity.

The silly Hundred meanwhile regularly pulled in attendances of 22,000+.

Oh dear.

The report explains that mitigating circumstances for The Blast include rail strikes during this period. But it still looks like there is an appetite for the silly Hundred at the expense of The Blast.

I’m voting with my feet this year. I’d prefer an extended season of Championship matches with a competitive one day competition contested at the highest level.

Elsewhere and the attendance of the Committee members continues with the same theme each year.

Ex-players always get voted on to the Committee at the expense of some very dedicated Members; each year the ex-players have a piss poor attendance record at meetings.

Album of the Day: The Beatles – With The Beatles

It’s difficult to listen to With The Beatles through fresh ears. It’s all so familiar, it’s all so predictable. But imagine listening to this for the first time in 1963. It’s a great little rock ‘n’ roll album. The originals are actually stronger than the covers. Thirty three minutes is also the perfect running time for any album.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

I was free for a swim at lunchtime. I cycled off to the pool on a MTB for the first time in a couple of months. It felt weird with the large wheels. I’ve been riding mini-wheelers around Ldn for the past two months.

There was high water long the Muddy Banks of the Colne. I found it hard work on the MTB.

The 20 metre pool took some getting use to once again. The water was warm and cloudy. I should be outdoors by now back at Lake Brockwell.

I did manage to have a lane to myself. I though I put in a strong swim. The time for the 1km effort was way off where I expected it to be.

Some gardening tidying up and chores took place late in the day. I’m finding all sorts scattered around left by the builders.

I cleaned the winter MTB and then put it away for another year. Out came the summer MTB for the months ahead.

I think I managed to fix the alarm on the shed. It’s very sensitive. The slightest jolt triggers it. I put in a screw on the shed door so that the lock doesn’t have any give in it whenever a cat decides to jump on the shed roof. I fear being woken up at 3am with a false alarm.

Another small win for the today was fixing the not very smart smart thermostat. Ideally I want a manual control that I can turn on and off. The Fuck Face gas engineer (who is no longer a gas engineer but is still a Fuck Face) fitted the not very smart thermostat without asking us.

The issue is that it’s so stupid it keeps on forgetting the WiFi connection. The router booster is definitely in range. Other devices work fine.

Anyway. The solution was to force a reboot and a firmware update. That seems to hold the signal.

Cheers, Fuck Face gas engineer.