West Mids Showground

It cost a tenner, and lasted 10 minutes.  Not too sure if that’s good value or not, it’s been that long since i actually paid to go to a bonfire night extravaganza.  However, my recollection of London bonfire parties does not include full-on fairs, hog roasts and folk bands, so perhaps it wasn’t such bad value when you add it all together (and parking was included in the entry price, for that alone it was good value eh?!!).

On the way there we realised that we didn’t actually have any cash, not to worry i thought, they’re bound to either take cards or have cash machines…oh my city naivety.  Of course not.  And so, the main ‘entertainment’ for the evening was driving round the outskirts of Shrewsbury looking for places that might spit money at us, ideally before the hat spat up her dinner from screaming so much, or Adam spat at me with annoyance that i hadn’t sorted it out previously.  We eventually found a shop that did cashback, and the crisis was averted.  Supper and entrance were gained, and we were even able to make use of the fair.

Needless to say, neither of the kids were particularly impressed with the whole night out.  The Hat literally screamed for 2 hours, and no1 child was much more excited with the ludicrously over-priced flashy sword that we got him and with his ear mufflers than with any of the actual entertainment laid on.  The duration of the display was spent saying to C “ooh, look over there” with him, in comedy deafness, turning the opposite way and screaming “what mummy? i can’t hear you”.  As the futility of this exercise became apparent, and we realised that we and about 10,000 other punters would all soon be heading for the only exit, the rest of the display was spent edging backwards towards the car, whilst trying to get our money’s worth and at least see as many of the fireworks as possible.  The moment that there was a pause in the bangs we made a run for it, no1 child being dragged deafly along (tripping other people up on his dragging sword) with no2 child screaming blue murder.  The final throes of the display were caught from the car, inevitably we missed the perfect timing (it taking a while to get a screaming baby and no1 child into the car “what mummy? I can’t hear you”) and got caught in the worst traffic i’ve ever seen this side of Much Wenlock.

Despite all that, we’re looking forward to next year!

And, more importantly, it was great therapy for my fixation with routine and schedule to have broken it, Adam was proud of me!!!