Derny

The second of the 2for1 days at the Fringe so more out and about activities.

Rest of my family went to a kids puppetry show called The Velveteen Rabbit at the art college in the morning whilst I tried to get the flat into some semblance of order after the last week or so of solid telly watching. They reported good things.

Afternoon's show was The Snail & The Whale at The Pleasance. The actors battled hard, but this was without doubt the noisiest, most distracting and generally just off-putting audience I've ever sat in for a kids' show. Glad I knew the story as very hard to concentrate with all the chairs banging, latecomers, early leavers, criers, shouters and bawlers that all sounded like they were directly behind me. Plus, the kid in front of me could not sit still to save his life, constant clambering around from him and at one point he virtually ended up in my lap as he teetered on his chair and then threw his arms out to regain his balance. There's usually a fair amount of noise at these things but, boy, this one was something else...

I'll quickly allude to the title of the blip. We were all having lunch today in Pizza Express and I was talking about cycling and asking my youngest if she knew who Chris Hoy was. When she replied that she didn't I started remonstrating with her and saying that she should know who he was, he was an absolute legend and what were they teaching her at school anyway. A voice from the next table said "This is him" and then whipped out a Chris Hoy mask from her bag and gave us a wave of the union flag that was folded on the chair next to her. It would have been even better if she'd been wearing the mask when she said "This is him" but it was certainly the next best thing. And, of course, well done that man.

Music. Bike-related. Again. Kind of. Well done that woman.