Balliol Lower School, Kempston

Good King Hal shows another delighted fan a thrilling new cure for a sore throat.

I thought I had got up early on Monday to go to North Cheam. 4am? 4?? AM?? There should be a law against such hours existing. I headed out into the damp dark morning and made excellent time. I was doing so well that my sat nav reckoned I would be at the school by about 7am! Wow! I could park up, grab a sandwich and a paper, maybe even have a snooze to off set the tiredness of starting so early. That was the idea anyway. I had forgotten about the Department of Transports quite brilliant idea to dig up ALL of Bedford and it's surrounds, close off loads of roads and install average speed check cameras everywhere. Added to this it was raining like mad and of course it was slowly getting closer and closer to rush hour. Therefore all dreams I had of getting to Kempston early and having a bit of shut eye in the car were crushed by the final 10 miles into the town as the traffic ground to a halt, all the roads I needed to turn off were closed and suddenly an hour had gone by. I arrived at the school at just after 8am. Still not bad for such a long journey, but not early enough to warrant a snooze.

I was warmly welcomed as ever at this lovely school. I had a cup of tea brought to me and I set up in the hall. I had been pre-warned that the group I would be seeing were a bit...er...immature. But they were mostly very good. As a year three group they struggled a little bit with the talky opening bit, but more than came into their own with the more physical side of the afternoon activities. Before the jousting I gave the boys a bit of a pep talk letting them know that not a single boys team had yet won any of the tournaments this term. I urged them to be aware that they had to win for the sake of all the boys of this World. So you can guess what happened next, can't you. The score now reads:

GENTLEMEN 0 - 5 LADIES

This is getting embarrassing. Their next chance to redress the balance is next Monday at South Green in Billericay in Essex. I will keep you posted on that one!

Blean - Balliol Lower - Tolleshunt D'Arcy

Another week of rushing around on a Royal Progress of mammoth proportions - and that's just me! I set off on Sunday the 19th October and drove to my sister's house in Kent. The eternal updating of her house continues apace, but with the added fun of dodgy electrics now. You can be quite happily sitting watching TV and sipping a glass of wine and then suddenly - FOOM! Out go the lights. Re-set everything, sit for another hour or so, and then FOOM! Darkness again. Not much fun for her and Julian her husband. I was in the Garden of England again for a visit to Blean School again down near Canterbury. This was my fifth visit to this school and as ever it was great fun. They are a wonderful bunch of people down there, very welcoming and the children are fabulous. We began with the morning in classrooms, but moved on to the main hall for the afternoon session. Another good day was had by all and the Jousting finished the day off a treat with a very good Gents side triumphing and therefore bringing the ever changing score for the year to:

GENTLEMEN 6 - 7 LADIES

Everything back in the melting pot!

I had driven up to my parents' house in Essex on the Monday evening, and was then up at the crack of dawn for a slog round the M25 and up the M1 to Bedford and a visit to Balliol Lower School in Kempston. I was only previously here back in May, but it was a delight to be back. Such a wonderful school. Great big hall to work in, excitable fun children and two of the most delightful teachers you could ever want to meet. I took great delight in pretending to flirt outrageously with Miss Harrison, one of the teachers, much to the laughter and fun of the children. "You fancy her!" They'd screech and I'd pretend to be annoyed and embarrassed. Wonderful stuff! And Miss Harrison was a good sport for playing along! The jousting was close and exciting, going right down to the wire before the Gents pipped the ladies at the post. This makes the score very interesting and now has us at:

GENTLEMEN 7 - 7 LADIES

Who could have imagined that a few days ago?

Wednesday I was over at Tolleshunt D'Arcy near Maldon for a first vist to St Nicholas' School there. I had been recommended by their acting Head who had seen me work before during previous visits to Little Parndon School in Harlow. Another good school, much fun with a little class of year 2/3's and a challenging day for me. They were running interviews for the new head position this day, so the place was swamped with Governors as well as young Tudors. However it was good luck to be here on this day as the lunch was a sumptuous buffet in the staff room. I should come back on days like this more often! The final jousting session took place in the hall and normal service, if it can be called that, was resumed with the ladies running out clear winners against a gents team who went completely off message during their second leg. Their rider went hell for leather after any quoit near him, and stands and quoits and any chance they had of winning went flying in all directions round the hall. So we now have our scores back to:

GENTLEMEN 7 - 8 LADIES

Where will it all end?

What next for me? The National Trust pub quiz to host on Friday night at Barrington, and then moving house next week. So not much of a rest!

Balliol Lower School, Kempston, Bedford

My alarm went off at 0400 hours this morning. What does the O stand for? Oh my God, it's early. It was going to be a long drive today up to Kempston near Bedford for a first visit to Balliol Lower School, a new venue for me. The drive was actually quite pleasant as it was before the full heat of the day had awoken and the roads were fairly clear at this early hour. I shot up the A303 and then the A34, before cutting across country and hedging Milton Keynes and then through Buckingham, which seems a delightful little town.

I arrived just before the school opened and so sat in a side road having some breakfast, much to the amazement of an elderly lady taking her dog for a walk. She obviously thought that I was lurking in her side road up to no good as she came past and had a good look at me about four times! The welcome I got at the school was much warmer, and I was informed in great detail by the lady in the office that she had cancelled the fire drill for that day because of me, but if there was a fire alarm it would be for real.

It was a Year 3 group today of about 50-60 children and they were just fantastic! Lively, inquisitive and ready to laugh. They also had some fine Tudor knowledge to share with me. The morning just seemed to shoot by, which is always a good sign that the day went well. I had a lovely lunch of roast beef from the ladies in the kitchens and then it was into the afternoon with all the nice gory bits! The stocks were hilarious and gruesome in equal measure. The joust was a good one too, with the gentlemen winning for a nice change. Balliol Lower was a delightful school to visit and I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did. It would be nice to go back and see them again sometime.

The journey home was a bit more fraught with much more traffic on the road, especially lorry drivers hell bent on overtaking other lorries at approximately 0.1 nano-mile-per-hour faster than each other. Why do they do it? They seem to wait until you are zooming up to overtake them and then just signal and blithely pull out, and trundle along for what seems like an eon before either completing the manouevre or, more commonly, giving up and tucking in behind again.

I got back in time to sit and watch Rangers being comprehensively outplayed by Zenit St Petersburg of Russia in the UEFA Cup Final, played at the lovely home ground of Manchester City, the finest team in the world with that name.