Friday 17th January 2014

It being a Tuesday must mean it is time to head to Denmark.

And being still January, it is still mighty dark at five in the morning when the alarm goes off. Even the cats are still sleeping. So, I have a coffee and some fruit, then it is time to head to the station.

Outside the rain was hammering down. The forecast was for sunshine during the day, maybe even by seven; it seemed unlikely. Jools dropped me at the station, I unload my cases, including the lovely new one we had to buy as I managed to wreck one last week on the way out. I get the tickets and so sit on the platform waiting for the train to London. It’s bad enough to do this every week, some folks, most of the folks on the train, do this every day. It seems to be grim. As we head to Folkestone then Ashford we pick up more passengers, and the train is pretty much full.

It is getting light as we head towards Ebbsfleet, and so I can see something of the countryside, in fact the rain clouds have cleared and the sky is a wonderful deep blue. All too soon we head into the tunnel that takes us under East London to Stratford, and it is time for me to get off.

Once on the DLR the guard strikes up a conversation, asking where I was going, then what I did, and it made such a pleasant change to have human contact, the journey to the airport flew. My stock answer when someone asks me what I do is that I annoy the Daily Mail, I then explain I put up wind turbines. Most people ask about whether what they had read in the right wing press is true of not, so I tell them the company line, tell them about reliability and investors getting their money back in 9 year. The whole nine yards. And he said, like most folks do, I see what they are good, but they destroy views. And so I give him another stock answer: people don’t complain about pylons do they? Maybe we should put up a turbine beside each pylon.

He thought about it and said, hmmm, that is true; wonder why that is…..

Anyway. I arrived at the airport to find it almost deserted; it is why I like to travel on a Tuesday. I get my boarding card, walk to one of the three free desks to check my bag in, go upstairs to security, walk right to the scanners, and I’m through in about 5 minutes. Time then for breakfast, and a nice eggs benedict and a huge coffee. That is so much better.

I get out WSC to read whilst I wait for the flight to be called; the lounge is very quiet, so I have a fine choice of seats for a change. There were just nine of us on the flight, and once aboard we were soon having the safety brief whilst the engines started and we began to move off. We took off heading west so that when we turned to head north-east we got a fine view of the city bathed in glorious winter sunshine. Trust me to have forgotten my camera!

As usual we headed up along the A12, flying over Shenfield, Chelmsford, Colchester, Ipswich before heading out over the sea by overflying Orford Ness. All of East Suffolk and Est Essex was bathed in sunshine, but further up the coast from Orford Ness, I could just make out Southwold peeking out from under the clouds, and beyond a hint of Oulton Broad reflecting the sky in its still waters. Down there is my Mother and a good friend, and yet here I am I 31,000 feet up, sipping orange juice and munching on pretzels. As you do.

I read some more as we flew over the North Sea, only to find Denmark covered in thick cloud, and once we had descended through the cloud, it was cold, grey and raining.

Once down and off the plane, I collect my case and make my way to the car hire place. Only to find they are short of cars and so are having to upgrade me to an Audi A4. Hmmmmm.

I sign the paperwork before they can change their minds, and I scamper off with the keys. Not only is it an A4, it is the sporty model too. Vroom, VROOM!

It made short work of the trip up the Aarhaus, and it was a pleasure to put my foot down and see the needle leap up and up. This was way too much fun…..

When I walked into the hotel, I knew there was something different. Hmm, what could it be? Oh yes, dozens of fit looking people wearing skin-tight sportswear. There were various European flags everywhere, new keycards and the staff wearing themed t shirts. Seems like the European Men’s Handball Championships are being held here in Denmark; and many of the teams are staying at the Scandic West.

I have played handball once, when I went to Germany on an exchange trip, with our exchange partners we went to various lessons, including sports, which meant an ‘us v them’ handball match. They had been playing for years, we had only been made aware of the game that morning. Needless to say West Germany cruised to an easy win.

I can’t say I understand the finer points of the game, I did try to watch a game during dinner, but it had me lost. So, two teams play something that looks slightly like basketball, as fast as that, and teams run up and down, throwing this little ball around. The crowd was getting very excited about it all, which as Denmark were playing is just as well. Denmark did win, which is always good for a competition.

I arrived at the hotel to be told that due to the handball, space in the restaurant was limited; so I booked a table for half five, dropped my bags in my room, and after freshening up, went down to eat. As I had not eaten since breakfast, I thought what the hell; beer and burger then! The soup was mushroom, which on top of beer and brewer’s yeast was risking gout a little too much so I had cured tuna. Cue the joke, I don’t know the tuna was ill!

Back to the room to settle down and follow the FA cup game via the BBC website and via Twitter. As I am not in UK, the commentary was not available to me, and the game wasn’t live on TV, or not the channels I had on my room. And what a dreadful experience it was, as despite starting bright enough, City grew ever more timid before conceding two goals late in the first half, and even by then we knew it was game over. In the end, Fulham scored a third and that’s the dream over for another year. Even my mate, Ian, has lost patience and is calling for change. Whether the axe falls before or after Saturday’s must win game against Hull is all that is needed to be decided. Sometime appointments work, sometimes they don’t. I have heard from a friend I have no reason to doubt, that City have already approached Malky and his team from Cardiff. Wouldn’t surprise me, but the silence regarding what has been happening is deafening.

Once the final whistle went, I switched the computer off and tried to go to sleep. I need sleep.

I could feel I had either an allergy attack coming on, or it was a cold or flu. The first line of defence is some anti-allergy pills, in my case in the hotel room. So I decided to leave work at four so I could beat the worst of the traffic.

I went to the car, loaded my bag and that is when I noticed the flat tyre.

Bugger.

Yep, no getting away from it, that tyre is flat, even if it is just at the bottom. So, I get the wheel and tools out of the boto to work everything out. Next get the instruction book to find the jacking point.

One last check that the tyre was flat, and away we go.

Undo the wheel nuts.

And jack the car up.

And up.

I jiggle the alloy wheel to break the cold weld. And try to wrench the tyre off. It was going nowhere. Then I remembered that I needed to take the nuts all the way off!

D’oh.

The wheel came off. I popped the donut, spacesaver, on. Did the bolts hand tight, lowered the car, tightened the bolts. Packed the car, checked the bolts again.

And into the car, start the engine and away we go. And to my surprise, the wheel did not fall off, and the ride was quite smooth. Although the traffic was heavy, I got back to the hotel in about 15 minutes. I was soaked from laying on the ground, sneezing heavily from the allergy, and I just wanted a shower and a snooze.

Imagine my surprise to find the doorway to the hotel blocked by several man-mountains;l in other words the Russuan handball team. None seemed less than 2m tall and as wide as a wide thing. Turns out they were just heading out to the stadium for that night’s game against Croatia. In fact, the game was on TV as I ate my dinner: Ribs washed down with a large glass of Christmas beer. It was an exciting game, but not so exciting that I watched the end when I went back to my room. Russia won 27-25, and very good I am sure it was too.

And that was it for an exciting Wednesday.

Phew.