Thursday 4th September 2014

Monday.

First day of September, and the weather is glorious, like summer has returned, so I head into the office in Ramsgate for a day of productive work. As you do. I steal my old seat by the window, and open the window so to get a nice breeze flowing. It is almost pleasant, even if work itself isn’t.

At the end of the day, I head home picking up Jools on the way, so we drive along Reach Road, with its stunning views over the edge of the cliffs and the Channel to France, even if it is mostly lost from view in the mist. Inside the house it is carnage; or it had been, with the living room full of bird feathers, a vole in the kitchen, another on the steps outside along with the back end of a mouse. Them cats sure to like to shower us with gifts.

I am glued to the computer and the radio as the final hours of the transfer window tick away, with the deals and moves getting increasingly desperate. Still, it is fun and interesting. However, after yet another portion of apple and blackberry crumble, I can feel my eyes getting heavy, so give up on the deadline days news at a quarter past ten.

Tuesday.

Just as well I did, as deals were still being announced at half one the next morning, as I found out when I checked on the computer the next morning before the usual early morning dash to the station for the early train to London. Once I am sat on the train and it glides out of the station, I reflect on how twenty nine years ago, I was a lowly process worker in a rural chicken factory, and by a very circular route here I am globe=trotting quality expert. Its an odd life.

London is its usual hustle and over-crowded trains. I climb onto the DLR and we go through east London to the airport. But at least being a Tuesday, it was just busy as opposed to being rammed with people. Once through security, I treat myself to what is called a full English, but it just a rasher of bacon, a sausage, some beans and toast. But, as I know I won’t eat again until the evening, I tell myself that I’m worth it.

We take off on time, and soon we are flying through a Simpson-esque sky, heading over Essex and Suffolk out into the North Sea and bound for Denmark. Down below the countryside is a patchwork of browns as the harvest is all but complete, and the next crops are being prepared or have been sowed.

I pick up a huge Ford MPV from the car hire place, drive down to Esbjerg for a meeting, and am on my way north again in less than an hour as that is where I am to stay in the hotel. It is a wonderful late summer evening, but also rush hour, and as seems the way, Audi and Mercedes drivers don’t have to keep to the speed limit and are in some kind of race. But I have all evening, and tootle along, arriving at the hotel at just before six, giving me time to settle in to my room before dinner at half past.

I wanted to say something healthy when asked for what I wanted, but I heard my stomach say burger and fries, which, I have to admit hit the spot.

Back in my room, my eyes began to drop, and despite being only half eight in England, I decided I had had enough, and went to bed. Another day done, and not a chicken giblet in sight…..