pumpkinstrokemarrow

A much better example of creativity exploration was to be found yesterday at Cambridge's Mill Road festive fair. A long, narrow and diverse retail area bristling with houses, shops and restaurants. A good proportion of whom had joined in the fun. Plus a variety of festive stalls selling a mixture of decorative and culinary crafts. Plenty of interesting snacks. IPA rather better quality than that which used to be found in TB. Various song and dance acts to liven things up. You could even have a guided tour of the local mosque. Lots of people out in the afternoon sun. Couldn't think of anywhere else which would lend itself to this sort of thing. Can't think of any other street quite of this sort. You used to have bustling high streets in parts of London but too big and wide to work well at community engagement. Keep an eye on http://www.mill-road.com/Home.aspx for next year.

One of the things we came across was a Chinese bronze contraption, a bowl with a broad flat brim with two rounded handle mounted on it. Fill the thing with water and rub the handles in the right way and the whole thing, including the water starts vibrating in a most odd way. The water dances. And if you put your finger in the dancing water you can feel the throbbing. Very therapeutic I should think. And if this does not make much sense, think of the trick of running a wet finger around the rim of an empty wine glass or beer glass to make the glass sing.

Stayed in the Gonville Hotel, very conveniently placed for Mill Road, the Catholic Church and town centre. Good sized car park, nice rooms. Plus points for the internet access mentioned above, a good quality, freshly cooked breakfast (no hot lights) and for carrying gluten free bread. Minus points for kippers (declined) which sounded as if they were soggy shrink wrapped fillets, a wash basin which was far too high for the average female and a water supply in the bath which could not decide whether it was coming out of the taps or the secondary shower head.

On the way back home we attempted a pilgrimage to the Tesco HQ in Cheshunt. We remembered that it was Delaware House in Delaware Road and the point of interest being that it is said to be a very modest affair for a very large company. No flashy nonsense in Holborn for Sir T. Leahy. Sadly, not having bothered to check beforehand, we found Cheshunt and we found a giant Tesco Store, but no Delaware Road. The giant store was most impressive though. Must have been at least a 50 checkout operation. They also had a cafe without music and with doughnuts. Fresh and sugary looking affairs which we declined.

Back home, had some trouble finding Delaware Road. Google maps seemed to know about the place but would not take me there. Not sure what was going on here. Eventually get to the Tesco site where they do indeed have a handy location map for Delaware Road, which was, after all, near Cheshunt Station and nowhere near the flashy Tesco store that we did visit. A bit like Microsoft on a small scale. Building number 1, Building number 2, Old Tesco House, and so on and so forth. Next time we will make it and pay our respects to what was, when I was little, a company of rather small, scruffy and downmarket self service outlets. How fast can the mighty grow?