Chapter 23 - Excuses

“Yes, I will definitely take my writing things up to son Graham’s, I’m sure to have a few quiet hours.” … Wishful thinking!!

Roy and I went up to Graham’s for a few days to see the Royal International Air Tattoo at Fairford in Gloucestershire. As he lives quite close to the runway there is a spectacular view of the air displays from his garden. The front lawn is covered with tents as it is only a short walk to the airfield. On the Friday morning William and Ellena had gone off to school and Valerie to work. Graham and Roy made sure everything was in order before deciding to walk up to the viewing area at the airbase to see the planes arriving. I had my instructions concerning three campers who were due to arrive at midday. Just the job, I thought, now I can get on with my writing. I made myself a cup of coffee, arranged my notes around me and seated myself at the dining-room table and took out my fountain pen from my pencil case in anticipation of covering many pages … when the burglar alarm went off !!!! The awful penetrating, shrieking siren filled the whole house and outside wasn’t much better!!

How on earth was I going to turn this thing off? When would the police arrive? I checked that no one had broken in then remembered the sensors that seem to be all over the house, so I stood in front of each one frantically waving my arms about. How stupid can you get? If that was all the burglar had to do the alarms would not be much of a deterrent. I looked at the box on the wall where I thought the controls were but that was just a solid mass. The sound was dreadful so I took a chair and my coffee and went as far as I could go to the end of the drive. I couldn’t hear myself think let alone write! The police didn’t arrive only the new campers. “I’m terribly sorry, it’s not usually as noisy as this,” I explained as I showed them the various facilities. They seemed quite oblivious of the noise and went about putting up their tent, in what is promoted as a peaceful site! I kept going out and looking up the road to see if Graham and Roy were on their way back. Eventually, after about one and a half hours, they appeared. The look on Graham’s face was a picture. “How long has this been going on? It should have turned itself off by now!!” He raced indoors and did what ever had to be done and it stopped. What a relief! It seems that the cause of this mayhem was the vibrations coming from a F16 Tomcat Fighter Bomber, which also set of all the car alarms in the viewing car park.

Any excuse is better than none … but an F16 … that takes some beating!!!!

Monica Olds