Dagenham & Sunday

Well it did not start very well. we turned up at 09.30 to find no marquee, but where told that it was on it's way. The day went on and at 11.00 everything started, but still no marquee. We were told that the van had broken down in Ilford. Then the story emerged - the company had loaded their van on the Friday night, it was stolen overnight. So they had to borrow another van and load a spare marquee, this van then broke down. Luckily another man who was running the mini train took his lorry to where the van was and transported the marquee to Dagenham. But watching them put it up was like Kerno's Circus. They did not have a sledge hammer to hammer in the 4 foot pins to hold the uprights, but used a little club hammer, and the crew to put it up was on man an his wife, with an older couple and a fellow off another stand. Putting the roof on was a joke as they did not even have the right stuff for that. But eventually at 14.00 we managed to get started at one end as they finished the other end.

Trade and interest was not too bad, but we had lost half the day. We had 2 tentative enquires about holding a party and also 2 tentative enquires about holding demonstrations. So we will see what happens over the next few weeks.

Sunday: We went to my son's for a BBQ, and Dani his wife went totally OTT with the food, there was enough left over after we finished to feed my son with packing up for weeks. It was good fun and the grandchidren enjoyed bouncing on their tampoline with Andy (Dani's mum's boyfriend). The weather was fine, bit overcast but the rain held off, unlike what we left in Barkingside.