This morning I woke up to the sound of moderately heavy rain on the skylights. So I snoozed my alarm and turned over in bed. When the alarm rang again it was still raining. I listened to it for a while, debating with myself whether or not to get up and go for a run. The rain eased. I decided to take the risk. After all, if it was going to rain all day there would be little chance of a long walk later.
When I set out it was barely spotting with rain. Perhaps I had struck lucky. But I was wearing my heavy duty rain jacket just in case. Some fifteen minutes down the road the rain grew heavier. By the time I reached the duckpond it was getting a bit torrential. As I went through the wooded I started to hear rumbles. Either there were quite a lot of planes going over or it was starting to thunder. It was the latter and it got worse. Pretty soon the thunder was rolling round the hills, sounding a little as though someone was tearing the sky into pieces. And the rain grew more and more torrential. I didn’t see any lightning though. Running in a thunderstorm is quite something! That was my endurance test for the day!
My heavy duty rain jacket did its job but my running trousers and trainers were pretty soaked. My phone was pinging messages from Granddaughter Number One, who lives a few miles away in Mossley:
“Have you seen the rain!”
“Where has all this weather come from?”
“We have huge hailstones as well as thunder and lightning!”
“Mags (her dog) is scared stiff. She won’t stop trembling!”
So the thunderstorms that have been promised for the last few days had all been saved up for this morning. Since then we have alternated sunny blue skies and more torrential rain. Yesterday we had occasional showers but I managed to get washing dry in the garden anyway.
In the late afternoon yesterday, when the family departed after dropping in for coffee and biscuits, we decided to watch the end of the Wimbledon final between reigning champion Dokovic and relative newcomer, but already acknowledged as world number one, Carlos Alcaraz. They had already been playing for about two hours and went on for probably another three. A real feat of endurance!
Gripping stuff!
Novak Djokovic lost his temper at one point and broke his tennis racket by bashing it against one of the net supports! Tut!tut! In the post-presentation interview Alcaraz remarked that when he was a small boy he was already watching Djokovic win championships. I don’t think he really meant to rub his idol’s nose in it.
King Felipe of Spain was watching. We were reminded of the occasion long ago when a young Rafa Nadal won Wimbledon and climbed across the stands to embrace King Juan Carlos of Spain. At the time I wondered if British royalty would have taken it so well as Spanish royalty did.
When Rafa Nadal was a young up-and-coming tennis player he was one of the Spanish celebrities I used to ask my new AS Spanish students to research at the start of their sixth form studies. One of them became a Rafa Nadal fan at that point and followed his career from then on.
A friend of mine in the Italian conversation class has also followed Nadal’s career closely. We have often joked that she would like to adopt him. Maybe the young Carlos Alcaraz will take his place as her new tennis hero. I texted her to get her reaction to the Spaniard’s win (she was delighted as she does not like Djokovic) and found that autocorrect kept changing his name in my messages: Alcaraz became Alcatraz! Crazy AI!
To complete our sporting day later we watched highlights of the day’s progress in the Tour de France, as they toiled up the steep gradients of the Alps … and as some of them came off their bikes in the process.
Wimbledon finals and cycle races - both endurance tests. These young men are quite amazing!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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