Going out to lunch. Problems with Lego. Being grumpy on the bus!

I didn’t run this morning. I was going into Manchester to meet my amici italiani - my companions from the online Italian conversation class. As we only ever see each other via zoom these days, at the end of term we meet for lunch in Manchester. 

I needed to go to the post office in the village before setting off for Manchester and there simply wasn’t going to be time for running as well. Besides, I was almost certainly going to walk around all over the place in Manchester as I planned to take advantage of being there to pick up a couple of odds and ends. That would have to do for my exercise for the day. In the post office I chatted to a friend who assured me it was not going to rain today! 

Hmm! She was misinformed! By the time my bus was halfway to the Oldham Mumps tram stop the driver was having to send his wipers at double speed! So it goes! My raincoat has a good hood.

I arrived in Manchester, as planned, with time to pop into the Lego store for an item I had seen advertised, something I thought might be of interest to Grandson Number Two. What a disappointment! This brightly lit store had masses of Harry Potter themed Lego sets. Ditto Star Wars. Ditto Disney. Ditto Super Mario. Ditto even Minecraft. All sorts of sets related to films and games but no simple Lego sets. I’ll have to find the advert and order it online. How very annoying!

So off I went to meet my amici for lunch. We had selected a restaurant called Sicilian NQ, in Manchester’s Northern Quarter. I say “we” but in fact it was one person who did the research and in the event she was not able to be there as she needed to take her husband for a hospital appointment which could not be rearranged.

The restaurant was a good choice. The food was good. We all spoke Italian, including to the staff/owners - proper Italian people not some other nationality employed to work there. We have sent the absent amica photos of the food and we’ll have to do a repeat visit early next year.

Afterwards I made another attempt to tick items off my Christmas shopping list. I was partially successful. And then I caught the tram back to Oldham. 

Uncertain about whether the bus from Oldham to Delph was going to stop at Oldham Mumps - there had been a notice saying the stop there would be closed for a week starting from last Tuesday - I got off the tram in the centre of Oldham and walked up to the bus stop before my usual one. I waited about 10 minutes, watching other buses come and go. Just before mine arrived, another bus to a different destination stopped, quite legitimately I hasten to add, at my stop. My bus swung round the corner, looked as though it was pulling in behind the first bus, but then pulled out round it. Was it going to pull in in front of the other bus? I was waving my arms around to attract the driver’s attention and realised that he was just going to drive on. But he was stuck in traffic. So I ran, banged on his door, glaring at him, daring him to ignore me. Phew! He opened the door. Some drivers would tell you they are not allowed to do that. “You drove past my stop,” I chastised him as I showed my grumpy-old-lady-bus-pass. “You should have been keeping a look-out!” he said, trying to justify his action. “No!” I retorted, refraining from swearing at him, “YOU should have been keeping a look-out!” Some of the other passengers were amused!

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!