Chapter Selection Menu: P 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 E Next>>
Mission Visits the UK - England & Wales, May 2013
Chapter 4th: Lee and Jules 3
Chapter 4th: Saturday afternoon at the Conwy Pirate Festival; A barrel race confuses our world; Meeting in the parking lot; More about my insulin than you'll ever want to know; Checking out the town of Conwy; Finding another pub (it's not hard to do in the UK); Meeting Elliot and what happened; Taking our leave and My room at the inn.
The Barrel Race in the Cleared Path
(Red Shirt = Clear Loser Here)
We wandered about again down by the water when people started walking down the sidewalk fronting the bay shouting for everyone to get out of the way. After a bit of confused chaos, the shouters cleared the walkway and announced that they needed volunteers for the barrel race. The barrel race involved rolling a barrel down the straight sidewalk for about 100 yards or so. Seeing a bunch of strapping young men in their early 20s volunteer quickly convinced me that this was an event where I would watch rather than participate.
The guy next to me said "2 pounds on the red shirt!", which I wish I'd have taken. Admittedly, the red-shirted guy looked like he might have an edge (plus everyone knows that red cars go faster than other-colored cars, so it might also be true for barrel rollers.) However, barrels do not tend to roll true and red shirt started having trouble with his charge early in the proceedings. The gambler started yelling for red-shirt's opponent to fall down, but he stayed upright and won the race.
This was the first of what looked to be several heats. Eventually the rstarted carrying the barrels instead of rolling them. I don't know if those was done to save time or because it was a new phase of the race. I didn't see the last race; as exciting as watching barrel races were, I had been separated from Lee and his family when they cleared the sidewalk and was wondering about that. So I started looking for them.
 Women Carrying the Barrels (Anyone in a long skirt really deserves a head start I think.) |
 Another Barrel Carrying Race. (This should burn enough calories for a pint.) |
 A Rolled Barrel Gone Awry. This guy was not even racing, he was demonstrating. |
The Parking Lot. And the Castle Wall.
Just before the race had started, Jules had noted that our 4 hour parking passes were close to running out. With everyone being soggy, she suggested that it might be nice to head for home with the kids. I then offered to take Lee home since I wanted to hang out for a bit longer. That decision was still hanging in the air because we had been separated by the race. I wandered back to the parking lot where the girls and the baby were clustered about the car.
Not to get OT here, but even the parking lot in this town contained a centuries old artifact of daze gone bye. The rear wall of the parking lot was actually a part of the castle wall that had originally extended out to protect the town. No doubt this was once the site of the ancient chariot parking lot which the Romans used. (Or not.)
C-Rex?!
Undead Batman Pirate
Now who is weirder in THIS photo?
Now, while I don't generally like to fill this Journal with notes on my diabetes, it is relevant to the story, so we must dig into the details a bit. To break up the monotony of this passage, I will fill the gaps with images of children, which people seem to generally like. (Certainly they like them better than stories about the care and feeding of diabetics.) We will begin with a group of undead pirates, mainly because I liked them best.
While in the parking lot, I noticed I was feeling a bit off, so I checked my blood sugar. It was a rather startling 600. I checked it again and it still came up at 506. (Normal is 80 – 120, high (in my book at least) is 300, so 600 was absolutley absurd.) I dialed in a rather large burst of insulin from my pump.
 Aww... |
 The Flames Mean 'Dangerous' |
 A Pirate Pram |
 As High as a Bucket Boot |
 That's a LONG long sword |
My pump warns me when it gets below 20 units, meaning it need to be refilled soon, which it promptly did after that huge burst. I was hoping that the 20 units of insulin would calm the raging blood sugar and I could last a few more hours. When it is that high, however, something else is usually going on and more than just a hit of insulin is needed. Following the 20 unit juice, I had only 12 units left in the pump, which worried me a bit. Still, home was 20 minutes away, so I decided to wait and see what would happen.
 The Captain Hauls Back (To Do What, I Don't Know.) |
 "All we have to do to start is take a fishing vessel..." |
 A Blue-Faced Blonde in a Pirate Coat. Um, Right. Looks neat, though, doesn't it? |
 OK, This is Not a Kid. But I Wanted It In Here. |
The Knight Shop at the Entry to the Pier
I sorted my parking fee and then volunteered to go in search of Lee. Jules went with me because she wanted to find Jasmine, who was (hopefully) with Lee. They turned out to be surprisingly easy to find. (Lee is sort of hard to miss.) Since I had agreed to take Lee home, Jasmine and Jules went back to the car park and left.
One of the reasons I wanted to stay was to see the shops in town, which we immediately set off to do. We started by checking out the Knight Shop, which was the headquarters for the event. There we found a nice display of swords, medieval weapons and fantasy sculptures and products – fairies and the like.
After I commented approvingly on a display of some really interesting crossbows (crossbows have always appealed to the engineer and D&Der in me) , Lee said, "You should take that home on the plane and see what security says." Indeed! It would probably be better than a box knife in their eyes...
The Streets of Conwy Village (A Quinn Martin
Production) (Unrecognizability Rating: 85%)
Since the shops didn't really have what I was looking for (I had been looking for some gifts for friends and so forth), we decided to find another pub. When in doubt, always try to find a pub. Fortunately there is usually one to be found, so we entered Dawsons with alacrity and ordered two pints. We eventually found a table and sat and chatted about the Pyracy Pub and people we knew there.
Lee wandered off to see a man about a dog and I was left at the table alone for a bit. A young buy in a pirate costume had been going in and out of the pub the whole time we were there. It was sort of funny to watch him open the large, sturdy door of the place – it took both hands. His dad was at the bar, having a pint and I think the boy was going outside to see what sort of pirate happenings were out there. (There had been quite a bit of what I believe was belly dancing at one point, although all that I could see of that from my seat was the top of severly girl's in fancy dresses with beads heads so I can't verify that.)
Anyhow, after Lee left, that boy shyly looked over and approached the table. Then he said something I didn't hear to his dad. His dad asked if they could sit with me, which I
Elliot's Dad Fixes His Kerchief. (See, it's not just me.)
invited them to do. I began to ask the boy about pirates. His name was Elliot and his favorite pirate was Captain Jack Sparrow. (Which was probably good for Elliot since I had seen at least a half dozen Jack Sparrows since I'd been there.)
Lee reappeared and sat down. Now, I don't know this for certain, but I suspect he'd have liked to sit with us earlier, but Lee is a pretty big fellow with frightening dreads and beard which might have been why Elliot asked to sit with me after Lee had left.
Elliot had a book of those stick-on tattoos, which he showed us in great detail. He had put two very large ones, which filled most of his forearms – one of a pirate and another I don't remember. (Fortunately the photos are below for you. I think the other one might have been a dragon.)
Lee had a purse of coins on him and he asked Elliot if he could like a piece of eight. You'd have thought Lee had offered him gold. (Well, I guess he sort of did.) You could immediately tell that if Elliot thought a lot of pirates before, they might now surpass dragons in his estimation. Lee explained the piece of eight and drew out one he had cut up and told Elliot how the people used to cut up coins which is why they were called pieces of eight.
 Elliot Showing Off His Pirate Ink |
 A Jack Sparrow |
 Mission, A Piratey Elliot and Lee in the Pub |
Your Author at the Pirate Festival in
a Very Soggy Patrick Hand Original™
Unfortunately, it was about this time that I began to realize that the jolt of insulin had not done its job. As much as I would have liked to have stayed, I explained the problem to Lee and we left. I figured that the issue was the injection site of the insulin pump. You can't leave them in too long or the area gets so saturated that the insulin doesn't absorb well and the pump doesn't work properly. Thus, we took our leave of Conwy sooner than I'd hoped.
Back in my room, I reloaded the pump and changed the injection site. While there, Lee commented approvingly on the room. I hadn't mentioned my room before because, although this Journal has elements of a travelogue, I didn't want it to turn into Mission's Travel Guide of Northern Wales. However, since Lee brought it up... I was staying at a Bed and Breakfast called Bryn Holcombe.
When I was trying to figure out where to stay, I quickly learned that the secret English code for a room with a bathroom in it is "en suite." (Take note of that and file it for future reference.) Lee told me that when Jules left for London to play
The Trampoline Fire Escape from My Room
Hellboy in a few weeks, she would be staying in a room with a shared bathroom, which is not unusual here. (Try to imagine putting on all the prosthetics and make-up for that costume in the common bathroom and having an unwary woman enter. The unsuspecting may not have to use the facilities after being confronted with that. )
There were two neat things (in my book) about this bathroom in my room: 1) They supplied toiletries looked like little apothecary jars. 2) It had a water heated towel rack. (No, I didn't take the toiletries. It's enough for me to have a photo of them.)
The room itself was what you would expect, although it also had two interesting (to me) features: 1) It was on the second floor and had a trampoline just outside the window, which I figured was there to serve as a rather fun fire escape, should the need for it arise. 2) It had an old fireplace with potpourri in it. I wonder what happens when you set fire to potpourri? (No, I didn't try it. As much fun as trying the trampoline would have been, I didn't want to cause a international pirate surgeon incident. Not yet, anyhow.)
Having done as much as I could for my insulin problem, I took Lee back home. Jules generously fed me dinner at their house again. After that, I headed back to the hotel before it got too dark. (Although I was almost, sort of, beginning to get comfortable driving, the GPS tried to take us in the wrong direction when I was bringing Lee home and I didn't relish trying to figure things out with it in the dark.)
 A Towel Rack Heater. Brilliant! |
 Apothecary-Like Toiletries |
 Patrick Hand Hat and the Potpourri Fireplace |