All dressed up . . . and nowhere to go 🙁

I’m getting a little cabin fever now. Basically I’ve been stuck in my apartment for 4 days now. It’s not that I haven’t got anything to do. I actually feel as if I’ve got more than enough fun things to occupy myself with indoors but I need exercise. With this in mind I decided to brave the weather and take a tour of Todmorden Town Hall, including afternoon tea. At least it would give me a reason for wearing something different than what I’ve been hanging around in for the past few days. Since it’s only about 50 paces to the bus stop from my place I thought I’d risk it. About an hour before I was due to set off snow was coming down heavily but I could see from my window that bus were still running, so off I went.

Todmorden town hall is a magnificent edifice that quite dwarfs the rest of Todmorden town centre. A large banner on the railing was advertising a Wedding Fair from 10-4 today. I knew about this already so I wasn’t too concerned, but on entering the building there was no sign of a tour, or even a sign cancelling a tour. So I had no alternative but to gatecrash the wedding fair. It was a small collection of stalls running around the perimeter of a truly magnificent hall, but it was all so sad. There couldn’t have been more than 10 attendees, totally outnumbering the number of vendours. I chatted to one vendour who said there had been a sign outside earlier in the day cancelling the tour but it had been obscured by the Wedding Fair sign. I suggested a small sign on the door would have been useful, but it wasn’t her concern. I was niffed that the organiser, who I’d called and left a message with asking about any cancellation, had not had the courtesy to reply. However, I was here now, so I needed to make the best of it. I chatted to several vendours including the Todmorden lady who makes this adorable bears:

and the ladies that make these:

I sampled the fig bread – delicious

There was even a string trio advertising their availability for playing at weddings:

Next, I went in search of icicles and frozen canals and found both

before heading back to Hebden. I did consider walking back along the canal (5 1/2 miles) but it looked just too slippery. Back in town there were a few people in the square heading for hot coffee in the cafes and just a few brave souls were noseying at the 6 stalls that were open (crazy) on the outdoor market.

The best Indian food in town

Home of the Stoodley swirl

I often buy a bacon butty, cooked to order, from this stall

There’s a new stall on the market today. I sampled the elderflower gin: just the thing for generating some warmth today.

Local butcher’s signs

And then I headed for the co-op where the  shelves were pretty empty!!!!

Enjoying what had turned into a fun photo opportunity I went in search of some of the buildings my ancestors lived in, some of which I discovered yesterday in the archives.

One of these buildings is #1 Crown Street, directly across the street from my abode. From 1871 to 1891 Thomas Wrigley, (the husband of my 4th great aunt)  ran a photographic studio from here. In 1841 he had been a resident of Lily Hall, living with his new wife, the former Sally Wrigley (my 4th great aunt). Which means that my gt gt gt gt grandfather was Sally Wrigley’s father!

Some time last week I’d found that an ancestor had lived in Oxford House. I found it today. It currently houses a vegetarian restaurant that I wrote about in my journal a couple of weeks ago, saying that I’d like to take Anna there.

For the past two days the weather has stopped being fun, a novelty to explore and  capture on camera. There’s been no sunshine, just a dirty white cloud cover. From my kitchen window I’ve watched hour by hour as the icicles on the roof grew, melted when the temperature got above freezing for a couple of hours in the afternoon, and

View from my kitchen window

Our mailboxes

then refroze. Choir was cancelled. The director was snowed in. The recording of a CD by the wind band I joined was postponed since the recording engineer couldn’t get over the

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Pennines. I’d changed my travel dates for going to Ireland so that I could do the CD. Now I’m thanking my lucky stars that I wasn’t meant to be heading to Dublin yesterday. Many airports in the UK are closed. Less than 1/4 of the flights are leaving. 3000 people were stranded in their cars on the M62 overnight. That’s the main motorway between

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Lancashire and Yorkshire over the Pennines. The only road open over the Pennines is the A646 which runs directly past my apartment. Ah, that explains why I was woken by lorries passing in convoy before dawn. The news channels have relegated Mrs May’s Brexit speeches to second place as we see farmers digging sheep from show drifts as tall as houses and doctors walk 10 miles to get to their work.

Around lunchtime I heard the distinctive clip-clop of horses’ hooves and looking through the window I saw the incongruous sight of a Victorian funeral cortege driving along the road. Men in top hats sat atop the carriage pulled by six black horses.

I spent the day quilting, playing with iMovie and writing up my summer journal. I’m up to 19,122 words and I’m only up to July 22nd. It goes to August 25th, the day I flew back to the US. I feel that I really must finish it before I embark on my next trip.

From the chippy downstairs

I ventured outside mid afternoon but although the pavement by the road had been gritted, the passageway from my front door onto the street was literally one sheet of ice. There are two small grocery stores on my block. The first only had the 3 inch tubes of table salt. “No larger sizes?” I asked. “No, all sold out.” Next customer asks for  milk. “Sorry, all sold out.” “Aw,” sighs the customer, “The Co-op’s all out of milk – and all veggies too!” It made me feel lucky that I’ve got milk. So I tried the next store. “Have you got any packets of salt?” I asked. “For cooking? Or de-icing?” I left with a bag of de-icing salt that she slit open for me so that I could spread it around on the ice in the passageway immediately. Supper was fish, chips and mushy peas from the chip shop beneath my apartment, and now I’m going to sit back and relax to Tones, Drones and Arpeggios. Yep, I’m a total nerd!