At Lord’s

“It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk, though my own red roses there may blow;

It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron  folk, though the red roses crest the caps I know.”

The Idle Skiers have been back in old London town for nearly a week now.  The skiing goes on in Wengen, but it is good not to be flying anywhere for a while. Instead, I made an early visit to Lord’s, to the season’s first match there, Middlesex v. Lancashire

The opening lines for tonight’s post are by Francis Thompson, a poet born in Preston.  When invited to a match between those two counties, shortly before his death in1907, he stayed away and wrote instead At Lord’s.

The cricket was good, but it has been an odd day weather wise.  The sun shone at times, but it hailed for a while as well.  Despite photographic evidence to the contrary, the crowd was good for a match in April.  There were many there from Lancashire and they thought it a balmy day. The Idle Skiers are from that neck of the woods, but I think we have become soft Southerners over the years.

Two tube rides brought absolutely no vertical metres and about 14 kilometres travelled.