The Scout Swimathon 2015

Hooray for the weekend! I Minecrafted and then we offloaded some old fancy dress costumes at the charity shop and went to church.

Now, a rock god like me doesn't have to go to church but my Scout group usually have stalls including the roll-the-coin game. I took a bagful of coins but they didn't have that game this year so I threw balls through the chorister's mouth to win a bag of sweeties, as you do. Santa's grotto was in the vestry but I really don't do that anymore. I met several faces I knew and a woman with a very impressive beard.

But I had to go to acting and the theatre was abuzz with people decorating the set for the pantomime and we practised the Festival of christmas lines and songs and Bertie was in a bad mood so didn't pay attention. Fancy that, a 9 year-old being sullen, moody and intransigent. Didn't know it could happen.

They wanted me to get a lantern for the parade so Bud bought me a big wind-up one like my wind-up torch so you never have to buy batteries. I bet mine is bigger than everybody else's.

After a few hours of Minecraft, he made me go to the new Giant Tesco which has opened up on a former area of ex-railway disused land also formerly vital to the future expansion plans of the football club before they totally ran out of money and died.

It's a very big Tesco indeed and they'd given all the locals some money-off vouchers and we met Poppy C and Eddie W and Poppy H so they'd all had the same idea. But I couldn't find any Pokemon cards which is no loss as Jof had told me I couldn't have them anyway.

Then Jof came home tired and we put her on the sofa and slipped away into the night (at a mere 4 degrees C) to the Scout Swimming Gala. I did this last year and swam against Johnny and Robert and planned a victorious comeback. We had to park on the verge because it was so busy. You're not allowed any photos of the event because of little people in swimsuits so here's one from before it started. We do widths, the older kids do lengths of the further section. All the parents have to sit on the viewing seats on the right and you can only really communicate by shouting down from where I'm standing. The pool is very big and I like the roof which is curvy. I came second in my backstroke race by a Gnat's nether-whisker and progressed to the finals, as did J and B. I saw many many known faces at the event and wandered around being the life and soul, every time I walked past the JBs I got a horizontal hand-slap (like a high five but lower) which was nice.

But tragedy struck in the form of some really crap people in my relay race. I was awesome and epic, James T was pretty good but the middle 2 were totally pants so we came 4th. But at least we weren't like some teams who were still swimming minutes later.

When it came to my backstroke final my feet slipped on take-off and I came in 6th (last) but I don't care and it's all about the joining in and it was a splendid evening all round and we ran through the car park (3 degrees C) to the car. At home I had a bath, because I wanted to feel warm. Because it'll freeze shortly, we brought the cacti in from the garage and I gained extra chocolate time by watching 'True Lies' again, I've seen it 28 times so it's lost its edge but who cares when you go to bed at 1130 with a head full of Kit Kats.