"Fish and Chips on the riverbank"

Thanks for watching and welcome to Part 11 from my self-published book in August 2023, "The Spirit of Cricket".

Please see the link below for the paperback version of this, my fourth self-published book, and three ways in which you could support me and poke the traditional publishers in the eye who refused to even read my manuscript!

https://www.patreon.com/TheBlackfordBookClub
https://www.paypal.me/TheBlackfordBookClub
https://www.buymeacoffee.com/steveblackford

Here follows a snippet from the chapter being read here, and chapter number 24 of a total of 41 from a book I'm immensely proud of:

"It was an overcast if slightly warmer English Summer’s afternoon as I strolled alongside the River Severn bubbling with more thoughts than simply the fish and chips I’d be treating myself with as I shared a moment or two of reflection in the shadow of the world’s oldest iron bridge. The toytown of Ironbridge itself was humming to the sweet sound of the bells of St Luke’s Church as always and today, the groups of tourists flocking to this World Heritage accredited site mingled with a party of schoolchildren, pencils and pads of paper at the ready as first they doodled their impressions of the river where an excited pack of hungry ducks had formed (as per usual!) before they were sprawled out in an excited hum of their own at the foot of the “Grand Old Lady”.

Ironbridge beguiles me. She has a space and time all of her own in a land that has thankfully left her alone in a different century, and with an aura and atmosphere all uniquely her own.

Jeremy, the genial owner of the “Old Fashioned Sweet Shop” was present and correct in his little corner of paradise and accompanied (today) by his granddaughter and (always) by his beautiful pug dog named “Bear”.
Tall tales were told as usual but for once I left centre-stage to my favourite Welshman born in England, and with far more roots in Ironbridge than I. A tale was told of a ferry crossing to a faraway island to collect a rare motorcycle that was highly prized by our friends in the Czech Republic for more reasons than I truly comprehended, let alone the inner workings of this rare dual-engine beast from the age of the Cold War. I nodded along as though as I knew one end of a motorcycle from another before I quickly crowbarred the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and the still incredible “The World at War” documentary narrated by Sir Laurence Olivier into the conversation, and before you could say “Ural Mountains” or “The Sudetenland”, I’d left with a quarter of lemon Bon Bons, a quarter of cough candy twist and some wine gums.

There’s a bench right beside the “Grand Old Lady” giving you the most perfect view of a magnificent reminder to a grander age. I’ve long bestowed this simple black bench with the moniker of “Stephen’s Bench” and I’m allowed to and so are you. Just be sure to have the name Stephen if you are to follow my strict example. It’s a little piece of heaven all right, especially when accompanied by the sweet chimes from St Luke’s Church, as well as a perfect spot for some fish and chips, a chat with passing tourists, and naturally, quiet inner ruminations on the week ahead for English cricket.

OK I had other thoughts on my mind too, otherwise you’d worry for me and think me an unhinged lunatic who constantly thinks only about Test Match cricket and that my friends is the way to the madhouse, a route I don’t particularly advise you taking".

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