Trolley 571

The first trolley since early May was a bit marginal, being parked up at the Clock Tower and not having left the market square. But scored anyway. An excuse to take another look inside the M&S food hall.

West Hill was busy with the addition of all the cars hoping to get onto the Downs for Ladies' Day. I did not notice any fancy cars, but quite a few impatient working people were giving up and doing U-turns.

Wetherspoon's was busier than usual, this being around 11:30 on a Friday morning. At least two ladies in full war paint. Most of the trees in the market square were looking pretty good, but the two outside Wetherspoon's - noticed three years ago at reference 2 - still had a good bit of catching up to do, despite at least one round of replanting.

Some extra policemen and policewomen. Some people in hi-vis, possibly council people offering advice on how to get up to the Downs. No left turn into Waterloo Road from the High Street, blocked with bollards and one of Edward Thomas's yellow coaches, possibly part of a shuttle service up to the Downs.

The man from the G4S van told me that this interesting looking contraption was a temporary microphone doing a sound survey on behalf of local businesses. Not at all clear to me why local businesses would want such a survey. But readers will be reassured to know that the associated box is fairly rugged - and given that it is eight feet above ground, you would need to be fairly keen to do damage. I failed to find anything about sound surveys at reference 4, so still not at all clear.

Through the Screwfix underpass to find that the climbing rose snapped at reference 1 is now past its first flowering best. While the tree suspected there of being a whitebeam and which was just then coming into flower is now, a fortnight later, all done and dusted. Flowers over for another year.

Round to the Blenheim, past another lady in full war paint, to find a posse of young men, possibly as many of ten of them, scrubbed and suited and aiming to get onto the Downs. Sadly, the fairly newly reopened Blenheim had a little local problem with its cellar and would not be able to open until 13:00. Or were they just making excuses? I didn't think to point out that the prices of booze in the Costcutter next door were very reasonable. I am sure that there would have been enough there to get them started.

PS: I have been sorry to read that Mount Everest, despite the massive efforts of some, who have removed many tons of rubbish, remains something of a dump with all kinds of rubbish, some unpleasant, scattered most of the way up the mountain. One might have thought that the sort of people who want to climb such a mountain would want to take good care of it - but this is clearly not the case. See, for example, reference 5, from which last I learn that off-mountain waste is a big problem too. Pity about all the adverts - a different kind of rubbish infesting the world we live in.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/05/trolley-570.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/05/an-outing.html.

Reference 3: https://edwardthomasandson.co.uk/. They have, I believe, a good slice of the schools' trade in and around Epsom.

Reference 4: https://www.g4s.com/en-gb.

Reference 5: https://www.livescience.com/63061-how-much-trash-mount-everest.html. 

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