Mr Grumpy and the NHS Parking Charges

In answer to the friendly query by roberthowell, Macclesfield General Hospital is where anyone can find a plentiful selection of pointy hats as featured in my Glasgow blip of yesterday. The hospital grounds in Macc are currently set up like the old traffic cone maze at Thelwall Viaduct on the M6 a few years back.

I can only imagine the NHS is intent on reducing available short-stay parking, whilst hiking up and enforcing higher charges under the guise of it being long-stay only. The minimum charge in Macclesfield now starts at £2 for a minimum 2 hours stay. We only needed 20 minutes, as we were only popping in for Nahida's quick healthcheck, but terrible for those with limited means and having to visit daily. There was an interesting feature on this new 'tax for the sick' BBC News website last month. I don't know about Scotland and Northern Ireland, but throughout Wales it is completely free.

Sorry to rant (again) but be grateful at least. I nearly inflicted you with a blip instead of my annual Nemesis, the holly hedge that surrounds one long side of our garden. This is now growing like billy-o with all this rain. Stand by for major hedge-cutting blip (and even more moaning) coming up quite soon.

Back home now and starting to feel calmer with the prospect of a cuppa and a Wagonwheel (Oh and the weekend of course).

Silsden, Yorkshire bekons for us as of tomorrow - I wonder if I can get away with visiting my mum whilst also mananging a nice long fishing outing on the Wharfe as well? We'll see, but I need to escape the football somehow.

Have a great weekend all!