Saturday: We arrived at the Doddington site around 8.30pm; we had decided that it would be better to leave London later than get caught up in the outgoing traffic.

Saturday started quite cold and then got hotter and hotter as the day progressed, thankfully there was a good breeze blowing that cooled us off a bit. We set up the Grymm Tooms Travelling Museum and waited for the throng of eager public hungry for knowledge...and we waited some more...Gosh is that the time already...and waited...

There seemed to be hardly anyone about, the fun fair seemed as devoid of paying public as our little street. When people came around we had real problems holding their attention, in fact we were lucky if they listened to us for more than a minute. The other odd thing was they seemed to avoid Tooms Medical Marvels with such regularity that poor Laz was starting to get a complex and I’m sure that I had a glimpse of him checking his fly or sniffing an armpit now and then!

Apart from minimal attention spans I suspect that most people had come down to pass the time while waiting for the World Cup to start. It was not until we were putting things away that we had a decent conversation with a family. There must be an invisible sign that tells the public that the best time to catch our act is just as all the stuff is being put away.

We had dinner with some friends in the evening which was great as we tucked into home grown chicken. Afterwards we returned to the street and sat around the fire and took part in the usual stories and drinks. A few people had gone down to the beer tent and one or two were now thoroughly possessed by Bacchus, they sang and gyrated in Dionysian delight into the early hours.

Sunday came hot and still. And it got hotter and hotter until Laz and Cassandra were sagging in their seats under the impact. Even Laz’s candle drooped and buckled until it looked like a skeletal finger pointing, in vain, at the nearest water bucket. Come to think on it; what was that poor candle doing out there? Strangely enough the previous night’s revellers looked surprisingly lively under the circumstances.

I like to pick out comments that the public make at shows and this weekend I give a joint prize: An old gentleman who told me that he was not in the very least impressed by anything I had to show or say – that’s a first! The other was a lady who said “Sorry but it’s far too hot to stand here for more than a couple of minutes talking to you” she was in modern light clothing. I would also at this point, so to speak, thank Phil and Jayne of WestPoint Sutlers for their hospitality as we sat in the shelter of the little shop on the prairie.

So there you have it, apart from being a great social event, not a lot happened and for everyone concerned the Doddington Country Show was flattened as if by Zulu Impi; Wayne Rooney and the World Cup making up the horns and the searing, intolerable, hotter than dragon guano heat making up the body.

This is Professor Leonidas Grymm heading for the fridge...