Some rest and relaxation after Election May 23rd-27th 2014

I actually did not sleep that well despite being very tired and getting home at 5.30am. It was very light and there was lovely weather, as there had been for the bulk of the campaigning weeks. May had been lovely weather-wise for the most part of the month and my bald head was quite brown!
I told myself, win or lose at the election, I would do some personal "me" things to recover, rest and relax after the intensity of the previous month. If you know me I don't sit down for long and rarely visit the cinema and actually don't even enjoy that much TV! News and Sport and good dramas may grab me, but retro TV on ITV3 and 4 or History and Yesterday channels are likely to be on, probably when I am reading emails! So my time is Rugby time and other sports, like cycling, motor sport or old cars, canoeing, swimming, golf, tennis and many others to watch, but I do actually swim and canoe a lot and I have been known to jump off mountains with a paraglider or abseil down cliffs.
I set off for Cardiff at Friday lunchtime. I was going to watch my Rugby team Saracens play in the European Cup against Toulon. 10 hours later I arrived in Cardiff and I was shattered. I'd missed the Friday evening game that I had hoped to see before the Saturday game-The Amlin Cup. The traffic was awful. It took 3 hours to get over the Severn bridge and the M25 and M4 was slow all the way with many standstills. It was a Bank Holiday weekend too! I stopped at one service station and it took one hour to get back onto the motorway.
I wanted to eat. I went to Jamie Olivers restaurant. It was a joy after the bedlam of the day and pressures of the previous weeks. The food was great, the service even better from a French waitress.
The next day I wanted to savour the atmosphere. My hotel was full of Toulon supporters. When I went to the city, it was buzzing everywhere, but there was a lack of Saracens supporters in the morning and too many from Toulon! (Sararcens supporters were to come by the afternoon by car and by bus and many were late, very late and missed much of the game:The Severn Bridge...again!)
I met up with a Toulon supporter. We exchanged conversation and finished up sharing the rest of the day together, except his seat was at the other end to mine.  He and I had lunch, a few drinks and much conversation together until the game. We separated for the game, which Toulon won quite efficiently. We met after the game though and then spent the evening together until the early hours. It was one big party. Cardiff is the perfect Rugby city. We met other Saracens and Toulon supporters and we all partied and some of us had dinner together! Losing did hurt, but Rugby is more than a game, its not about being partisan all the time, its just for 80 mins and perhaps a bit more. Sharing time with others is such joy, when the "world in union" is so much fun.
My new Toulon friend and I exchanged email contacts and addresses and now I expect to visit him in France for the start of the Toulon season in September.
I was tired, very tired the next morning. It all caught up with me.I was not feeling alert enough to drive home. So I stayed another night in Cardiff. I then enjoyed the other aspects of the great City. I saw a Choir! Thats Wales! I went to see the Dr Who Experience and the Bay. I also went to the Welsh Assembly and I got a special tour of the whole place escorted with all the questions answered, I loved that too.
I had a simple meal and an early night.
The next morning I went home and I did it in a relaxed way. I stopped off in Royal Wootten Basset and took a scenic journey. It was still very busy on the roads as it was the Bank Holiday Monday.
On the 27th May I had to go to Kings College Hospital London to have one of my regular checks and a MRI scan. Oh dear it seems I have done some damage to my leg and my spine. All that walking! I wondered why it was more painful than usual. 

Election Night 22nd-23rd May 2014

I was up at the crack of dawn, not intentionally, but I was! I guess it was adrenalin.

It was going to be a long day and night so I made sure I had a good breakfast. I then went to Headcorn Polling Station to thank the Returning officers and clerks, then I went to East Sutton, Ulcombe, Grafty Green and Hawkenbury to pay my respects to those Officers also. I stayed on for a while at Hawkenbury with my fellow other Council member, as it was in a pub, so we had a drink! I drank J20 Orange. I then went to my friend and prospective Council member in Staplehurst for a while so I could wish him, John Perry, the best of luck. Naturally whilst I was at the Polling Stations I engaged with many and felt that I was getting a warm reception especially from the many people I knew.

It rained a bit, I got soaked at one point, so I went home to change and have a cup of tea and some food.

I returned to the Headcorn Polling Station and met many more people I knew throughout the afternoon and shared cordial exchanges with many. The UKIP candidate also showed up and offered balloons.It was a cordial exchange and we both agreed that "we do it for the ward".  He left whilst I seemed to be frequently engaged with the public. There was an absence of campaigners from the other parties however.

I kept this up for hours. I went home periodically for tea. and at 9pm I had a meal. I returned to the Headcorn Polling station at 9.30pm to see the last voters  before I had a short rest and collected the other Council member, not up for election, for the ward and we went to the count for about midnight.

Very little was happening, other than boxes arriving and the votes being emptied out until about 1am. It was also a Euro election so there was more scrutiny of events and times, but nationwide. It was delayed until somebody in Southampton approved. Something to do with ensuring ballot boxes were in the appropriate places! It seemed ages before there was  the go-ahead to count.  Finally results were announced.

I was announced in the early stages. Headcorn is often last! It was a tight vote with a low turnout, but I got in.  There were a few minor frictions during the night between rivals from political divides and despite that many of us shared experiences and concerns, especially with fellow Conservatives, but also with the opposition parties. It was all quite respectful most of the time. I stayed to support other candidates, especially the similar Wards to mine as they were declared far later and after me. It appeared to be a hung Council at the end of the night, with no overall majority. The Conservatives were only just the biggest party, but the Lib Dems were closely behind and with 4 new UKIP members plus 5 Independents and now 2 Labour, none of us could predict the future with any certainty. And we were all very tired and needed a rest. We then looked forward to meeting up to decide the direction of the Council and our own party.

It was going to be a busy time.

I needed some sleep, but  clearly there was a lot of work to do.

May 2014 1st to 21st

The Month on May 2014 led up to the 22nd May Election Day and Night. It was a lot of walking and door knocking plus my usual and regular activities of organising the Headcorn Youth Forum which entails ensuring I am available and/or I have other volunteers to run activities on 3 occasions per week at this time of the year.
Then I also have Parish Council roles, plus I am a member of "Locality" an organisation to build strength in local places and organisations that serves for the benefit of them. I am also in training to be a Care Quality Commission/CQC team member that takes up some of my time and I have responsibility for my 84 year old mother. So life is always busy. ( I also love some R&R with my partner Eileen, but that tends to involve visits throughout Kent; we just love our home county, but we probably have a bias to Whitstable, and other time out in France-well it is nearer than the rest of the UK!)
On Mondays we have Boxing in the Scout Hut - its actually Training, Keep Fit and learning techniques for 8 to 18 year olds. It keeps them fit and healthy, gives them some disciplines and is NOT aggressive contact sport, but gives them some fun especially when we "sash box" which is essentially competitive defensive movements to defend your sash and grab the other persons sash thats tied around them. (On Thursday the 8th May we joined the Beavers/Scouts and demonstrated sash boxing and had some fun for an hour with them at their invite and then as a result got invited to several fetes and fairs;all good promotion or fund raising activity!)
On Wednesdays we have a social evening, very little is actually organised so they can just mix and chat, but invariably we have some balls or badminton rackets and end up playing sponge football or rounders at the Scout Hut or on Hoggs Bridge Green.
And on Fridays during the summer months, once we have got light enough and weather permitting, we play "community"  football on the main village Days Green with the children from the primary school from 3.30pm until about 6.30pm, when the younger children have left and the group is mainly older ones. Though some young ones insist on staying! That means we need more vigilance and good volunteers.

Despite the need to get round the entire Headcorn Ward and either knock on doors and post leaflets for the Election I also had 3 hospital appointments at Kings College Hospital in London during May and that usually takes some time!

But I managed to get a few volunteers to help in Ulcombe, Grafty Green and Hawkenbury and some parts of the Headcorn village area whilst I'd work on all the "targeted voters". That still amounted to a lot for one person-with a very bad leg! Headcorn is a 26 sq mile Ward and there are many out-of-the-way places.

As the 22nd loomed I was getting desperately tired-and pained-but win or lose I did have some plans after that Election, all purely pleasure, knowing how much energy and stress it may cause.

The Election campaign brought up many issues that were mainly related to the Local Plan or issues around it. I have to say there were a lot of people who felt it was an agreed "done deal" and that plans were cast in stone, as per the Consultation evening that took place in the Village hall some weeks previously. I knew I had my work cut out as at this stage as it is a CONSULTATION that has some way to go before it is certain, and I personally have objections and concerns to the most part of it, where it affects the Headcorn Ward. I intend to play my part, if elected, to make my concerns well known.