Update

A lot has been happening in the world of Ed and some of it goes a long way to explainig why I haven't been as active in this blog as I should.

Firstly there was Ivan's funeral service. This took place in a medium sized church in Richmond on the 26th June. As you may or may not know Ivan was a policeman, a detective constable and a well liked and loved man. You get some idea of the lives he touched when you saw the amount of people who turned out to send him on his way.
About 80% of the people who turned up where police officers of one sort or another, from uniformed officers to fellow detectives and right up to some very senior officers (you know the blokes who run it) with very fancy badges and scrambled egg on their peaked caps. The rest of the people where family, civilian friends, some of the nurses and medics who fought with him in his fight and one or two peeps who knew him about the borough.
It was a send off that did him proud. The MET sent him on his way with full honours. His coffin was draped with the police flag, his cap (in which some wag had written "calm down, calm down" on the inside) was resting on top along with his medal and a small bunch of flowers and the bearers where all strapping lads from the met and all in uniform.
I don't remember much about the service other than feeling really sad and low, but it was a traditional funeral service just as Ivan wanted and with some traditional hymns that I didn't know, it was all very solemn. There was a reading from the bible by one of the officers he worked with (it may have been one of his bosses) and a small story from Ivan's life told by one of his friends about how he (Ivan) met the woman he would later marry.
The service droned on, we stood, we knelt, we stood, we knelt. This sounds awful I know, the way I say "The service droned on, we stood, we knelt, we stood, we knelt". It's just that I lost what little faith I had a long time ago but to Ivan his faith was a thing that was alive, he believed even before he became ill. How do the Christians say it? His faith was his rock. Any way I just let the whole thing wash over me and remembered my friend, remembered Ivan from when we where in our final years at school, our time in cadets and our too infrequent get togethers with friends when we where all grown up and gone our different ways.
I was snapped back to reality when the service ended and his coffin was carried out to the theme tune to "Enterprise". Listening to the words of that song was what finally done it for me. I had lost yet another of my small group of proper friends, the ones you hold dear or the ones that are proper friends because they go way back to your time growing up together at school. Either way I wept. I wept for him, for Francesca, his girls for our loss and the injustice of it all.
A good man is gone yet many of the scum bags he dealt with are out on bail or out on some ridiculous home office early release scheme and back to their horrible ways.
That's what I wept for.

After the service there was tea or something stronger if you wished with something to eat in the crypt. It had been cleared out and extensively renovated to house a large room and kitchen and loos and a wheelchair lift and a nice patio at the the other end. A very nice place.
After that those who weren't going up north said their farewells and those of us who where got in the cars or trains and set off back to the Wirral so that we could do it again the next day only this time at the grave side and then lower him into the earth.
This time it was a little lower key, a small group of family and friends and a local priest. The whole thing was in contrast to the service in London, there the church was full, every pew had a bum on it and they where standing shoulder to shoulder to the door and as far as I could make out, out of the door.
Again (to me) another load of droning words but this time no singing. A small police presence was there, some senior officers from the met and some coppers from there as well as from up here.
The diplomatic escort group from Liverpool police did the escort for the funeral cars, motorcycle out riders with a large police car at the back of the procession with a large illuminated sign in it's rear window that read "DO NOT PASS ME!", a nice touch I thought.

It was at the pub that it soon became apparent to the groups of people there that Ivan liked to keep everyone he knew in small groups and that those groups never knew of the others existence. For example at the wake in the magazine where some fairly high and respected coppers whom Ivan was friends with, yet at the same time there was a few peeps in that room who had not long got out of prison for serious crimes the least being an accumulation of 17 charges of aggravated assault. Then there was people he could talk about science and engineering to. Another lot that where potty for cars of all sorts.
And it seemed to go on like this until you found out that at least one person from one group knew at least one person from one of the other groups, who knew someone else from one of the other groups. It was like a large VEN diagram except that the senior coppers there where like rouge data and didn't seem to fit in anywhere, least ways in no way that they would ever admit.

And now for something completely different.

I have yet to finish putting all the photos from our holiday in Wales in order, along with my thoughts. Also need to tell you something about the lads and their trip to Birmingham for the national trampoline contest, they came 2nd and 4th in their age group.

And finally for now at least I have to report that in February of next year Tracy and I will be having a baby.
We're both hoping for a little girl but will settle for healthy.
So any knitted baby stuff that you may have laying about the place doing nothing, well I'm sure I could find a use for it.

When I come back it will to bore you all with a quick breakdown of the holiday in Pembrooke.

TTFN