Out of the blue I got a phone call from Will asking if I wanted to go go-karting yesterday and it didn’t take much convincing. I didn’t even realise we had a go-kart track in the Bridge, but apparently we do, and for the hour or so we spent there was much enjoyed. It’s not something I’ve tried before (not for not wanting) and found the whole experience much like paintball; great fun but one of those things you’ll only ever do every so often, so I was keen to make the most of it. I’d definitely do it again one of these days, though the unusual surge of adrenaline in the morning meant I had to drink coke all afternoon to stop myself from falling asleep.

In the evening I helped Dad assemble a vast collection of parts for his new compressor. It involved visits to Brierley Hill, Netherton and Wollaston before we finally got the whole apparatus together. While we were up near Quarry Bank we went over to one of the family graves which hadn’t been visited for by anyone for years. Despite being 99 years old this year, the memorial is still intact and good to see still standing. Only four or five of the nearby graves (out of many hundreds) are still tended and most have been vandalised, collapsed or fallen apart. It’s the first time I’d seen it and it’s a pretty impressive bit of stonework, put together for my great-great grandfather (Edward) in 1909, then used for his wife (Emma) and their son (Richard, my Gran’s dad who died four days after she was born, yet whom she still eulogises for).

I love this sort of stuff - not the macabre aspect of the graveyards, but seeing things that are genuinely important to your family history. There was something striking about this, probably the biggest memorial in the whole cemetery, in the highest plot, but now so wrapped up in brambles you cannot get to it without climbing through trees and round collapsed stonework. It’s completely lost to most people, but thankfully remains intact apart from some minor ageing. The other thing that intrigues me about this stuff is that I simply would not have existed without the people who lie in that grave, buried almost a century ago; people not even my 95 year old Grandmother ever really knew. And yet there it stands still.

I finally completed all the paperwork I needed to, created some interesting vector work and took a trip up to Sheffield to organise a new project this week. Despite this, it doesn’t quite feel like Easter yet - it seems to early - and I think next weekend is likely to be more relaxing than this one (says the man who’s organised a photography trip to mid-Wales).