37 years later, I finally leave Dudley.....

What with the business on the reviewing front and the recent Birmingham Comics Show I've had very little time to write about some of the momentous things going on with the Brutons.

Not Brutons of Pocklington, but Brutons of Dudley.

My Mom & Dad have finally decided to take the plunge and have sold up the family home to head our way to live here in Pocklington. After many years of moving further and further away from them, it seems they've decided to follow us and now I find myself faced with the prospect of living closer to them in Pocklington than at any time since I was actually living with them as a boy.

Of course, I'm being rather flippant. It's going to be both wonderful and difficult having them up here with us. But at least one member of the family has seen absolutely nothing but upside so far:
"Daddy; does this mean that they'll be getting a dog?" is Molly's verdict on the whole thing. Of course, more than anyone, she's tremendously excited about it all and can't wait for them to move up. And we've warned her to not pester the oldies about getting a dog. But even I think it sounds like a bloody good idea. Active for them, pet ownership without needing one of us to be home for Molly.

As for me, I spent a weekend down in Dudley at the end of September when I had to pick up Mom's car for her and drive it back to Pocklington. And during the weekend I realised that this may well be my last contact with Dudley after 37 years.

I was born and brought up in Dudley, left to go to University in Birmingham and came back for a couple of years to live in squalor after ditching my PhD. So I lived in and around Dudley for many years. Yet because the majority of my friends were Birmingham based I ended up seeing Dudley as merely somewhere that Mom & Dad lived.

So it was rather a bizarre experience wandering around Dudley that weekend reliving all of the old places I knew as a child and a teen. I was out around the town at night and even managed to take a nostalgic trip on the 126 to Birmingham and back. And then the ultimate, end to a night..... wander down the hill from the bus stop and grab a pizza from Parrs. It's the epitome of crappy takeaway pizza places and somewhere we used to head after visits to JBs when I was a teen. Of course, this time I wasn't completely drunk whilst enjoying the pizza.

So goodbye Dudley. You were a wonderful, magical place for a while. The Zoo, JBs, The Dudley School, and many, many other things that meant so much then and are now consigned to memory.

And in case, you're wondering; I completely forgot to take pictures. Moron.