Alfie & Autumn

Summer is truly over, as the rain and dark clouds outside my window rub my nose in the fact.

Time to knuckle down and get on with my new story..well, I started it many years ago but there is still a way to go. It is a prequel to "Week of 1000 Nightmares" and it's proving rather fun.

Trying to draw inspiration from my faves, I indulged in weeks of summertime reading. From James Herbert's conspiracy heavy "Ash" (Wow! What a bombshell to go out on)
to full immersion in my idol Agatha Crispy (as my sister affectionately calls her).

We finally got to see The Mousetrap, last year, at the Manchester Opera House, as it toured for the first time outside London. It was worth the wait and totally fab. This year it's "Go Back for Murder". So excited. Then I've a week in Majorca to soak up some sunshine before the winter gets fully installed.

But whilst I knuckle down and get on with some work, there are a few little stories I want to run by you. They are strange but true stories, happened to me or someone close to me. You'll probably think I'm bonkers but, hand on heart, I'm telling it how it happened. What you believe is up to you. I'll put one up every now and again as I get time to put them into words. Here's a little snippet to get going.

About eight years ago, before the kids started school, we were wending our way up a frosty M6 in early December.

A beautiful part of the world, the motorway cuts a rust and green canyon along the Pennines. Steep-sided clover scattered hills, speckled with the odd flock of sheep, it slices up two jewels of the North of England; the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales.

Not a million miles from The Slaughtered Lamb and the Moors ( Beware the moon. And stick to the road..oops.) we ploughed through in a family convoy towards Penrith and our own little rent-a-cabin in the woods.

I am not a driver, Oh God, don't let me behind the wheel but as the other significant adult in the car, I kept one eye on the road whilst the other roamed the wonderful view as a decadent tourist. ( Curse of the Boss-eyed. Should have gone to Specsavers.)

What I saw that day has bothered me for years. It was probably nothing but now I'll never know.

To the side of this remote stretch of road, there was something lying very still, probably dead. Roadkill? I don't know. A weird discarded toy? A mutated animal? A Gremlin? Pinkish and grey, a tiny hairless monkey creature at the side of the road.

I regret we didn't stop to have a closer look.

So, if anybody threw a creepy doll thing out of their car all those moons ago, please let me know and put me out of my misery. Arrivederci and toodle pip. A X