The signs were there

I hate letting people down. If I've agreed to do something then I will do it, even if it means splitting myself in two, three or even eight. Sometimes this is exhausting and recently I had decided that something had to give for a while. Cutting down on my commitments so that I can spend more time with Mum was a huge relief. Getting the balance right, people told me, can be tricky. "Make sure you look after yourself," they said. "Make sure you still do things you enjoy."

I decided that my Friday evening Youth Orchestra lifts my spirits and I knew I would be supported by my wonderfully bonkers committee (WBC). We were due to play at an event the following weekend that had made us all twitch with the spelling of 'kidz'.  I wasn't sure about my brain, fairly certain that I could be there in body but my mind could stubbornly refuse to attend. We made a decision to go but reduce the time we were there and delegating tasks. Children had to take their own stand and music.

Half an hour before I should have left I realised that I didn't have anything to put my music in and having visions of it flying around a field I ran (literally) round Tesco, pushing in front of barely seen friends in the queue.

I was late, stressed and confused. I couldn't quite find my way and my daughter and WBC member found the whole thing very funny.
"You're just not functioning properly, are you?" they said.
We arrived with 2 minuites to spare.
"Help. I've probably come in the wrong gate but we are performing at 11," I said to a man in a hi-vis vest. He suggested I abandon the car and run. Men were offering to swap me their babies for my heavy box of percussion instruments, despite my daughter's warnings that I was in no fit state to be trusted with a baby.

The boy on the gate couldn't point me in the direction of the bandstand but was very interested to know where we had heard of the event. The WBC were in hysterics as I tried to string words together. "Booked to play at 11. Late. Where?"

The WBC looked around. "It's more field than fete," they observed.
"I probably should have cancelled this pertinence," I told the WBC, confusing my words.
 "The signs were there," they said. " I did wonder when you replied to my text about bringing music stands with, "You should get yourself cheese eating."

It was an event with many signs.

Behind the field, over a bridge guarded by trolls with signs demanding a return to the good old days, was a museum, miniature train and model gnome village. I was surprised at how passive-aggressive gnomes are. Signs stated things like,"Pine cones don't sing and dance. If we wanted them in the water we would put them there."
The signs seemed to be written for children, which was strange as most were under five. They said things like, "Children, please keep your parents under control. Badly behaved parents will be shot."
Leaving the troll area the passivity was dropped.

 Corporal punishment ruled. I wondered if the trolls on the bridge had won and returned us to 'the good old days where beating children was acceptable.

However, nothing causes as much offence as a badly placed apostrophe.