Perth Ladies Day 15/5/25 - Blue Thursday

Firstly - apologies for the complete absence of a blog for the 3 day festival at Perth, at which we attended all 3 days, but a slipped disc and a trapped nerve meant that I could only contort my body into either vertical or horizontal position - 90 degrees at the waist was a distant dream for 10 days or so. Perfect for star gazing or standing on The Kop in the 80s, but not so good for sitting at a desk attempting to write witticisms and topical lyrics.

In summary, the Wednesday and Thursday were a pleasant surprise - workable midweeks being a tough find but, whilst, Friday showed an increase in business, as expected, over the previous 2 days, it was a wee bit down on previous years. Won wages on Wednesday, won very nicely on Thursday and watched 6 out of 7 jollies go in on the Friday when the turnover was the highest. Obviously. Managed to not do too much damage on a few of them and only losing expenses felt like the biggest win of the week in the circumstances.

A shift from a couple of books to the lawn end meant that our usual pitch wasn't available so we pitched up at the other end of Tatts, nearest the winning post, which was unexpectedly available. The reduction in rails bookmakers (2 of whom pitched up at the beer barn somewhere near Scone Palace) meant that business was even more brisk than usual. It was also the "stage" end and we were "treated" to a veritable smorgasbord of competitions from the usual "Best Dressed Lady" to "Best Dressed Man" - to the untrained eye it appeared to be 10 blokes in blue suits whilst also suffering from a sock bypass (George next door opined that he would've won and it was hard to disagree) - to the more bizarre "best headwear" (one lady was nailed on until blurting out that she owned a hat shop - went from a stone well in to a non trier in a single utterance) and there also appeared to be some sort of strut your funky stuff competition, the criteria to which will remain a mystery to, not only this correspondent, but, I suspect, most of the competitors and possibly the judges. The prizes sounded generous but I suspect the gin firm who seemed to put up a hugely expensive bottle up for each and every more and more bizarre competition were somewhat disappointed when said bottle was described as "a fancy bottle of alcohol but we can't pronounce the name" by the host- dispiriting. I'd imagine they'll be wanting their money, and possibly their gin, back.

Interludes in the competitions were filled by what appeared to be a mixed CD of "1970s mediocre disco tracks that you haven't heard since the 1970s for a reason" when, out of nowhere, Mr Brightside was followed by Blue Monday in most unexpected fashion before reverting to Ottowan type misery (apologies to Ottowan fans). How does it feel? Outside of a 7 minute hitaus, again it was dispiriting.

1) Early pitch in and business started brightly, mainly on Chichester and Dapper Gent who were the bogeys, before a late flurry in the jolly, The Last Cloud turned it from moderate winner to 0-0 draw which we regretted pretty much throughout as it won with plenty to spare. "Anything back on the places?" I enquired of Steve "lost 97p" was the truncated reply.

2) A proper liability this time on favourite PeeJayBee, along with similar on Kandor and we had a nice move forward when WhistleInTheDark won going away. Won 20 quid on the skinned forecast...

3) Max on Summergrounds and liabilities on Hay Meadow and Belle of Annandale and we had two cracking results fighting it out to fill up the Cairn Bet coffers when Go Go Chicago appeared from the double, possibly treble, figure in running price to take its place as "Cairn Bet worst winner". A small move forward rather than either of the others for a jackpot and it felt like we lost. Dispiriting.

4) Stood the top 2 in the market. Fav won and another step backwards, albeit not quite as painful as Evaluation would've been. The fast finishing Mack The Man was the jackpot - obviously - and was more Mack The Knife to the Cairn Bet heart.

5) Took a lump on odds on jolly Stumps or Slips from a friend of CairnBet. Shortened prodigiously to mess up our book before a late drift at least gave us a modicum value but it was all for nought as, not only did it win, it looked like we had it beat on at least a couple of occasions. It's the hope that kills you. And your friends... Places less than kind as well in a race that favoured the each way punter and all we had were our expenses. Money for Nothing. Dispiriting.

6) And so to the lucky last. Our favourite race of the year - the Perth bumper. And turnover didn't disappoint. Stood the jolly Zhanma Enki and relative outsider Borders Eagle and got our best result of the day on Not For Passin which was.... well, you know.

Just the 6 races and it was a hokey cokey day which left us, well, dispirited despite a wages day but, in truth, no more.

Denise van Outen was, apparently, the post race entertainment. She probably was up there somewhere but who knows? I appreciate I'm getting on a bit but the abomination that was coming out of the sound system had us wishing for Colonel Abrams to make a reappearance. The Killers and New Order were a distant memory. The exit was also blocked off, without punter shin decapitation, and the detour via the paddock didn't improve our humour. Like the unnamed, unplugged gin company. Dispiriting.

Hamilton tomorrow. We hope for better. Until then...