The eve of May Morning

I came across these turfs outside an Oxford club at lunchtime today, about to be laid inside the club for the May Morning celebrations. This 500-year-old Oxford tradition starts tonight with all-night balls in university colleges and revelry in bars around town.

A bit before 6am tomorrow the gilded youth in evening dress and the ungilded in jeans, many very drunk, will spill out onto the High Street and join early-rising townsfolk to make their way to Magdalen Bridge. Some will jump into the Cherwell river below and, with a bit of luck, will miss the shopping trolleys.

Exactly at 6am everyone will fall silent(ish) and, from the top of Magdalen tower above the bridge, the college choir will sing to greet the rising sun (which, given the forecast, no-one is likely to see).

For a couple of hours from 6.10 there is morris dancing, music and merry-making in the streets all around central Oxford. The pubs and cafes are open for breakfast - liquid, English or otherwise.

At 8 the roads are re-opened, the all-night-revellers go to bed and the workers get to work early. The visiting morris sides usually can't bring themselves to stop, so we are likely to see them at odd places throughout the day tomorrow.

All of which is why we in Oxford would like to celebrate International Workers Day on the day itself, rather than next Monday.

That would also make it easier for me to do as the turf-layers recommended, and collect the superfluous 'good-quality turf' when it is thrown out (pun avoided) tomorrow morning. I fear, though, that by then it will be alcohol-based mud.