27th December 2009

Dear All,



Hope you all enjoyed Christmas - just a few photos to illustrate the week:




Esther and Mary-Ann arrive



Christmas Eve walk by the river Cam


Elderly routinely humiliated on the WII - bring back Skinny!




Esther and Ben



Mary-Ann and Andy



Kate with Picture created by Mary-Ann

love

Mike & Kate

20th December 2009

20th December 2009.

Dear All,

Well how has it been for you? – ice, snow and power cuts – a proper winter week! We had about 4” snow on Thursday night, Friday morning and another flurry last night but three power cuts so far including 17 hours from Thursday 9 pm until Friday 2 pm. Tropical fish cooling, deep freeze warming and nothing working. It shows how dependent we are on electricity. It is fortunate that we have a log fire to brighten things up.

Overcote Road, Over

Over Fen

19 Willingham Road

On Monday I had my second session at the dentists to complete the crown fitting then a review session at U3A for the college gardens course. Our leader has all the contacts but has passed his “sell by date” as far as organisation is concerned so we are never quite sure what is happening next. We had a Mold-AG planning session in the evening. It has started snowing in Moldova 3 weeks earlier than usual and we have already been sent photos of 3 feet accumulation.
My computer has been going slower and slower so my “computer man” has updated the virus guard and cleaned all the files. I also doubled the memory, result: it is going slowly!
We had a Christmas lunch at NIAB on Wednesday which was well attended.
The Thursday walk was tough going, it was billed as 10 miles starting at Radwinter but the selected pub had closed so we moved to Hempstead. Instead of shortening the walk our esteemed leader added on 2.5 miles and with mud underfoot, snow showers and a biting wind it was not for the faint hearted.


Pure Enjoyment

It was “cut your own Christmas tree” time on Friday as a friend has a copse available at £1 per foot. Could be “Strangle your own turkey” next year!
We went carol singing round the frozen village last night and have a candle light service tonight.
May we wish a happy Christmas and prosperous new year to all our readers! Esther and Mary-Ann are expected Wednesday, Ben around that time, Andy and Eirwen sometime later.
Love

Mike & Kate

13th December 2009

13th December 2009.

Dear All,
Our College garden visit this week was to Homerton, which is just going through the process of being absorbed into Cambridge University, having previously been a teachers training college. It has a huge 26 acre site near the hospital and houses 700 students more than any other college. Having a large car park it is greatly favoured for out of term conferences and these have helped improve their bank balance. Once again the gardens were not spectacular but feature several sheltered courtyards, a conservation area with 3 species of orchids, an orchard and a 60 tree lime avenue.


Homerton Cavendish Building


Secluded Courtyard

Monday evening we had a pub meal out with 10 of the rambling group at The Old Crown in Girton. It was an excellent meal and good company.
Tuesday was work, a trip to the garage to have wheels balanced, tracking adjusted and 2 new tyres followed by groups in the evening. A third group started up this week which is encouraging.
I had to write a book review on Wednesday covering “Vegetable Seed Production” for Experimental Agriculture. I am sure most of you will have read it, if not I can recommend it for the dark evenings! I visited my old director, John MacLeod, again in hospital with prostate cancer. He went from walking to not being able to move in a week but remains very positive. Leaving Brookfields in Mill Road at 4 pm took me 1 hour 45 minutes to get home as Cambridge was gridlocked.
In the evening we entered a team in the Christians in Sport area quiz at St Neots. The quiz was run by ex Cambs Utd star? Graham Daniels and there was a full house of 17 teams of 8. I told our team not to try too hard but we had a sports genius on board (Chris Kean) so we won!


Winning Squad

Our walk on Thursday started at Braughing near Buntingford. It was billed as 8 miles but our leader was back from a 6 week cruise and decided we would be back too soon and added a couple of miles. It was sticky underfoot so quite hard going.


Cottage in Braughing

On Friday Kate and I went to Cambridge Christmas shopping which went quite well ending with lunch and my first trip to Morrisons at Cambourne.
Kate is currently at choir practice ready for the Christmas services – 2 weeks today and it will be all over - as Dad was wont to remark!

Love

Mike & Kate

6th December 2009

6th December 2009.

Dear All,

It has been an interesting week beginning with an hour in the dentists chair on Monday morning. I chipped a tooth and needed a cap so this was session one removal of old filling and drilling out to fit a plug. I was the second slot on Monday, and it would have been better if session one hadn’t been a difficult extraction, so I had to wait 30 minutes to see a grey faced lady stagger out holding her mouth! Roll on session two.
The college for this weeks U3A slot was Hughes Hall a post graduate establishment next to Fenners. As they had built on their entire garden we joined the morning “View the buildings” session. They have recently mortgaged their future by erecting a new building on Fenners boundary.


Hughes Hall Old Building


Hughes Hall Fenners Building

Deacons meeting Monday followed by work and Home Group Tuesday filled up the first part of the week.
Dave and Jen came up to Over on Wednesday to try and sort out our next trip to South America. It was slightly complicated as six plan to go to Ecuador and 3 of us want to stay on for a holiday while the rest want to return home after 3 weeks work. We agreed on an Ecuador holiday and went to the Travel Agents to book flights around the chosen timetable. Unfortunately the holiday had been cancelled the previous day and so had several alternatives that we tried (either cancelled or not guaranteed to run). Eventually we tried a new tack and picked another company and another country and booked 2 weeks in Costa Rica on the way back. On impulse I rang Kate at work and gave her 30 seconds to decide whether she would like to join us in Costa Rica (she is not going to Ecuador) and she bravely said “yes”. The departure date is 15th February and I am hoping that my deferred jury duty does not over run as that should finish on the 5th.
I led the short walk this week which was 7 miles round Willingham Fen. Kate had the day off and joined us – unfortunately it was one of the very few wet walks we have “enjoyed” and Willingham Fen on a wet December day is an acquired taste!
On Friday I had a difficult session with CEEM Board members as the other two were at loggerheads so I had to referee which I did not enjoy too much. It did not go too badly but of course there is plenty of opportunity to revisit problem areas.
Our new garden shed was delivered this week (10 x 8ft) so it has been an exciting exercise erecting shelves, inserting hooks and restocking the shed (you are easily pleased past 60!)


New Shed


Timely Matt cartoon!

Love

Mike & Kate

29th November 2009

29th November 2009.

Dear All,

We have just returned from Hutton where we have had lunch with Esther and Mary-Ann. M-A has spent the weekend with Esther shopping and preparing for Christmas so Kate and I drove down after the am service. Both journeys were blessed with torrential downpours which made driving interesting.
I returned to walking this week after missing 3 weeks with work and ankle problems. It was a bit painful to start with but improved on the home straight and has been better since. We started from The Crown at Northill beyond Biggleswade and the walk was a good one via Ickwell (huge village green) Shuttleworth and Old Warden.

Old Warden Cottage


Old Warden Church

Another Old Warden residence

I have spent most spare time this week with a chainsaw cutting up our demolished shed and branches from the bottom hedge. It is only a small 14” blade machine so quite hard work for it but it has got through a decent pile so we are set for a cold winter and lit our first log fire last night.
Otherwise I have been catching up on winter digging clearing the runner beans (a record late date), dahlias, gladioli etc.
On Tuesday Kate and I attended a U3A science lecture on “Disease, Experimentation and Physiology” There was a lot about cholera and salt absorption but not as lucid as some in the series.
We had a meal at “The Exhibition” following the cricket club AGM on Monday, Kate told her story at Groups on Tuesday and I watched Over 1 v 1 Gt Shelford on Saturday. We invested in a new “slimline” TV this week to replace the free monster we had before. We celebrated having a working DVD by watching “The Green Mile” last night.

Love

Mike & Kate

22nd November 2009

22nd November 2009.

Dear All,

It was good to see most of you at David’s Septuagintual anniversary. The links between Frinton and old age will be even more strongly reinforced from now on.
I have spent half of this week at Peterborough for the biennial Onion & Carrot Conference which is held at the showground. There were 14 speakers on onions Wednesday and 9 on carrots on Thursday. You forget how much concentration it takes to sit through solid days of presentations. Wednesday was especially stretching as 6 of the speakers were foreign with varying grasps of English. NIAB had a display in the exhibition hall and I attended the conference dinner with our new lady director to help present a trophy, as an onion won the NIAB cup for the best new variety (of all crops in trial) for the first time. The guest speaker was Greg Wallace of Masterchef fame. We had the joy of sitting at the same table as he entertained everyone within shouting distance with his cockney wit and charm.

Nigel Kingston & Tina Barsby


Greg Wallace

Our college visit on Monday was to Girton which is deceptively large both the accommodation and the grounds. There is an ancient orchard with heritage varieties, a Fellows garden in which only they can tread and a large lake from which they dug the gravel to construct the original buildings.


Girton College

Girton Lake

Kate and I have been demolishing the shed at the bottom of the garden as it was decaying beyond sensible repair and have ordered a replacement. We now have quite a large heap of timber to saw up. Kate has been struggling with a cold and had Saturday afternoon disrupted by taking Toni and her two moderately behaved boys to Chesterton Hospital as she (Toni) has a severe chest infection. My ankle is much better but not yet 100%.
There are several interesting exhibits in the garden this week as we have harvested sweet potatoes, fennel, chilli peppers and peanuts.


Sweet Potatoes

Fennel

Chili Peppers

Peanuts

Love

Mike & Kate

15th November 2009

Some photos from Davids 70th attached

.

8th November 2009

8th November 2009.

Dear All,

Kate and I have just returned from a couple of days in Banbury courtesy of Tesco's and their voucher scheme. It was slightly marred by the fact that I have been hobbling with a swollen ankle for over a week. It is being treated as gout but is slow to clear this time. We managed to walk/limp the historic town circuit, started some Christmas shopping and explored some local villages by car. Although it is not quite the Cotswolds it is very close with picture book stone cottages and rolling countryside.
Another downside was the fact that my camera lost a vital component – metal fatigue? So although I managed to improvise with a tooth pick I may have to fall back onto archive footage in future weeks!



Banbury Cross



A Fine Lady



Deddington Village


Kings Sutton

Our college visit this week was to Wolfson, one of the newer establishments where the gardens are run by two former NIAB men so needless to say were very good. Sir Vivian Fuchs once lived in the grounds and the weather vane bears an image of his dog sledge and team.


Wolfson College


Medlars at Wolfson

I had to miss the walk this week anyway even if I had not been lame as we had our annual onion open day on Thursday where the great and good of the onion world were gathered. I think that standing up all day did not do me too much good but needs must…


Onion OpenDay

We joined the Thursday church group at Sutton to celebrate Gordon’s birthday. They have purchased an enormous dining table which sat 15 of us on new banqueting style chairs.
We hope to see some of you next weekend at Beaumont, meanwhile have a good week.

Love

Mike & Kate