23rd February 2020

Dear All,

I contacted “Mr Fothergill’s” for seed to take to Moldova and they had it ready for collection from Kentford near Newmarket this week. They have been very generous and supplied three large box fulls – the next problem is how to get it to Moldova! I have actually contacted the embassy in London for advice but am not holding my breath.

Seed from Mr Fothergill

We have been to see “Parasite” at the cinema this week – it is the Korean film that upset President Trump so much by winning the Oscar for best film. It is certainly attention grabbing and initially amusing but with an unsettling ending!

I was asked to speak to Over Gardening club this week, “A prophet is not without honour except in his own village!” but it went OK, they are a friendly lot and although I do not charge them, they gave me a donation for Moldova.

Our Thursday jaunt started at a new location as the planned pub have stopped doing food. We gathered at Cornish Hall End between Haverhill and Saffron Walden. It was a dull day with the by now familiar degree of mud but thankfully did not rain until we were back in the pub – when it poured down for a while.

The Horse & Groom, Cornish Hall End

  

Snowdrops at Great Sampford

“Biography” topic this week was Eric Gill a controversial artist, sculpture and typographer. He was responsible for 12 fonts including Sans Gill and Perpetua and numerous sculptures, paintings and drawings. He had architectural training and designed a church at Gorleston-on-Sea. He believed in sexual freedom and was accused of incest with his two daughter, sister and dog! Which sat slightly awkwardly alongside his conversion to Catholicism!

  

Eric Gill

I have seen two football matches this weekend, on Friday night it was the Cambs Premier League cup final at Newmarket between Cheery Hinton and West Wratting. It was played on an artificial pitch and with an appreciable wind did not make for a great game as the ball was difficult to control. It was 0 v 0 until the 88^th minute then Cherry Hinton scored twice.

Yesterday’s game was far more exciting as Over drew 4 v 4 with Eynesbury. The referee had a large influence on the result awarding Eynesbury a dubious penalty, sending an Over man off and putting another into the “sin bin”.

With love

Mike & Kate

16th February 2020

Dear All,

We travelled to Hove via Bexhill-on-Sea on Tuesday as we met up with Robert and Heather Hadland who we met on holiday in Turkey in 2014 and have kept in touch. Robert is chairman of Bexhill U3A and his daughter Sarah is prospering as an actress most famously as Miranda’s sidekick. After we visited Pevensey castle which dates back to Roman days and was very important to William the Conqueror.

Pevensey Castle

Amélie had made an excellent model of the Titanic for homework which was duly taken to school on Wednesday. We took Albert to Hove Park on Wednesday where there is a decent playpark and he played – with caution not liking to get too far from the ground!

HMS Titanic

Fearless Adventurer

Driving back, we had the by know usual excitement of 7 junctions of the M11 and A14 being closed so we had to divert through the villages. A feat I had to repeat on Thursday evening when I was returning from a Garden Club talk in Stapleford.

Our walk this week started in Great Chesterford close to where Kate worked in her final years for Takeda and circled close to Hadstock and Linton. It was a return to mud but compensated by a herd of deer and some rolling hills.

Site of old Roman camp near Gt. Chesterford

On the Icknield Way

 

Manor Cottages Gt Chesterford

Our “Biography” topic this week was Sir Cloudesley Shovell who rose from cabin boy to admiral. He had a distinguished career in naval battles mainly with the Dutch and French but is best remembered for being in charge of one of the biggest naval disasters in British history. He was returning from the siege of Toulon with a fleet of 22 ships when they encountered a storm and ran aground on the Isles of Scilly. All 800 men on his ship drowned and altogether 4 ships were lost and 2000 men. It was mainly due to their inability to calculate longitude in those days.

Sir Cloudesley Shovell

We had a spring-cleaning session at chapel yesterday morning and achieved quite a lot in a short time.

Football was played in less than ideal conditions yesterday afternoon but Over beat Hemingford 3 v 0.

With love

Mike & Kate

9th February 2020

Dear All,

We had a serious malfunction in our tropical fish tank, while we were in Hove the thermostat packed up and overheated the water and cooked the fish. Consequently, we have started again with some new electrics and a spring clean of the tank. Fortunately, a friend – Adam Swain had an over population of Swordtails and was keen to restock our tank.

  

We attended the U3A film club this week to see “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” starring Humphrey Bogarde  made in 1947 but it was still very good.

Our cemetery has been left some money and is spending some trimming the hedges where there was some hefty trees growing up. I have been the main beneficiary of the timber and spent much of Wednesday sawing up logs so that we sat in front of a roaring log fire for the first time this winter on Thursday.

Sowing is well under way with peas in gutters, tomatoes, celeriac, lettuce, beetroot, salsify, cabbage, cauliflowers and broccoli all started and a severe gash on my head as I forget how low the greenhouse doorway is!

I spoke at Great Chesterford Garden Club on Wednesday night and had to judge their spring flower competition – I try and leave before the results are announced!

Thursday saw us at another distant location this time at Shillingford beyond the A1 in Bedfordshire. The journey was worthwhile with wall to wall sunshine and rolling countryside.

  

Shillington church on the hill top

  

Near Lower Gravenhurst

Wrest House

“Biographies” this week features a relatively unknown polymath called “John Cranch” presented by one of his descendants who had written a book about him. He was born in 1751 in Devon and did not go to school due to poverty. He was apprenticed to a lawyer aged 10 then to an Attorney in Axminster before escaping to London where he had a lively interest in all things artistic teaching himself Latin and French and developing great skill as a painter becoming a mentor of John Constable. He moved to Bath and started collecting Roman pottery and coins and his collection started the Bath museum collection. He must have been a remarkable man in his day and yet none of had heard of him illustrating the transience of fame!

John Cranch

The Plasterer by John Cranch

Over won a cup semi final on penalties yesterday after drawing 1 v 1 with Bassingbourn.

Amḗlie has spent 4 days away with her school at an outdoor activities centre which she has greatly enjoyed.

Ben was uncomfortably close to the site of the stabbing and shooting in Stretham last weekend but thankfully not too close.

With love

Mike & Kate

2^nd February 2020

Dear All,

We were down in Hove for grandparent duties Tuesday and Wednesday with good journeys both ways. On Wednesday we took Albert to Brighton to visit a few places from “The Secret Brighton” book. These included the “Loaves & Fishes” sculpture, the Toy Museum and the Jewish quarter.

The Toy Museum is not large but packed with vintage toys including vast numbers of trains and displays of iconic names like Meccano, Dinky, Corgi etc. To make it more interesting for small children they had included a number of Lego men amongst the exhibits and Albert was very sharp in spotting these.

 Loaves & Fishes sculpture

 

Toy Museum

Jew Street

 

Jew Street

On the Bus

 

Gull with lunch

Amelie demonstrating the Yoga method of putting your shoes on!

We walked on the beach after and spotted a gull eating a baby shark.

On returning home we found that the thermostat in the fish tank had misfunctioned and cooked all the tropical fish which was especially disappointing as several babies had been born recently.

The swimming pool was still sparsely populated on Monday with our car load of four providing half the occupants. In the evening I had a garden talk at Wickhambrook about 40 miles away on a cold damp evening which made me ponder how much longer I wanted to continue turning out especially in the winter. To make things worse there was a a 5 mile queue on the A14 so I had to take to the villages to make it in time.

Biographies this week featured “T. E. Lawrence” of Lawrence of Arabia fame. He was a complex character as described in one biography entitled “Hero or Charlatan”. According to the presenter the famous film “Lawrence of Arabia” got a lot of things wrong but captured his character quite well.

T.E. Lawrence

This week’s walk started at Ingham north of Bury St Edmunds on light sandy land so we escaped mud for the first time for several weeks. The route took in Culford school grounds where some pupils were having a golf lesson – just like our own school days! It was a good walk including the River Lark with a good collection of water birds. On the downside it was very odiferous with the smell of Bury Sugar beet factory blending with numerous piggeries and an odd bonfire.

Culford School

Egyptian geese

Culford Bridge on the River Lark

We were on the streets Friday night and it was busy being pay day and Brexit but well behaved with little trouble. We had two ambulance incidents, one a large lad completely comatose with wide dilated pupils suggesting ketamine indulgence and a severely sick girl for whom a helpful passerby had ordered an unnecessary ambulance.

We watched Over at West Wratting yesterday in very exciting game where Over were 2 up in 6 minutes but West Wratting equalised for 3 v 3 in injury time.

With love

Mike & Kate