4^th October 2020

 

Dear All,

We were fortunate to choose last week rather than this for Derbyshire as there has been decidedly less sunshine and more dampness this week. We did manage to sort the cricket square on Monday: aeration, scarifying, reseeding fertilising then covering with loam. We did not give it such a heavy dressing this year as it has been so lightly used.

 

 

Scarifyer

 

Aerator

 

 

Top Dresser

In June we received an anonymous £1000 donation for CEEM on a charity cheque which I sent to HSBC straight away. I then received a missed phone call message from the bank in St Neots asking me to ring them. However, due to the excitement of lockdown I tried every day for a week, holding on for 30 minutes twice, but failed to get through. When a statement came the amount had not been added, so my colleague Terry who lives closer to St Neots than me said he would go into the bank so sort it out. He got rather busy and delayed his visit and when he did go in forgot to ask. Eventually he returned and the bank clerk he saw said he could not find the cheque and knew nothing about it. I therefore wrote to the bank and received a phone call to say that they had the cheque but it had been damaged in a flood but was still legible! They explained that it was not an ordinary cheque but a charity token which needed an accompanying form filled in. The form when downloaded proved to be a 3-page document, which I have now completed and sent to “Stewardship” for redemption. Fingers crossed that this is successful.

It has been a bit wet for serious gardening this week but I managed to plant Elephant Garlic, remove the asparagus fern, harvest fennel and do a little digging.

 

 

Fennel

 

We walked with U3A again this week but were split into groups of less than 6. We missed the rain starting at Hildersham taking in Abington, Hadstock and Linton ending with a picnic rather than a pub.

 

River Granta at Hildersham

 

 

Hadstock

 

Quince tree

 

 

Linton Water Tower

 

U3A classes begin again next week and “Biographies” will be via ZOOM. This will be a challenge with a group closer to 80 than 70 and as a joint leader this time I have been helping to train our elderly participants.

The lockdown seems to have affected the fitness of Over FC as they currently have 7 players out with injuries! However, they managed a very credible 1 v 1 draw with Cambridge University Press yesterday.

 

With love

Mike & Kate