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Sunday, 13 November 2022

13^th November 2022

Dear All,

After our usual swim on Monday the U3A Quizzes session was more lively than usual as two ladies stormed out claiming that the tutor had been rude to them following a discussion about the content of the course and the clarity of his diction. He is from Yorkshire and did not take kindly to their criticism and could have dealt with them a little more tactfully. They subsequently reported him to U3A HQ and the course has been suspended pending an investigation – a pretty good example of adults acting like children! In the evening I was speaking at Abington Garden Club about “Vegetables in a Small Garden”.

“Napoleon” on Tuesday covered his relationship with the British which was not too good as between 1693 and 1815 there were 7 wars and a constant state of tension with brief periods of fragile peace. We built 515 warships between 1803 and 1815 and this was the major British industry at the time. After the class Kate and I lunched at Pizza Express in Newmarket Road and visited Dunelm at Kate is in charge of replacing curtains in the Chapel Schoolroom.

On Wednesday I finished digging in the old strawberry bed and planted out Broad Beans. Norman Ingle came for lunch; he was widowed last year but earlier this summer travelled to New Zealand and Australia with one of his granddaughters. In the evening I travelled to Sandy for a CEEM meeting. At Gordon’s 70^th a whip round raised £485 for CEEM and I received a further £500 donation following a presentation by Philip Bowes during last Sunday’s evening service, Needless to say there are always more needs in Moldova than we can cover but these donations are very encouraging.

Our Thursday walk started at West Wratting of football fame! And circled via Western Colville, Brinkley, Carlton and Western Green. Thankfully no rain this week but the wind was quite lively for the second half of the walk. The short? walk was 9.2 miles this week and the longer one over 11 miles.

The Chestnut Tree, West Wratting

Western Green

Western Colville

The Biography topic this week was “Archbishop Desmond Tutu” who was involved in an amazing number of conflicts round the world – not just South Africa,

Desmond Tutu

On Saturday morning I attended the Willingham Ploughing Match with David and Lawrie from walking. It is the first one that I have been to and was amazed how many were taking part – 74 entries! Richard Fenwick was the only contestant I knew and most of the equipment was fairly elderly.