May 1997
It will not be long before we start to ask (or pester, depending how you see it) you to have a look in the loft or garage etc. to search out items for our fund-raising auction. We hope to make it a bumper sale this year and exceed the target the PCC has set us of £3,000. So please start searching - we have plenty of storage space as soon as it is needed.
This year we intend to combine furniture, collectables, bric-a-brac etc. with the popular ‘Pledges and Promises’ so if the loft’s empty, why not dream up an interesting pledge or two!
The main reason for this early note is to advise you of a change of date for this year’s auction, to:
Saturday 25th October
So please put the date in your diaries now and start searching.
For full details and for collection please call Graham Holt on 01923 262704.
HMP THE MOUNT
If you would like to be a HACRO Volunteer, or just find out more about what goes on ‘Inside, come to our Open Meeting on Thursday 22 May from 6 to 8pm at the Officers’ Mess. (There’ll be signs to guide you from the Chesham Road in Bovingdon).
You’ll meet the Governor and some of his staff, the heads of departments who are looking for volunteers - e.g. Education, Probation, Chaplaincy, - and representatives of voluntary bodies. You’ll hear about working in the childcare facility, planned for the Visits Area to help ease the strains caused by enforced separation of families. We also have some interesting opportunities for people who prefer to work on the ‘Outside’.
For more information, ring Anne Wyburd (HACRO Chairman) on 01923 267515.
THE HELPLINE
by Neville Thomas
Is that the AA?
A smooth impersonal voice came through the air.
If you require information concerning becoming a member of the AA say ‘yes’ now. Slight pause. Silence.
If you require information concerning the facilities available to you as a member of the AA say ‘yes’ now.
Another pause. Silence.
If you require information regarding traffic conditions say ‘yes’ now.
Yes. I thought ‘Gosh, I wonder: what’s going to happen now?’
If you require information about traffic conditions in London, say ‘One’.
Well, actually, I don’t really want London. I think I shall only skirt around the,edge. If you require information about traffic conditions in Kent, Sussex or Surrey, say ‘two’.
Well, I’m sorry to be a nuisance. I might well need Sussex or Surrey, but I don’t think I am going through Kent at all.
If you require information regarding traffic conditions in Essex, Hertfordshire or Buckinghamshire, say ‘three’.
Well, actually, I do want Essex, but only on the way back.
At this juncture, a somewhat irate disembodied voice came across the ether.
‘You silly twit, now you have gummed up the works. Why can’t you do what we tell you and use your intelligence like a normal human being?’
I thought, Well, stone the crows! For an impersonal robot to talk about behaving like a
normal human being is a bit rich. I now became slightly annoyed and just shouted into the telephone:
Twenty.
After a short pause the disembodied voice came through again.
We have no reports at present of any traffic problems on the Stornaway Bypass.
Lucky old them, I thought. I was becoming exasperated by this time, so I rang up the
emergency number. I was immediately cheered and surprised by the friendly female voice - a real live human being. She asked how she could help.
I intend going by car to visit relatives in Sussex over Christmas and I’d just like a bit of advice on which would be the best day, time and route to avoid the worst of the traffic.
She actually chuckled and said ‘I’ll put you through to someone who I think will be able to help you’.
My spirits were rising by the minute.
A friendly young man came on and gave me some useful tips about my intended journey. I thanked him and said how much I appreciated talking to a real live person. Whether the tips actually worked had become secondary. I was in harmony with my fellow human beings
once again.
CHIPPERFIELD TENNIS CLUB
The Annual General Meeting of Chipperfield Tennis Club will take place on Wednesday 7th May, starting at 7.30pm at the Village Hall. All existing and prospective members are invited, when our very keen Treasurer will be delighted to relieve us of our membership fees!
The Committee are also considering resurfacing the original court at the end of this season. This will be a major expense and consequently there will be a number of planned activities as the season progresses - watch this space for details!
Our Spring Show was rather disappointing. The flowers were beautiful, but it was the low number of exhibits that caused concern. It was the unusually warm weather that must have spoilt the daffodils. Thank you, members and supporters, for your efforts nevertheless.
Mrs Sue Tyler won the Abrahams Cup for the most points in show. Mrs Hazel Bowen and Mr John Hopkins collected many first awards. Congratulations!
Let us now look forward to our Summer Show on Saturday 21st June. Let’s hope we get some rain and not a hosepipe ban.
NEWS FROM AYR (AUSTRALIA, NOT SCOTLAND!)
It is no longer ‘News from Millaroo’ because I made the move to join Ian at our house in Ayr last October. It took us a bit of time to adjust to living together full-time, after about 18 months of seeing each other for just a day or two at weekends, but we’ve got used to being together again now. We’re still not seeing that much of each other as I now spend 2 to 2. 5 hours a day commuting to and from Swan’s Lagoon. I leave home at 6.45 a.m. and get back at about 6.00 p.m. and Ian also works Saturday mornings. As you may remember from the last report from here, Ian now has a mini-photolab./shop in Ayr. He puts in a lot of hours, but doesn’t pay himself much of a wage. However, he enjoys the work, meeting people and feels as if he’s doing something useful.
The renovations to the house have slowed considerably with Ian working full-time, but the inside is essentially finished and we are pleased with the result. The front verandah is finished too. The floor of that was sanded back and Ian has stained it to weather-proof it and it looks really good. I now want to fill much of it with plants. It is hard to believe it is the same house that we moved into almost 3 years ago. We are now working to get the rest of the outside painted and as it is a wooden house we have to paint all of it. It is obviously many years since it was last done and so we have had to do a lot of work sanding and grinding off the old, peeling paint. We are also trying to get some shrubs and trees planted in the yard, because it is very open and bare apart from the fruit trees which we planted at the back not long after we bought the house. When we moved from Millaroo I tried to salvage some of the plants we’d put in there. I took a lot of cuttings and have planted about 80 along one fenceline. The hope is that they’ll form a hedge to give us a bit more privacy. We have also had a concrete slab put down at the back of the house. The aim is to build a wooden pergola over it and grow grape-vines over it. The theory is that they will shade the house in the summer, but allow us to get the winter sun when they lose their leaves.
We are not doing all this work at the best time of year as this is the wet season and for a change we are actually getting one! December and January were pretty dry, but it has hardly stopped raining in February and March. We have had two cyclones hit us. fortunately the lowest class of severity, so haven’t had the damaging winds, but we have had a lot of rain. In fact the reason that this is getting written is that I’ve been unable to get to work today because of a cyclone! We also had a tremendous storm a few weeks back; between about 9.30 and 11.30 p.m. we had between Sand 10 inches of rain fall. Our yard was about 4 inches under water and it was several days before the surface water went. Our chickens should have been ducks; we had to put pieces of timber down in their run so that they could get out of the water. When the concrete slab was being put down the builder got all the form-work, plastic and mesh in place and then it rained for about a week. It looked like we were building a swimming pool! My newly planted hedge has also been flattened a couple of times. When the ground here gets wet it just forms a ‘soup’ (and sets like concrete when it dries!), so with the strong winds the shrubs just keeled over. However, I’ve propped them up and most seem to be surviving.
The weather has disrupted my work too. We were due to bring in cows and calves from one of the paddocks at the end of February, but a month on we’ve still been unable to do it. The paddocks have turned to ‘soup’, the cattle have moved to the high, rocky ground and the creeks have been running too high to risk crossing them with horses, cows and calves. This country is certainly one of extremes; areas which have been in drought for years are now suffering devastation from floods.
I’ve been doing some work in Central Queensland again, at the feedlot where I worked at the end of 1995. So, I’ve been travelling the 1,000 km each way every few weeks for the last 4 months. I have had a number of trips to Brisbane too and have managed to combine a little pleasure with business and catch up with family and friends occasionally. Towards the end of last year I went to an animal behaviour conference in Canberra. The weather reminded me very much of the UK - cold, wet and windy! I was very thankful I’d not thrown out all of my clothes from when I lived in Scotland! Whilst in Canberra I visited the Australian National Library where there is ‘Petherick Reading Room’. I managed to get some information on the person for whom it was named - an Edward Augustus Petherick (1847-19 17), who donated, to the people of Australia, his large collection of monographs, maps and books about Australia and the Pacific region. I am wondering if we are related at all.
I am excited because I am planning a visit ‘home’ later this year! I hope to get to a conference in Prague and will return to the UK about mid-August. It is hard to believe that it will be nearly 4 years since I left. Unfortunately, Ian isn’t able to leave the business, so once more I will be holidaying on my own. I will, of course, be spending some time with my family in and around Chipperfield. I am so looking forward to being home again and I hope I will get to meet my many friends there.