It was the day of the long walk into Eastbourne and we were watching Royal Ascot on TV and trying to cool down.
So why did I want my horse to lose?
As you know I like a small bet on the gee gees. £1 each way or something like that. I have an account with Sky Bet. Quite some time ago I deposited £20. As Royal Ascot approached I still had £19.47.
So plenty left for an afternoon watching racing on TV. There's a thing called the ITV 7. It's a free competition where you have to pick the winners of all seven races. You have to do this before racing starts and on this particular day we just didn't have time to enter. After the final race £250,000 is divided between however many successful tickets there are.
So you can imagine our chagrin as we got the first four winners. Please let me have a loser, I said under my breath. We didn't get another winner and nobody won the money. But at the end of the day our £19.47 had grown to £38.79. Subsequently it's grown to £42.02.
We celebrated by going to a pizza restaurant but our winnings didn't even cover the cost of our starters. I wonder if that has anything to do with the phrase "being under starter's orders." I guess not.
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Now here's an admission. I'm not finding it as easy to get my leg over as I used to.
Now before you harbour ideas that this blog is going to get raunchy I must add that we are talking about the height of bathtubs here.
The higher they are the more trouble I have with my right leg which I have to grab with both hands and lift manually. I put this down to a hernia operation I had over 40 years ago. I have never had the same mobility since then.
It does show how medicine has changed. After the hernia repair I spent something like eight days in a cottage hospital recuperating which largely meant eating, watching television and playing cards with people similarly recuperating.
When I came out, I had put on so much weight I couldn't do my trousers up.
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So another day on the sunshine coast and it's certainly living up to its expectations. Yes it's on the coast. Of course I was referring to the sunshine bit.
So on Saturday we had coffee sitting outside a cafe in Eastbourne's old town. Our son left home around the age of 18 to go to Brighton University to study PE at their Eastbourne campus. His first flat was above a fish and chip shop in Old Town.
A lot of water has gone under the bridge since then but he now has a house just round the corner from that first flat.
Old Town is pleasant. You have Albert Parade which includes a cafe, butchers and much more. There's a Sainsbury's and a library and a few minutes walk away and you are on the South Downs.
On Saturday we drove to one of our favourite places which I have mentioned before - East Dean. We had an outside table booked at The Tiger Pub and enjoyed a pint in the sunshine. It took almost an hour for our food to arrive but this wasn't a problem as we weren't in a hurry. The drive there took five minutes.
On the way back, stopped to take some photos of Eastbourne in the distance.
Getting back to old town. It's a pleasant half hour walk into Eastbourne Town Centre or about 10 minutes on the bus. The walk can take you through two pleasant parks one of which goes close to a church which is surrounded by some very attractive and historic buildings. This is an area well off the usual tourist track. I must check out the history and report back some time.
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I was very sad to hear of the death of Hethersett resident Connie Tindale. I got to know Connie through the articles she wrote for me for the Hethersett Herald.
Connie collected and grew miniature Bonsai trees. She was also a huge champion of hedgehogs, rescuing many over the years and looking after them at her home in Grove Road.
Connie also had an amazing and unusual garden which she tended with great enthusiasm. She had spent many years living in Egypt and had a great fondness for that country and headed up a charity to support Egyptian children. She was also a big supporter of Hethersett Youth Club.
I wrote an article about Connie for the local newspapers and will be looking to do a full tribute in the August edition of Hethersett Herald. This will include her involvement in Hethersett Writers' Group where she initiated a competition for local schools.
I have also heard that former parish church organist Rita Bircham has died.