What is he talking about today I hear you say?
Well of course I'm talking about a 2014 diary. What else could I possibly be talking about?
It was all connected to a day out yesterday in North Norfolk as I will explain. When we are travelling around North Norfolk we like to let the Coasthopper bus take the strain. In the winter there's only one bus an hour as compared to two an hour in the summer.
So we caught the 9.47 from Weybourne after having time to take a few photos of Weybourne Church. We got off at Wells Next The Sea and had a very enjoyable two hours there which included taking some of the photos included here. We paid a return visit to a craft fair which is tucked away and seems to be open every day. Did quite a bit of Christmas shopping as they always have some very unusual gifts. We then found a new gem for us in Wells Maltings Arts Centre where there was a cafe, an art exhibition and what looks like a good programme of events. Just missed a concert by Chris Difford who some of you will recognise as formerly in the rock group Squeeze.
After a quick walk, we wandered back to catch the bus to Blakeney to have lunch in the church as we had seen this advertised on the way through.
But first I bought that whopper. I think it was the largest diary I have ever seen. It's A4 size and has two pages to every day as opposed to this year's which has a page per day apart from Saturday and Sunday which only has half a page. After 51 years of writing a diary I had toyed with the idea of cutting back how much I write to just notes. Now I'm faced with twice the space to fill. So what can I do? Over to you.
We got off the bus close to Blakeney Church. As we walked up the church path I noticed the name of Dew on one of the gravestones and then there was another with another Dew on it. So there's plenty of research needed there as my ancestral Dew family came from Great Yarmouth but before that from Salthouse, Cley and other places which now may include Blakeney. I'm looking forward to more research.
We were made very welcome at the lunch in the church. I had leek and potato soup and the other threequarters had broccoli and stilton. It was very tasty but the sweets that followed were the highlight. The bread and butter pudding was glorious. Apparently it's a speciality of one of the organisers and I got the last portion.
Blakeney felt like a ghost village. There was scarcely anyone around. In the summer the quay area is bursting with people but in November there was a couple braving the cold by sitting on a bench. Other than that it was deserted.
Back to the bus stop and onto the bus with a very chatty man and his wife. Over the next half an hour we learnt a load about his life. He didn't learn very much about ours. There was also an Indian lady who lives in Luton and who is walking the Norfolk coastal path. I just love meeting people who come into our lives for a short time and then disappear. Each of them has a story to tell and we are good listeners. I informed the gentleman that I write a daily blog and he would be appearing in today's. I'm not sure he was entirely impressed.
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When it comes to claiming compensation don't believe those companies that tell you how easy it is. They are more likely to make it as difficult as possible.
Step forward Greater Anglia trains. They boast that if your train is cancelled or delayed you might be able to gain compensation. So we tried for the two delayed journeys the other threequarters had recently. We filled in a from, gave them the number of the tickets, details of the delays which they would have been aware of anyway and also a photograph of the tickets.
Back they came to say the photograph of the tickets wasn't sharp enough. So I took another and filled in another form and sent it off. Back it came. They needed to have a photograph of the tickets cut up so that they couldn't be used. I'm not sure how you would be able to use a ticket clearly out of date and with the date clearly shown on it. So we cut the tickets up and sent them another photo and we await a reply. I'm not sure what they will want next. Perhaps they will need a full biography and a picture of us to prove we exist.
This kind of thing makes me want to scream. They obviously make the process as difficult as possible so that you just give up. They were aware of the delays on these two journeys, they had photographs of our tickets and the ticket numbers and still they want more. This is very bad customer service.
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What a piece of work Suella Braverman is and to think if things had gone differently she could have been prime minister. Her vitriolic response to being sacked makes her look like Violet Elizabeth Bott "I'm going to scream and scream until I'm sick."
The Tory party is currently giving a good impression of a group of schoolkids having petty quarrels. It's a pathetic attempt by men and women in death throes trying to paper over massive cracks that just cannot be papered over.
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I had to laugh at the news that the RAF Red Arrows display team has been put into special measures, although it's actually no laughing matter of course.
Watch the Red Arrows whoosh and swish across the skies and you feel the word togetherness was invented just for them. But on the ground it's a sordid and tawdry tale of sexism and bullying. This is very sad because the Arrows have always stood for teamwork which looks like just being another myth that is thrust upon us.
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I've been putting it off for sometime. It's what I do. I speak here of my autobiography which is pretty much written but I've been putting off editing it for some months. On Tuesday evening I decided it was time to crack on with the corrections and you will be glad/unhappy to hear ( delete as necessary) that I have got through the first two chapters and made some additions and alterations. Last night I continued on my way.
Very shortly once the next Hethersett Herald is out of the way it will be time to make the corrections to our book on Le Paradis Massacre with a view to getting that published early in the New Year. It's going to be a busy few Winter months.
As I've already said I hope you enjoy the photos which were taken yesterday at Weybourne, Wells and Blakeney.