So let's start with that quiz question posed yesterday. The answer is Margaret Smith as I'm sure many of you will have realised. Actress Margaret Smith, known as Maggie Smith, got an Oscar for best actress in 1969 for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. Margaret Court was born Margaret Smith and won Wimbledon Ladies singles in 1970, having won the doubles title in 1969.
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How many times in life do we fail to appreciate something until it's gone? I often reminisce on what were essentially happy schooldays but didn't really appreciate where I was at the time. I refer here to a place because my grammar school as you will all know was in Norwich Cathedral Close.
There can be few better locations in which to be educated. Every day should have been a delight but it was something at the time that we just took for granted.
In my autobiography (yes I know that it's slow coming out but I seem to have so many demands on my time) I talk about the dreadful standard of some of the teaching at the time and I stand by these remarks. Let's just say it could have been better but the location at the side of Norwich Cathedral was stunning.
Midway through my time at the school we had a change of Headmaster and almost overnight we went from the Victorian era into the land of modernity.
I loved being in the sixth form as certain rules were relaxed and some teachers called us by our first names rather than surnames as we had been used to.
I mentioned a few days ago the shock that visitors to the Cathedral Close would have got on passing the school chapel. For those of you who know Norwich, the chapel is on your left as you walk towards the Cathedral.
In those days that area would be resonating to the sounds of Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Jethro Till and a few others. The crypt of the Chapel was used as a six form club where after school and at weekends we could doss (sorry relax) on comfy chairs, listen to rock music and have social events. I really don't know how we got away with it but we did. Those Saturday night socials were something else.
I often wonder when it stopped being a six form club. There must have been a time when a Head (there have been several) said enough is enough. We had a look round the school a few years ago and the crypt is an art studio. Times have changed as sixth formers now have a coffee lounge which is much less cutting edge but you have to remember that my memories are of the late 1960s when liberalisation was the thing of the day.
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There was a news item on television stating that only two on 10 people thank a bus driver when they get off and only one in 10 speak to the driver when they get on. The reporter's maths was a bit awry. They said one in 10 or 8 percent. When I went to school one in 10 was 10 percent.
I always thank the driver when I get off and most people do. So here in Norfolk I would say it's nearer 80 percent. Next time I'm on a bus I will note how many thank the driver.
Of course it's a two way thing when you get on. Some drivers seem to be very sullen and even rude. At times it's hard to think of a driver that has been pleasant.
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I saw a comment the other day along the lines of it isn't until you are retired that you realise how much can be done/achieved in pyjamas.
How true that is. Staying in pyjamas isn't necessarily a sign of laziness but more a sign of a person who wants to be comfortable and can't be bothered to get dressed when they are the only person around.
The only thing that ruins it is when there's a knock on the door. After all who wants to open the doors when all they have on is a skimpy nightdress (but enough about me)?
The same goes for shaving. Is there any point in shaving if you are going to be in the house on your own all day (but that's enough about the other threequarters)? Maybe I've got those last two paragraphs mixed up a bit, but then again maybe not.
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The phrase rats off a sinking ship comes to mind. A number of long serving local BBC journalists/presenters have decided to hang up their pens or whatever reporters hang up when they quit. The latest to announce they are leaving is Louise Priest. Something is not quite right in the land of the BBC me thinks.
As for some of those that are left. Well some need lessons in reading an auto cue. There's a young lady who sometimes does the early morning news who is just atrocious. I don't think anyone has ever explained to her that the art of reading from an auto cue is to make the public think that you aren't reading from an auto cue if you know what I mean.
The best really do make you think that they are speaking off the cuff and just making everything up. This young lady obviously has the farewell at the end of the bulletin written down
That's all from me. Have. A. Nice. Day, she drawls in a most unconvincing fashion.
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You wouldn't believe how many people would be 100 this year if they were still alive.
I say this after reading one of my favourite magazines The Oldie. It's one of those I shouldn't enjoy as half the time I don't act my age and the other half of the time I don't act my age.
But there it is in black and white. Each edition seems to have a list of people who would now be 100 and those are people I remember as fairly young men.
This month it includes Larry Shut that Door Grayson whose real name was William White. As a boy he called himself Willie White and let's face it that is a much funnier name than Larry Grayson. If he wanted to get a cheap laugh it would be no good switching his stage name round. There's nothing remotely funny about Grayson Larry. But switch his real name round and White Willie would have raised a titter.
Then there's actress Glynis Johns and actually she is still alive. Finally Donald Swann who was one half of a duo who did amusing songs about mud and hippopotamus and gnus as in I'm a gnu how do you do?
More than enough for today I feel.