Apologies for the delayed publication. The letter was written last week, so the timing references are out.

Dear Steve,

Once again,  I find myself in the position not being able to follow, through this letter, the topic of Gilbert’s Letter XVIII.  He talks with much detail on the appearance of the Loach.  I have to be honest and say that I don’t think I’ve ever seen one.  He then moves on to the topic of a woman who claimed to have a cure for cancer through the use of toads, he even uses the expression “marvellous cures”.  I have usually associated quacks and snake oil salesmen with the Wild West, but I guess there’s no reason we wouldn’t have them here as well.  Indeed, I believe the victorians had pretty wild “cures” for various ailments.

Gilbert talking about fish, and me writing about Gilbert writing about fish, is always going to be problematic.  I’m going to be a bit hypocritical and say I don’t like handling fish horrible slimy feeling, Yuck.  But then I will happily eat cod, haddock, scampi, prawns as long as they are fresh. I “tolerate” salmon, it’s just under the threshold of being too “fishy” in taste. I don’t recall ever eating things like trout or bass. 

I wonder if it was because my mum used to love pilchards and sardines and would eat them straight out of the can, whilst I found the sight and the smell disgusting that I developed a dislike of fish in general?

Moving away from my eating habits, we were in the garden yesterday afternoon,  I commented to Elayne that it looked lovely and green, I think the word would be verdant. We had moved our seats the previous week to give the grass a chance to recover. The new location seems to suit the local fox which has started using the space behind it as its restaurant, I found feathers and the shell of a chickens egg.  Unfortunately, we’ve realised they are now perfect for the starling squadron to perch whilst waiting for their turn at the feeder.

I also noticed that somebody has used one of the tubs of fresh compost as a toilet.  Really chaps, come on.  That’s Not on.

All the very best

Bill

I’m just sorry that I don’t have a picture of any part of the A1120.

As we left the cottage this morning, the last thing I heard Mark shout was “Go via the 1120, the tourist route“. I’m ashamed I have to confess I had no idea what he was talking about. Luckily Elayne did.

We picked up the A1120 after just a few miles down the A12. Oh my, what a lovely road this is. For two reasons it made our journey to St Neots so much more pleasant than it could have been.

As I was driving my focus was very much on the road, but it was clear that we were passing through areas that were very likely steeped in history. It was one of those times that we had a schedule to follow, so weren’t able to stop and appreciate them. If we ever go that way again, I’d like to think that we could build in some time to explore a bit.

The second reason was the quality of the road for by far the bulk of the journey, the ride was incredibly smooth, I really felt like we were just gliding along. I can’t think of any road where I’ve had that feeling, even on the AutoBahns.

Actually, there is a third reason why that way was such a delight, and I am sure that it was just a quirk of timing. For most the journey, I had no cars behind me and no cars ahead of me. That does happen occasionally of course. But this was notable as it was for most of the length of the route we had. I am willing to bet that the road could, at times, be a nightmare.

But not today. Today, it was a delight.

Today is our last full day here. The town has entirely lived up to my expectations. It really is quite delightful.

Although we don’t have a dog, our friends do, Dilly is delightful, and it is lovely to see a town which really cares about dogs, and it is clean. We Haven’t encountered any mess.

We had a lovely breakfast in a local cafe

Today we visited the pier. Another favourite spot, as quirky as they come with an admittedly small amusements area, contains some rather unusual games.

This evening we ate in a slightly unusual restaurant our booth was a beach hut. They had been introduced during covid as a way of keeping guests apart, and have been so popular, that they kept them on.

The food was delicious.

A lovely end to a lovely day.

Dilly has had a fabulous time here in the sea. The temperature has been a bit cooler as we’re by the coast with a refreshing breeze.

Today we walked from our cottage along the edge of the golf course down to the creek to a pub for some lunch. We didn’t have to book and it wasn’t as busy as we expected, so it didn’t take long for the food to turn up whist we were sipping drinks outside in the sunshine.

After lunch it was a meander along the river to the sea, passing lots of simple restaurants mostly serving fish and chips but they all seemed busy. I noted to come along before we go home to buys some kippers and fresh crab…yum yum!

We had an ice cream near the dunes then Dilly could run free on the way back to Southwold. by the time we got back we were all knackered and needed copious tea and flopped onto the sofa.

Dinner was cheese and biscuits and a few chocs….yum yum!

A nice relaxing day and we’ll do it all again tomorrow!

I can remember seeing a TV programme some years ago about Southwold. I had thought that it was Coast. But I have the DVD set of the first season of Coast. The segment covering the town is not what I remember, so it must have been some other TV show.

What I remember is an image of a town that was really quite lovely. It. Was a happy place and looked really quite beautiful. I have to say that my experience so far pretty much matches that.

I went out with Mark to take the dog for her morning walk. As we came onto the sports field area, we were discussing the car park, and whether it was free. There was a lady sat reading a book, and she said “sorry for listening to your conversation, but the car park is free, but if you can make a donation, that would be good”. We thanked her and then had a very pleasant chat. At one point I asked if the locals didn’t get fed up with all the tourists. I think her response was immediate and sincere, and very much in support of the visitors, that we are very welcome. I’m not sure everyone will think like that, but for a random engagement, it was a very nice response.

During the day, when we went for a walk, and stopped in a local pub for a drink, I really got the impression of a happy atmosphere. Everybody seemed to be enjoying themselves.

I would very much like to find that original clip, whichever series it’s from, because whoever did it, got it absolutely spot on.

We went on a journey today. In the car. It was one of those journeys where you encounter all sorts of people. Today, it was mad drivers. We were particularly entertained by a lady in an expensive car, who was determined to get ahead by lane hoping as much as she could.

She was driving very assertively, and for a brief period, she did get ahead. We kept on catching up with her. She gave us one of those looks. Luckily, she turned off.

Another driver was being really quite aggressive. It didn’t do him any good. He was as stuck as we were.

We just plodded along, it was almost pleasant.

It’s amazing how just asking one simple question opens up a whole avenue of exploration. This last Tuesday, we had the latest Exploring Art session with the u3a. I think I mentioned in Tuesday’s post that I hadn’t prepared anything, as I hadn’t been inspired to research the topic of Circuses. At the end of that session, we were told that the next session would be about portraits.

What I like to do is try to find that different angle, and this time I did that by asking the search engine, what are the most extreme representations of a portrait. One of the first suggestions was Van Gogh’s The Chair – I might take a picture of a chair and ask ChatGPT to make an oil painting of it. Is it a portrait because it represents the person who sits in it – I could do the sofa, and do a Tracy Emin type thing – make it untidy, representing me. Is that a portrait – arguably, yes.

There are a couple of pictures that I will include in the presentation that I am going to prepare for the next session, but I’m not going to talk about them here until after I’ve presented to the group.

One thing I will talk about is the header picture. It’s obviously a portrait of me, but done in the style of Refik Anadol – as best as ChatGPT can. Anadol uses large datasets to produce some amazing images, https://refikanadol.com/works/ Well worth having a look.

I must admit, even doing this basic level of research has been fascinating.

This morning, we had the u3a Interest Group Online (IOG) for Archaeology group. One of the groups members did a detailed presentation on Doggerland, the area of land between the British Isles and Europe that slowly disappeared between 8 – 10,000 years ago. Like all of the presentations I have attended since joining u3a, and subscribing to the IGOs it was excellent.

After the session, a number of us stayed on Zoom, I ended up offering to do my AI in Archaeology presentation next month.

We had a discussion about WhatsApp & Beacon, and some GDPR concerns. It was suggested that we look at an alternative: Moodle. I’ve done a little bit of research, and it looks good, but there are associated costs, which may be a problem. We’ll see how that goes.

We went to the beach with Aurora, the sea was a little bit rough, and she didn’t like it, so we went and had an ice cream instead, which was nice.

Last night, I promised that I would update you on the inaugural meeting of the Gosport u3a Creative writing group. I have to be honest and say that I would have been pleased had three or four people turned up. Instead, there were 12 people, yes, that is not a misprint – 12. Apparently, there also a number who had written to the groups manager to let them know that they were interested, but were unable to attend today’s meeting. I think it is fair to say that I was gobsmackingly delighted.

The atmosphere, even in this relatively short meeting, was keen and enthusiastic; all I have to do now is meet their expectations. Once I finish tonight’s post, I have the survey forms to analyse, which should give me some information for feeding into the group dynamic.

I am now a little bit worried about making sure that I try to do right by them.

After the success of the morning, I moved on to the afternoon session, Exploring Art. The set topic had been the circus. I haven’t been to a circus in roughly 60 years. I’m really not enthused by them, and couldn’t motivate myself to prepare anything for the session.

The next session is Portraits. I have some thoughts about that.

When I picked Elayne up from her volunteering session she said she had a present for me. I had to stand with my eyes closed, whilst she sorted it. She said “open your eyes” and she handed me my first book on Compost. I am absolutely delighted.

I think that perhaps the main thing is to ensure that I understand what people want to get out of the group. I know that I want to iimprove my writing, perhaps expand the scope (I need to have something fictional within me to help my credibility to group members as it wouldn’t surprise me that they will be producing fiction.

I just want people to be entirely comfortable to have a public forum to share their work, and have it critiqued if they want.

I’ll let you know how I get on.