Christmas Greetings
2020 ...
... for both 2020Before
and 2020After Borislock
A year of two contrasting parts, nothing plannable in advance ... and the picture of Humber Bridge on a misty October morning disappearing on the way to ...
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If we have failed to select your best side in any of the pictures, please email and we will remove you from public view. Enjoy!
| 2020Before continued, here in Crosspool, like 2019: at least six Ringing sessions each week, including theory and practical training of learners mostly at Ranmoor and St Marie's Cathedral; associated drinking, eating, walking, bustrips and snow; Todmorden for Elaine chairing the Yorkshire Association's Education Commitee; our forty-ninth consecutive bellringers' dinner, with the students at Southampton University Guild, with quick trips to Hythe, Itchen Bridge, Oxford and Salisbury; handbells and boats in Leeds, including a peal and a concert in the Town Hall; a Fulbourne meeting in London; and Elaine's early-morning warm-pool swimming, library volunteering and weekly yoga. |
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Just ahead of the AccursedVirus, we had ten days in Scotland, around a handicraft exhibition looking out on the River Clyde, walking around Edinburgh, the Glasgow canals, then via Inverary to the Crinan Canal with Fyne, Bute and Rothesay carferries on the return to Helensburgh; and boat trips on Ullswater, Loch Katrine, Loch Lomond and the Clyde. |
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2020After began with Elaine, probably suffering the AccursedVirus,
fainting in the bathroom, acquiring a large bump-on-the-head, a fortnight abed,
and a long recovery - still continuing.
Increasing local walks now aim for a daily ten-thousand-steps and we are now better acquainted with the local hills, and occasionally an historic sewer-ventpipe: all of which the Before-schedule didn't seem to allow. There's a new rhythm to the week: the vegbox arrives on Friday, followed by a visit to local shops on Saturday morning and we work up to the excitement of which wheeliebin is to be collected on Monday. We had always intended to limit the car to long journeys; with the time for that, the eight months after Borislock had no-car-use on 230 out of 245 days and bus/train journeys were nil. In parallel, Pub visits were nil; takeaway meals were just-the-one for Elaine's birthday; haircuts two, both Elaine's; face-to-face, distanced, conversations were nine. |
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Peter's Big
Birthday
had a new camera to play with and lots of candles: fortunately a really
B - I - G blow extinguished the lot of them without needing to summon the firebrigade. |
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From New Zealand, at the beginning of Borislock, Don and Val
suggested
" In this time of incalculable gloom, our boats, landscapes, boating activities and wildlife are still stunningly beautiful and give joy to those viewing. ... You would cheer me up, and I guess many others by posting ... that lovely dawn photo today and more. Spring in Britain is beautifully photogenic, and as this goes on, so is summer, and then autumn, and winter. ... " Much of the rest of Borislock was spent with old pictures, posting one every couple of hours since then: a tentative start, then April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December, ... |
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Ringing on tower bells has occasionally been
possible,
on
three
bells for
fifteen minutes before Sunday services. Mostly, the ringing chambers have been empty, and church services
Zoomed.
There were some quick computer-developments allowing ringers, remotely, to press keys and ring changes with others around the world: all good fun but Not The Same as real ringing, even when it has to be outside and distanced. Our planned canal trip to Nottingham for a Central Council of Church Bellringers meeting morphed to a Zoom, which worked well-enough ... |
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... There were two canal trips on Copperkins during Borislock-lite;
from Streethay we navigated to
Braunston
and
back,
and then via the
ShropshireUnion
to
Middlewich
and
Warrington,
returning
along the
Trent&Mersey
to
Streethay.
Our usual thousand-waterway-miles has been just
378
and our hundred-plus days afloat just 31, on fifteen
boats.
There were some waterway-walks around the Manchester
Ship Canal,
Sheffield
Basin,
Ickles,
Tapton,
Shireoaks,
Bewsey,
Leeds,
Huddersfield,
Driffield,
Leven,
HumberBridge,
Scarborough,
FlamboroughHead,
Mirfield,
Marple,
Lymm,
Kirkstall,
Castleford,
Armley,
Durham
and
Knostrop
Fulbourne has not moved all year. Henry Tillotson, our friend, fellow-owner and navigator died from the AccursedVirus in November after thirty days on a ventilator. We will miss him mightily. |
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Since Borislock, we Zoom with Iain most days; he works-from-home in
Warrington.
For Christmas, we Zoomed with a good proportion of the Scott-29-cousins twice, and for carols and a quiz, with Elaine's family. Christmas nostalgia had picturebooks of Boating Christmases past, and of Elaine's twenty years on the Lavender boat at IWA National Festivals 1992-2013; for a second consecutive year Peter chose for Iain the same book Iain chose for Peter. 2020 it was Tim Harford's, and last year Matt Parker's. We had some new ideas for building on our house's dull flat-roof-extension and having some rooms in the loftspace, and that should happen in 2021. |
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On t'web:
Lest you missed those 2020Before years: 2019 or 2018 or 2017 or 2016 or 2015 or 2014 or 2013 or 2012 or 2011 or 2010 or 2009 or 2008 or 2007 or 2006 or 2005 or 2004 or 2003 or 2002 or 2001 or 2000 or 1999 or 1998 or 1997 or 1996 or 1995 or 1994 or 1993 or 1992 or 1991 or 1990 or 1989 or 1988 |
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Here's to something better in 2021 |
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Elaine's email:
elaine@homescott.free-online.co.uk Peter's email: peter@homescott.free-online.co.uk To phone: 0114 2301870 (home) 07980 953880 (Elaine’s mobile) 07973 468126 (Peter’s mobile) To write: 3 Moorbank Drive, Sheffield, S10 5TH |
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| Text:Peter©2020 Pictures:Peter©2020 Layout:Peter©2019 |