BULLETIN

Sedgefield & District July 22, 2020

Well here we are, another couple of weeks nearer normality. It was wonderful for those of us who can now form a ‘bubble’ to be able to get close to our loved ones again. I don't know who was more excited, the grandchildren or myself, to be able to indulge in the very much missed cuddles and hugs. On the flip side, of course, has been the distress and anxiety caused by the anarchic few who over-reacted to the BLM issue and proved that recent months have not resulted in, as hoped, tolerance, open-mindedness and respect for our fellow men.

We have a couple of items to tell you about re U3A Amendments and apologies from matters in the next few weeks. last issue.

Following the success of our inaugural Covid meeting 1. when over 40 of you joined us to listen to Peter’s fasci- Recipe ingredients list should read nating talk on to Infinity and Beyond, our next General 150g skinless salmon ie approx. 1 Meeting will be on Friday, 3rd July at 2pm, again via salmon fillet. Zoom. Ray Manning will be encouraging us all to ‘Eat wisely, 2. National Trust property visits. Not Eat Well’. In his previous life, Ray was a lecturer at all properties are open, and all Durham University and its Stockton campus where he houses are still closed. It is best to ran the Biological Sciences and Medicine programmes. check online before setting off as He really knows his stuff and we look forward to him many sites have introduced an ad- sharing it with us then. vanced booking system to help man- If you know of anyone, who is perhaps no longer a mem- age visitor numbers and to keep to ber or a friend or neighbour who would like to join us for safe, social distancing. Tickets are this session, please forward their e-mail details to released every Friday for the fol- Maxine who will add them to our invitation. lowing week. It seems that if you We’re really pleased to tell you that we are the only haven’t booked and don't arrive at group in our area - from Saltburn to Wooler - to have your designated time, you will be held a general meeting in the current situation or to turned away. have so many of our members continue to meet (online) and keep their groups moving forward.

Carole Morgan and Carol Bell will be hosting a Picnic Lunch in the grounds of Ceddesfeld Hall on July 16th at 12.30pm. Hopefully it will be a warm and sunny day. Members are requested to bring their own food and drink and a chair or picnic rug to sit on. We will, of However, more gardens and parks course, practice social distancing and follow any up- are due to open every week and dated advice - currently to keep to no-more-than-6-in- more tickets are gradually being re- a-group. Please note that there will be no toilet facilities leased for those places already as both Ceddesfeld Hall and the Squash Club are closed open. Keep checking! until further notice. Alison and Ray Manning have sent in some thoughts and comments on the Wit and Wisdom of vari- ous famous authors, poets and writers. Given our age demographic here are a few anecdotes about forgetfulness :

John Drew, a comic stage actor, once shaved off his large, impressive moustache, dramatically changing his appearance. Soon after, he met Max Beerbohm, the famous English satirist, whom he failed to remember. Beerbohm, on the other hand, remembered Drew. “Mr Drew”, he said “I’m afraid you don’t recog- nise me without your moustache!”

Now, the writer G.K. Chesterton was very absent-minded and was devoted to his mother. After he became engaged, he wrote a long letter to her to share the happy news. Having finished the letter, he turned around, only to remember that she was sitting in the same room as him.

On October, 1944, Dylan Thomas failed to appear at the wedding of his friend, Vernon Watkins in London, where Dylan Thomas was due to be his Best Man. After the ceremony, Watkins received an envelope from Thomas containing two letters. The first letter apologised for having forgotten the name of the church – and the second letter apologised for having forgotten to post the first letter!

The famous conductor Sir Thomas Beecham once met a very distinguished looking lady in a hotel. She looked familiar but he couldn’t remember her name. He vaguely remembered that she had a brother, so asked about the health of her brother and whether he was still working at the same job? Oh, he’s very well”, said Princess Mary ….and he’s still King George VI”

In 1984, the members of the Oxford Library Club for Retired Professional People were really looking forward to hearing their next guest speaker on the subject of “Old Age, Absent- Mindedness and Keeping Fit”. Unfortunately, the speaker forgot to turn up ! (This reminds me of the time Ray was due to give a talk on Diet and Health to the Wellbeing Group but had to cancel as he was unwell!!)

John Campbell, an absent-minded Scottish writer in the 18th Century, was in a bookstore one day. He became very engrossed in a particular book, decided to buy it and took it home. After he had read it half-way through, he realised that he had written it!

William Cecil, Bishop of Exeter, was travelling by train one day, on his way to a ceremony. When the Ticket Inspector arrived, he couldn’t find his ticket. “That’s alright, my Lord”, said the sympathetic Inspector, “We know who you are” “That’s all very well”, replied the Bishop – “but without my ticket, how do I know where I’m going?”

Sir Isaac Newton’s maid once found the great man in the kitchen, standing in front of a pot of boil- ing water. Baffled, he looked at the pot, which contained his watch, and next at his hand, which contained an egg.

...... and haven’t we all been there, done that? ......

Now, which famous wit gave us these quotes?  Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much  We are all in the gutter but some of us are looking at the stars  A good friend will always stab you in the front  Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination  Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing  America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilisation in between. Oscar Wilde

Memories, stirred by recent events, prompt Chris Balfour to write : Over forty years ago my then husband was given the opportunity to go and work in Nigeria, building new roads and bridges in Jos state in the middle of the country. Early in September he set off, carrying my sewing machine as hand luggage. As you do! Six weeks later, unwilling to let him have such an adventure on his own, the children and I had packed our bags and followed him out there. Never having flown before, my first task was to make my way through Heathrow with an over- loaded luggage trolley and two over-excited young children, then aged 4 and 7. They remember me as being confident and sure about what we were doing/where we were going but all I remember was how anxious and worried I was about getting on the right plane! We landed in Kano at 6o’clock in the morning and John met us at the foot of the aircraft steps. My first impression of Nigeria was the intense heat, even at that hour, and the pervasive smell of sew- ers and Shelltox (fly-spray). I do wish someone had better warned me about mosquitos: we had started taking our anti-malarial medication and had had all our required injections, but I wasn’t aware that either I or my daughter would react so intensively to being bitten. That first evening we’d gone out for dinner with some of our new colleagues and I was wearing a long skirt - under which i was bitten 37 times!; overnight Jac was bitten on her eyelid which swelled up to close her eye. We visited the local Company doctor who promptly sent us to the local hospital where we were given injections of antihistamine. Not the arrival I had hoped for. After the weekend, we travelled down country to our new home where we were introduced to our new ‘staff’. In the current climate, I’m a bit reluctant to admit to that, but they were all paid at the agreed rate and all lived with their families in purpose built units next to our camp. As John was the Consultant on the job, we had our own bungalow in its own grounds attached to the Con- tractor’s camp - where there were two other families with young children. I had a ’houseboy’ who helped me in the house and we had a driver and two ’guards’. One for the day , and one for night- time, they sat by the gates and stopped any passers- by from coming onto our grounds. Jos State is on a raised plateau in the middle of Nigeria and has a com- paratively temperate climate to the rest of the coun- try. It is there, therefore, that many Christian mis- sionaries based their attempts to educate and con- vert local people. Both our houseboy and the day guard were Christian but the driver and our night- guard were Moslems. They both wore the embroi- dered skullcaps which signified they had taken part in a Haj - the pilgrimage to Mecca. Apparently we were very honoured to have them working with us. Alex was our first Houseboy. He was very keen to learn but also rather arrogant. It was a sign of kudos to work for the ’big boss’ and he rather let it go to his head at times. We had to eventually sack him! We’d come back from a weekend in Kano to find him asleep on our sofa with an empty bottle of our whiskey by his side and signs he’d been smoking John’s Hamlets. After managing to finally persuade him to leave the property he tried to climb back in over our security fence. As this was constructed of ’chicken wire’ fixed to saplings driven into the ground it rapidly collapsed and wrapped around him. Our next houseboy, Thomas, who had been our first day guard was a much gentler character and fitted in really well with us all. But he still found it difficult to understand Western equipment and how it worked. He thought our Gas cooker was magic and couldn’t understand why he couldn’t use the Gas Cylinders once empty. And he was always disappointed that the ice we regularly chipped off the freezer didn’t stay frozen however carefully he stored it in the garage. Fortunately our Driver was a very steady character, too. A bit like the Romans, roads were built in a straight line from A-B. Bridges were built over dips or river beds but none of them had parapets and most were single carriageway. Generally, drivers played chicken as to who could cross the bridge first with neither ever giving way. Over our time there, the piles of rusting vehicles grew ever higher on either side of all the bridges. M’hadji , our driver, always drove very carefully when he had any of the family in the car, although there were several occasions when John had to query a scrape or two or a big dint in the bodywork if he’d had the car on his own! Another couple and their son had gone out to Nigeria with us but they were based in Yola on the Cameroon border. To visit them we had to cross the Benue river on a chain ferry. As all African transport it was dangerously overloaded with the deck riding just above the water. Hoards of local people gathered around us, even on the car roof and bonnet (I’m not sure some wouldn’t have tried to get inside but we kept the doors locked!) and many were precariously hanging over the side of the ferry; there were several baskets of chickens and a horse but fortunately no cows! I made sure I had had a very stiff drink before we attempted the return journey. For dinner one evening, Jennifer had prepared a traditional Sunday meal of Roast Pork which was absolutely delicious. She told me she’d bought the meat from the local market; something I was loathe to do as it generally sat on the ground in the sun for several hours generously garlanded with big black flies. I always bought imported meat at the large American supermarket in Jos. However, she told me, the trick was to soak it in Milton for several hours and then freeze it. This tenderised as well as sterilized the meat! Back in Toro, I tried it too and it worked. . . . In return for me teaching him basic western reci- pes, Thomas taught me how to make Goat curry - with meat bought from the local market. Soon after we arrived, one evening m’Guardi came to tell me that we had a visitor but that I would have to go to the gate to talk with him. Rather warily, I ap- proached a man dressed in beautiful ceremonial clothes sitting atop a similarly ‘dressed’ white horse. m’Guardi had to translate that he was the local big chief and he had come to welcome us. He gave me a big woven basket filled with local fruit and vege- tables and said that this was free but we would have to pay for anything we bought in the future. Having previously bought everything from the super markets in town, I took his advice (I was a bit scared not too!) and sent the Houseboy every couple of days thereafter to our local market. Fortunately, I’d taken my Good Housekeeping and Claudia Roden Recipe Books with me and was able to work out what some of the items were and how to cook with them. Not having seen peppers, avocados, auber- gines, mangos or guavas before , it was a steep learning curve. The chillis were certainly a surprise but we never got away with okra. . . At Christmas we attended the annual Carol Service in Jos Cathedral and while there met the Bishop and his wife. He had been attached to York Mister as a curate in his younger days and had met his wife there. They’d spent much of their time since then in ministry in Africa and his wife was able to give me many pointers to living as an expat in Nigeria. Their children had attended local schools while young but were back in at Boarding School for their Secondary education. I had decided that I would home-school our two. I had re- ceived really good support from their school before we set off with lots of borrowed text books etc, but is was not as today. There was no on-line set work or support and no Joe Wicks! However, we did our best, and I really don’t think they suffered. They’re both top-rate professionals and do- ing really well in their chosen careers. Children from the local villages would visit and try to talk to us through the fence. ‘Good Morning, Madam’ they would say if it was the afternoon, or ‘Good Afternoon’ if it was the morning. I eventually discovered that they attended school for only half a day and would repeat what they had learnt from the Nuns as the greeting for the time they were there. Not speaking Hausa , I couldn’t correct them. Were it today, I would have been on-line and learnt some conversational words and phrases. Once John was finishing his contract and it was time to move on, we discussed the next step. We decided that we were happy to continue working abroad while the children were young. However, we were offered a job on the Gold Coast in Ghana and on investigation found the site was really in the bush ie. remote from civilisation, and on a river plain prone to flooding in the rainy season - with attendant hoards of mosquitos. Ghana forty years ago was a very different place than it is today and was a centre of West African unrest. As we felt that this was unsafe for us as a family and did not want to live apart we returned to Sedgefield and the security of Durham County Council.

And my sewing machine? Fortunately we didn’t have to carry it back with us! I’d taught Thomas to use it and he was going to set up his own tailoring business with the stash of needles, threads and haberdashery I’d had sent out from England for him.

Over recent weeks it has felt increasingly unsafe to visit Hardwick Park for our daily exercise. We’ve had to share it with everyone and their dog who have made the journey from all over . So many of whom seem to be unwilling or unable to socially distance. ‘...... I had intended to do an article on other local ish country parks but my Facebook has gone down so I’m unable to access the lovely photographs other members and friends had given me permission to reproduce. But here’s some information to give you a start anyway. . . .

1. Local Nature Reserve is a Site of Special Scientific, and is UK Woodland Assured. Habitats include grassland, woodland, wetland and scrub.

2. Cowpen Bewley Nature Reserve comprises large areas of woodland, colourful meadows, streams, wetlands and areas of open water. There is an extensive network of footpaths, one of which offers a spectacular panorama with views to the coast and to the Cleveland Hills.

3. is another Site of Special Scientific Interest and is the largest area of semi-natural woodland in NE England. A big attraction is the 1.8ml squirrel walk .

4. Thrislington Plantation NNR is the most valuable wildlife site on Co Durham’s magnesium lime- stone. The grassland supports scarce plant species and unusual insects. Access may be restricted as the site is adjacent to a working quarry. Check online for details.

5. Saltholme’s trails carpark and trails are open although the visitor centre etc and hides throughout the site are closed for now.

6. NR is another SSSI nationally recognised for its plant life. There are many species of rare and specific butterflies and moths and the European bee-eater bird successfully bred on the site in 2002.

7. The Foxglove Covert NR, although a little further away at Catterick Garrison, covers 100 acres of moorland edge and hosts a remarkable mix of habitats and species. The reserve contains semi-natural woodland, heathland, flower-rich grasslands, streams, ponds, a lake, wet meadows and a mixed woodland

Maxine and I would really appreciate it if some of you could submit an article or two on any days out you’ve had recently or other recommendations to pass on to other members. Gillian passes on this story sent from one of her friends in Swainby.

THE SWIMMING COSTUME

I have just been through the annual pilgrimage of torture and humiliation known as buying a swim- ming costume. When I was a child in the 1950s, the bathing costume for the mature figure was de- signed for women with a mature figure - boned, trussed and reinforced, not so much sewn as engi- neered. They were built to hold back and uplift and they did a good job. Today's stretch fabrics are designed for the prepubescent girl with a figure chipped from marble. The mature woman has a choice - she can either front up at the maternity department and try on a floral costume with a skirt, looking like a hippopotamus who escaped from Disney's Fantasia, or she can wander around every run-of-the-mill department store trying to make a sensible choice from what amounts to a designer range of fluo- rescent rubber bands. What choice did I have? I wandered around and made my sensible choice and entered the chamber of horrors called the fitting room. The first thing I noticed was the extraordinary tensile strength of the stretch material. The Lycra used in swimming costumes was devel- oped, I believe, by NASA to launch small rockets from a slingshot, which gave the added bonus that if you manage to lever yourself into one you are protected from shark attacks. The reason being that any shark taking a swipe at your passing midriff would immediately suffer whiplash! I fought my way into the swimming costume but as I twanged the shoulder strap into place I gasped in horror - my bosoms had disap- peared! Eventually I found one under my left armpit. It took a while to find the other - at last I located it under my 7th rib! The problem is that modern bathing suits have no bra cups. The mature woman is meant to wear her bosom spread across her chest like a speed bump. I realigned my speed bump and lurched towards the mirror to make a full view assess- ment. The bathing costume fitted all right but unfortunately it only fitted those bits of me willing to stay inside it. The rest of me oozed out rebelliously from top, bottom and sides. I tried on a cream crinkled one that made me look like a lump of masking tape and a floral two piece which gave the appearance of an oversized napkin in a napkin ring. I struggled into some leop- ard skin bathers with a ragged frill, a black number with a cut out midriff and a bright pink affair with high cut legs. But, finally, I found a costume that fitted. . . A two piece with shorts-style bottoms and a halter neck. It was cheap, comfortable and bulge friendly. When I got home I read the label which said "Material may become transparent in water"! Ugh???!!!

A couple of jokes. . . .

The Government in Egypt has ordered all taxi drivers in Cairo to sound their horns at any and all opportunities whilst driving around the city. It is hoped that the return of familiar sounds of the city will help the people to once again find tranquillity and normality following the Covid 19 pan- demic. Operation Toot ’n’ Calm ’Em will continue throughout this month.

President Trump is heading towards his Limo when a possible assassin steps forward and aims his gun. A Secret Service agent, new to the job, yells ‘Mickey Mouse!’. This so startles the assailant that he drops his gun and is captured. Later, the Secret Service agent’s supervisor asks him ‘What in the hell made you shout ‘Mickey Mouse’?’ Embarrassed, the agent replies, ‘I got nervous, I meant to shout...... Donald, duck!’

The Wine Appreciation Group will be holding their second meeting, via Zoom, on Tuesday 23rd June at 8pm. We will each be ‘sharing’ another favourite wine, but rather than just de- scribing it, each of us will give three facts/stories/ descriptions, one of which will be false. A sort of Wine ‘Call My Bluff’. To allow ease of chatting we will limit participants to about 10 connections but if there are any new members who would like to join us, please contact Ray Manning ([email protected]) who will be able to help.

There seems to be a new scam every day Some artistic person/s recently constructing at the moment and this is one that seems to this Fish sculpture on a local beach. It must have be catching out a lot of people. BEWARE! taken some time to collect the various stones, shells, and flotsam and jetsam and gather it all “Good Morning!. I’m calling from the NHS together at this spot - but such a clever idea. Track and Trace service. According to our

system, you are likely to have been in close

proximity to someone who has tested posi- tive for COVID 19. This means you now need to self isolate for 7 days and take a Covid 19 test”. . . . .

They wont give any information, citing ‘confidentiality’ and will ask for an address to send a testing kit and for your debit card number to pay for the kit and the test re- sults. DO NOT give these details. Check out any number given to call them back and re- member that personal information should never be requested, or given, over the phone.

Please Note: there is no charge for the NHS testing kit.

Possibly one of the most accurate graphs on the Covid situation. . . . ?

We know that many of you have been working really hard in your garden over recent months and would like to showcase some of them in the next issue. Please send me photos of general views or special plants that you’re particularly proud off. ([email protected]) Bloom are still working hard around the village, see their item, but we’d like some of your photo- graphs at this time.

Alison Manning has sent in a short report about the diffi- culties the Bloomers are contending with this year.

The Bloomers have been hit hard by Covid19 . Many of us are over 70 and the need to self-isolate prevented us from gar- dening in the usual social spaces in the village for a while. But we also suffered from a lack of being able to raise funds . Normally we hold coffee mornings and dances , well-attended by friends in the village which raise the money to buy the plants which we then plant around the village. So this year we have been unable to buy bedding plants and I am afraid the village is less colourful as a result. Some of us are back out in the village, maintaining social distancing, and tending the gar- dens --weeding, removing storm damage, and, where neces- sary, watering perennials. The latter is hard work when you have to use watering cans! I even threatened to do a rain dance - so you can blame me for the recent weather!

So you will still see some of us about the village, tending our patch as best we can. Many of the residents are complimentary about our efforts and we really ap- preciate that. I guess it is a year of consolidation --doing the jobs we often don't have time to do. We all hope to be back to normality next year to make Sedgefield Blooming beautiful again.

The gallery for the latest U3A Eye theme, 'Inside', is now up on their web- site, showing the creativity and talent of mem- bers across the country

See the gallery and submit photos for the new theme, 'Beginning with a T', here, u3a.org.uk/learning/u3a-e… Answers to last issue quiz :

WHO FAMOUSLY SAID THESE LINES? General Knowledge Courtesy of Madely U3A 1. rain 2. a small car 1. Neil Armstrong 3. 8 2. Dorothy from Wizard of Oz 4. All of them 3. Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey on eve of WW1 5. Wet! 4. Martin Luther King 6. ‘R’ 5. Sir Humphrey Appleton (Nigel Hawthorne) 7. Wrongly 6. Rene Descartes 8. Fish 7. John Cleese (Monty Python Sketch) 9. Lady GaGa 8. Mark Twain 9. George Best 10. Abraham Lincoln 11. Dustin Hoffman (Film, The Graduate) Dingbats 12. Oliver Hardy 1. Top Secret 13. Prince Charles 2. I Understand 14 George Formby 3. Seven Seas 15. Gordon Banks 4. Base Line 16. Kenneth Wolstenholme 5. Get Over It 17. Bruce Forsythe 6. Yellow Belly 18. Humphrey Bogart (Film. Casablanca) 7. Tickled Pink 19. Captain Oates (Scott’s Antarctic Expedition) 8. Growing Old 20. Michael Caine (Film, The Italian Job 9. Any Questions 21. Oscar Wilde 10. Three Wise Men 22. Arnold Schwarzeneggar (Film, The Terminator) 11. Three Little Pigs 23. Franklin D Roosevelt 12. Wave Goodbye 24. John McEnroe / Victor Meldrew 25. Brian Hanrahan 26. Neville Chamberlain Picture Quiz 27. Fred Flintstone 1. Keukenhof Gardens - south west of 28. Theresa May Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Over 7 29. Obi-Wan Kenobi million bulbs are planted, with a total of 30. Donald Trump 800 varieties of tulips. 31. Brian Clough 2. Viewing Platform, Tour Montparnasse - 32 Spike Milligan a 210-metre (689 ft) office skyscraper lo-

cated in the Montparnasse area of Paris, 3. Reichstag Dome - The Reichstag dome is a glass dome, constructed on top of the re- built Reichstag building in Berlin: its dis- tinctive appearance makes it a prominent landmark. It was designed by architect Norman Foster and built to symbolize the reunification of Germany.

x x x x x This Issue’s quiz - I’m beginning to run out of ideas to vary the quiz each time. Would some of you like to submit things? Please!

Islands of Britain—just fill in the missing vowels. Riddles - try these conundrums! 1. LDNSFRN 1. What English word has three consecu 2. BRR tive double letters? 3. LDRNY 2. What other letter fits in the following 4. NGLSY series: B C D E I K O X? 5. SLY 3. What building has the most stories? 6. STGNS 4. How can you make six into an odd num 7. LSCRG ber? 8. LWS 5. I can be liquid or solid, sometimes I 9. STKLD bubble and you can find me in every 10. SLFDGS home. What am I? 11. SKMR 6. Why didn’t Adam and Eve have a 12. JRSY date? 13. RRN 7. How do Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, 14. FLNSS Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune 15. MCKLFLGG make up the solar system? 16. SLFMN 8. You find me once in the morning, twice 17. GGH in the afternoon but never in the eve- 18. RKNY ning. What am I? 19. TRSC 20. N

And now some Number puzzles for the mathematicians amongst us :

1. What is the lowest and the highest number you can write without using the same letter twice? 2. What is unique about 8549176320 ? 3. When asked about his birthday, a man said: "The day before yesterday I was only 25 and next year I will turn 28." This can only be true one day in a year - when was he born? 4. Tim looked at his oven digital clock and noticed that each of the three numbers was one higher than the number to its left. He wondered: Of the 720 different clock times in a 12- hour period, how many times does this happen -- and what are the clock times? Can you help Tim out? 5. Two friends have a nice meal together, and the bill is $25. The friends pay $15 each, which the Waiter gives to the Cashier. The Cashier hands back $5 to the Waiter. The Waiter keeps $3 as a tip and hands back $1 each. So, the friends paid $14 each for the meal, for a total of $28? The Waiter has $3, and that makes $31. Where did the other dollar come from?

A big Thank You to everyone who has sent in copy for this issue of our Newsletter - which once again, is more pages that we intended. As mentioned throughout, please do let us have some more copy from yourselves - a travelogue from an exciting holiday, an enjoyable day-out, or

Pictures of/from your garden.

Don’t forget our virtual meeting next Friday, 3rd July. We look forward to seeing you all then.

And remember Maxine, Gillian and I are always available to try to answer any questions you may have or just to chat. Chris Balfour 07854365453 [email protected] Maxine Patterson 01740690433 [email protected] Gillian Bowman 01740621822 [email protected]