Category Entries for Friends
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Sunday March 11, 2012
Ride a Cock Horse
As we prepared to leave the area, we fell to talking about the nursery rhyme. I resolved to check it out. As expected there's a lot of information and misinformation on the web. As I read one explanation after another, I preferred each one to the last, and finally I came upon this summary of the various suggestions, which I think provides a balanced view, and is well worth reading.
One thing that does seem clear is that "Banbury Cross" probably refers to the road intersection rather than a physical cross; the proven dates associated with the rhyme, compared with the various identities mooted for the "lady", demonstrate that, however tempting, some of the explanations really cannot be true. The link with pagan Irish rituals seems tenuous and yet at the same time highly plausible.
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Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross |
So I'm off home now - and never did get to eat a Banbury Cake. Maybe next time...
Posted on March 11, 2012 at 2:11 PM | Comments (0) Leave a comment
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Saturday March 10, 2012
WTHS Oxford and Banbury
A day out in Oxford.
The evening meal was the usual curry at the Sheesh Mahal in Banbury - followed by some further refreshments at a local hostelry... (back to the Reindeer of course!). Sad to say there were even more absences this year; Nicolette is not well, and Robert was planning to be there but his Father was taken ill. Our usual toast, with warmest wishes, to absent friends...
Posted on March 10, 2012 at 11:08 PM | Comments (0) Leave a comment
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Friday March 9, 2012
The Reindeer Inn
Time again for the WTHS reunion. This year it was "Oxford" but hotels there were way off our budgets so we are staying in Banbury. Those who arrived today dined at the Reindeer Inn which offered excellent pub food served in fascinating surroundings.
The pub is steeped in history. The Globe Room in which we ate was where Cromwell is said to have planned the Battle of Edgehill, and which was also used as a courtroom to try the Royalists. It still has all the original oak panelling - though it has been on a bit of a journey between now and then.
On top of all that, I cannot emphasise enough how truly wonderful the staff there were. I can thoroughly recommend it - and all at excellent prices.
The pubs seem to have been key in housing both sides in the Civil War and the following quote particularly pleased me with the reference to pub names: The Roundheads (the Parliamentarians) and Cavaliers (the Royalists) - used to billet their troops in alehouses, taverns and inns. As the progress of the war swung in favour of one side and then the other, an alehouse would change its name from say, the King's Head to the Nag's Head and back again.
Posted on March 9, 2012 at 11:16 PM | Comments (0) Leave a comment
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Sunday March 7, 2010
Is it that time already..?
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Can't believe it's already a year since I met up with some of my old school friends. Anyway - here we are again in Canterbury this time. It is so great to see everyone.
Canterbury is a lovely city - I don;t think I have ever been there before - so I took a few photos and admired the cathedral from afar.
This is because I was too mean to pay the really excessive charge to get in. I don't know why it offends me so - but it does. Intellectually I believe that in a time when fewer and fewer go to church then lots of us heathens that want to trip around as tourists should fund the building - but my heart feels it's wrong. Still - Canterbury as a religious tourist attraction with tacky souvenirs etc is very traditional - probably dates back to the murder of Thomas Becket in 1170 causing a massive increase in urban development in Southwark, and even the reconstruction of London Bridge as pilgrims followed the route of Becket's last journey from there to Canterbury (as described in the Canterbury Tales in the late 1300s).
Above is a detail of the Christ Church Gate - off Butter Market (below) and where you "pay". The centre statue of Christ dates only from 1991 - the original bronze having been destroyed during the Civil War in 1642.
Posted on March 7, 2010 at 1:29 PM
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Sunday March 8, 2009
Worcester
I have just spent a really great weekend in Worcester, meeting up with friends I have not really associated with for about 35 years. We all attended the Worthing Technical High School through the dawn of the 1970s. Here we are now - just the same - well - maybe a bit older - and with wives and girlfriends.
Our school was opened in 1955 as a school designed for vocational study; my own brother was one of the first students in the brand new school. It was endowed with excellent metalwork, woodwork, and home economics departments - and also a small farm!. By the time we were there, this educational experiment had been abandoned, and it was a conventional (although co-ed) grammar. Soon after we left it changed its name and merged with the adjacent school to become a "comprehensive". Now, my friends tell me, they have pulled the old building down, ("without even asking us!")
When we arrived in Worcester, George and I wandered around the town and visited the cathedral, where the Chamber Choir was practising for an early evening performance.
George was absorbed in reading a memorial to poor Richard Solly who in 1803 "whilft on a Tour of Pleafure with his Family was feized with an Inflammation of the Inteftines, which in five Days terminated his Life". George empathises with those who have inflammation of the Inteftines.
Thank heavens for modern medicine.
After George left, I rushed round the town alone - shopping. I was extremely successful, managing to acquire two coats and a pair of shoes - all bargains of course. I also bought myself some bamboo sock needles - a new venture in needles - as I seem to have a lot of sock wool, (not to mention patterns), to get through.
Posted on March 8, 2009 at 8:37 PM
« Previous entry | Main | Next entry »Friday October 31, 2008
All Hallow's Eve
Somehow I need to make my own personal acknowledgement of a friend that I have not seen since I was at school. Over the past couple of days I have been reminded of a lot of people I have not thought of for years. I'm sure I have better photos than this one, but on reflection this is the most appropriate. Here are some of the lads, (the ones who could sing), who still keep in touch with one another - all in costume for HMS Pinafore (just in case you think I went to a rather odd school).
Lots of fun ...but life can play hard tricks.
Posted on October 31, 2008 at 11:50 AM
