The Joy Of Whales

With Mum's party and the Christmas break over, this week has been a chance to try and recover the fitness that disappeared in just a few days without exercise. Despite our delight at Mum reaching 90 in such good health, the sad news of two major stars dying at only 69 this week rams home the message that we should make the very most of the years of retirement that we have left and the old adage "Never put off tomorrow etc " has never rung so true. So it's been eight exercise classes at Fram Leisure since Monday and I'm pleased to say that each one has left us gasping a little less than the last. 

There's no point exercising if you're eating badly so we've continued to make a real effort in our weekly menus using Jamie Oliver's and other healthy eating recipes. We even gave Hello Fresh a try. This company delivers a box to your house containing the recipes and all the ingredients necessary to cook a set number of meals (we chose three). The meals were all delicious, the recipes easy to follow and, as they provide exact measurements for each ingredient, there was absolutely zero waste. We won't be doing it every week as we like to support our shops here in Framlingham but maybe once a month we'll order a box for variety.

We caught up on our movie going this week and went to Cineworld in ipswich to see a couple of films from the wish list. The first was Joy. As always, Jennifer Lawrence stole the show and upstaged all her fellow cast including the not insignificant Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro. Lawrence is that rare film presence who steals the screen in every scene. The only other current actor to have this level of star quality in my opinion is Idris Elba and I am sure that Lawrence is destined to be one of the all time Hollywood greats. To achieve this level of watchability in a film about a woman who invented a mop makes Jennifer Lawrence's performance all the more amazing and well deserving of today's Best Actress Oscar nomination. It's not a fantastic film - an interesting rags to riches story. But it's worth seeing for Lawrence alone.

Our second film was In the Heart Of The Sea - the true story that inspired Moby Dick. It's an underrated film that hasn't been a huge box office success (and no Oscar nominations that I could see) but there is some very fine cinematography, a very convincing CGI whale, some superb whaling scenes and an excellent study of relationships in a horrific survival situation. Chris Hemsworth is a little bit of a fish out of water in an "acting" role compared to his usual smouldering hunk in Thor but he does his best. Cillian Murphy and Benjamin Walker excel as  his crew mate and captain. I recommend that you try and catch it on the big screen as TV won't do it justice.

In The Heart Of The Sea has courage, honour and humility as its dominant themes and last night we went to Framlingham College for the first Fram Soc event of the year where John Bradshaw (above) spoke on the subject of courage and humility. John was blinded in his youth when he was on his National Service as a bomb disposal operative in what was then Rhodesia. Despite this major setback he went on to have glittering careers in computer sciences, agriculture and later as a headmaster. He told us his nine key words for success and, unlike many "inspirational" speakers these were heavy on being a decent human being rather than the usual ambition, ambition, ambition. 

We're two weeks into 2016 now and the weather was very fine yesterday so I ventured onto the fields for my first detecting outing of the year. I was only out for two and a half hours but managed to make some more interesting finds. 

This was what I tipped out of the bag when I got home.

A Charles I penny c1630's

Scottish Medieval cut quarter penny possibly William The Lion c1200

Another Medieval cut quarter penny. Not yet identified.

Unsure but possibly a Medieval strap end. Appears to be decorated.

Just a lump of scrap but I believe that it is waste from a very old casting

I find scores of buttons - most are very ordinary but this is for the short lived and very early railway company Eastern Counties Railway which ran between 1837 and 1862