We've had a busy but enjoyable five days in Framlingham. We got back late on Tuesday night and have packed loads into the time we've been home and are now getting ready to head back to Rochester for another few days of babysitting.
We've done a couple of spinning classes and a circuit training class at the college. We've been in the monthly quiz at The Railway too ; we won last month but this time we were half way down the rankings despite a very good score. I've also been writing letters to the district councillors about the reckless overdevelopment that's being planned for the town - that makes me sound like a NIMBY but I'm all for development if done sensibly and for the benefit of the residents and not just the developers. There are scores of arguments against the plans. Here's just one.
This was the scene in the Co-Op car park on Saturday morning with cars driving round and round before exiting without finding a space. Does this show that the town can cope with a 30% increase in residents (and their cars)?
Halloween was a non-event in our road. We stocked up with sweets but the bell didn't ring.
Meanwhile in Rochester, our two year old granddaughter was terrorising her neighbourhood as a bright red and very ferocious crocodile.
After another excellent Saturday cooked breakfast and a stab at the Times2 crossword at The Lemon Tree (finished all bar two this week), it was time for a look around the market and to pick up some food from Hall Farm Butchers and Leo's Deli.
In the afternoon Marion carried on with her master plan for the garden and planted a superb specimen Mexican Orange Blossom from nearby Crown Nurseries of Ufford. Our neighbour David came and put up some wire trellis for me while I acted as his assistant. Thanks David! I'm a bit useless at DIY and don't possess much more than a screwdriver and hammer by way of tools and, having bought this custom made wirework to support a new rose, Marion didn't want it wrecked by my handiwork.
With the days getting shorter I didn't think I would have time to get out with the detector but David was so quick that I managed to walk down the road and have a quick try. It was a successful ninety five minutes and these were the better finds that I made. Apart from the small medieval buckle and the small pistol balls, there were two medieval to post medieval lace tags, a cut medieval silver halfpenny, a medieval harness pendant and a possible medieval to post medieval hawking bell. The "bell" might be simply a button with holes in it but the local FLO (finds liaison officer) will be able to tell me.
This harness pendant would once have been decorated with a coat of arms and been part of the decoration on a knight's horse.
This cut silver halfpenny dates from around the same period (13th century).
One of the lace tags.
Our daughter Sarah phoned yesterday to ask if we could get to her old Sindy house easily. She got it as a present from her nana and granddad when she was three and was thinking of handing it down to her own daughters. Fortunately we spent four hours on Thursday afternoon tidying the garage so finding it wasn't too hard.
We fished it out of the garage and put it back together. It's in pretty good condition for thirty plus years old.
Here's Sarah with it on the day that she got it all those years ago.
In the four and a half months since I published Give Me Your Tomorrow I've been encouraged by sales and extremely encouraged by feedback by way of reviews and comments from readers but, without the backing of a publisher's publicity machine there's not a great deal that an independent author can do to keep a book in the spotlight without breaking the bank. So I am trying a short promotion offered by Amazon Kindle to all who enrol in Amazon KDP Select. This allows me to offer the book for free download for a maximum of five days. This promotion begins tomorrow 23rd October and ends on Monday 27th.
Apologies to readers who have invested a couple of pounds in buying the Kindle Edition but I am sure that you will appreciate the competition I am up against and the benefits that a jump in circulation could bring. Obviously if hundreds download the novel and hate it (and say so by way of reviews) it's a giveaway that could backfire but I am reasonably confident that this won't be the case as the reviews already written are genuinely independent comments.
So, please spare a moment to tell your friends or anyone you know with a Kindle or ebook reader and pass on this link. Remember, the promotion starts tomorrow and runs until Monday. I will let you know how the promotion goes.
In other news, our babysitting in Rochester continues. We're only looking after our little granddaughter for two days a week for the next week or two and we went on Monday and spent a very happy time with her. We enjoyed playgroup on Monday and Toddler Boogie on Tuesday and Marion spent the rest of the time playing with her with (amongst many other things) Duplo and a set of Peppa Pig figures which she absolutely loves. Catherine insisted that I take a photo - so here it is. I cooked a roast dinner on Monday and I must mention Hall Farm Butchers in Framlingham who provided the fabulous beef that made it such an enjoyable meal.
I should also mention Camel Footwear. I bought a great pair of Camel Active boots last winter. The laces became worn and I couldn't find replacements anywhere (they are quite a distinctive colour which matches the stitching). I emailed Camel service in Germany and asked them to tell me the name of a stockist and, just a few days later, I received a pair of laces free of charge. In these days of tight profit margins I imagine that the cost of a pair of laces plus postage and packing to the UK would almost eliminate their original profit on the boots so thank you Camel Active for your excellent service.
If someone had suggested last year that we'd be spending an autumn Saturday sampling sausages at twelve different venues in a small Suffolk town whilst being transported between those venues in a pink stretch limo and that one of those tastings would be at In Da Cottage, a shop selling the unlikely combination of "Antiques And Sourdough Bread", I'd have said they were having a laugh. But that's what came to pass yesterday as we encountered our first annual sausage festival in our new home town.
The event's fame had spread to Wapping and was listed in The Times' "great days out this weekend" which must have boosted numbers. The £4 fee bought a book of perforated voting slips entitling the holder to sample and vote on sausages at each venue and, in addition, along with the ballot slips were a couple of stretch limo vouchers to reach the sites at the extremities of the town.
After a very fine coffee at the Lemon Tree, where we managed to finish The Times Jumbo2 crossword without using the iPhone to cheat for the first time in a while, we bought our weekend's provisions at Leo's Deli, Hall Farm Butchers and the greengrocers before heading off on the trail. And what a delicious trail it was too! Fortunately the sausage samples were not too large and artery threatening and we assessed the samples seriously and marked them honestly on three categories. The big problem for me was the question "How likely are you to buy regularly?". However delicious a sausage might be I am hardly likely to drive to Norfolk to buy a packet so our own Co-op and Hall Farm butchers had to score highest here.
After the event I tweeted this and was delighted to hear later that our local butcher had used their home advantage and won. I don't know how my other selections finished.
Although we've lived here for almost nine months now we've not actually been at home for more than a few weeks at a time so it's taking some time to get into a routine but there's certainly plenty going on. In addition to the Sausage Fest yesterday the excellent Crown was holding a small sale of jewellery and accessories in one of their function rooms. Marion bought this lovely and inexpensive pair of gloves (the photo colour is wrong - they're grey) and another present which I won't mention here as the recipient may well read this. We also saw the excellent Roadii outdoor fire cooking system outside The Crown and we will be getting one for next spring.
We ended the day with a rabbit dish. I finally persuaded Marion to give it a try so the butcher jointed one for me and I used The Hairy Bikers' recipe off the BBC website. Slow cooked with prunes, brandy, wine, shallots and finished with double cream it may not have been the healthiest of Saturday night meals but it was very tasty and once Marion had got over the association with Benjamin Bunny and Peter Rabbit I think she enjoyed it.
A very pleasant day ended with watching The X Factor and my annual ritual of betting on it on Betfair whilst reading everyone's comments on Twitter. Someone tweeted "It's S**t" but I can't disagree more. Manipulative perhaps but always entertaining and, at the moment my bets are going in the right direction (all winnings being offset however by Marion's phone bill as she votes for Rough Copy)
