Month: January 2011

Good morning to you all from a frigidly frigid Byfield. Interestingly, the weather people tell me that it’s not as cold as it was in the few weeks before Christmas but it certainly seems mighty cold to me! Why do we put up with it?

I’m sure most of you will have heard the excellent news from our friend and neighbour Pete Taylor that the scribblings he compiled on his journey around the US watching a baseball game in every major league stadium and a minor league baseball game in every state without a major league team are to be published in the spring or summer. The book, entitled “Brit at the Ballpark: An Englishman’s Baseball Tour of all 50 States” is described on the publisher’s web site as: Continue reading “30 January 2011”

Good morning on a bright, brisk morning – not quite so Arctically frigid as it has been the last couple of days, just damp and muddy. Another busy week filled, this time, with a couple of birthday celebrations. Continue reading “23 January 2011”

What a week! Busy and full of exciting events as well as those which should have been exciting which, in fact, turned out to be not quite so exciting.

On Sunday afternoon Nick and Lucy came by to join Pen’s folks for the celebration associated with Beryl’s 87th birthday. Clearly 87 is not nearly as significant as a 60th birthday and so the feast which Ms Playchute prepared was almost inconsequential after the one she prepared for my birthday. Still, there was enough to feed an army for a week or so and I think everyone enjoyed themselves.

On Tuesday evening Ms Playchute and I set off at about 5.00 to make our way to Oxford to see the film “The Fighter”. I have to confess, this was probably not a film we would have opted to see except that it was another of these free offers from our satellite provider and, since we can combine the outing with a meal out, we thought we’d give it a go.

Continue reading “16 January 2011”

This is what winter in England is really all about. Never mind the picturesque snow-covered fields, the lightly frosted branches. Nope, we’re talking real, traditional English winter weather here – on Friday it was just about as miserable as it is possible to be. It was cold, the wind was blowing a decent pace and the rain was absolutely sheeting down. It was grey and dreary and even the dog had to think twice about venturing out for her morning constitutional, hesitating at the prospect which greeted her as I opened the front door. I certainly seriously considered simply letting her out, telling her to be careful with the traffic and reminding her just to give us a quick bark when she wanted to come back in again, but she wasn’t buying it. So out we went and it was, truly, truly awful. It’s the kind of weather that makes you wonder why you ever left the west coast.

Continue reading “9 January 2011”

Good morning and Happy New Year to you all! Penelope and I celebrated by welcoming the New Year in Prague, Athens, Bucharest, Istanbul, Beirut, Cairo and Damascus, not to mention Helsinki, Riga, Sofia, Tallinn, Vilnius as well as Jerusalem and Minsk. And a splendid celebration it was too!

You will have noticed (probably) that the New Year brings a “new” blogging environment; from henceforth all future editions of the Befouled Weakly News will be posted here. The only difference is that we are now using a WordPress template which provides an opportunity for readers to comment on the postings as well as a relatively easy way to search through the archives. I’m not satisfied with the current “theme” yet (the general layout) so you may see some changes in the weeks/months to come but you can rest assured that the content will remain as tediously dull as previously.

What a difference a week makes! This time last week we were enduring freezing Arctic conditions with mountains of snow; this week we are positively basking in almost tropical temperatures. Well, perhaps not quite tropical but definitely and deceptively warmer. That’s what happens when you get a 20 degree temperature swing in a matter of a day or so – the perception is that it’s quite warm when, in fact, it’s still cold! Last week we had temperatures of -15 degrees (Celsius, of course); today the temperature is forecast to reach the lofty heights of +5 degrees C. For those of you working in Fahrenheit, that’s a swing from 5 degrees F to 41 degrees F in a matter of a day or so which, as I say, leaves one with the feeling that it’s tropically balmy outside.

Continue reading “2 January 2011”