Good morning on a somewhat foggy and slightly autumnal feeling morning in beautiful downtown Byfield. So, that was summer then, was it?

In fact, this week has been very pleasant - warm, sunny and still - which provided a few opportunities for bike rides which were most pleasant. The attached photo of sheep in a field was taken on Tuesday afternoon which was a glorious day. Although the photo doesn't do it justice, this is a gorgeous view from a moderately steep escarpment looking west over the Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire countryside - very pleasant.

I hope you all have been keeping up with Pete Taylor's baseball road trip - there are a couple of new videos of his interviews on British television on his web site, the most recent of which asks him to recount his adventures of Tuesday 4 September where he was throwing out the first pitch at a minor league game in Bridgeport, Connecticut. If you haven't read his diary, allow me to provide a brief synopsis.

Originally, the plan was for Sally to join Pete in Connecticut to witness the first pitch and to visit with friends they have in Glastonbury, Connecticut. However, with Sally having to fly out to Albuquerque to be with him after his detached retina, it had been decided that she could not afford to come out again. Still, Pete was rather hoping that she might surprise him anyway.

Meanwhile, friends of theirs in Pittsburgh, Steve and Liz Schurer, had sent Sally the money for a ticket so that she could, indeed, surprise him. Sally and the friends in Connecticut decided upon an elaborate scam - they contacted the baseball club who agreed to participate in their deception. On the day Pete was due to arrive in Connecticut, Sally was transported up the road to a hotel where she stayed on Monday night. Pete arrived, disappointed that she wasn't there and e-mailed, as he does every day. Sally, from down the road in a hotel, e-mailed back about how she too was disappointed but that it just didn't work out this time.

The following evening, Pete and the husband Arthur went off to the ball game - Lee Ann, the wife, would follow along later having had some errands to run, etc. At the stadium, Pete meets up with the owner and is introduced to the Bridgeport Manager, one Tommy John of "Tommy John" surgery fame, and the two team mascots, a blue fish and a salty old sea captain, Captain Long Island Sound.

Pete duly threw out the first pitch and, he said, that although it wasn't a strike, at least it didn't end up bouncing to the plate. The crowd gave him a warm reception and then he had to pose with the mascots for the local press, one of whom, the salty old sea dog, began to become quite amorous.

Pete went along with the joke and gave the mascot a warm embrace and it was then that he heard the familiar voice of Sally from within the mascot costume announcing that it was she, that she was there after all.

Apparently, on the first occasion, he didn't understand so she had to repeat that it was really her and she was there, inside the costume. Whereupon the crowd was treated to the somewhat unedifying sight of Pete attempting to embrace and kiss (or, as he wrote it "snog") the mascot. When all was revealed, the crowd loved it and Pete spent the next twenty-four hours discovering that no one had been telling him the truth for weeks. You couldn't make it up!

Speaking of not being able to make it up, I don't think you could make up either of the two "championship" stories I stumbled across this week. The first I originally came across on the BBC web site and describes the World Bog Snorkelling Championships which were recently held in Wales:

LLANWRTYD WELLS, Wales - One of the most bizarre yearly competitions has taken place in the Waen Rhydd Peat bog in Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales, the smallest town in Britain. Entrants raced to complete two lengths of a 60-yard trench while wearing snorkels and flippers, (wet suits optional but advisable) but without using any conventional swimming strokes. The competition has taken place ever year since 1985 on August Bank Holiday Monday and some people even dress up. This year, 11-year-old Ellie Jones dressed up as octopus for the race, and another entrant braved the peat in a Borat costume.

Regrettably, none of the articles I ran across gave the names of the demented winners.

Not so with the World Beard Championships recently held in Brighton. Jack Passion, an American from San Francisco won the title for the best, full natural beard as described in the Guardian.

BRIGHTON, England - A young American put his best face forward this weekend in Britain and came away with the title of world's best beard. Jack Passion of San Francisco won for best full, natural beard, considered the top category among the 17 divisions in the ninth annual event held in Brighton, The Guardian reported Monday. "I feel fantastic," he said. "I'm 23 and I have the best beard in the world. I looked like a groom; too bad you never get married when you have a huge beard." More than 250 men competed in the finals with thousands of people cheering them on, the British newspaper said. They were allowed to use wax and hairspray in most classes but dye and extensions are banned. Other winners included Willi Chevalier of Sigmaringen of Germany, who sported a looping gray beard to win the partial beard freestyle category. Elmar Weisser, a 42-year-old German hairdresser, won the freestyle full beard prize by working his facial hair into a facsimile of London's Tower Bridge. The event is organized by the Handlebar Club of Great Britain, which requires its members display "a hirsute appendage of the upper lip, with graspable extremities."

You can read more at http://www.worldbeardchampionships.com

And so, with that...

Love to you all,

Greg

The Chairman of the Board, feeling it was time for a shake-up, hires a new CEO known as a hatchet man. The new boss is determined to rid the company of all slackers, and make a real impression on his first day.

The Chairman takes him on a tour of the facilities, and the CEO notices a guy leaning on a wall. The room is full of workers and he thinks this is his chance to show everyone he means business.

The CEO walks up the guy and asks, "And how much money do you make a week?"

Undaunted, the young fellow looks at him and replies, "I make $500 a week. Why?"

The CEO then hands the guy $500 in cash and screams, "Here's a week's pay, now get out and don't come back!"

Feeling pretty good about his first firing, the CEO looks around the room and asks, "Does anyone want to tell me what that slacker did here?"

Finally one of the workers raises his hand.

"Yeah?" the CEO demands.

"Pizza delivery man, sir."

Bubba goes to a revival and listens to the preacher. After a while, the preacher asks anyone with needs to come forward and be prayed over.

To the preacher's surprise, Bubba gets in line.

It takes awhile, but Bubba is very patient. When it's his turn the preacher says, "It's been a long time since you came in, Bubba."

Bubba simply nods.

The preacher says. "What you want me to pray about?"

Bubba says, "Preacher, I need you to pray for my hearing."

So the preacher puts one finger in Bubba's ear and the other hand on top of his head and prays a while.

After a few minutes, he removes his hands and says, "OK, Bubba, how's your hearing now?"

"I don't know preacher," Bubba says. "It's not until next Wednesday."

A man in North Carolina had a flat tire, pulled off on the side of the road, and proceeded to put a bouquet of flowers in front of the car and one behind it. Then he got back in the car to wait. A passer-by studied the scene as he drove by and was so curious he turned around and went back. He asked the fellow what the problem was. The man replied, "I have a flat tire." The passer-by asked, "But what's with the flowers?" The man responded, "When you break down they tell you to put flares in the front and flares in the back.
I never did understand it neither."

A Tennessee State trooper pulled over a pickup on I-65. The trooper asked, "Got any ID?" The driver replied, "'Bout whut?"

The young man from Mississippi came running into the store and said to his buddy, "Bubba, somebody just stole your pickup truck from the parking lot!" Bubba replied, "Did you see who it was?" The young man answered, "I couldn't tell, but I got the license number."

A senior citizen in Louisiana was overheard saying... "When the end of the World comes, I hope to be in Louisiana." When asked why, he replied he'd rather be in Louisiana because everything happens in Louisiana 20 years later than in the rest of the civilized world."

A group of Alabama friends went deer hunting and paired off in twos for the day. That night one of the hunters returned alone, staggering under the weight of an eight-point buck. "Where's Henry?" the others asked. "Henry had a stroke of some kind. He's a couple of miles back up the trail," the successful hunter replied. "You left Henry laying out there and carried the deer back?" they inquired. "A tough call," nodded the hunter. "But I figured no one is going to steal Henry!"

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