Random thoughts and photos of my journey through life…
…from Me to You xx
Friendship Hearts: At the end of their working day the Glass Blowers would use up the molten glass by blowing these small ornamental hearts to be given as tokens of friendship on special occasions. This ancient tradition is carried on today.
19 Comments CherryPie on Feb 14th 2015
The Daimler “Dingo”, introduced in 1939, was used by both 10th and 11th Hussars. It was one of the best reconnaissance vehicles and remained in service long after the war.
The Dingo had 5 forward gears and 5 reverse gears for a fast withdrawal. It was armed with a .303 Bren light machine gun and had a crew of two. The driver’s seat was turned sideways so he could see over his shoulder when driving backwards.
In the Dessert War the Dingo was the Crew’s home. They kept ammunition inside the vehicle and their kit was carried outside.
The 11th Hussars wore an un-badged brown beret with a crimson band, unique in the British Army. They adopted steel helmets only after D-Day.*
*From an information board next to the Daimler “Dingo”
6 Comments CherryPie on Feb 13th 2015
Rather him than me…
16 Comments CherryPie on Feb 12th 2015
Hidden away near to the medieval Kingsgate in Winchester a Victorian post box is mounted in a window. The post box complete with its original enameled sign is still used for regular collections of mail today.
NOTICE. LETTERS WHICH CONTAIN COIN IF POSTED AS ORDINARY LETTERS WILL BE CHARGED ON DELIVERY WITH A SPECIAL REGISTRATION FEE OF 8D
20 Comments CherryPie on Feb 11th 2015
In a dry dock behind HMS Victory is the new Mary Rose museum. The building was purpose built to house the remains the flagship of King Henry VIII which capsized and sank in the Solent in 1545. The museum is very well done; the remains of the Mary Rose are on its starboard side and on the port side the artifacts that were found with the ship were displayed laid out as they would have been on the ship. The starboard side was preserved by silt whilst the port-side was exposed and so decayed and was lost.
The Mary Rose is currently behind Perspex because she is being dried out as part of the final stages of the work undertaken to preserve her. It was good for me to have seen Victory first because the layout of the two ships is similar which allowed me to interpret clearly what I was seeing of the Mary Rose.
Mary Rose Revealed
Sometime in the late afternoon of July 19, 1545, the Mary Rose, one of the largest of Henry VIII’s great ships, heeled to the starboard and sank. As the King watched from his encampment on Southsea Common, scarcely a mile distant, he could not have realised what an unparalleled insight into his life and times this catastrophe would ensure. Mary Rose represents both a living community and a state-of-the-art fighting machine, fully manned and equipped for war. A 34-year old veteran, built in Portsmouth, she sank whilst engaging a French invasion fleet larger than the Spanish Armada of 43 years later. To date no marine excavation has attained the scale of the Mary Rose project, nor captured the imagination of the public so completely.
Only rarely in history have so many circumstances combined to preserve a complete community and a moment of such drama. Through this miracle of preservation, her historical treasures provide a unique and vivid impression of life at sea nearly half a millennium ago.
In 1945 Henry VIII watched as his ship sank to the seabed. Just over thirty years ago, His Royal Highness, Prince Charles, President of the Mary Rose Trust, watched as she rose from the seabed. Both have had intimate contact with the ship, King Henry dined with her captain the day before she sank, and Prince Charles dived on the day before she was raised.*
*From the Mary Rose Revealed guidebook
6 Comments CherryPie on Feb 10th 2015
This morning when I turned the key in my car ignition nothing happened… I was reminded that on Friday the car had been a bit sluggish starting and that I had taken it for a bit of drive on Saturday to boost the battery.
Now I was in a bit of a dilemma. How was I going to get to work on time? I considered a taxi but I thought it was unlikely that one would be available straight away at that time in the morning. I prevailed on the services of Mr C, although I had to wait for him to finish getting ready for work. I was a little hassled when I arrived at work with moments to spare.
I was left wondering how to go about arranging to get my car checked and fixed as I wasn’t entirely convinced the problem was the battery. Mr C checked the car when he got home and he decided it wasn’t a battery problem. That left me with two obvious choices to try; phone the garage for them them to pick it up and check it over or check my RAC cover. I did the latter and as I suspected I hadn’t opted for the home cover option. I chose to upgrade to the home cover option and a very nice gentleman appeared on my doorstop in less than an hour.
He asked me when I last drove it and I mentioned my Saturday drive and that it had been popped on and off the drive the day before (Mr C had been shuffling cars after visitors). Straight away he said your engine is flooded and then proceeded to fix the problem and tell me all the technical details of what causes the problem. Within ten minutes he had gone and I was left to decide what I might like for dinner…
18 Comments CherryPie on Feb 9th 2015
We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch it – we are going back from whence we came.
John F. Kennedy
20 Comments CherryPie on Feb 8th 2015
