Friendly chat

Same here, Dreamtime. We have raised a healthy and prosperous family over here, but I can't stop myself watching those TV programmes with beautiful old houses for sale in beautiful old villages - last night's was set in Powis and Shropshire, making me nostalgic for all that magnificent scenery. And, while I follow the Wallabies and the Matildas, I still follow the Sky Blues and fervently hope for the revival of the Bees! There's a few thousand miles between Dreamtime and me, and at the moment we have much more rain over here than you can poke a stick at, so us Poms can't agree on everything!

First World problems - gambling that the thing you want but don't need on Ebay comes down in price but doesn't vanish or get bought by someone else.

I've been through Newbold On Avon before but have never stopped until an hour or so ago. Found a space to moor up and walked to the shop. I see there is a warning that I was coming.....

How rude of them to suggest that you're a dead end!

I am with you every step and year of the way JW. Not sure if Coventry is as picturesque as your origins though. But the Warwickshire countryside takes some beating.

I know that some of our treasured members like doing accounts but I hate them or anything similar. It's not that I find them that difficult but I have a phobia of forms. I agonise for days, putting them off and then when I get down to them they're really not as hard as I build them up to be. It's even worse now that you have to be armed with millions of passwords, access to your email and a charged mobile. How can you develop a phobia of forms?

I don't have a phobia about forms, I just find them irritating and (swear word deleted) annoying. A complete waste of precious time, asking 20 questions where 3 would suffice. Many of the questions are repeats of what they already know, or are irrelevant, or even more annoying, there is a tick box question where you can only tick one, yet two or more apply... GRRR. Or, just like those wretched automated phone answering things (press 1 for this, press 2 for that, press 3 for something different, press 4 for something completely irrelevant...), you have four options, but none of them are remotely applicable. It just makes life more difficult and wastes my life (which consists of time). I am in the process of assisting my boss in a property purchase. You would not believe the email I have received from the young school-leaver estate agent chap. The stuff they want: I've never known anything so onerous from an EA. It would take far too long, and some of the demands are not do-able. They are acting like lawyers, and guilty until proven innocent (all that "anti-money laundering" nonsense), just like the TV licensing people. That's the solicitor's job. Personal information on bank accounts - none of their flaming business. They have induced me to do nothing and look for a property deal elsewhere.

And so say I Slim. Anything official in my letterbox I shy away from. Any forms to fill in - I don't. They go in the bin. Which reminds me, I must have a word with my friendly post lady about it. !!!!!!

Just got back from spending the week working at the Farnborough Air Show. Some great machining and technology on display.

Our state of Virginia governor was there too - great boondoggle!

Hello, High pressure at the end of July will encourage the new swifts to start reving their engines. As the air becomes more moist during the middle of the week, so insects will be in abundance, so the adult birds will be in full action. Swooping here & everywhere. By the 8th, of August, their bags will be packed, as they line up on telegraph wires ready for their off. Five days later only the ones staying will be visible. Another summer come & gone. I haven't seen so many this year.

We saw a lot flying over our son's house in Cannock Wood yesterday while enjoying a family barbeque. Must have been getting on for about 50. I would think the flying ants would be coming out as well. Very happy, just picked our first load of runner beans, love them. We just have them growing up canes shaped into a teepee planted in a black builders bucket.

I'm not sure that I've ever seen swifts. Swallows and house martins a plenty but not swifts.

Hello, On a day filled with such hurtful news, life still goes on. So much of my volunteering is by rail, so coming out of Coventry station on to Warwick Rd, puts me back seventy years. Even more so if I get the No 11 or 12 bus, as that drops me outside of the Earl. Then, a walk to Trinity St, takes me past the site of the Coventry Gulson library, where much of my homework was completed.

Hello, Another sad reflection of society is bank fraud. I had a new one yesterday. I received a message on my phone, thanking me for signing up to a bank credit facility. Now, I know that I hadn't done such a thing, besides I don't have banking on my phone. The essence of the fraud is for me to reply stating that I haven't signed up to such a scheme. If I had done that, I would be on the road to disclosure of all of my details. So, please be aware. Just simply delete the message. Your normal routine of checking your banks will reveal all. Have a good day.