Prayers from Junior Church this morning

Stop press! The cat’s just brought a glis-glis in

... and abandoned it! We managed to catch it and release it in the garden.

Energy-saving lightbulbs

Prompted by our ‘Think Local’ in a few weeks, I thought I’d start some green blogging. Hence the subtle change of colour! I’ve been trying to convert as many of our lights at home converted to energy-saving bulbs – with mixed results. The standard bulbs – the ones with visible tubes – are now very good. They start up quickly, have a good colour and do seem to last a long time. We’ve got these in hall, stairs and porch lights and they’re fine. In our lounge we used to have 40 watt incandescent golfball bulbs on wall brackets with small lampshades. The ceilings are low so we can’t have ceiling lights. The first bulbs I found – long life golfballs were a failure – they took 10 minutes to fire up and, although quoted as equivalent to 40 watts, were rather dim. I’ve now found some better ones – they have exposed tubes but in a small spiral. We’ve had to buy some new lampshades but I’ve moved the golfball bulbs and lampshades to the study – but I have to admit to having one tungsten lamp for instant light! The kitchen has reflector bulbs in downlighters. Originally 40 watt tungsten , I had already converted some of these to halogen bulbs which are reported to last 2000 hours. I’ve now found some replacement bulbs – at Gil-Lec in Chesham – that are pretty good. They are slow to start, which is not ideal in a kitchen, but once they warm up they work very well. The kitchen lights are 7 watt and the lounge ones 8 or 12 watt so we’re achieving a significant saving on electricity. I’ve just had a letter reducing my monthly direct debit because of lower usage. We’ve also got two outside lights that are switched on via a photocell. I normally leave them on all the time, but I thought I’d try to get a timeswitch to switch off at midnight or so. I found one in B&Q but what I didn’t notice (it was very small print) was that it doesn’t work with ling-life bulbs. I guess that it needs a trickle current through a filament to keep it operating. So it’s back to the on-off switch. I’ve just done a check of the lights we use regularly at home: 73% are long-life, and we’ll convert most of the rest once the current ones expire. How are you doing? What do you think of the look of long-life bulbs? We recently had a visit to St Peter & Paul, Great Missenden, by members of the Bucks Historic Churches Trust. We have the plain long life bulbs in most of the fittings. One member said ‘they don’t look too bad, do they?’ another said ‘they look terrible.’ What’s your view? The older tungsten bulbs are no more authentic, of course, just that we’ve been used to them for many years! ‘Think Local’ will take place in the Oldham Hall, Church Street, Great Missenden HP16 0AZ on Sunday 4th October from 10:00am to 4:00pm. Sponsored by the Church, it aims to encourage members of the community to reduce their carbon footprint and support local businesses by shopping locally.

Elizabeth and Joe arrive

Elizabeth, who’s going to be our part-time youth worker for the remainder of Lizzie’s maternity leave, arrived tonight with her husband Joe. Joe is starting to study for his PhD at Oxford. We’ve all been looking forward to this meeting for some time – none more than Elizabeth and Joe! They flew in from Reykjavik – Iceland Air was the cheapest one-way from the US – where they had a few days doing the sights. During their stay, they amused the tour bus by owning up, as Americans, to being responsible for the shrinking of the glacier they were visiting!

By the way Heathrow was deserted: this was the terminal 1 arrivals waiting area at 8 pm tonight – a sign of the recession?

Buildings

Buildings have been in the news recently. The latest Chiltern News from the Chiltern Society has the results of the 2009 Chilterns Buildings Design Awards – awarded jointly by the Society and the Chilterns Conservation Board. Winner is a house extension in Berkhamstead with two commended entries: the Akeman Restaurant in Tring and th Pool Barn at Chisbridge. More details can be found on the AONB web site.

Two other awards: the ugliest building in Britain was won (lost?) by Liverpool’s Pier Head Ferry Terminal.

The bookies’ favourite for the annual Sterling Prize is the Fuglsang Kunstmuseum in Denmark – designed by British architect Tony Fretton.

Art – JW Waterhouse and The Pitmen Painters

We went to the theatre to see The Pitmen Painters today. On the way we caught the JW Waterhouse exhibition the RA. Waterhouse is one of the best known Pre-Raphaelites: many of his pictures are very familiar:

All Waterhouse’s women seem to have the same expression – perhaps he only had one model!

The Pitmen Painters was great. It is written by Lee Hall of Billy Elliot fame and has some common threads with that tale. It’s based on a true story of a group of miners from near Newcastle who in 1935 start painting as part of a WEA Art Appreciation class. Several of them were undoubtedly very talented but they continued to go down the mine, painting only as a pastime. Like Billy Elliot, it is a story of development of hidden talent in people of unexpected background. The play is very light-hearted but also very moving. They project many images of the miners’ paintings during the play. Unfortunately there are no images on the web – only the small ones on the website of the Ashington group, the trust that now owns them: http://www.ashingtongroup.co.uk/

The play is touring the UK soon and there is talk of a west end transfer: if you get a chance, do go and see it.

Back to Waterhouse: there was a wonderful St Cecilia: perhaps the RA would loan it to us if we dedicated Little Hampden Church to her!

I've put some links in the 'links' panel to the right.

They're back!

Helen and Will arrived triumphantly in Church today.

They recorded their track on most days on my GPS. I’ll post a detailed map here later in the week.

Wedding at Little Hampden

And now for something completely different: there was a wedding at Little Hampden this morning. The registers we are currently using started in 1840 – note that neither bride, nor groom nor the witnesses in marriage number 2 could write.

Today’s couple were number 69.

Lucy rang the bell – the first time it’s been rung for several years.

They've made it!

2:15 this afternoon, a text from Margaret said: ‘They’ve done it! Just in time – it’s pouring. They’re both safe but tired. 305 miles of hard cycling.’ Helen’s Facebook entry (via her mobile) said ‘Helen Biggerstaff Has finished the ride. Back to the undulations of the beautiful Chilterns! See some of you on Sunday! X’

It’s been a hard week, particularly with mixed weather, but Will and Helen have achieved their target: across the North of England from coast to coast and back. They should be back in Great Missenden on Sunday – come to St Peter & St Paul to welcome them home.

If you haven’t sponsored them yet, it’s not too late: email me on david.m.harris@btinternet.com

Thursday evening – only 30 miles to go but...

No mobile signal tonight so just a quick phone call. I think they are at Bewaldeth. They’ve had a very good day but the forecast for tomorrow is very bad: 40-50 mph head winds. They are looking at alternative ways of doing the last 30 miles without struggling against a head wind.

View Larger Map

Thursday - they're in good spirits

Just had a text: Having coffee in Hethersgill. Will’s got too much energy – is cycling up and down the road. Making for Carlisle

I've just looked at the profile - downhill today but a 350M climb tomorrow


View Larger Map

Wednesday update

Latest info: Difficult day. Will had a problem with his bike. A bike hire shop mended it – for only £1.50! Poor signage round Kielder – Helen was rescued by two 80-year-olds! They are staying in a Roman fort on Hadrian’s Wall. The weather hasn’t been too good today – should be better tomorrow – forecast is for sunny intervals and no rain.

Looks like a wet day

No communication yet direct from Will and Helen but facebook entries: 'had a hot shower and is looking out at Hadrians Wall- YHA at Birdoswald. Quirky but nice!' and 'Is back in mobile signal. Good ride, but got very wet and very lost out of Kielder- signage rubbish!'

Birdoswald is here

View Larger Map


And here is how they are doing on a larger map

View Larger Map

C2C completed – Reivers started

Will and Helen reached the coast yesterday and have set out on the return journey on the Reivers route today. Margaret reported at about 16:20 that they were making great progress and had passed Bellingham in lovely weather. The profile of the Reivers route looks tougher than the C2C – see the web site – but they are still in good spirits and can see the end of their 310 mile ride.


View Larger Map