Ian, 17 November 2020
Hello everyone
Not a lot to add since my last message, but Jill and I have been following the exchanges with great interest, especially the reminiscences over children's books. I have pulled the spasmodic exchanges of the last two months together into two blogs and have even added images of some of the books discussed to pile on the nostalgia. Alarming to think that we are in the 37th week since lockdown began.
The exchanges reminded us of a visit to the public library at Ventspils in Latvia in 2008, where "We were particularly amused and surprised to discover that foreign writers have the spelling of their names changed, so Enid Blyton's Famous Five becomes Enide Blaitone, Noslepums and J.K.Rowlings' Harry Potter becomes Dz. K. Roulinga, Harijs Poters in Latvian. They are different again in Russian but our computer hasn't got Cyrillic script. "
Enid Blyton's Five go off to Latvia
J.K.Rowling's Harry Potter and Curse of the Cyrillic Script
Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories
As you have said, some children's writers are popular everywhere. Jill was a
fan of Gwynned Rae's stories of
In Bern they have bears decorating their manhole covers.
I will pull the blogs together and print them out for Peter Miles, who phoned me the other day. He is keeping well but Maggie seems to be suffering badly from sciatica. I wished them both well on behalf of you all.
Stay safe all of you, Ian and Jill
Anne, 27 November 2020
Hi everyone,
This may give you something to think about
and/or read during your lockdowns.
There is a German English-language magazine
which I subscribe to called Spotlight. It has developed into quite a glossy
life-style mag over the years and in fact it doesn't now have as many
Easy/Intermediate level articles as I would wish for my students. However, in
the latest issue, Spotlight 14/20, on pages 24 - 28 , there is an interesting
article on books in English about
Here are the titles mentioned, you may find them
of interest:
Neil McGregor
John Kampfner Why the Germans do it better (2020)
James Hawes The Shortest History of
David Stubbs Future Days: Krautrock and the
Giles MacDonogh On
Another title I'd like to mention is in German:
Annette Dittert London Calling: als Deutsche auf der Brexit-Insel. Hoffmann und
Campe, 2017. I have read this and she writes very entertainingly about her
travels in various parts of the
Otherwise I hope you are all fit and healthy.
Our lockdown has been extended and I just heard today that all our VHS courses
have now been cancelled until the end of the year.
Take care everyone, Anne
Sylvia, 29 November 2020
Hi Everyone,
I hope no one is feeling too much in the dumps. Coming out of lockdown, other than Jane, Howard and Anne, who have other rules to comply with, will feel little different except that we can now go and pick up Covid in our local shops. I don't think SUPSLISKAN is lucky enough to be in a Tier 1 area.
I thought you might enjoy the picture below.
Keep smiling and stay well everyone! Love
to all, Sylvia
Ian 5 December 2020
Hello Everyone
As we are now out of lockdown #2, but into something that seems worse for most of us, despite there being at least three vaccines on the horizon, We are sending out our print-it-out-and-fold-it-yourself card and our dreaded annual round robin. [Neither attached]
We find the streets in town much more crowded this week and are relieved that we will not have to frequent them too much this year as the only person with us over Christmas will be Jill's sister Julie. Stand by for the third spike, due in early January.
Above all, stay safe everyone and love to you all, Ian and Jill
Sue, 23 December 2020
Hi
Just a quick note to say Happy Christmas and to
thank you all for your
company during the year.
Let's hope that with Biden and Harris at the
helm, Brexit sorted one way
or the other AND more than one vaccine actually
being administered, the
world will be a better and safer place in 2021.
Take care and stay safe and well. Love, Sue
Lesley, 23 December 2020
Share your 2021 wishes, Sue. Warm greetings to everyone, Lesley
Howard, 23 December 2020
Best wishes from
Howard
Pat, 23 December 2020
Warmest
wishes to everyone on this bleakest of days. I hope that we all escape from
this dreaded virus and that we get protected soon. I think we in the
Have a good Christmas, Trish
Janet, 24 December 2020
Dear All
A Merry Christmas by Zoom and a Healthy & Happy New Year to everyone from John and me. And thank you for the cheery anecdotes, Janet.
Angela, 24 December 2020
Dear All
Just adding my Very Best wishes for as good a
Christmas as is possible and a Happy and Healthy New Year from
It has been a real bonus hearing news from
SUPSLISKANS far and wide. Hopefully this rainbow over Cley is a sign of
better things to come in 2021!
Keep safe and well, Angela xx
Margaret, 24 December 2020
Dear All,
Just sending my very best wishes for a happy, if rather different, Christmas and peace and good health in the New Year. Keep up the messages in 2021!
My news is that I had the vaccine last Saturday morning and return on 9th January for a second jab. Thankfully, no aftereffects - just a bit tender. Rather embarrassed that none of my Wolvercote friends has been offered it yet. I go to a GP in town and they all go to one in Summertown; I gather that mine has linked up with a few in town to be first in the queue.
Love from Margaret
Tony, 24 December 2020
Hello Supliskans
A Happy Christmas from
And of course best wishes and high hopes for
2021. If the news is to be believed Brexit has been sorted (fingers crossed),
and most of the over 80s we know have received their first jabs. I'm guessing
we're all in the next tier.......
All best wishes, Tony
Sylvia, 24 December 2020
Dear Everyone,
I too send my best wishes for an enjoyable Christmas, whatever you do (or don't!). I hope I'm not tempting fate by saying that 2021 can only be better than 2020.
Love to you all and stay well, Sylvia
Val, 26 December 2020
Merry Christmas everyone! Hopefully some of you will have been able to see family yesterday.
Over 1000 in Barnard Castle
have been vaccinated this week & Brexit sorted, so fingers crossed it’s the
start of the climb out of all this.
Love to all & all the best
for 2021, Val
Ian 26 December 2020
Since then twelve score years have passed by
And 2021 is nigh.
No wars in
Our feeling of great gloom reflects it,
But as for plaques and sickness, Covid
Deserves the pen of poet Ovid
Who sings its metamorphoses
And then a better world foresees.
So, this Exonian newsboy cheers:
Good riddance 2020's tiers!
Sylvia, 6 January 2021
I'm assuming that most of us are spending at least some of our time quiddling. My son gave me a wonderful book for Christmas called Word Perfect: etymological entertainment for every day of the year by Susie Dent. There are several words each day and one of the ones for yesterday was quiddling, described as "prone to attending to the trivial tasks in life as a way of avoiding the important ones", although I'm not sure what could be classed as important at the moment, other than keeping body and mind active.
Here in Herefordshire, we're
really struggling to keep Covid numbers in check, in part because we, as the
only county north of
Keep smiling (and quiddling) everyone, even if it is through gritted teeth! Sylvia
Jane, 6 January 2021
Happy New Year from Grumpy Jane.
If you can call it a new year … Still a competition between Your Boris and Our
Nicola as to who can manage the crisis better and the trouble is that far too
many Scots believe that because ON is apparently organising Covid restrictions
well, she will be as effective in an independent Scotland. Now we hear that
over a million people have received the vaccine in
But we have not changed our routine much since March last year. The only difference is that it is too cold or wet to sit or work in the garden with the ground sodden or frozen hard, and we are less keen to go for walks lest we slip and take up hospital space with broken limbs. I bought myself a jigsaw which is proving difficult so will keep me busy for days and David always has some research to do. And having said I would never book another holiday (still waiting for the refund of the deposit from the September 2021 Canada trip I booked in March) I have booked a Northern Belle rail trip to Dumfries in September, in the hope that the country has not reached Tier 50 by then. Workmen are busy all round about with the conversion of two houses across the road into 14 flats still not complete although two are already occupied, and a complete refurbishment of the cottage next door including double glazing without planning permission which is mandatory in this conservation area. We hope that we will get our sitting room painted soon after the new double glazed windows were installed several weeks ago, then new curtains, and carpet throughout the flat. Moving all the books in advance will provide us with much needed exercise.
Best to take each day as it comes, I think, keep away from other people, and not expect to be let out to play in the near future.
Love, Jane
Janet, 6 January 2021
Dear Jane
And a Happy New year to you too. Also Happy New Year to everybody else. At least we all have the prospect of vaccinations happening so that, although we will be sticking with the face masks, the social distancing and the hand washing, there will hopefully be some prospect of getting out and about, whether to parks or countryside, and some chance of visiting or being visited, if only for cups of tea in one another's gardens.
We had no visitors over Christmas/ New Year in the end but did manage board games or home-made quizzes with the family over Zoom almost every day. Our son managed to rig up some sort of contraption to give a view of the board at their end to help keep track of where we were all moving everyone's pieces on our own boards and it worked surprisingly well. There was a slight hiccup when we found that one family's version of Buccaneer was an Australian one, where the orange ship was grey and the purple one was a wishy washy crimson but we soon got that noted and play was able to continue unhindered.
Very best wishes to all, from Janet & John.
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