Kitchen Replacement - Day 12

More construction and installation work in the kitchen and utility room today...

Kitchen Replacement - Day 11

Another great day's work from Tony our fitter today.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 10

From an empty kitchen yesterday it is now full of furniture under construction.

Kersey Mill Walk

Today, while Dawn was busy painting, I joined Joyce and 5 others on a walk from Kersey Mill.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 9

The flooring was due to be laid starting today, but it was agreed to wait until the furniture has been installed.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 8

Today it was the turn of the Floor Dimensions fitters to have a go at creating our new kitchen.

John's Walks 2024 Updated

I've done an update to John's Walks 2024 to cover March and April (so far). It provides an index to all the walk blog posts so far this year. You can access it via the menu bar at the top of the page or the "John's Walks" section in the sidebar. As usual, I'll continue to update it periodically during the year - every couple of months on average.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 7

Dawn has been busy (understatement of the year) this weekend doing some painting.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 6

 

This is how the kitchen looked this morning... ready for painting.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 5

Today, after another 7:30 am start, James finished the plastering in the utility room by early afternoon.

Weekend Quick Cryptic 101 - Solution

Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce our series of Quick Cryptic crosswords. We take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's  Phil's turn. 

You can find a link to the crossword here and the answers below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 101 by Phil Jordan

This time it is Phil's turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 101 in the series.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 4

More plastering today and now the kitchen is done.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 3

Today we had some more electrics done and a start  made on the plastering.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 2

Superficially, not a whole lot more to see after today's work.

Kitchen Replacement - Day 1

This was our kitchen as it looked this morning.

Bluebell Walk

Today, in a lull before the onslaught of the kitchen replacement, Dawn and I did the perennial Bluebell Walk from Suffolk Food Hall.

Orford Ness

Today we had a group trip to Orford Ness where we had a guided tour.

Times for The Times Reaches 1000 Active Subscribers

Announced today on TimesforTheTimes.

Wedding Cake Update

We just had to find out. Is our 34 year old wedding cake still edible?

Wedding Cake Anyone?

It was still in its box on top of the cupboards in the kitchen, which we are busy clearing to make way for the new one....

Weekend Quick Cryptic 100 - Solution

Although The Times has bowed to pressure and started providing a Saturday Quick Cryptic crossword, my fellow TimesforTheTimes contributors Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce Quick Cryptic crosswords to fill the gap left by the Sunday Times not having one. The plan is for us to take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's my turn. 

You can find a link to this week's crossword here and the answers below. Did you find the Nina? Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 100 - X squared

Click here to read about the origin of this series of crosswords.

A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times for The Times every other Friday, I often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February 2020, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May 2020, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Times for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too. And then, more recently, so did Sawbill. So now the three of us take turns, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. The popularity of these has been such that The Times has bowed to pressure and started publishing a Saturday Quick Cryptic online. But there is still no Sunday Times Quick Cryptic so we will continue with these as long as there is sufficient interest.

This time it is my turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 100 in the series, entitled "X squared". As usual, there is a bit of a hint in the title but this time to a Nina (hidden message) rather than a theme. Finding and completing it could help with a few clues. Enjoy!

You can try and solve the crossword interactively here on MyCrossword or here on crossword.info.  As usual you can download a PDF to print which you can find here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries are welcome with the solution post (which also gives tips on some of the clues).  I will react to any comments or queries there as soon as I can. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

U3A Knettishall Heath Walk

Today it was my turn to lead a walk for the Bury St. Edmunds U3A Longer Walks Group. I chose to do a walk that was familiar to me but not to most of the other members of the group - from Knettishall Heath.

Goldfinch

Spotted on a family walk yesterday morning near Sybil Andrews Academy.

Family At Easter

We have William, Laura and Laurence staying with us over Easter. Here we are at the dinner table yesterday.

The Man From The Pru

Here is something else from the archives.

Some Old Photos

Found in stuff from Mum and Dad's house. Can you tell who these two are? 

U3A St Albans Visit

Today we had a coach trip to St. Albans to visit the cathedral and Verulamium Museum.

Giraffes in Cambridge

Today we had a trip to Cambridge to hunt for giraffes. Standing Tall is this year's Break Charity Wild in Art sculpture trail.

Ixworth Walk

Today we did a Plan 'B' walk instead of continuing our St Edmund Way journey so as to allow the rest of the route to dry out before we tackled it. Instead we walked from Ixworth.

Weekend Quick Cryptic 99 - Solution

Although The Times has bowed to pressure and started providing a Saturday Quick Cryptic crossword, my fellow TimesforTheTimes contributors Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce Quick Cryptic crosswords to fill the gap left by the Sunday Times not having one. The plan is for us to take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's Phil's turn. 

You can find a link to this week's crossword here and the answers below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 99 by Sawbill

Click here to read about the origin of this series of crosswords.

A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times for The Times every other Friday, I often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February 2020, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May 2020, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Times for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too. And then, more recently, so did Sawbill. So now the three of us take turns, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. The Times has now bowed to pressure and started publishing a Saturday Quick Cryptic. But there is still no Sunday Times Quick Cryptic so we will continue with these as long as there is sufficient interest.

This time it is Sawbill's turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 99 in the series. You can try and solve the crossword interactively here on MyCrossword or here on crossword.info.  As usual you can download a PDF to print which you can find here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries are welcome with the solution post (which also gives tips on some of the clues).  I will react to any comments or queries there as soon as I can. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

St Edmund Way Part 5

Following on from the fun we had last year doing the Angles Way (see here), today we continued this year's expedition - to walk the 79 mile St Edmund Way.

Coming Soon - A New Kitchen

Exciting news! Today we got given a provisional date for work to start on installing a new kitchen and utility room.

Aly Bain and Phil Cunningham at The APEX

Tonight we were at The APEX for a concert, given by the Scottish Folk Duo, Aly Bain and Phil Cunningham.

Cockfield Walk

After the sogginess of Wednesday's walk (see here), Joyce postponed the next stage of our St Edmund Way walk as it is likely to be even soggier at the moment. Instead we did a walk from Cockfield.

St Neots Beer Festival - Booze on the Ouse

Today I took a trip to St Neots by train to visit the first day of the St Neots Beer Festival, aka the 'Booze on the Ouse'

St Edmund Way Part 4

Following on from the fun we had last year doing the Angles Way (see here), today we continued this year's expedition - to walk the 79 mile St Edmund Way.

Email Subscription to the Blog - Update

If you are already a subscriber you may have noticed you stopped getting emails recently. That is because the provider of the service I used, Mailerlite, no long support email campaigns from a blog feed as part of their free tier. I have now moved to a new provider, Brevo, and you should have had a first email from them today. Please bear with me if you get more emails over the next few days as I try and get it working correctly - i.e. include the summary of the post rather than just the heading. 

This is now working but I may do further updates to tweak content and formatting. Thanks-you for your patience. I have now got subscriptions to the new provider working but still have some minor formatting issues to solve.

Email Subscription to the Blog

If you are already a subscriber you may have noticed you stopped getting emails recently. That is because the provider of the service I used, Mailerlite, no long support email campaigns from a blog feed as part of their free tier. I have now moved to a new provider, Brevo, and you should have had a first email from them today. Please bear with me if you get more emails over the next few days as I try and get it working correctly - i.e. include the summary of the post rather than just the heading. More anon.

This post will be deleted in a few days.

St Edmund Way Part 3

Following on from the fun we had last year doing the Angles Way (see here), today we continued this year's expedition - to walk the 79 mile St Edmund Way.

Weekend Quick Cryptic 98 - Solution

Although The Times has bowed to pressure and started providing a Saturday Quick Cryptic crossword, my fellow TimesforTheTimes contributors Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce Quick Cryptic crosswords to fill the gap left by the Sunday Times not having one. The plan is for us to take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's Phil's turn. 

You can find a link to this week's crossword here and the answers below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 98 by Phil Jordan

Click here to read about the origin of this series of crosswords.

A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times for The Times every other Friday, I often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February 2020, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May 2020, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Times for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too. And then, more recently, so did Sawbill. So now the three of us take turns, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. The Times has now bowed to pressure and started publishing a Saturday Quick Cryptic. But there is still no Sunday Times Quick Cryptic so we will continue with these as long as there is sufficient interest.

This time it is Phil's turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 98 in the series. You can try and solve the crossword interactively here on MyCrossword or here on crossword.info.  As usual you can download a PDF to print which you can find here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries are welcome with the solution post (which also gives tips on some of the clues).  I will react to any comments or queries there as soon as I can. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

U3A Ely Walk

It was the first Thursday of the month today, so time for a walk with the Bury St. Edmunds U3A Longer Walks Group. Tim was our leader today for a circular walk from the centre of Ely.

St Edmund Way Part 2

Following on from the fun we had last year doing the Angles Way (see here), today we continued this year's expedition - to walk the 79 mile St Edmund Way.

Bradfield St George Walk

This morning we did a circular walk from Bradfield St. George church.

St Edmund Way Part 1

Following on from the fun we had last year doing the Angles Way (see here), today we embarked on this year's expedition - to walk the 79 mile St Edmund Way.

John's Walks 2024 Published

I've added a new page to the site, which you can access via the menu bar at the top of the page or the  "John's Walks" section in the sidebar - John's Walks 2024 provides an index to all the walk blog posts so far this year. As usual, I'll update it periodically during the year - every couple of months on average.

Snape Walk

Today we did a varied circular walk from Snape Maltings through marsh, heathland and forest.

Weekend Quick Cryptic 97 - Solution

Although The Times has bowed to pressure and started providing a Saturday Quick Cryptic crossword, my fellow TimesforTheTimes contributors Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce Quick Cryptic crosswords to fill the gap left by the Sunday Times not having one. The plan is for us to take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's my turn. 

You can find a link to this week's crossword here and the answers below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 97 - Down In The Woods Today

Click here to read about the origin of this series of crosswords.

A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times for The Times every other Friday, I often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February 2020, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May 2020, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Times for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too. And then, more recently, so did Sawbill. So now the three of us take turns, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. The popularity of these has been such that The Times has bowed to pressure and started publishing a Saturday Quick Cryptic online. But there is still no Sunday Times Quick Cryptic so we will continue with these as long as there is sufficient interest.

This time it is my turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 97 in the series, entitled "Down In The Woods Today". As usual, there is a bit of a hint in the title to some thematic answers. You may need to know the origin of this.... in a discussion on TimesforTheTimes about the vocabulary that appears in crosswords, I promised to include the OUP's Word of the Year for 2023 in my next crossword to show that setters can keep up with the times. In fact it is so new it's not yet in most of the standard dictionaries (although it is in Merriam Webster). My clue for that word gave me the idea for the theme... Enjoy!

You can try and solve the crossword interactively here on MyCrossword or here on crossword.info.  As usual you can download a PDF to print which you can find here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries are welcome with the solution post (which also gives tips on some of the clues).  I will react to any comments or queries there as soon as I can. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

A Rainy Day In Cambridge

Today we had another day out with Kirsty and David, this time in Cambridge.

Saint Vigor's Fulbourn

After our visit to Anglesey Abbey yesterday, we went with Kirsty and David to have a look round Fulbourn and get a bite to eat.

Anglesey Abbey Walk

Today we met up with Kirsty and David and all joined Joyce's walks at Anglesey Abbey.

Tassel Gin #20

Time to make some more gin as, having given some away for Christmas presents we were running out and I still needed some for sisters Sue and Kirsty when we meet up with Kirsty next week.

Great Barton Snowdrop Walk

Today we had a local walk with Joyce's group... and an amazing turn out of 27 walkers!

The Stolen Lamb Chops

This was a bit of an unfortunate mix-up.

Return to The Inn at Whitewell

After Sarah's graduation in York on Thursday (see here), we came across country to Clitheroe yesterday to visit Dawn's sister Jilly and husband Ian.

Weekend Quick Cryptic 96 - Solution

Although The Times has bowed to pressure and started providing a Saturday Quick Cryptic crossword, my fellow TimesforTheTimes contributors Phil Jordan, Sawbill and I are continuing to produce Quick Cryptic crosswords to fill the gap left by the Sunday Times not having one. The plan is for us to take turns, publishing one a fortnight, and this week it's Sawbill's turn. 

You can find a link to this week's crossword here and the answers below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions here as you would do on TfTT. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Weekend Quick Cryptic 96 - by Sawbill

Click here to read about the origin of this series of crosswords.

A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times for The Times every other Friday, I often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February 2020, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May 2020, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Times for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too. And then, more recently, so did Sawbill. So now the three of us take turns, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. The popularity of these has been such that The Times has now bowed to pressure and started publishing a Saturday Quick Cryptic (albeit online only). But there is still no Sunday Times Quick Cryptic so we will continue with these as long as there is sufficient interest.

This time it is Sawbill's turn to provide the fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic crossword, Number 96 in the series. You can try and solve the crossword interactively here on MyCrossword or here on crossword.info.  As usual you can download a PDF to print which you can find here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries are welcome with the solution post (which also gives tips on some of the clues).  I will react to any comments or queries there as soon as I can. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here. 

Sarah Moody BSc

Today Sarah graduated as a BSc in Mathematics (with placement year) from the University of York.

Tattingstone Walk

Today I led a walk for Joyce's group from Tattingstone.

Colchester Winter Ale Festival

Dry January is finished so I thought I would have a day out at the Colchester Winter Beer Festival.

Felixstowe Sunrise Walk

We've tried this a couple of times before and found it too cloudy to see the sunrise. But not today.

Blog Update Notifications

Apologies to my subscribers for duplicate notification emails last night and the night before. I have had to migrate between versions of Mailerlite, the email platform I use and created the new 'campaign' before I'd deactivated the old one. If you are not already a subscriber and would like to be, please sign up via the "Subscribe to Email Updates" box in the sidebar or send me a message.

Bacton Walk

Today we walked some new paths for me in a circular walk from Bacton via Finningham and Gislingham.