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.