Times for The Times Summer Gathering

Yesterday we had what has become an annual gathering of TimesforTheTimes folk at The George in Southwark.

This was the invite.

"A reminder that we are  having another informal summer gathering on  Saturday 14th June 2025 from 1200 at The George, Southwark. Do come along – all are welcome. We have reserved some indoor space in The Coach House bar. Read about last year’s here."

It was also only the second meeting of the three Weekend Cryptic Crossword compilers, celebrating 5 years of our series of Weekend Quick Cryptics.

Here are a few photos.

My journey began with a train from Bury St Edmunds to Cambridge, where I changed to a train to London Liverpool Street.

It was a pleasant meander from there to The George.

 

It was still quite early, so I had a visit to Borough Market. I was amazed at how busy it was.

But enough tourism for today... it was time to go to The George.

They had the Test Championship final TV coverage showing on the giant screen.

The George, unusually, has a gallery, but we were going to be on the other side of the courtyard.

I visited the main bar for a beer while it was still quiet.

David1 and JerryW were there before me and we went inside to our reserved tables.

It wasn't long before others arrived.

Boltonwanderer and John_dun were among the first of the others to arrive.

I had brought some name badges along so people could identify each other.

Here's Pootle writing his.

Chris and Francesca had come before.

Piquet is in the red shirt.

Keriothe, Kitty and Amoeba.

Paul-in-London was over from New York.

Alto_ego has also joined us before.

But it was Ham's first time.

Galspray was over from Australia. It was good to see him again.

We were joined by Mick (puzzles editor) and Jason (crossword editor). Thank-you both for coming and joining us.

Dvynys explained to us that his username is Lithuanian for "twin". Tim is a new solver. We encouraged him to join in the commenting.

Cedric, seen here talking to Jason, joined us after a birthday lunch.

Raffles1958 seen here with Galspray's friend James who had come along with him.

Paul-in-London, following on from his gifts of baseballs 2 years ago, distributed copies of the Official Rules of Baseball.

Here he is demonstrating the different grips used by pitchers.

I include some photos from David1 and John_dun.

I left about 5:15pm to head for home and there were still half a dozen left in conversation. 

Thanks to all who came and David1 for organising. In total we had, I think, 30 people there. In attendance were: Mick Hodgkin (Times Puzzles Editor and QC setter Peridot) Jason Crampton (Times Crossword editor and QC setter Asp), TimesforTheTimes bloggers Cedric Statherby, Galspray, JerryW, Johninterred, Keriothe, Kitty, Piquet, Weekend Quick Cryptic compilers Johninterred, Phil Jordan, Sawbill (seen together at the top of this post),  and other regular commenters/visitors on the site Alex and Margaret, Alto_ego, Amoeba, Boltonwanderer, Chris and Francesca, David1, Dvynys, Ham, John_Dun, Paul-in-London, Pootle, Raffles1958 and Tim. (Apologies to anyone I may have missed).

See you all (and maybe more) same time next year, I hope!

You can find more of my photos here.