tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61633661336044558032024-03-19T08:07:55.737+00:00Lucy MelfordLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.comBlogger1234125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-37772347821949289662024-03-16T18:57:00.005+00:002024-03-16T22:53:39.719+00:005G comes to my villageSince its launch some while back, 5G has been making steady progress. I see that 5G coverage with EE (my mobile phone service provider) has now reached the point where every city and most towns in the land can get it. Various country areas can as well, some of them rural tracts of no great population. Presumably this is to fill in the 'not spots' in the 4G network, so that if one's local 4G Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-39317498754544958162024-03-11T19:13:00.005+00:002024-03-11T19:24:42.947+00:00Big nibs at Newhaven - 2It's late January 2024, and I've made a special point of seeing what the developer did with the former Parker Pen European management HQ and manufacturing site at Newhaven. I was in for a pleasant surprise.I had thought that there would either be no link with the old use of the site, or merely a token reference to it - in the name of a road or building perhaps. I was expecting a series of Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-36085783662467979192024-03-11T11:17:00.007+00:002024-03-11T12:05:26.347+00:00Big nibs at Newhaven - 1The Sussex coast is a strange mix of once-elegant Regency resorts, breezy seaside towns, yachty backwaters, and one or two working ports. Newhaven is one such port, sitting astride the River Ouse. It has a seaborne trade in scrap metal and gravel. It is also the ferry port for crossing to Dieppe in France. I've never taken that boat, but really must one day, just for the experience. Newhaven alsoLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-71805604851932231582024-03-05T13:42:00.005+00:002024-03-11T08:50:19.377+00:001988 and all thatHere's an interesting slice of social history. I have before me a copy of The Field magazine for October 1988. This is the front cover:This was - still is? - a magazine primarily aimed at well-off male landowners and (to some extent) their wives, containing serious articles on various aspects of country living, especially the sporting side of it. I think I found this copy in the attic of one of Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-30314362162374565472024-02-20T15:18:00.006+00:002024-02-20T23:56:39.055+00:00Fiona's on the road againI occasionally visit the DVLA website for news of my previous car, Fiona. I traded her in when buying Sophie last October. At that point she had covered 194,729 miles and was visually in very good condition inside and out, despite her thirteen years. I'd looked after her. But a very expensive auto gearbox replacement was looming, and rather than use up most of my savings on that, I put sentiment Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-77687840792935991232024-02-19T19:51:00.008+00:002024-02-21T08:04:26.113+00:00CopilotMicrosoft have been rolling out their AI app called Copilot, and a short while ago, after a Windows update, I noticed a new and colourful icon at the bottom right of my laptop screen. I left it alone until yesterday, when an experimental tap opened up a wide sidebar on the right-hand edge of the screen. It invited me to create something. So being frivolous, I asked Copilot to 'create a greenLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-75658649596539766682024-02-03T23:59:00.005+00:002024-02-04T00:54:43.152+00:00My abiding memory of MumMum died fifteen years ago today, on 3rd February 2009. It was cancer, first diagnosed in 1975, but defeated for a long while with a mastectomy. It had, however, returned it later life, when Mum was in her late eighties. This time, it was lymphatic cancer. I was never told the precise details, nor about what had to be done at home daily. A nurse would come; and Dad learned to do a lot of it Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-19584270254339546322024-02-02T23:31:00.005+00:002024-02-03T10:40:46.575+00:00The immigrant barge at PortlandI was on Portland recently, having lunch with friends at the Jailhouse Café inside The Verne Prison. From the garden there you can look down on much of the vast Portland Harbour, including the quays and jetties at the foot of the cliffs. I was intrigued to see the Bibby Stockholm moored there. This is the floating accommodation intended for immigrants whose applications are being considered. It Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-77291905567432894512024-01-29T23:51:00.008+00:002024-01-30T10:19:36.097+00:00More on my new phoneThank goodness getting to grips with an important item of new equipment happens only every few years! The arrival of Olivia, my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra smartphone on the morning of Wednesday 24th January has ensured an extended period of disrupted routine, and a lot of lost sleep from staying up late. Once the microSIM card was taken out of my old phone and inserted into the new one, Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-43622859935320282312024-01-18T18:14:00.019+00:002024-01-22T10:33:20.206+00:00I've just bought a Samsung Galaxy S24 UltraIt's inevitable that sooner or later one's electronic equipment needs replacing, item by item. Technological developments make it a good idea; but lack of support for security measures, and apps that no longer work so well, or not at all, are generally more pressing reasons. For instance, I absolutely must replace my 2016-vintage Microsoft Surface Book - my laptop - by 14th October 2025, the dateLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-28836202669959145862024-01-06T22:43:00.003+00:002024-01-06T22:51:19.088+00:00When OO15 SHE met OO15 ZZZI've got an eye for car registration plates. I do notice them, and always have done. So when travelling westwards on the dual-carriageway A27 past Old Shoreham this morning I couldn't help seeing that just ahead of my grey Volvo car Sophie (OO15 SHE) was a white Kia car with registration OO15 ZZZ. How likely is it that two OO15 plates should ever meet each other? And two obviously Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-77393791464431450162024-01-04T14:14:00.007+00:002024-01-05T18:20:01.047+00:00New app from Memory-MapA new year. On the last day of the old one, I made a string of Caravan Club site bookings - my long late-spring tour that will take me to Scotland and back. And as an encore, I bought Memory-Map's 2024 All-Great Britain Ordnance Survey map package. It cost me £149.98. But for that, I got all of Great Britain at various scales. The ones I was chiefly interested in were the 1:50,000 and 1:Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-18026660945061150752023-12-19T19:44:00.003+00:002023-12-20T21:28:12.651+00:00New bootsI've had mixed luck with boots, or at least that used to be the case. In search of elegance, I seemed always to buy boots that looked good but didn't really fit me properly. In other words, I needed more wriggle-room for my toes, and a wider fit to accommodate the way my feet had spread out over the years. Boot makers didn't have my feet in mind when designing their winter offerings. So I tended Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-39095550982424927462023-12-19T18:06:00.007+00:002023-12-20T09:04:01.972+00:00Will this cold never go?As soon as I returned from South Wales, the usual cold symptoms began. And it was 'just a cold' - I didn't have a high temperature, for instance (and that has remained the case). But the symptoms - a runny nose, nasal congestion, formation of catarrh, endless coughing to expel the same, and a general feeling of unwellness - have persisted longer than I would expect. It's as if my bodily defences Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-814225999613726072023-12-10T09:21:00.006+00:002023-12-11T08:11:32.731+00:00South Wales in December: rain, rain, and that 20 mph speed limit in every built-up areaI suppose you could call my six-night visit to Newport a 'holiday' - it would have been, back in late October, when the weather was much nicer. But a few weeks' delay make a big difference. This has been one of the wettest holidays I can remember, and to begin with one of the coldest, although it's now thankfully turned milder again. As much as I like my little seventeen-year-old caravan, I'd Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-29255579095414785492023-12-01T09:02:00.003+00:002023-12-01T09:10:06.037+00:00One more post on this before moving onAlthough it might seem a topic of very limited interest, my posts on number plates have generated some positive reactions. So one more. Then I want to write about something else.I've just written an email to my friend Coline in Scotland, explaining that the SHE in my personal registration refers as much to my new car as to me. If passing drivers could somehow guess the name of my car, they'd Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-55959225604873135782023-11-30T20:53:00.009+00:002023-12-01T00:58:35.556+00:00Way more interesting than Bitcoin, or gold bars languishing in some vaultThe corrected form V5C (showing that OO15 SHE belonged to Miss Lucy Melford) came back quite quickly. Next day I went down to Caffyns Volvo at Eastbourne and got them to make up new plates for Sophie, and fit them for me. I also brought away a spare rear plate to stick on the caravan, which at that moment was with the dealer at Ashington for a service and other work. Here I am, posing with a rearLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-51632642078620850762023-11-28T15:52:00.005+00:002023-11-28T17:12:31.627+00:00A mixed anniversaryYesterday, 27th November, was the anniversary of three very different things.First, it was the 17th anniversary of buying my caravan in 2006. I needn't show pictures of it, as it featured in a recent post (Swansong of a caravan on 21st November). It was then new, and was jointly purchased with M---. We both put up an equal amount of money. But it was bought in my name, and I was the formal owner.Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-62323176212771229072023-11-26T22:11:00.005+00:002023-11-26T22:39:11.567+00:00Sunsets and moon haloesYesterday was a remarkable day for a fine sunset and, later on, a moon with a halo around it. I saw the sunset at Dell Quay on Chichester Harbour, from various points above (and on) the shingle foreshore, from the quay itself, and from the pub there, the Crown & Anchor, which seems to have been built expressly with sunsets in mind. It was in fact originally put up in the sixteenth Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-35064418767650963482023-11-21T06:16:00.004+00:002023-11-21T09:11:20.242+00:00Swansong of a caravanThe replacement of my cherished thirteen year old car Fiona last month, and the very good start with her much younger successor Sophie has got me thinking about replacing the caravan as well. It's even older than Fiona was: seventeen years old. And unlike Fiona, falling to bits.Caravans get a terrible shaking-up when being towed. Their construction isn't flimsy, but it has for obvious reasons gotLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-67999533601844989692023-11-14T17:56:00.007+00:002023-11-14T18:10:04.093+00:00An annoying mistake with consequencesBack in July 2019 I wrote a post titled I must look married. This what I wrote:I style myself 'Miss', and have done this for many years.I was in fact married once, and could - if I wanted to - claim 'Mrs' for a title. But 'Mrs' implies the existence of a husband, current or former. I don't want to give the impression that there's a man in the background.My marriage was not a success, and ended inLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-23590708974821716082023-11-08T09:35:00.004+00:002023-11-08T18:11:59.416+00:00It's like setting up a new homeIt looks as if late autumns from now on are going to be plagued with bad weather, or at least unpredictable weather. And, of course, the days are short. All this discourages holiday breaks and days out. But I'm not a stay-at-home: dodgy weather and early sunsets are merely something to cope with. So I'm looking forward to my next trip - postponed from October - to South Wales, which I can slot inLucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-48783453921643458582023-11-02T09:06:00.003+00:002023-11-02T09:08:33.371+00:00Sussex turned upside down by Storm Ciarán!Here in deepest Mid Sussex we seem to have escaped the worst of the flooding, tree-topplings, tornados, power cuts and general mayhem caused by Storm Ciarán, the latest of a series of autumn storms to hit the UK. We have still been lashed by rain, and struck by lightning, and deafened by thunder - that cannot be denied. But Mid Sussex folk are hardy, and won't be druv, and although Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-15378944743662970232023-11-01T19:16:00.008+00:002023-12-03T09:21:48.383+00:00Who is she?It's a commonplace that people indicate their style and taste and income bracket (and, regrettably, their ego) through their home, the car they drive, and many other things, such as what kind of holidays they have, and which schools their children attend. In those respects, I have little to flaunt. I've only a modest home. I take modest caravan holidays. I have no children to boost my image with.Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6163366133604455803.post-64962597527525720082023-10-31T21:38:00.002+00:002023-10-31T21:41:13.715+00:00Chilly wet weather - time for bootsThat time of the year has come around again, when ordinary shoes and bare ankles won't cut it. Time to get the boots out. It wasn't so very long ago that canvas shoes would do nicely, as in these two shots taken in Cornwall on the 13th and 25th September:But now, just one month later, it's cooler and much wetter, and comfort demands something better able to keep one's feet warm and dry. So this Lucy Melfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03124557363335770051noreply@blogger.com0