A better Birhday celebration at the Whitehall Hotel

This year the event that should have been planned for last year was planned and executed, not perfectly, but close enough (I hope).  Jo had wanted to have a cream tea with all the family at a posh restaurant.  We'd looked at the prices and decided that it could not be afforded.  I found a nice restaurant, and we went out for a meal, except it was not such a nice restaurant.  This year, there had been various discussions about afternoon tea in the papers.  I was a little wary.  Still, I booked the Whitehall Hotel for Sunday afternoon tea.  I'd discussed it with the girls and then let the boys know.  I left telling Jo's mum until the last minute.  My sister and her children came, unfortunately Jo's sister was on holiday, so couldn't make it.

It's quite a long drive (about 50 minutes), with Mike in the car complaining that he's missing football on the TV and moaning about being stuck in the car for such a long time, it seemed a lot longer.  The North Essex countryside is a lovely place to be in the warmest April I can remember.  The Sat Nav took us straight there.  Some of our party had to rely on maps and took a lot longer to find it.  It is 'in the middle of nowhere'. 

It didn't look too impressive.  I was starting to worry.

We arrived about 10 minutes early and were led into the restaurant.  We explained that there were still 4 to come.  Drinks were delivered, and soon the sandwich course came out, some were held back waiting for the other guests to arrive. Two more arrived and then after some 'phone calls, one made from the hotel phone, because mobile reception is very poor, which we were not charged for, the final two arrived.  The remaining sandwiches were delivered, and the champagne was brought out. 

We sang 'Happy Birthday'  and I took a few pictures.  Our waiter offered to take a picture of us all, here it is:

The cakes were delivered shortly afterwards.  If the sandwiches were nice (very nice), the cakes were out of this world.  All but the Danish slices are made in the hotel - our compliments to the chef.  There was plenty of tea and coffee.  After we had eaten, we sat in the garden for a while.  It was still very warm and comfortable in the garden.  The only interruptions to the peaceful countryside were planes leaving Stansted Airport, which is only a couple of mile away.

A really enjoyable afternoon.

The Axe and Compasses Aythorpe Roding

It was the fiftieth birthday celebration, or at least a part of it. Jo did not know what was happening, just that something was.  Liz had helped me to select the restaurant.  Neither of us had been there, but it had received good reviews.  The immediate family, and their boy and girl friends made their various arrangements and we arrived at the Axe and Compasses in good time.  The boys had brought some 'party things' - a hat and a badge with flashing lights - they had also bought some sensible presents.
After a drink we were led to our table.  I had not tried Doom Bar before, it has a very pleasant taste, and is far too easy to drink. I am limited to just one as I have a full seven seater to drive home later.
The menu had been handed out in advance so by the time we arrived at our table most of us had decided what we would order.  We had been told as we arrived that there was no pork left.  We ordered various starters, I ordered the pigeon breasts.  The starters soon arrived, after a very quick Grace from Liz we began to eat. We were in a quiet corner, but had livened it up a bit by now - and the regular family banter was already well under-way.  The pigeon was extremely rarely cooked and bled onto the plate.  I cannot eat bleeding meat, but the boys seemed happy to share an extra starter. There was quite a wait for main courses.  We spent the time chatting and were not too concerned.  Jo said I should tell them, but the meat was eaten, so it didn't seem right.
Eventually the main courses arrived.  They were less than impressive from the start.  The yorkshire puddings served with the lamb were burnt, so was the top layer of the lasagne.  I had the salmon in cream and prawn sauce, with new potatoes.  Andrew had chosen the same thing, so I passed on my prawns.  Both of us agreed that the sauce was just prawns in cream, and was quite unpleasant.  The vegetables were delayed (forgotten).  By the time they arrived we were half way through the main courses.  Some of my potatoes were cooked on one side and hard on the other.  The carrots in the vegetable were similarly varied, some almost raw, some almost sloppy.
The third course was skipped but some of us - again because our choice was no longer available. 
Only while I was paying for the meal was I asked if everything had been OK.  I didn't get to the end of my list of complaints, I don't think she wanted to hear any more.  Some items were removed from the bill.
We enjoyed the evening.  Our family get togethers are usually enjoyable, and it takes more than a poor meal to put us off.  However, it was a big occasion, that cannot be repeated, and I for one was left disappointed.

Christ Church and a 60th

Christ Church
Colossians 3:18-4:1 includes the command "Wives submit to your husbands" and various other commands on family life.  I'd swapped for today, and at the time hadn't even thought to check what the reading might be.  Anyway I should, in theory, be able to preach on any passage in the Bible.  Its just a matter of prayer and preparation.  Isn't it?  Well some passages are more difficult than others.  I researched my topic carefully - as I always do - and the result is here, should you want to read it.
As it was a fifth Sunday the young people provided the music.  Having them rota'd  like this means they can fit it in between revision and school work and clubs and ... (why do we teach our children to have such busy lives?).  I don't know how the rehearsals went, but the music was very good!  And I should note that Liz sang very well - and that she was the only singer.
We are still learning how to make the best of the new projector and teaching people to switch it off and on. It's a long time since I've used slides, and had forgotten  that to make open office presentations transportable you have to embed the pictures, not link to them.  There are ways of doing it.  The easiest is to paste the pictures, rather than attach them - so some of my pictures were missing.  
I'm currently working on evaluating the software for the new laptop - to see which is best for projecting songs and other things.

60th Birthday
After lunch we walked across town (30+ minutes each way) to a friends 60th Birthday celebration.  He had an 'open house' for the afternoon.  Very many friends had come to wish him well from his old workplace and from the church. We had a very enjoyable couple of hours chatting to various people. 

Hoop Beer Festival

In honour of my getting (even) older, we spent the afternoon at the Hoop Beer Festival. As you will see, if you follow the link, there is a large marquee which serves as an extension to the pub. There are many different beers to try, more than I could possibly get through in a week, and certainly not an afternoon.
Between us we tried a number and shared the glasses round so that we got to taste many more. Being the sort of person that I am, I naturally scored the beers on their taste, here are our combined, agreed scores:

Brewery	Beer	Rating
Brentwood	Lunberjack	********
Brentwood	Summer Virgin	*******
Brentwood	Marvelous Maple Gold	******
Crouch Vale	Essex Boys Bitter	********
Crouch Vale	Brewers Gold	******
Crouch Vale	Best	******
Downton	Maroonmaker Mild	*********
Goffs	White Knight	********
Goffs	Jouster	*******
Hop Back	Summer Lightening	*******
Summerskills	Hopscotch	******
Titanic	Anchor	**
White Horse	Wayland Smithy	****
	Farmhouse Cider	**********

There was a general high approval rating, but one or two were not so good. Usually because the flavour was too strong.

The festival itself runs all week. If it's as crowded for the rest of the week as it was today, the publican can take a long and expensive holiday. Food was also available, so I ditched the diet (just this once) and went for the 'hog roast' - a large burger, with carved pork, stuffing, apple sauce and crackling. Very nice, but not really quite enough - still the beer fills you up!

A very enjoyable afternoon with my family and my sisters family.

Birthday celebration

Saturday saw another family birthday. Jo had decided that she would like to go bowling. We invited my sister and my nephew, and booked 2 lanes at the local 10 pin bowling establishment. My sister arrived, we enjoyed an early tea together, and the cameras were out. Jo had been given a digital camera for her birthday (a joint present from us all). It has to be easy to operate, point and click - and the rest is optional - it certainly looks as though it is - with clear buttons, and plenty of them. I think Liz has made a good choice.

We arrive at the bowling lane the requested 20 minutes early. Now I know why you have to arrive 20 minutes early - we were the fourth party in the queue, and only just got to our lane on time! We split into two lanes - boys on one, girls on the other. The three of us played significantly faster than the four of them. That was partly to do with the number of strikes, but also there's something about boys and competition that leads to them wanting to get on with it more than the girls do.

I was beaten by my nephew in both games. By just one point the first time, but in the second game he ran away with his win - scoring 180 (including four strikes in a row). My scores were around 120 and 140 (both quite good for me). I guess I have to get used to being beaten by the youngsters as I get older.

Jo came last of the seven of us on both games, but she enjoyed herself - which is the point of going in the first place.

There are some pictures on Facebook, visible to friends, and friends of friends, but here's a cake to be going on with:
One of Jo's birthday cards says "Birthdays are good for you - people who have lots of them live longer"

21st Birthday / On-line Shopping

21st Birthday
On Saturday the family gathered in the Inn on the Green. Mainly the family, and a few friends. Lunch was unremarkable, the food was mainly alright, but some parts of it were not very nice. It has apparently been refurbished - it looked to me as though it wasn't finished. The staff were pleasant and friendly, but it isn't enough to make up for the slightly disappointing food. Still the company was good, and I hope that our 21 year-old enjoyed himself. He has now borrowed my Previa and taken his friends to a haunted camp site. Which brings me to ...

On-line Shopping
Its my usual thing for Christmas, and this year was no exception. However, this year I have to return things, that's not something I've had to do before. Shopping at Amazon(.co.uk) is easy, I wonder what returns are like.

I also purchased, more recently a book, which I downloaded, so that I got it in time. This was from a site called lulu.com. Now registering and paying can be easy or complicated. On lulu it's more towards complicated. The site is designed for people to sell products, so why make it so difficult for the buyer? Surely if it a site for selling then most of the hits will be buyers - the site should be tuned to their requirements - my requirements in this case. When I sign-up, I'd expect to be asked why I came to the site, not told that I can now start my project. Mind you, buying was a bit of a project!

Now to the third, and so far least satisfactory experience. My son wanted to borrow my Previa. To do this the insurance needs to be upgraded. Budget said they'd ring back in 2-3 hours. That was this morning, no call so far. We tried DayCover. An interesting experience - their site will not accept credit card details!!!!!!! Amazing and unbelievable. How do they do business? My son phoned them and got the policy agreed, they said they would send an e-mail. No e-mail. After the start time of the policy he called again, and they claimed to correct the e-mail address (or did they?), but still no e-mail.

Perhaps I should have titled this entry "Where not to buy ...".

The UK used to have a reputation for poor customer service, seems to me its getting worse again.

We should all be proud of what we do, and try to do our best at work, sometimes the systems defeat us. On those occasions we have a duty to do what we can to improve things for our customers. That's just common sense, from my point of view.

25th Birthday Celebration

Yesterday we collected ourselves together and made our way to Milton Keynes (MK) -"the land of the concrete cow", to celebrate the birthday of my nephew. He's 25 - that makes me feel old! He has a two bedroom flat that he is in the process of decorating, and although he's been there quite a while, its the first time I've travelled to see him. We all went (except Jo, who has a fever, and was not well enough), and collected Karen on the way.

Holmesdale Tunnel
There are two tunnels on the M25, between the junctions of the M11 and the M1. The second is the Holmesdale Tunnel, when travelling anti-clockwise. For the last , I don't know how long, it has been undergoing refurbishment. This journey was the first time through for me since it re-opened. The lighting has been significantly down graded - I had thought it was temporary, but apparently not. Here's a clip, which shows the patchy lighting - watch from about 2 minutes in. I found driving through at about 65 MPH that the lights appeared uncomfortably flickery. Does anyone think its an improvement?

Celebration, TV, and Wii
Anyway we got lost in Luton! How many times have I been there? So Liz phoned Karen and got directions. We found our MK destination easily enough. As you enetr his flat, the first thing that greats you is a huge TV. It really dominated the room. His flat is quite spacious, and a very respectable for a 'first time buyer'. He is inevitably doing lots of work, and most of it is still in progress. None of that spoilt the celebrations. It is an ideal lounge for playing on the Wii - the strangely named games machine that gets you up and active, and all the 'children' really enjoyed themselves. If the children are happy, then their parents have no cause for concern - so it made for a relaxing afternoon. No, in case you're wondering, I don't join in with the video games. New hand-eye coordination skills, especially those with a 'digital delay' do not suite me at all.

We eventually left, and the worry about the car got worse. I think the blow-out at the beginning of the month has caused some more problems - may be damaged the shock absorbers. Cars are great when they're working ...

We got home without incident, and I can confirm that the tunnel is no better at night.

Party Weekend

Out of sequence - doesn't it just annoy you so much!

Saturday Jo and I attended a fortieth Birthday party. Lots of things were different about this party. The time in particular. Given that I had a busy Sunday to follow (see previous post), it was nice to be home and in bed before midnight. There was also live music and a singer, instead of the usual disco. Not my sort of music, but a good singer, and easy songs, and not too loud. So a very enjoyable evening. I had some very interesting discussions, and as a result was lent "The God Delusion". Can I refute the arguments of Prof. Dawkins, all on my own? It'll be an interesting challenge.

Sunday was the 18th Birthday party (family version) for one of our friends sons. I was pleased that both Andy and Mike could make it. We knew most of the people there, and it was good to catch up with a few of them. Jo did a cross stitch for him.  It was one that I had scanned and manipulated, so if there are stitches out of place don't blame Jo. He's off to university soon, so it will remind him o home.

50th Birthday

Its a sign that we are getting old, as if we needed reminding, but as the birthday girl said - you can either hide away, or celebrate! So we celebrate, and a very nice party it was too. Here is the card Jo made.

Michael has done it! And other celebrations

Congratulations Michael!

He is now a qualified driver, and is looking for his first car, and pressurizing his dad to put him on the insurance.

After this celebration, another one. In the evening, six of us went to a local pub for a meal in honour of Jo's birthday.