(Translation) A Strange Week

Thass bin a rum ow week! ... but I'll come back to that.  There wasn't any great highlight to last week, which is why there was no post here yesterday. It wasn't until ruminating this morning that I realised that I hadn't written a blog.  So here goes.

It started off with a meeting on Monday morning with the churchwardens, following my submission of a report about the 'state of play' that I found on taking office as Health and Safety Officer.  I feared that this encounter would be a condemnation of 'this upstart trying to tell us what's what', but it turned out to be very productive and I learned that, based on my report, they had formed the opinion that - despite my admission of learning on the job - I was the right man for the post.  Time alone will tell on that one!

It's true what they say, 'novelty wins'.  In the first week after I'd accepted that position, I was scanning websites galore and downloading booklets to read about what should be done: lots of theory, and most of it applicable to large industrial establishments; little of relevance to the day-to-day running of a church and a church hall.  Then came a guided tour of a property that I thought I knew so well, and the detailed analysis of the existing policy document, giving rise to that report.  Now boredom has set in, and trying to focus my mind on a draft for a questionnaire to be issued to all relevant parties in the coming weeks was very much an uphill struggle!

I've been struggling over the last few months with a family tree I've been working on for my distant relative in Canada.  Addiction triumphed on Tuesday and Wednesday, although it highlighted for me many of the frustrations of family history.  In two fairly solid days I managed to add fifteen new names, but it was only after the agonising wait, time after time, for the screen to change after I'd asked once more to 'edit the search details'. Not only were there difficulties in imagining how first the census enumerators, and then the 21st-century transcribers, had interpreted the name I was looking for, but also the internet itself was not working at anything like full speed.  It was as if 'the lights were on but no one was at home'.

In the face of this technological rebellion I was very glad of what I have described as my 'little white friend'.  This is variously identified as a 'my wi-fi' or 'my-fi'.  I obtained it about a year ago when I visited my local mobile phone showroom, complaining about a warning message I'd received when trying to use my phone as a wi-fi hotspot.  After learning how old my contract was, and that I had no desire to exchange my phone, the salesman helpfully came up with the suggestion that I take out a new SIM-only contract for the phone and, alongside it, another contract for this little gadget, which has its own link to the mobile network and acts as in the same way as the internet 'hub' that sits in my lounge.  Considering that the new combination costs me less than the former phone contract, I was well pleased!

Yesterday, for the first time for quite a while, I joined in a monthly ringing meeting of the local bell-ringing association.  I met lots of old friends and new, and it was a very pleasant morning; I seem to recall spending more time chatting than actually ringing.  One method we rang was one of the oldest and yet still very familiar today.  Called Grandsire, it's name is usually pronounced as if it had no final 'e', the last syllable rhyming with 'fur'.  My own tower captain was also present at that point.  He knows me well; perhaps better than I give him credit for.  As the method was called for ... by someone who pronounced the name the way it looks, i.e. to rhyme with 'tyre', he turned to me and said, with a twinkle, "I expect that's how they say it in your part of the world, Brian."

I rose to the bait.  "W'no, master," I said, in a mock Norfolk accent, "we allus say Gran'sir, jest like all tha rest!"  Somehow, it's usually when with fellow ringers that I find it easiest to lapse into that old way of speaking ... not that I was ever as broad as I like to make out.  I suppose it's because it's an activity and an atmosphere that echoes my roots better than any other; perhaps, too, because there I'm more relaxed.

At another point in the morning, I found myself in conversation with two ladies, one of whom is thinking of learning to ring.  The other mentioned the very recent introduction in one of our towers of a 'dummy' bell linked to a computer, which allows a beginner to have almost limitless practice without annoying the neighbours.  She turned to me and said, "I don't suppose they had such luxuries when you were learning."  Out came the Norfolk accent again as, with only a little exaggeration, I replied, "That we han't; that was 'jest a few rown's fer tha boiy afore we pack up'!"

So now you can see why this post began the way it did.  And later this afternoon I shall join that perceptive octogenarian, along with four others as we attempt a quarter peal ... but not of Grandsire, whatever way you choose to pronounce it!