What's Happening? - a page of miscellaneous interest.

The A-Team

The A-Team was formed in October 1999 following the merging of the Maldon and Ipswich Units.

The team members of the A-team first met at a dinner to commemorate 25 years service, and are both spookily very similar. They both work alike, think alike, and even their hand writing (using the same type of pen) is of the same neat and tidy quality. Often, one member would say “how about...”, and the other one would reply “I was just thinking about that!”

During the last year, both members have been going swimming once a week (in the same type of swimming trunks!) and built up the pace to 32 lengths of the pool. Over the course of those 32 lengths, which takes approximately 25 minutes, it was quite often found that both members finished within a few feet of each other. Afterwards in the showers it was discovered that both members, unbeknown to the other one, use the same shower gel.

The latest “spookyism” concerned a purple advertising pen, issued some two or three years ago. At a recent visit to a Pizza Hut, one of the team members was seen to be writing down a drinks list, and another colleague commented on the pen he was using. After describing where the pen came from, which by now is quite rare, the other member said “a bit like this one”, and produced from his pocket an identical purple pen!

The Holiday Page

Have a look at the Holiday Page for details of our favourite places to go. There is also a Photo Album to view.

With one of my interests as Steam Engines, and one of our favourite holiday places Cornwall, it is therefore no surprise that every year when we visit Cornwall, we make the annual pilgramage to the Bodmin and Wenford Steam Railway.

17 years ago in 1986, the railway bought a "Barry Wreck", a "Small Prairie", 2-6-2T No. 5552. Over the years we have seen the engine dismantled and slowly rebuilt. At one stage 5552 had it's own special shed, and one year there was great excitement when the bunker had been rebuilt using new steel plate and fittings from the original bunker.

Now, after all those years of hard work by staff and volunteers at the railway, the engine is running again.

On 12th August 2003 the engine made it's first self-propelled movement for 43 years out of the shed. Two days later various trials and test runs took place, and then 5552 officially returned to steam at the Steam Gala on 6th and 7th September 2003.

5552 outside the engine shed

For information and pictures of other steam engines at Bodmin, see the steam locos page at the Bodmin and Wenford Railway web site.

Coming soon - some amazing Robotic Lego models, some are Computer Controlled and Programmable.

Hyper Text Markup Language - it's what makes your web site tick.

Know your <P> from your <BR>, and how many can sit round a <TABLE WIDTH=780 CELLPADDING=2 CELLSPACING=0 BORDER=0>

All you ever need to know about the language your computer reads, and how to build a web site at the HTML Tutorial web site.

Conversions - from one unit to another (e.g.miles to kilometres).

Laws of Physics - calculate distance travelled, acceleration, gravitational pull and more.

Mathematical Equations solved, two calculators, trigonometric equations etc....

It's all here - in glorious, easy to see, javascript.