For thems that don’t know, Hago is a classical guitar orchestra based in, well Hampshire surprisingly. The Orchestra was formed by Derek Hasted in 1999 and will be celebrating its 100^th concert in June of this year. The Orchestra has raised a shedload of cash for both local and national charities and fully intend to continue in that vein.

Hago has performed in venues all over the South of England and play music which is as varied as the sizes of instruments they use; from Baroque to Spanish, The Beatles to Dvorak on four different sizes of guitar. There’s the tiny Alto, the baby of the family (but the most tricky to play!) the Prime (the ‘ordinary’ one we all know well) the Bass (bigger than the Prime and lower in pitch) and finally the Contra (which the Hago Director states is a little like a wardrobe in its size!) this has the lowest pitch of all the four.

So yes, all very interesting you say but so what? Well here’s where you come in. Hago are playing a once-only concert on 26^th May 2012 at All Saints Church, Milford-on-Sea. It’s on behalf of Naomi House and Jack’s Place and tickets are £8 in advance or £10 on the door. These can be purchased by calling 01962 672457 or email Nicole.denison@naomihouse.org.uk  Or send an SAE & cheques payable to The Wessex Children’s Hospice Trust to Nicole Denison, Naomi House fundraising office, Unit 3, Sun Valley Business Park, Winnall Close, Winchester, SO23 OLB.

If you haven’t heard about them, Naomi House and Jack’s Place are two children’s hospices based at Sutton Scotney in Hampshire. They provide support to children and young people with life-limiting conditions from all over the South of England. The two units mean that the hospices can provide care structured to the needs of both younger and older children as well as now also helping young adults (over 18’s) at the recently opened Jack’s Place.

The hospices provide a range of service from end of life care to respite care, bereavement services and family support. They also provide a hospice at home service. It costs £5 million to keep the hospices running each year; only 10% of these costs are paid using money given by the department of health which means a staggering £4.5million must be found through charitable work and donations.

So there you have it, a worthy cause and a good time. Unbeatable. If you need further convincing some of the music being played is as follows;

Plink Plank Plunk

Bransle de la Torche  (See Below)

Penny Lane

Elizabethan Serenade

Danza Cubana

plus more which you’ll only find out about if you go!

So first place to start I thought was Lymington’s very own modern carbuncle, the town library. In passing I really must commend our library to all. OK the building itself might seem more Boy Georgian than Georgian and no doubt is not too everyone’s taste. But in a town with many limitations to disabled access, it is a shining light of what should be aimed at by all. Admittedly it does suffer from the perennial Lymington parking issue, ie not enough unless you choose your time carefully, but it does have two disabled spaces right next to the door. More to the point they are not just a nod in the yellow paint direction and actually have enough room hashed out either side to allow for the car doors to be fully opened. Full marks for that. To gain access you just have to walk or wheel with fully automated doors on a level surface to a reasonably low-level counter. Did I mention that you can register online and get an email when your books are due and can renew up to four times without leaving your computer? I didn’t? Well you can and most efficient it is too.

Anyway I digress. Once in and having taken my pick of crime novels, my personally preferred genre, I took a look at the local history section. I’m not sure exactly why, but there were a number of editors at some point who concluded that it would be a wizard wheeze to take a varied collection of black and white postcards and bind them into books. What I’m even less sure of is why said images were considered to be suitable for postcards. However I am very glad they did. Despite the denizens of and visitors to Lymington doing the old-fashioned version of ‘Hello Mum’ and freezing whilst staring into the camera, it is possible to see how little certain parts of Lymington have changed. As exhibit 1 I give you a view of the High Street from c.1955 showing St Thomas’ church and surroundings.

Very easy to see what has been retained compared to this recently taken shot.

I then looked a little further back and found another High Street view this time from 1860.

I don’t have a modern day version of this view as it’s pouring down outside and I’m frankly not disposed to go out to take it. However you will see from this photograph from a similar date that Boots Opticians seem to have taken over the ground floor of the Londesborough Hotel.

There are a great many similar examples of buildings that have been mostly unchanged for a century, some considerably more, but does it matter? Well you have to make up your own mind on that, but to my mind removing buildings with history to replace them with buildings of convenience has to be very carefully considered. We are an Island which prides itself on our history but once gone historical postcard collections may be all we are left with. I think that would be sad.

Since Wife has some trouble with stairs and such, we had often commented on the fact that it was nice of Barclays to put in a big pushy buttony type thing which meant you didn’t have to open the door yourself. Call us picky if you will, but we had also concluded that having to mount two stairs to get at it did tend to take the shine of their largesse.

So having noted Barclays welcome if a tad tardy move into a more enlightened age, I fell to wondering how easy access was in all the other banks and building societies on the High Street. So in descending order of altitude, ie starting at St Thomas’ end, here is the brief survey. Probably worth noting this is what one might call a kerbside view and consisted entirely of me wandering along the High Street with pen and paper pausing at all the banks and building societies and making notes. On reflection that may possibly have looked a tad suspicious, but I seem to have got away with it.

Nationwide – 4 steps to front door with electric door release next to door. Ring for assistance bell push at pavement level. Didn’t ring for assistance so no idea how they would have got you up the steps.

Post Office – OK stricly not a bank but does have banking facilities. Flat, wide entrance, open door, didn’t look like access was a problem.

Cheltenham & Gloucester – 3 steps to front door, something called a ‘Service Call’ facility via a window-mounted box. It would appear to need a gadget to get it to work see http://www.service-call.net/

Halifax – auto opening door with low ramp.

Santander – 2 steps up to entrance, no call facility visible. Door auto opens though was propped open when I saw it.

Lloyds TSB – Auto opening door, entrance level with street.

NatWest - Auto opening door, entrance level with street.

HSBC - Auto opening door, entrance level with street, slight internal ramp.

Barclays – 2 steps to front door with electronic door push. Signs to auto open door with electronic entry push in alley by side of bank.

All the above establishments can be considered to be above the vertiginous part of the High Street although you might feel a little on the edge venturing as far down as Barclays if you were in a wheelchair or not too steady on your feet.

So it’s a bit of a mixed picture really. Almost all at least nod in the direction of disabled access, but it’s not clear what would happen should you call for help. I do have a Pythonesque image of them carrying out a desk and chair and transacting on the pavement.  Actually in absence of fact, perhaps it would be better not to joke about that. You never know….

It was billed as the Christmas bash where every offering had to be Christmas related. Now I don’t know about you, but at such a time stuffed full of traditional, and stuffing filled with Thyme, I don’t mind the annual trotting out of standards. Seems that everyone is trying to be edgy and ironic which doesn’t exactly help the sing-along aspect of a lot of traditional songs. Of course when I say traditional songs that includes Santa Claus is Coming to Town and it’s ilk.

So when it was announced at one point that the performer wasn’t going to do the obvious choice of songs, I have to confess to feeling a tad deflated. It’s not like I was expecting All Around my Hat, but I was hoping to exercise the vocal chords to some degree. As it turned out the song that followed was the Fairytale of New York, though the Christy Moore one, not the Pogues version. And a decent fist was made of it as well, though to my mind it’s become something of a Christmas standard in it’s own right.

Enough of the high-falutin music discourse, the evening was about enjoying yourself and aided by the Ringwood Brewery, we did just that. An added bonus was that having walked into the bar at the start we met our friend Mr Jim Anderson, accordion player extraordinaire, who not only got the first round in, but was shortly afterwards up on stage exercising his superb accordion stylings. In theory it was a Christmas medley, but so many tunes were included so quickly perhaps a Christmas mash-up would be a better description. For me one of the highlights of the evening.

Now if I were any kind of a diligent reviewer I would have taken note of all the performers and therefore been able to steer you on their relative merits. However the convivial atmosphere and the assistance of Messrs Ringwood meant that I can’t do that. Oh well. However I did particularly like the band with the young bloke playing the ukulele banjo. I like ukuleles, I like Christmas. What’s not to like.

What I can do is recommend the Lymington Folk Club as a good way to spend an evening. If the Christmas bash is representative of their regulkar meetings, then don’t wait until the evening is due to start to turn up. The seats will all be gone and you’ll have to stand at the back. There are worse things to have to do but I’m just saying.

Finally I can only wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. It’s not Folk, but it’s my Christmas song for this year. A wonderful Reggae track from the Maytals. Apologies for the advert at the start.

One lives in hope. If my tv had its own voice it would probably have said ‘I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that’. Funny how one always expects electronic goods of any sort to start channeling HAL when things go wrong. Blue or Yellow made no odds. Change channel, turn off, turn back on, message in black box. So I thought maybe it’s imminent and therefore necessary that I do something right now. So I Googled when the digital switchover was due putting in my postcode and noticed that my house name or number was also requested. A little strange, so I made use of the ‘Why do you need this?’ link only to be told that the results would be a lot more accurate if I input this detail.

Now I’m no expert on public transmitters, digital or otherwise, but I have the sneaking suspicion that, unless you live on a road the length of the M3 the number of your house isn’t going to make that much difference to which transmitter you are getting your signal from. This suspicion was born out when the results came back saying ‘The Rowridge transmitter in the Meridian TV region is your most likely transmitter.’ So much for accuracy.

Expecting the changeover date to be that night because of the insistence of my tv, I was a little surprised to see that it was in March 2012. A horrible thought then dawned on me, what if this was going to happen every time I changed channel or switched on until Spring next year? Fortunately it seemed that there was to be no repeat the following day, or the day after. One cannot help but have the sneaking suspicion that the black box may be appearing again before we are launched into the digital wonderland next March. One last little point to give us all the feeling this will all go fine and dandy is a note on the Digital UK website which says “You won’t see these messages if you already watching digital TV (e.g Sky TV, Freview or another) or if your aerial is pointing at another transmitter that will switch at a different time.” That worked then and nice to know they can spell ‘Freeview’. Details such as they are below.

As good fortune would have it, my sister had the sense to marry someone who is currently employed chopping down trees, grinding stumps and generally creating logs for our stove. Result. Since he also cuts hedges and does other remarkably green type things, we normally get a visit late autumn from the entire family with a large trucky thing full of logs which gets exchanged for a trucky thing full of hedge clippings. Can’t see why this sort of thing hasn’t caught on. Shame they live in Surrey Dorking Tree Surgeons.

All that was needed to safely ignite said logs was someone to sweep the chimney. Wife suggested it could be me as I had accidentally purchased a chimney brush when I bought an extending drain cleaning jobbie from B&Q. Don’t ask, it was while the MiL was still with us and is best not discussed. Anyways when unwrapped it also had a circular brush which could be attached to the same extendible shaft. Obviously it had seemed like a natural pairing by someone at B&Q head office, maybe there had been a greater than normal chimney brush bristle harvest and they badly need to get rid of the excess. Hmm, bad enough typing that, wouldn’t want to have to say it aloud quickly. One thing I have learnt about DIY’ing things of which you know nothing, the phrase ‘a little knowledge is a dangerous thing’ was written for it. A professional chimney sweep was required.

Fortunately it’s not hard to get a chimney sweep in Lymington, getting an appointment suggested that many other people don’t think of getting their chimney swept until they want to set fire to something. In the end the Big Yellow Monster rolled up, an impressive 4×4 stating it’s business very clearly on the side. Fortunately Barry the efficient sweep refrained from saying ‘Cor blimey Mary Poppins’ even once in my hearing, reported all fine and having used the biggest Henry I’ve ever seen (Henry the eighth?) to keep the soot issue an non-issue, departed. Maybe to a wedding or other significant social event since the business card clearly stated that attendance at weddings was all part of the service. It also states that there is a Guild of Master Sweeps, one can only imagine what their Christmas party is like.

Sorry, couldn’t resist. Anyway if you need Dick Van Dyke Barry we finally got him on 610221.

So as the BBC sound effects wind howls around the house, we hunker down, wait for the thaw and practice wassailing, whatever that is.

It was announced earlier today that The Torch would travel to within ten miles of 90% of the population during its roughly 8000 mile journey. You have to wonder how they do it, I suspect dark arts, or at least Google Maps. Actually at times they seem to be the same thing. Wonder if Google will sponsor it. They could put a camera in The Torch and update a whole bunch of their spy camera Street View images at the same time. I’ve been expecting a knock on the door any time with them offering untold amounts of dosh for my insightful marketing ideas for a while now. Strange it hasn’t happened yet though…

Anyways, for more information than you probably care for on the subject, the Blessed Beeb have the dope on it at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15572381

But if you’re looking for info on whether it’s going to come down your road, don’t hold your breath. At least not unless you can hold it until ‘later in 2012′ which is when the detailed map comes out.

Please note-

Since we are due quite a lot of rain here on Saturday, it has been moved to Sunday at the Pennington Recreation Ground, Lodge Road, Pennington.

Details as follows;

Gates open 5pm Fireworks 6.30pm

Adults £4 Children (4 to 16) £2.00

Free Parking on Pennington Common

Judging the Guy 6.00pm

“Best Walking Guy” and “Best Guy in a Wheelbarrow”

Apparently they are not have a “Sweet Talking Guy” as that was a hit song from the sixties by the Chiffons. I don’t just throw these together you know. OK, I do, still you learnt some pop trivia you may not have known before.

For even more detail (of the fireworks, not the Chiffons) go to http://www.lymingtonrotary.org.uk/Fireworks.html

That’s it, nothing more to see, move along.

Not suprisingly there is a Wikipedia (aka always utterly, utterly true) entry just on that one guitar. However if you view it any romantic ideas of one man, one guitar are quickly dispelled. Lucille is many. And some weren’t even Gibsons, oh the horror. I guess if you’re not into guitars then that won’t make any sense to you, but at least I didn’t start on about whether the guitar had  a Tune-o-matic bridge or a TP-6 stop tailpiece. It does amuse me how intense some guitarists get about the techie side of things. I’m not one of them, if it sounds right then it is right as far as I am concerned. So get to the point I hear you say. OK, I will.

For I while now, well since I made the mistake of looking on the Dean Guitars website, I have been somewhat enamoured with one of their acoustic guitars. Watching the documentary about the bloke from House and his blues music I saw him play the exact same model. Sounded mighty fine. But still costs money for those of us who aren’t sufficiently gifted or high-profile to have one with our own signature printed on it given free by the kindly manufacturers. But a chance to sell one of my current guitars came up and so taking the plunge I got the object of my desires and sold my previous BFF. Best Friend Forever if you’re not down with da kidz. Whatever.

Which got me thinking. I also own a Fender 12 string electro acoustic JG12CE-12 (image below) which would get played more if there were more blue moons. As it stands it is therefore not only surplus to requirements, it is also an asset. So anyone with 300 of the Queens pounds gets the guitar along with a pretty decent hard case and I get to wonder what delights I can purchase in the music shop next visit. Now that I think you will agree is what we call an equitable agreement. If interested, use the Contact page to send me a message. If not interested, find someone who is and pass it on. Simples.

I have no idea what the judging criteria was as it seems that the organizers main focus was in getting all the competitors to race a sufficient number of times to sink most of them. I was minded of the concept of testing to destruction in order to ascertain quality of design. In truth it really didn’t take long for the limitations of some designs to be well and truly found out. We were given to understand that one particular tub hadn’t even been tested in terms of actually floating. I think it safe to say that actually putting it in the water turned out to be a step too far. Not a particularly welcome feature for something designed to be a water-borne method of transport. Still, from dry land at least it was a thoroughly experience watching others misfortunes. Particularly when the misfortunes were brought about in shall we say a planned fashion by other contestants.

As ever at this sort of do, I took an awful lot of pictures, here’s just a few…