EileenH

Crikey! So many Calvertonians! I lived on Ramsdale Avenue as a kid, moved there from the Medders when Dad moved from Clifton Pit to Calvo Pit, then we moved to Salterford Avenue.

I`ve got a rescued greyhouind called Colonel. His racing name was Colonel Rhythm. He`s the third one we`ve homed from the Retired Greyhound Trust and he was in the worst condition. He was half his normal weight (can you imagine how skinny that is for a greyhound?) and had lost about half his hair to serious mange. It took a long time to get him fit for re-homing and he`s still a grumpy b&gger but we wouldn`t have any other breed now. Then about six months ago my OH was walking him and he spotted a budgie hopping along the gutter. When he got home he got a shoe box and went round to where

ditto. Are you sure you`re not me in disguise?

We must have been a vulgar lot. I remember the 'clapping song as - Once upon a time, The birds sh*t the line And Monkeys chewed tobaccer. The liitle pigs run With their fingers up their bum To see what was the matter.

Such a lot of childhood rhymes were skipping rhymes weren`t they? So many come back to me. Such as - There`s somebody under the bed Whoever can it be? I feel so jolly nervous. (Friend`s name) come into me. (Friend jumps into the rope) First I light a candle Then I look under the bed. Get out you fool! Get out you fool! There`s a monkey up your leg. The words indicate actions and the skipping carries on with a new skipper ad nauseam.

Oh the Grand old Duke of York He had ten thousand men. He marched them up to the top of the hill And he had them all again.

Erm - - Knock knock knockin on Heaven`s Door? and Another one Bites the Dust? I`ve always fancied Meatloaf`s Heaven Can Wait as well.

And the 40s!

Suppose this is something you don`t feel any more really. Do you remember when you`d been playing in the snow and your hands were freezing cold under your gloves (or old socks) and your mam said, 'Don`t warm them in front of the fire - you`ll get hot-aches.' And if you did it was excruciating. My grandchildren haven`t heard of - or felt - hot-aches. (`ot-aches). It wasn`t just a Medders thing was it?

I can`t usually get hold of Pork Farms pork pies but this year they were on sale in ASDA so I bought one. Disappointed. I found it strangely bland. Not as I remembered at all. Oh well - <sigh>.

It was always a holiday where I worked in the 60s - EMEB HQ. We understood that it was prolly cos some of the Board members were Scots

Before I left school in 1960 I was a 'Saturday girl' at Arnold Woollies at 14/9 a day and did babysitting for four bob, a bottle of pop, packet of crisps and two parkies. When I left I went to the EMEB as a trainee junior clerk for £4.10s.0d.a week. I tipped up my wages to me Mam and she gave me back £1 for bus fares and dinners and £1 for spending money.

My first car was a Triumph Toledo which lasted a year or two until it was scrapped - then a Datsun 100A, which lasted until I ran it into the back of a Barton`s bus. I was coming up to the lights at the top of the road from Gedling to Mapperley top - was it called Arnold Lane? I was behind the bus in the right hand lane when the lights changed and I did my famous hill start = revving like mad and clutch up to biting cos I was dead scared of stalling on that steep hill. Then my clutch cable snapped and I shot forward into the bus. So - I was stalled in the right hand lane. In gear. No clutch. F

Oh wow! I`d better get stitchin` then!

I do all kinds of textile art - felting, quilting, embroidery `n that. I`ve just finished doing two of my Christmas cards using a mixture of ribbon embroidery and beading. As each one took me a week only two special people get them! I started making a patchwork quilt a few years ago and it still lies half finished in a corner of the back bedroom. Every New Year I resolve, 'This is the year I finish the quilt!'

Ayup Dennis. Whereabouts did you live? What Primary School did you go to? Look forward to sharing memories with you.

And in the same area you could always find cowslips blooming! Wonder if you still can.

Gallivantin`? gallivantin`? If you mean always good for a light or the share of a Park Drive - - - -

Oh - and putting bits of school pudding in your hanky and feeding it to the ducks on the lake.

When I was at school we used to go on the Arboretum every day in the dinner time. We`d be marched down there in a 'crocodile', given a certain length of time to play and then had to line up in class order at the gate to be marched back to school. In the first and second years we would look at the aviary and play chasing games on the grass. By the 4th year it would be 'aving' a fag' behind the chinese bell thingy where the cannons were. Ee - tecks yer back, dunnit?

The roar of hundreds of pit boots on the cobbles as the day shift came up Hawthorn Street at the end of the shift.

Aw Thanks! !jumping!

Dorket Head! Brings back memories of biking back from Nottingham and knowing that it was a glorious freewheel all the way home to Calverton!

The waltzers! And just hanging around on the surround listening to the records. And being spun round by oily 'fair lads' who spun the cars round to make you scream.

I have Kale, savoy cabbages, brussels sprouts and leeks growing in my allotment. I`m still picking runner beans and tomatoes in my home garden and I`ve planted some carrots in a big container outside. In the next few weeks I`ll put my overwintering broad beans into root trainers ready to plant out in early November. I`ll also put some sweet peas into root trainers to overwinter ready to plant out next spring. I`ve got some trays of aquilegia and foxgloves on the back bedroom window ledge - if they germinate, that is. That`s about all really - oh, I`ve got a super crop of apples and pears this