Jill Sparrow

Don't try dancing in them now! I still have some blocks but no longer have the strength in my legs to do Pointe work. Old age!

We did have standards!!

As with @The Pianomanlast year, I don't qualify as I'm born after the September watershed! At least he will get his this year!

This dates from 1956. It is, supposedly, Berridge Senior Boys' School. I've asked PP to look at it as I'm not sure about the blazer badges. Some look like the Berridge badges whilst others look different. It's a concert of some kind, clearly. The stage may be the one Letsavagoo remembers from the upper hall. I do remember it vaguely, as I cavorted about on it in the first year juniors wearing my pink party frock, pink satin ballet shoes and performing my Sugar Plum Fairy dance at Christmas. I also recall the headmaster, Jack Baugh, speaking to us in assembly from an elevated position at that

I don't know, CT, but I will ask his sister and advise you of the answer. It is a pretty unusual name. Having checked the birth records, I can't find anyone else with that name, so you're almost certainly correct.

Thanks to Letsavagoo for posting this interesting photo from around 1954. An old classmate of mine had two much older brothers at Berridge and the younger of the two sent her a couple of his old photos. This photo shows the penultimate year for those born in 1944/5. My friend's brother Markham (Mark) Handfield is on the front row, third from the left. We are still compiling a list of names and I'll post these shortly. This photo is taken at a strange angle in what looks like a corner of the hall.

I once taught a child whose mother was grossly overweight and had tried everything to lose a few stones. In desperation, she announced that she was going to have her jaw wired together to prevent her eating foods she shouldn't have. She had this procedure carried out privately but still didn't seem to lose any weight. Some weeks later, she announced that she'd had the wiring removed. I commiserated that it hadn't achieved the desired effect. She agreed that it hadn't... because she was liquidising fish and chips, pizzas and all sorts of other stuff and drinking them through a straw! She went

Pleased to hear that all went well at Kings Mill, Ben, and a few laughs were to be had. Humour and colonoscopy make strange bedfellows but if anyone can reconcile the two of them, it's you!

Hope all is going well for Ben down at Kings Mill Hospital today. If he dislikes that place as much as I do, he'll be gritting his teeth every time he drives past but, Ben being Ben, he'll have them dancing in the aisles and laughing. Laughter truly is the best medicine.

I don't know about you but I always get out of the same side of the bed and rarely in a patronising frame of mind. It could be argued that permitting yourself to be portrayed on tabloid front pages most days of the week, dressed in sequins and grinning at the press photographers might encourage those perverted individuals who are so minded to develop unhealthy obsessions such as stalking. The oxygen of publicity has much to answer for. Many there are who seem to revel in it until it turns on them as it invariably does.

Given the horrendous mess the world is in at present, who cares what some simpering, blonde haired bimbo is doing. I don't like the expression 'bimbo' but, for goodness sake, do we really need images of her inane grin, clad in sequins on every front page? There are far more serious things to write about, surely.

Sounds like front page news. Tomorrow's fish and chip wrappings!

That's not going to curry favour with the owner. What happened to their (mushy) peas and queues?

Make hay while the sun shines!

It's a minefield, Malcolm. If you are euthyroid (ie your thyroid is in balance) then you shouldn't have a cholesterol problem but if not then you probably will. We shouldn't need to explain this to the GP but it's more often than not the case. Thyroid patients can experience TSH levels that can skyrocket for no apparent reason, leading to drastic amendments in dosage, leading to nasty knock on effects on how we feel. It's an area which is little understood, especially by GPs.

Interesting post, LBF. Many of these Victorian schools housed the whole spectrum of educational years until the mid 60s or so. I went to nearby Berridge and a similar system operated there. Also interesting to note that both schools are still alive and well.

When I was around four years old, my mother trod on a bar of soap whilst getting out of the bath. She slipped and fell heavily over the side of what was then a cast iron, roll top bath tub, the type so beloved of folks today. She was only in her mid 30s but fractured several ribs. In those days, the treatment was to wrap the upper torso in heavy duty sticking plaster. She seemed to cope fairly well until it was time to remove it some weeks later. She said the pain of removing the sticking plaster was worse than the pain of broken ribs. It was put on at the old Nottingham General

I'll bet he was called George or William, as are a lot of the folks on the Indian subcontinent who are employed in such roles. One of them rang me recently for British Gas. He said his name was Charles. I told him my name was Sita. That appeared to be lost on him.

My father claimed to have danced with Bette Davis somewhere out in the tropics during WW2. She was his favourite actress and every time one of her films was shown on tv, he'd tell us how he danced with her. I asked him if that was the reason why she walked with a limp. Actually, my father was a very good dancer. I suppose, thinking about it, he could well have met her during one of her visits to the troops.

Many people have a very limited vocabulary.

In 1944, my mother walked the same route with a massive suitcase en route to the NAAFI station at Garats Hay. Not a very propitious start but she made many good friends during her war service there. Lots of dances, time off and, unlike many of those in the ATS, no shortage of food, make up or nylons.

Mine have cats on!!

Someone gave me a pair of those a couple of years ago! Other than that, I know nothing about them.

Actually, I meant email...cos I can't read my PMs either. No I didn't know her but it's not difficult to find information in the public domain re her marriage and children.

I've PMd you on the above, Beekay.