Category Archives: Past Times

Memories of a Moke!

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Yesterday I followed what might be described as a ‘Sixties Classic’ down to the town. I suddenly realised that I had forgotten they existed, and had a flash-back of a press photo from way back then. Despite an extensive search thanks to Mr Google, I can’t find the photo so it may just have been an illusion…

In the petrol station I met this bloke,
who was driving an original Mini Moke!
I remember a photo (of which I was fond),
astride a Moke – a ‘Hot-Panted’ blonde!
I was nine in sixty-four
Don’t remember much (soon be sixty-four!)
Of my faulty memory fun you may poke,
but I fancied the blonde more than the Moke!

Have a fun day and see if you too can have an illuminating flash-back today!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

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The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


 

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The Dens in the Wood!

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Every school group is different, every school visit is different, no two visits have ever been the same even when the visitors are from the same year group and the same school, like yesterday. The visit was going to plan, we were walking through the wood when suddenly a visitor suggested an activity I’d never considered…

“Please can we build a den?”
without a thought I said ‘Yes!’
And as a new part of the visit,
It was an immediate success.
It brought out leadership,
and co-operation,
both much-needed skills,
for a future nation!
Some were on transport,
fetching the wood,
Some were organising,
like an architect would,
But all were helping each other,
under the Hertfordshire sun,
but best of all,
they were having such fun!

With my grateful thanks to all 89 of you who have come to the farm this week with your teachers, I’ve learnt so much from all of you. Come again!
Enormous thanks also to Sara and the Countryside Trust for making it all possible http://www.countrytrust.org.uk
Have a great weekend. Stay happy, healthy and safe.
© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

 

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Cereals 2018 (b)

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Yesterday I went to Cereals 2018. Various people asked why, when I no longer had any arable acres, did I bother going. At first I couldn’t come up with a good answer. However having mulled it over while I was walking around amongst the giant tractors, combines and cultivation machines I suddenly realised the answer…

You can take the farmer out of the farm,
a move contemplated with some alarm,
when he’s been used to a harvest all his life,
(so have his friends, family and wife).
It is more to him than just a career,
with it’s worry, uncertainty and cash flow fear,
when you remove his arable armour,
you can’t take the farm out of the farmer.

Have a great day and enjoy what you do while you can and stay away from big toys you can’t afford or justify!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


 

 

 

 

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Simon Woz Ere!

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Have you ever wondered what you’ll leave behind after your day is done? Perhaps your lasting presence will be preserved in digital bytes on Twitface or similar? A piece of graffiti on a rail bridge gave me cause to ponder this question the other day…

‘Simon woz Ere”
written in paint,
apart from the spelling,
I found it quite quaint!
How did he do it,
was it done for a dare,
must have sat on the pipe,
with nary a care!
So let’s here it for ‘Simon’,
he can be sure,
that until workmen paint it,
his immortality’s secure!

I have to admit that despite sharing a name, I didn’t do it and haven’t the nerve nor the love of heights to leave such a marker!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


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The Donkey’s Half Trim!

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It’s a well-know fact that many farmers make bad gardeners unless they can use a tractor! In my garden I wage a love/hate war with the topiary. Topiary can be compared to a vegetable plot – fine where you just look at it in someone else’s garden, but it’s hard work and unlike vegetables you can’t just pop out to buy what you need in town! According to my late mother I am the eighth generation to cut the hedges, they should have had my battery-powered trimmer (with added beer!)…

I was trimming the garden topiary,
Dreaming of a beer!
When I reached the man on a donkey,
My arms were tired I fear.
The trimmer whirred and snipped away,
Cut around the donkeys head,
and just before I removed an ear,
The battery went suddenly dead!
So I put it back on charge,
Much-relieved I did appear,
There was much relief from dead relations,
So I revived myself with a beer!

If you are doing something skilled and need a hand today, don’t ask me to help!! Have a great weekend and I’ll see you on the other side!
Just in case you were wondering… the picture shows the man on a donkey half trimmed!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

 

 

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Where Old Caravans go to Die!

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Walking the dogs this week in rural Cambridgeshire, I came across an abandoned caravan in a small yard miles from anywhere. Such is life, that once you spot one, you spot more and by yesterday I’d seen more abandoned caravans than one could sake a stick at. I came to the conclusion in the middle of the night that I’d discovered where old caravans go to die…

I was awake and in my mind’s eye,
I wondered where caravans go when they die,
when you stop to look and stare,
you see dead caravans everywhere.

They remember a time,
when the kids were both young,
old-fashioned holidays,
in the rain and the sun,
such great excitement,
with Lucy and Lance,
queuing at Dover,
before a ferry to France.
Life slowed down,
when the kids left home,
Sid and Betty,
were left on their own,
gentle weekends,
with the caravan club,
a few days away,
in a field by a pub.
Sid stopped driving,
and Betty didn’t tow,
sold the van to a rider,
to take to a show,
but then the rider,
got bored with her horse,
the caravan now lays abandoned,
between the elder and gorse.

…as for boats,
it’s different I think,
they just give up,
and finally sink!

If you’ve been away in a caravan for Half-Term I hope you had a wonderful time and brought back many wonderful memories.

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


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Wedding Days!

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It is ironic that this weekend when millions are watching a certain wedding on TV, I, in my little corner of the world, have my mind firmly fixed on a wedding in a little Welsh village on the 19th May 1979 (also at 12 noon).
Have you ever looked at a photograph and wondered ‘what was I thinking at that moment?’ in an attempt to remember your thoughts at an important moment in your life.
The picture above shows me with semi-wet hair at the moment we said ‘I Do’.
All our lives are truly unique. We all have sunny days but when the storm hits the only option is to cling together and wait patiently for the rainbow and sunshine that always follows.
There is only one preparation for a life like this: Choose your partner well by choosing your best friend.
After all these years I can look back at this photo and know what I was thinking: “I’m so lucky she’s just said ‘yes!'”

I’M STILL AS LUCKY TODAY!

Have a great weekend and enjoy ‘that other wedding!’

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

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Holy Moly – It’s a Landmark!

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Desperately searching for a topic and photo this morning, both presented themselves by accident! The photo subject caught my eye on Saturday and was stored for later use and the topic caught my eye just now! This mornings post is dedicated to the hundreds of thousands who have read my offerings since February 2012…

Holy Moly,
Guacamole,

Look up with surprise
Fall off a log!
Today marks the seventeen-hundredth
Baldock Bard Blog!

Thank you for reading,
for being there,
have a great day!
You see – I care!

Have a great day and I’ll see you all tomorrow!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


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The May-Day Cowslip

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Using a ride-on mower on a lawn is a mixed blessing. While it is great to glide up and down the grass, it can be difficult to weave in and out of obstacles like hedges and flowerbeds. However one obstruction at this time of year is entirely worth the inconvenience (and un-mown patches of long grass!)…

There’s nothing quite like cowslips,
when they appear on your lawn,
you have to swerve the mower,
or in haste they’ll be shorn!
Their delicate strident yellow,
perfect contrast to the green,
the disruption’s always worth it,
for this annual April scene!

In years past the cowslip was used to decorate May-day head-dresses, Happy May the First!

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
starts 7am Every Saturday
until October 20ththOctober 2018
Buyers Park and Enter FREE!
www.u-boot.co.uk

It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD

 

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Memories of a Gentle Man

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I seem to have entered a phase in life where funerals comprehensibly out-weigh weddings, christenings and other celebrations! Yesterday, Mrs Bard and I went to say goodbye to a friends father, Roy. As I sat in the church watching people arrive, I wondered how they all fitted into the large jig-saw that was Roy’s life. Then I thought of how this ‘truly gentle-man’ fitted into ours…

Roy was a newspaper editor from the days when they were representative of the community they served and not just ‘swapsies’ for large faceless organisations. When our son was killed, it was to him we turned for help with writing the notice to be put into the newspapers. He sat in our kitchen and went through the word-options with such kindness and quiet helpfulness that the memory is vivid even some fifteen years later. When I delivered the eulogy for his daughter Sally’s funeral, he came up to me afterwards and paid me the greatest ever one-word compliment by simply saying ‘Thank you’, but in a way that conveyed a thousand unspoken words and emotions.
He had been a great amateur sportsman in his time and it was entirely fitting that we left the church to co to a ‘Cricket Tea’ afterwards.
The sun shone and the daffodils were in full bloom, how very appropriate.
Thank you Roy.

© Baldock Bard 2018
For more from the Baldock Bard click on ‘Home’ above

Facebook: Baldock Bard
Twitter: @baldockbard

The Baldock ‘Boutique’ Boot Sale
STILL HERE AFTER 26 YEARS!
Season starts 7am Saturday 14thApril 2018
It is the friendliest bargain bonanza anywhere!
Feed your hungry sat-nav with SG7 6RD


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