Old News - 2013

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April 2013

• There is actually very little news at the moment as I have spent the last 3 months settling into Pateley. I feel as if I have lived here for years! I love the house, I love Pateley and I love the locals who have made me very welcome.
• I have done some decorating already and a few essential works - the first of which was to create a third of an acre dog proof pen as I’m surrounded on 3 sides by sheep! Tinker has still escaped twice and I can’t for the life of me find out how she is getting out - but at least I caught her both times before she reached the fields with sheep!
• I have thrown myself into several new groups such as the Summerbridge WI, the Pateley dramatic society and I’m going be trained in July to be a First Responder.
• I am also trying to get a jazz jam session together in Pateley, but it is proving a little difficult as all the music around here is mainly brass bands or folk. I did however gate crash the classical orchestra one week and give out jazz flyers!
• I am eventually knuckling down to do some writing, although I have booked on another Arvon writing course, this time to focus on  travel writing. As I have already written 3 books on my travels, getting some tips and hints on the course, may make the next edit more fruitful.
• I haven’t actually booked any travels yet - even though before I moved the plan was to unpack boxes then book immediately for Peru. As settling in has taken longer and has been more pleasurable than I anticipated, Peru will have to wait until later in the year!
• Finally, I’m speaking at Warwick University on Saturday 18th May about “Happiness”. As an old student I received their alumni invitation by email just after I had moved and was feeling especially “happy”. The day had academic speakers talking about “The happiness effect”. I then had the gall / impudence / arrogance to drop them a line and say that it was all very well having academics talking about happiness but what they really needed was someone talking about designing their own happiness and I volunteered. To my utmost surprise - they said yes!

July 2013

• The talk at Warwick University about happiness and my second life in May went down extremely well, and many people either said afterwards or sent me an email to say how inspiring they found it, which was great.
• I am not having much luck in setting up Pateley jazz despite 2 ads in the local mag and flyers. I’ve had more interest from people wishing me well as they would like to come along and listen, than I have musicians wanting to play!
• I am really enjoying the WI and recently did one of their day course on learning to play Mahjong. I could very easily become addicted, as it’s a fascinating game of strategy - I just need to find 3 other people to play with!
• I recently returned from another excellent Arvon training course. I did an introduction to creative writing last year and this year a week about travel writing. One of the authors running the course, Chris Stewart (Driving over lemons), gave three bits of advice (amongst others): 1. To be a writer, you have to write. 2. You need to read lots 3. It’s helpful to join a local writing group to keep the momentum going. So I decided that on my return I would become a writer, and I now “go to work” each day to work on my material. I’ve bought a load of second hand travel books to read, and I’ve joined the Pateley writing group. Yep - I certainly don’t let the grass grow under my feet! I have however stopped the journalist course as it was just too “Mickey Mouse”. The tutorials and feed back from assignments goes on and on about typos and grammar, and yet their material is littered with such errors. I contacted the British College of Journalism (dot com!) about this and was told that their proof readers try their best! As I mainly wanted to do the course to help with my travel journals, I got got zillions more advice and support from the Arvon writing course than I would if I completed the journalism course. So that comes off my bucket list!
• I have started making enquiries about a trip to Peru and Easter Island, but have yet to find something within my budget. Although I wanted to do it entirely solo, I may have to join a group for part of it just to be able to afford it.
• My interest in nature didn’t wane at all after leaving Seven Acres, and indeed I have an abundance of wildlife here, and with the arrival of Red Kites a few days ago, I am already planning to make a feeding station for them. So I have added a Pateley Nature page to this site.

• And talking of wildlife …. I had an extraordinary day’s outing to Bedford to Walk with Wolves… SEE HERE