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18th October 2006

As you will know Podge died this year. What you may not know is that Jane wishes to sell up in France and return to the UK. Apparently it takes some time to sell in France therefore any help would be benificial.
If you know of anyone who is contemplating a move to the continent, would you point them at the advertising site, www.VEFuk.com. The house reference number is 140123 and is called "The Cherry on the Cake" in the Tarn et Garonne region. It cannot do any harm.

Recent changes.

17th October 2006

Unfortunately I found that I was unable to update the site from my recent location, so nowt got done. However it was suggested at the last reunion meeting that a "guestbook" be placed on the site, I have found one that does not plaster banners all over the place and installed a link on the front left side with the other jump links. I will see how this runs for a while, but reserve the right to remove it if it starts getting abused. However there is no "Close" button so you have to use the "X" in the top right hand corner of the page.
Another minor hiccup is my lack of time to continue the site updates in the immediate future. My last company has made me an offer I found hard to refuse, and I am off to Abu Dhabi for a couple of weeks next Sunday, so all the rest will have to wait another three weeks.
I have put another group shot, 1 wing 3 sqdn, from when we joined on the "Old Photies" page, and some scanned shots that Mike Plimmer gave me at the reunion. These are available by clicking his name on the same page.
I spoke to Glennie about a week ago, and she sounded very upbeat, though she bemoaning the fact that she had very little to wear of the correct size, due to her lack of appetite. Let us all hope that that particular side effect of the chemo sorts itself out soon.
The swallows have disappeared off back to NZ, and I assume Colin and Jane Beale have done a similar trip to OZ. He is however unavailable on his email, so would appreciate him getting in touch with me soonest please, if he is reading this.

28th September 2006 Mike Godfrey spoke to Glennie Richardson last night and she sounded Very perky. She also said that her consultant had told her that as far as he was concerned Glennie was technically in remission. She still has two sessions of chemo to go through but things are definitely looking brighter.
On a more mundane note, I have managed to write the pages and upload the photgraphs of THE DO. They are only available via the reunion page. I have managed to deal with a few old photographs given to me for publication, but not all. These will have to wait about three weeks 'cos believe it or not I am off on holiday yet again tomorrow. I will however be checking my email so feel free to contact me whenever.
Please note that there are a lot of photographs on the pages and it could take a while to download, even though I have dropped the resolution as far as possible, any comments made on photographs or otherwise are purely my own, if you take offence - - - - HARD LUCK.

26th September 2006 Published mugshots and group photographs, problem is a couple of ladies names to faces escape me. So if they are the ones you swapped a cow and two camels for, and have lost your salary for the past million years please let me know.

25th September 2006 Nobody mentioned it to me, but have just found and fixed an errors on the reunion page. The links to the past reunions were not working.
Amendment of names made to train platform photograph in Dick Leonards and Mike Godfrey photographs.
Photo of Johns Horan and Mackenzie added to Old Photo's area and another boxing team photograph added to Fred Munsons old photo's.

19th September 2006 Just a quickie, have changed the reunion page to next years date and fixed the duff link to the RAFHAAA site. Will be updating as soon as possible with regard to the 50th.

4th September 2006 It has only taken 50 years but Brian (Happy) Gillett has finally managed to make contact with us and will be attending Ross-on-Wye in 10 days time, as will Ken Rowe and the very welcome addition of Jane Price. Brians email address is on the contacts page. Unfortunately Jeff Richardson has had to withdraw because Glenny is not very well, but as far as I am aware everyone else who said they were coming - are, plus the ones above. Let us hope the weather is kind to us, no bottles get broken going in and that we all have a bloody good time. John will be relieved, I believe he is onto his third draft speech and fourth bottle of wine, and there is still 10 days to go. (I am OK he says he doesn't read this, he still has dialup)
One other thing to note is that the address for the RAFHAAA site has been changed, the URL from this site is the new one so all should be well, Roger Harvey has finally given up on AOL and gone to Waitrose.
See you at the Do.

23rd August 2006 Those of you who have booked for the reunion should have received a "Starter for 10" pack from John, giving all information about location and check in times, if you haven't - contact him soonest. If you have not booked, then I am afraid you are too late unless we get a cancellation through unforeseen circumstances. I trust that you have all strengthened the right arm in preparation for this momentous occasion even if the prices appear to be rather stiff by Northern standards. Guys who live around the London area will not even notice, I am so pleased my son gave me a hip flask last Christmas.
I for one am looking forward to the next 22 days passing by, and DO NOT FORGET YOUR ID CARDS. If you ain't got one you will get one when I get there.

7th August 2006 Having just been on detachment to the South of England for my sons wedding, I took the opportunity to visit a few friends on the way back "Up North". One of them lives in Carterton (near Brize) and I tried to visit Dave Bowles who had not been answering my emails. Now he never will, a neighbour informed me that he died of cancer in May of this year.
38 days to go to the 50th as I write this, I have to admit that there are more attending than other years, but I am disappointed that there are not more coming, especially from those who have been before. Are we doing it wrong?????, or is it down to army yet again and General Apathy.
I am looking forward to it anyway, soooo there.
One more thing, Ian Blunt has changed his internet address, see contact page for details.

14th July 2006 You should by now have received the latest newsletter scribed by John giving details of the 50th and proposed attendees. If you have not "volunteered" yet but still wish to come, contact him soonest please.
Three more guys have been found or have made themselves known to us. they are
Roy Bourne, who has changed his name to Yuval, now living in Switzerland.
Dick Freestones email address was sent to me by John Fenwick. No idea where he is living yet.
The unfortunate notification was for John Hammond who came to us from the 82nd, Dave Pearson of the 82nd informed me that John died of a brain tumour in September 2003.

16th June 2006 As we served our Queen prior to 31st December 1959 it appears that we will be able to claim the Veterans Badge with effect from 27th June 2006. An application form has to be sent to Veterans Agency, Thornton-Cleveleys, Norcross, Blackpool, FY5 3WP after this date, but the form can be downloaded from here http://www.veteransagency.mod.uk/vets_badge/application_form.pdf.
What also may be of interest to some of our members is the granting by the Queen of the issue of The Pingat Jasa Malaysia Medal to all HM forces who served in Malaysia up to 1966. Although there is a bit of a controversy over the wearing of this foreign medal it is available to qualified personnel. The application form should be sent in the first instance to
Mr Fred Burden
Membership Secretary
National Malaya & Borneo Veterans Association
44, Meadgate Avenue
Great Baddow
Chelmsford
CM2 7LQ
Tel No. 01245 495238
The application forms can be obtained from http://www.veteransagency.mod.uk, or I can send you one in pdf format.
We are in luck, Bob Marshall has changed his plans and is coming to the 50th after all, so come on all you happy chappies who are undecided, pull your finger out, and pay up.

29th May 2006 Not one but three new email addresses this update, including two "newly found" brats. Well they found us really but very welcome nevertheless, they being Gerry Bassett living in Ireland but coming over for the 50th, and a recently retired Bob Marshall living in Fife, who unfortunately has a prior engagement over the 50th period. The third address is for Sonnie Raee who we knew of, but appears to have recently joined the internet world. All three addresses are now on the contacts page.
The funeral for Podge took place on 3rd May in St Antonin Noble Val, France, and the family will be holding a Memorial Service for him on Tues, 6th June at St John's church Aldbury, where I know the entry will be represented.

9th May 2006 George Gibson has informed me of his change of email address after retirement, Phil Horton has ventured into the 21st century and purchased a PC, so now has an email address. For both of these see the contacts page.
The number of rooms provisionally booked for the reunion have still not been filled, so there is still time for you chaps who are undecided to "take the plunge" and send the loot to John together with your booking and any peculiar requirements.

30th April 2006 It is with great sorrow that I have to report that Podge Price will not now be coming to the reunion, he died on the morning of 26th April. Jane tells us that they discovered the root cause of his disability on the day previous to his death after two weeks in hospital, a massive cancer in his head.
On a more mundane note please note that Bob Collar has changed his email address.

18th April 2006 Mr Billings of Australian fame sent me an email with some names for Dave Woods photo, it was then that I realised that I had uploaded the incorrect HTML to the website, the one without the names. I have now uploaded the correct file with the names that Dave supplied and all should be well. We are still missing names from some of the photographs on the site, and with the expansion of broadband it may be that some of have recovered from memory loss since your last look. Please have a shufty and let me know if you recognise anyone else.
John has not informed me of how many have responded to the newsletter, but I can only reiterate that the monies for the 50th reunion are due in before the first day of May.

29th March 2006 Dave Wood has sent me a picture of 2 Wing 2 Squadron B Flight from 1956 and Laurie Williamson sent in two more photos of the passout march past together with another of 3 Wing rook block room 4. These have been published under "old pictures" on this site. Names have been added where available, but of course you may know better, so do not be backward in coming forward with your own suggestions. Laurie also sent in some of himself at that time and these I have published under his own name on the site.
You should by now have received an email with details of the September reunion. If you have not, please contact me direct because I obviously do not have your correct email address.
Please note that Eric Shipley and Brian Jones have changed their email addresses and Sam Hammond has got one.(see contacts)

11th March 2006 Better news this time, Laurie Williamson made himself known to John in the last few days, he put the chocks under the wheels in Lincolnshire and his email address has been added to the contacts page.
John still reckons he is about to produce the latest newsletter, so when I come back off holiday I expect to be busy.

1st March 2006 Sad news again guys, Alfie (Cyril) Fletcher, of whom we had no knowledge until now, has attended his last parade. Brian Atkinson of 83rd fame has just informed us that he died of heart troubles on 15th April 2005. One more found but under the wrong circumstances.
John informs me that he is brewing up the next newsletter, and that it should include information on the reunion, cost etc. Look forward to that and will ship it out as soon as I get it. The evening entertainment planned at Holme Lacy House for that weekend is as follows. - (FRI) Teamshow (SAT) Elton Glam and The Rocket Band (SUN) Eagles by Talon. No big names but should be good. Rumour has it that there could be guys there from halfway round the world.

16th February 2006 Due to a cock up by NTL I lost my email account for two days, this means that any mail sent to "ridskid@ntlworld.com" has probably been bounced, whether you will get a notification I do not know. However a nice lady in India has now after many telephone calls managed to restore the original email address. Unfortunately I have lost the web storage part and am having to upload all the data to another area, so if the website does not work the way it is supposed to, please let me know and I will attempt to fix it. Because of this error on their part I have also set up another address on which I can be reached, this is "ridskid@googlemail.com"
Frank Hedgecock has finally got, or decided to give me his email address, Ken Rowe and Eric Shipley have changed theirs. All three have been added to the contacts page and mine has been changed therein.
Pete Rushen has sent me an interesting link to RAF life, with the suggestion that it would suit the rest of us, see the link in "Other Websites" from the front page.
Bill Sherman has finally had his telephone installed after all this time courtesy of Spanish Telecom, and has found the joys of SKYPE, if you have Skype you can find him by using his email address for the search.

1st February 2006 Dave Wood of 2 Wing engine fitter fame contacted me out of the blue, so have added his email address to the contacts page. Not only that but he gave me the address of Alan Weeks who is alive and well in Cornwall. That means that we now know the whereabouts of 186 members.

19th January 2006 Happy New Year to all our readers, especially 84th. Remember this is our 50th anniversary year, so plan on doing something special in September and come to Ross-on-Wye, see the reunions page for the info.
A couple of our guys got a bit upset at the deceased roll call in the back of the last Haltonion. It initially seemed that we were dropping like flies 'cos they failed to look at the dates of the events. I had never seen an entry there for any of our guys so I sent an email to the Halton "committee" with a full list asking for them to be published if they had never been before. Well that was the result, so apologies to all for the scare, I have now taken it upon myself to inform Halton of any future events of that nature that come to my attention.
Mike Willett has really been changing his life around, he has retired, well nearly, got married for the third time and changed his email address. I can understand two of those but this liking for wedding cake is a bit much, you would think he would learn wouldn't you. Reckons he is using bits of his body that he hasn't even seen for years, I wouldn't know what he is talking about. Anyway congratulations and good luck to Mike and Susan from all the entry, anybody going to Melbourne, give him a call.
We have now got hold of Leon Underwoods email address as well, so he has been added to the contacts page along with Mikes change.
Did you know that Skype now has a video capability, so video calls are here chaps, see how old we look (for free), slows it down a bit but works well otherwise.

END