Yes all packed and ready to go for the Belgium and Luxembourg trip, back home late English bank holiday Monday. After that Mandy is in Ireland and I'm doing the rounds filming in the North East of England then Gaydon truck event. On the tail of that we are in Albania for two weeks. We went up to Manchester today and bumped into friend Jose who is hospitality manager at the RNCM, his partner is Andy Burnham's assistant. and they have a 7 yo boy. We managed to finally transfter the money out and close all accounts with the Co op which migrated from Britannia in a move to consolidate our banks and if anything were to happen to us the executors would have a less awesome challenge. I dad a bit more gardening today and took a few shots, most are very common plants here some are a little rarer. It is nothing like the garden I had in my heyday so a now and then set of slides! On the back of the Co-op taking in Britannia they seem to be struggling with a takeover by the Coventry Building Society possibly underway. After hour upon hour on the phone we are considering rocking up at the Manchester Co-op HQ and asking for cash! It's really been that sort of week. I did manage to mow the lawns and do some weeding,but then it rained yet again. The bag is packed ready for the Belgium trip which prompts me to think of a slide show from Belgium on previous trips. I was there quite a lot for work but never really had the chance of filming. Other trips we have coming up are to Albania in June, Nov in Bangladesh, Feb Dominican Replublic - sometime I want to get to HK and Singapore and catch up with the spread of the corporate liveries in Singapore ( Green) and the huge influx of retro liveried buses in Hong Kong. Other locations on the table include Suriname and, Paraguay. Meanwhile another dip into those 50 years Mandy and I have been together!
A tiring day as most seem to be these days, we cleared the decks at home and loaded the car up despite the ominous dark clouds and surprisingly there were only the tiniest spots of rain all day but the soil at the cemetery was oozing water. We got all the jobs done, difficult as I can't really bend enough these days. We called at Plumleys on the way home for coffee and cake ( thats unusual Dave).. moving on swiftly yet more jobs to clear at home. Really focussed on getting myself sorted ready for flight to Brussels on Saturday. I've luckily managed to catch the sole remaining unrestricted view seat at Liege opera house for the second Saturday which is something to look forward to as my travelling companion Martin will be back home by then but I'm overnight in Liege where I've never been and then Sunday over to Luxembourg and depart there mid afternoon Monday for late evening flight back to Manchester. I managed to get the Polio Fellowship Newsletter done and circulated. So many jobs to get cleared. I've put a couple of clips on the OTA Youtube site. Tomorrow I want to get some films on to travelling external drive in case we can manage an evening film show in Ghent etc. After regaling you with our wedding anniversary I though it may be interesting to have another look back to our early days together.
Mandy this morning processing the orders in the original PMP office. The PMP Office looking towards the editing and display room We hired a mini for two days for the weekend honeymoon at Red Wharf Bay, Anglesey Where you all need to be 2nd June 2024 complete with Dave and Mandy and the PMP stall. Go on then, one more shot from 1974, a bit blurred but perhaps that goes with story.
What a day it has been, finally got to the source of all the computer problems with internet speed etc, it was AVG security protection, actually a scam to create problems and then offer you to subscribe to something to remove what they have put in your way - 2 hours on the phone to get that sorted. Then all the usual stuff, was hoping to get family graves at Southern Cemetery sorted for summer, hoping to do it tomorrow now. Getting ready for the Belgium trip and some research for the June Albania jaunt, it seems just possible that trains are moving there once more. I'm going to have a go at sorting the polio Fellowship branch newsletter this evening. I just need to make the cover for the recently completed Dutch Archive film on the East Indies, Batavia as it was which would call itself Indonesia when independent. This will become a bit of a prequal to releases from PMP and or OTA featuring the works of Geoff Todd and Ivor Harding.. I note that it is mostly British subjects which have gathered the most clicks on the Youtube channel for OTA that I manage but the archive is really very much worldwide. All this fits in well with the world wide sales of digitised images as downloads via Drop Box. At just £9 they are a great saving on DVD prices and higher quality images. I've also been in touch with BWW Buses World Wide and trying to get a bit of momentum for OTA archiving services and our own offerings. One subject which had been giving people headaches was Algerian buses, not the easiest place to take photos so why don't you have a peep at what the trouble is all about, there are several Algerian families who are bus enthusiasts in the UK I wonder if they can help with details on the vehicles. Mandy worked at the Town Hall for the council and knew the lads who swept up so got handed the broom to do it herself, it was a joint effort though. Strange to think it is almost exactly 50 years ago. I'm just putting the finishing touches to a prequal Indonesian/Batavia film which is an hour of colourised film which be leading up to editing the OTA films recently donated to the archive many with real soundtracks.
A bit of a before and after scene, Brundetts Road on the morning of the wedding and yours truly covered in confetti. All so long ago in 1974.! Garden work and flowers ready for family graves at Southern Cemetery, more cine scanned and we went to Parbold up Wigan way, we had seen an artists work last week and went to his gallery and came away with our anniversary present to each other. Tomorrow I hope to make a start on outstanding DVD covers and get them on the shop. All very quiet on the PMP front, no orders for two days, relaxing really!
Roll back the years, yes it was 1974 at Manchester Registrars office and we have certainly done a lot and been around a lot since then. Not long to go before we get to the actual anniversary of our marriage, 50 years these days is a spectacular achievement. I need to get a lot of film covers done so I can put items on the shop. Bulk pricing facilities seem not to exist on either EBay or Weebly and I done want to do thousands of items by hand. Perhaps pull the plug on Ebay. They charge us £2 each time we sell a DVD there. Perhaps we'll put a digital request there like the one on our shop. Meanwhile some more Edinburgh shots. Of course regular readers and viewers etc will know that we are celebrating our 50th wedding anniversary in June shortly after the NWVRT open day and running day at the premises in Kirkby. Our photos from the wedding are mostly slightly damaged B&W so some quite aggressive repair and colourising work to get them to something like acceptable. 28th June 1974. Today I'm going to do a bit of gardening and hopefully clean my little IQ car. My back isn't that brilliant, I think it was the two consecutive days filming at the weekend. I've edited all the weekends film, one each bus and truck from Llandudno and three truck from Lincoln.
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PMP Sponsors the North West Vehicle Restoration Trust at Kirkby.
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