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Apr. 12th, 2007 10:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eiffel_71Up at 5.30 this morning as we were being picked up at 6.30 for the long drive up to Fleet for Hart's Civic Day.
Funnily enough, despite the early start we were wide awake all through the trip, and because we beat the traffic we arrived at the Civic Offices at 8 am, a full half-hour ahead of schedule. Fortunately a very nice lady was already there and gave us a tour of the offices till the others began to arrive around 8.15 and we were allowed to start on the tea/coffee and Danishes.
As we were going to be taken up in a Chinook at RAF Odiham in the afternoon, over the coffee and Danishes we all had to sign waiver forms clearing us to fly. When Brian, the Hart chairman, made his welcome speech to us all, he revealed that two people had "chickened out" of the flight - but didn't name and shame.
First we visited the Royal Engineers' Combat Engineering School in Minley, but before we called there Brian had us taken just a bit further along the road, to drive past a pub called The Crown and Cushion. This was a Shepherd Neame pub (which alone was enough to get it a thumbs up from me) with a fascinating claim to fame. When Colonel Blood stole the Crown Jewels in 1671, his lover, Mrs Cushion, owned this pub. Trying to flee arrest, he got a message to her, but when he was then arrested she falsely believed that he'd been killed and drowned herself :( Ever since, the pub has been called the Crown and Cushion. Just a shame we were taken there before opening time...
At the Combat Engineering School we were served coffee by soldiers and offered biscuits over a slide presentation before being taken round the place on the coach, stopping to visit various facilities. These included the place where they practice blowing up bridges, and a large lake where they have watermanship training. It was a glorious sunny day, perfect for walking by the waterside. We watched a group of recruits getting into a dinghy, about to do a training exercise. As we walked to the coach, Margaret from Basingstoke said to me that the facilities there were all impressive, but as a pacifist she couldn't help having reservations as all the skills they were teaching were for war purposes...
Driving along the road, passing lots of forest, Brian told us a few trivia about places in Hart that we wouldn't get the chance to visit today. One such was Yateley, whose claim to fame was that in 1605 Lord Monteagle - the man who blew the whistle on the Gunpowder Plot after one of the plotters warned him not to attend the opening of Parliament - lived there. Today there is a 'Monteagle Estate' in the town.
Next we went to DASH (Disability Access Self Help), one of Brian's chosen charities for the year, then from there on to RAF Odiham for lunch.
We had a choice of lasagne or chicken curry and rice - I went for the curry. There was also side salad, and half a dozen sauces on offer; I ladled on generous helpings of four of them. One I'd correctly guessed to be garlic mint sauce, but another one turned out to be rather hot and spicy! My enjoyment of the food wasn't too marred, though; I was luckier than my mother, who'd put a few red hot chilli peppers on top of her food, thinking they were sun dried tomatoes. When I'd arrived in the mess (after visiting the Gents) Sue from Winchester was just sitting down with her food; there'd been a long queue for the serving hatch, so I'd draped my jacket over the seat next to Sue before lining up. Jim and Maria got served while I was in line; for a moment Maria was about to sit next to the seat I'd earmarked (she didn't know the jacket was mine), but my hopes of having lunch flanked by my two favourite ladies were dashed - Charles motioned to Maria to come and join him at the opposite end of the table, and she did.
After I'd finished my food, I asked Tony to pass me the cranberry drink. That prompted Maria to observe "Wilhelmus likes sweet things. He likes me." We all smiled. I concurred with a nod, then added "And Sue," extending my arm towards Sue.
Maria did her 'not amused' act. "I'm not going to be..." She struggled for the word she wanted. My mother suggested "Two-timed," but Maria said "...Second. I am number one, you have to be number two, Susan," she added firmly. Sue put on a 'chastened' face.
Minutes later I heard my mother and Charles laughing and telling Maria she was "wicked". From what little I'd heard it sounded like she was after extra food, so I, smiling, asked Sue "Is she trying to blag seconds?" "Only of the garlic bread," Sue grinned. When I looked back at Maria, she said "I thought you were my friend."
"I am."
"...Not hers," she finished.
I never imagined Maria would be the jealous type.
After lunch we were taken to a long room and shown a slide presentation all about RAF Odiham, its history and military helicopter operations today. With the combination of having just eaten, the comfortable chairs, the warm room and having been up since 5.30, despite my best efforts I nodded off for sections of the presentation (thankfully I didn't snore). Later, on the drive home, my mother would confess she'd been close to dropping off herself.
Next we were taken outside, given our safety briefing for the Chinook flight, issued with our helmets and shown how to put them on properly. I had to take my specs off to even begin to put mine on, and even then it was a squeeze, but I managed to get it on, and locate my chin straps with a little help from the kindly Mayoress of Bracknell Forest. With the helmet on, I couldn't hear a sausage, though that didn't stop my mother trying to talk to me the whole time. I could see there were group photos going on so lined up for those - I put down my dark visor, Top Gun-style, impressing Sue and amusing my mother, then we were into the kite and up, up and away.
It was surreal, flying in a helicopter, almost deaf thanks to the helmet, seeing without my specs and through a dark visor. But with us safely strapped in with seat belts, the airmen left the tail flap of the kite open, giving us all a magnificent bird's eye view as we flew over North Hampshire. Tony and Margaret made motions to us all to indicate when we flew over their house.
After landing, we went back to the long room and wound down with a cup of coffee (my stomach felt a bit funny so I declined the offer of more biscuits) while watching a short video of helicopter operations in Afghanistan. Then we just waited for the second group to return from their flight and all said our goodbyes.
On getting home, went upstairs for a lie down till Tottenham v Sevilla came on. The Spaniards' two early goals killed off the game, so switched off at half-time and listened to some music till it was time for the last Life On Mars on BBC4.
What a finale! I think we all knew that Sam was in a coma and his life in 1973 was symbolic of his medical condition in some way, but no-one expected Gene Hunt to be the disease. The twist halfway through, when we, like Sam, were all left wondering if it was real after all, was a masterstroke, but the ending was the biggest twist of all - and rather sad when you think about it. Still, a fantastic programme. As I never saw Series 1, once my holiday is out of the way I'll have to buy the DVDs of that.
Funnily enough, despite the early start we were wide awake all through the trip, and because we beat the traffic we arrived at the Civic Offices at 8 am, a full half-hour ahead of schedule. Fortunately a very nice lady was already there and gave us a tour of the offices till the others began to arrive around 8.15 and we were allowed to start on the tea/coffee and Danishes.
As we were going to be taken up in a Chinook at RAF Odiham in the afternoon, over the coffee and Danishes we all had to sign waiver forms clearing us to fly. When Brian, the Hart chairman, made his welcome speech to us all, he revealed that two people had "chickened out" of the flight - but didn't name and shame.
First we visited the Royal Engineers' Combat Engineering School in Minley, but before we called there Brian had us taken just a bit further along the road, to drive past a pub called The Crown and Cushion. This was a Shepherd Neame pub (which alone was enough to get it a thumbs up from me) with a fascinating claim to fame. When Colonel Blood stole the Crown Jewels in 1671, his lover, Mrs Cushion, owned this pub. Trying to flee arrest, he got a message to her, but when he was then arrested she falsely believed that he'd been killed and drowned herself :( Ever since, the pub has been called the Crown and Cushion. Just a shame we were taken there before opening time...
At the Combat Engineering School we were served coffee by soldiers and offered biscuits over a slide presentation before being taken round the place on the coach, stopping to visit various facilities. These included the place where they practice blowing up bridges, and a large lake where they have watermanship training. It was a glorious sunny day, perfect for walking by the waterside. We watched a group of recruits getting into a dinghy, about to do a training exercise. As we walked to the coach, Margaret from Basingstoke said to me that the facilities there were all impressive, but as a pacifist she couldn't help having reservations as all the skills they were teaching were for war purposes...
Driving along the road, passing lots of forest, Brian told us a few trivia about places in Hart that we wouldn't get the chance to visit today. One such was Yateley, whose claim to fame was that in 1605 Lord Monteagle - the man who blew the whistle on the Gunpowder Plot after one of the plotters warned him not to attend the opening of Parliament - lived there. Today there is a 'Monteagle Estate' in the town.
Next we went to DASH (Disability Access Self Help), one of Brian's chosen charities for the year, then from there on to RAF Odiham for lunch.
We had a choice of lasagne or chicken curry and rice - I went for the curry. There was also side salad, and half a dozen sauces on offer; I ladled on generous helpings of four of them. One I'd correctly guessed to be garlic mint sauce, but another one turned out to be rather hot and spicy! My enjoyment of the food wasn't too marred, though; I was luckier than my mother, who'd put a few red hot chilli peppers on top of her food, thinking they were sun dried tomatoes. When I'd arrived in the mess (after visiting the Gents) Sue from Winchester was just sitting down with her food; there'd been a long queue for the serving hatch, so I'd draped my jacket over the seat next to Sue before lining up. Jim and Maria got served while I was in line; for a moment Maria was about to sit next to the seat I'd earmarked (she didn't know the jacket was mine), but my hopes of having lunch flanked by my two favourite ladies were dashed - Charles motioned to Maria to come and join him at the opposite end of the table, and she did.
After I'd finished my food, I asked Tony to pass me the cranberry drink. That prompted Maria to observe "Wilhelmus likes sweet things. He likes me." We all smiled. I concurred with a nod, then added "And Sue," extending my arm towards Sue.
Maria did her 'not amused' act. "I'm not going to be..." She struggled for the word she wanted. My mother suggested "Two-timed," but Maria said "...Second. I am number one, you have to be number two, Susan," she added firmly. Sue put on a 'chastened' face.
Minutes later I heard my mother and Charles laughing and telling Maria she was "wicked". From what little I'd heard it sounded like she was after extra food, so I, smiling, asked Sue "Is she trying to blag seconds?" "Only of the garlic bread," Sue grinned. When I looked back at Maria, she said "I thought you were my friend."
"I am."
"...Not hers," she finished.
I never imagined Maria would be the jealous type.
After lunch we were taken to a long room and shown a slide presentation all about RAF Odiham, its history and military helicopter operations today. With the combination of having just eaten, the comfortable chairs, the warm room and having been up since 5.30, despite my best efforts I nodded off for sections of the presentation (thankfully I didn't snore). Later, on the drive home, my mother would confess she'd been close to dropping off herself.
Next we were taken outside, given our safety briefing for the Chinook flight, issued with our helmets and shown how to put them on properly. I had to take my specs off to even begin to put mine on, and even then it was a squeeze, but I managed to get it on, and locate my chin straps with a little help from the kindly Mayoress of Bracknell Forest. With the helmet on, I couldn't hear a sausage, though that didn't stop my mother trying to talk to me the whole time. I could see there were group photos going on so lined up for those - I put down my dark visor, Top Gun-style, impressing Sue and amusing my mother, then we were into the kite and up, up and away.
It was surreal, flying in a helicopter, almost deaf thanks to the helmet, seeing without my specs and through a dark visor. But with us safely strapped in with seat belts, the airmen left the tail flap of the kite open, giving us all a magnificent bird's eye view as we flew over North Hampshire. Tony and Margaret made motions to us all to indicate when we flew over their house.
After landing, we went back to the long room and wound down with a cup of coffee (my stomach felt a bit funny so I declined the offer of more biscuits) while watching a short video of helicopter operations in Afghanistan. Then we just waited for the second group to return from their flight and all said our goodbyes.
On getting home, went upstairs for a lie down till Tottenham v Sevilla came on. The Spaniards' two early goals killed off the game, so switched off at half-time and listened to some music till it was time for the last Life On Mars on BBC4.
What a finale! I think we all knew that Sam was in a coma and his life in 1973 was symbolic of his medical condition in some way, but no-one expected Gene Hunt to be the disease. The twist halfway through, when we, like Sam, were all left wondering if it was real after all, was a masterstroke, but the ending was the biggest twist of all - and rather sad when you think about it. Still, a fantastic programme. As I never saw Series 1, once my holiday is out of the way I'll have to buy the DVDs of that.
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