Well, so endeth my 2013 entries in the blog. One thing BFWI has achieved this year has been a fully working website which has been kept up-to-date throughout. I just wish more members would use it! I went through a very frustrating patch at the end of November-the beginning of December when for some reason I became persona non grata and my password in to the website wouldn't work or, having given me access, it wouldn't let me add anything. I spent about 5 days wandering round the house alternating between muttering every swearword I knew, weeping internally with frustration or wishing I had something to kick until the BFWI Digital Champion came round to sort me out.She said she didn't actually do anything but I know my computer saw her sitting at my elbow and decided to go quietly and stop playing me up. If you need help, I do recommend that you contact one of the county team even if your helper just has to sit there to achieve miracles!

Happy Christmas to all my readers and WI members in Bucks and I wish you a prosperous and interesting New Year ---or as one christmas card wished me "an encouraging new year". I am trying to work out whether this is to be something different or to struggle on in the face of difficult odds. I have tried encouraging people to comment on the blog but they rarely do, in spite of my trying to stir up opposition to some of my views.Let's organise a march in favour of HS2...that should do the trick.

Travel safely and enjoy a break from WI.

18th December
The Bletchley Belles held their Christmas concert this evening and the hall was full to bursting. I always enjoy this event and cannot remember how many years I have been attending. The group has raised thousands of ££s for Willen Hospice. There are always also two items in the programme from a young local musician.This year it was a 13 year old trumpeter at Stage 8 level who must be destined to equal the achievements of past solo-ists.We exit-ed feeling all warm and full of Christmas well-being into the father and mother of a rain storm that gave us shoes full of icy water and skirts wet through before we reached our cars to drive home.It was a good evening all the same.
Did you see in the press that Maggie Aderin-Pocock, the space scientist is to be the new host of the astronomy series The Sky at Night? She came to speak to the NFWI at the AGM a couple of years ago to encourage us to motivate our daughters and grand-daughters to study science.Then Maggie gave her presentation with a baby on her hip throughout. Would you believe that in the photo of her at the Women in Film and TV Awards she was still carrying that child on her hip! So we can expect to see the youngster present on TV 's Sky at Night!

9th December
Tonight the local WI met at a nearby restaurant for its social Christmas dinner. There were more than ever present and the community bus was hired to ferry the members there and back. The meal was lovely and the level of noise quite high so everyone must have been enjoying themselves.This gathering used to be the opportunity to invite guests and partners along to say thank you for their support during the year but this time there was only one male present which I thought a pity.If any member is involved in committee or outside monthly meeting events she has at best either had to inconvenience the folks at home or enjoy their active support making screens , moving chairs or taxi-ing, so why not treat them to a dinner? Long ago WI Enterprises used to sell a china mug called a "WISH mug" which was for WI Supporting Husbands which became prized possessions. Perhaps in these days of equal opportunities we think it our due to ask them to carry our clutter about the county and to vacate the sittingroom for meetings even when there is an international match on the TV. Perhaps now it isn't just the female in the household who is taken for granted.

　

4th December
Our annual Christmas party meeting was a very noisy affair. We covered the business side of the evening fairly quickly: we heard who had been chosen for all the various posts next year and the good news that our exercise area was now open for use in the playing field. An intrepid band were planning to go en masse to try out their routines.Reports were given of the resolution selection meetings and of the Gloucester trip and the Group meeting. We then played competitive games where we made a table Christmas tree and this was followed by some mind-stretching number games. Of course there was the usual cheating but a good time was had by all. We even attracted a couple of new members for 2014. The refreshments were excellent and far too much but we never learn...
I think half the membership is now booked in for a Christmas dinner next week at a pub nearby where there will be even more food!
To show that we can share we have made donations of goods and food to the Women's Refuge and the local food banks. We also collected some money for the Air Ambulance instead of sending Christmas cards to each other.

26th November
The local WI Book Group met this afternoon. It was almost a full house and an almost unanimous opinion of the novel we had all been reading. It was perhaps a bit unfair that Jane Green's Beach House followed Bring Up the Bodies because it cannot be described as prize-winning fiction.The category is chicklit, I believe but it is classed as good chicklit, so to each her own! The trouble is that a novel like this gives us very little to actually discuss so we enjoy a nice long talk about other things over a cup of tea.

25th November
Today there was a day conference at Denman College which WI members could attend if they had applied for a ticket in time. The subject was the disposal of nuclear waste and whether the previous approach by the authorities to find a site had been the best way to tackle the question before they try again. Did you know that they had asked county and district councils to volunteer to have a facility built under their area for storing spent nuclear waste? The UK only needs one site (Scotland is doing its own thing apparently) and West Cumbria volunteered but the County Council veto-ed it although the district council considered the benefits offered would make it worthwhile.Any storage site will take ages to build and we were shown pictures of some in other countries. One can understand that people living near Sellafield where the most knowledgeable scientists are already based would volunteer.There are not all that many places where the geology is right for the building of such a huge cavern.It was all very interesting and the discussions were led by specialists and professors and the WI members had their say and gave advice on an approach. We agreed that there must be a huge educational campaign to inform the public, to do complete geological surveys of the country and encourage the universities to educate geologists as soon as possible because the site will not be operative in our lifetimes but will be absolutely necessary in the near future.

21st November
Today was cold, very cold but nothing daunted the Group Convenor took her 5 WIs on a trip to Gloucester to the Christmas Market at Gloucester Quays.It was lovely to visit all the stalls on the dockside. There was a good smell of cinnamon in the air, bakers and piemakers were busy and all the stallholders were dressed in Victorian costume. There were jugglers and carol singers and live music. After that, there were all the modern charms of factory outlets where bargains could be had from well known traders. Other members went off to visit the cathedral or the Maritime Museum---so plenty to do.I think everyone enjoyed themselves and the cold gave us all a wonderful excuse to partake of mulled wine, hot mincepies and other warming spirits!