Saturday 21 September 2013

The last month or so


We've not got used to Jim not being about, not certain we will, we keep listening out for his throat clearing, always a give away that he was about.
The long term lung complaint finally caught him out,due mainly to radiotherapy treatment received about a year ago for cancer from which he got the all clear a couple of months ago. It probably exacerbated the long term problem, weakening his bodies natural fighting abilities.

Jim was a Manchester born man, from a very poor background, he lived and was brought up by his aunt for many years,two doors down from the family home and four sisters, before being drafted into the army at the age of 18 in 1951 for two years National Service based in Shoeburyness, Essex.
Married twice, with two adopted children from his last marriage, he moved across to Lincolnshire after his retirement and a divorce in 1996 at 64, and after 40 years of selling flooring for the same local family company James Halstead. Once again almost penniless.

He chose Lincolnshire because it was a good distance from Manchester, which apart from an occasional visit to friends he had no wish to return. Not even as ashes! He lived on his own during all this time.
A Manchester City fan, with not a good word to say for the other lot, especially their previous manager (AF) whom he had met a couple of times after organising "business days" at the City ground for his clients, at the after local derby match chats.

We met Jim when we moved into the village, getting on for 11 years ago, he soon got us into village life, firstly by taking me along to the local pub where he was treasurer to the fishing club.
Jim didn't fish, but neither did he still play football, but was also treasurer to the village football team.
We socialised with him on occasions for about the first 4 years or so, he spent most of his social time with a couple of the old boys in the village, but popped over on occasions, usually with a bottle of wine clutched in his hand.
After a fall in the garden about 6 years ago (he's the one I found lying by his back door after disturbing a wasp nest and breaking his leg just below the knee) we got to know Jim even better.
He relied on us for some many months, ferrying back and forth to hospital, for his leg and his chest complaint.
He spent time with us for meals and for regular trips to the village pub, and others around our part of the county for lunch.Very often we would fight to get to the till first to stop him paying the bill, he was a very generous man.
Over the next too few years, we got to know him and his background very well. Some stories repeated many times!
Jim effectively became part of our family, and we his.
His 40 years with Halstead's, saw him relatively well off with a good pension, and a share scheme that has proved to be an extremely good investment for him in his retirement years.
Having now being advised what I/we have to do as executors by the solicitor acting jointly to get his estate dealt with, I'm glad we bludgeoned him into making a Will some four years ago.It's going to be difficult enough dealing with the taxman even with the Will, and may take us a year to sort everything out for his family.
Anyway, Thursday was the day of his funeral, which I arranged according to his wishes. It went very well, with about 50 friends and family in attendance and a wake in the White Hart after.
I now have to organise a pub crawl to disperse his ashes, his wish, around the Lincolnshire countryside!
After that we have to look after the house until the taxman lets us sell it.

So to our  very good friend, who was like an elder brother to us both, a man who passed on something good to all who met him, Rest in Peace Jim.




Friday 20 September 2013

Our mate Jim Palmer






                                     Gone but not to be forgotten. 
                                      Rest in Peace 


Friday 13 September 2013

Nothing in particular

Around the garden pond just now







Any experts on dragonfly/hawkers ?




Angling Missing from Welsh Outdoor Survey 

Dear members and friends,

We need your help to complete a 5 minute online questionnaire before the 20th of September please.

We have recently been alerted to a survey of outdoor activity in Wales that is being carried out by the Welsh Assembly Government which does not include angling as one of the activities. It is very important that the Government is made aware of the importance of fishing to the local economy at the moment, particularly as it is currently considering bringing in new legislation to introduce universal access for canoes to all rivers in Wales.

If you, or anyone you know, has fished in Wales in the past year, please complete the survey and enter “Angling” in the “Other” box at the bottom of the list of possible activities and then describe how much you have spent on recent fishing trips. 

It really does take only 5 minutes and you don’t have to give your name or e-mail address if you don’t want to (but you can win a voucher of £100 for outdoor activities or goods if you do).

Wales Outdoor Activity Tourism Visitor Survey

The link to the survey for individual anglers is here: Wales Outdoor Activity Tourism Visitor Survey

Wales Outdoor Activity Tourism Business Survey

If you run a club selling day tickets, or a fishery, please click here: Wales Outdoor Activity Tourism Business Survey

Thank you for your help. 

All best wishes,

The Angling Trust

Sunday 8 September 2013

Rest in Peace Simon King.... Follow up

From Miles King

milesking10 (http://anewnatureblog.wordpress.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Rest in peace Simon King": 

Thanks Fred. 

I certainly didn't mind you posting about Simon, quite the opposite.

I've finally set up a FB page "memories of Simon King". please feel free to post memories, stories, photos etc of Simon.

Thanks

Miles (his brother) 

Posted by milesking10 to Experiences at 8 September 2013 10:43

Memories of Simon King


Glad to hear from you Miles and thanks

Fred

Friday 6 September 2013

Ah well...again!

Rest in Peace James Palmer
Being local "next of kin" to our next door neighbour Jim, I was called at 5:45am on Tuesday morning and asked if I could get along to the hospital as Jim had taken a turn for the worse.
I was hoping that it was another false alarm as I had also been called out on Saturday with much the same message. We hung around then until his family from Manchester arrived and left them all around his bed fearing the worse.
The old boy come to and after exchanging pleasantries,  a few jokey words about his football team Manchester City, and a good bit of time, he told the family to bugger off back home as he was tired!
They were happy to see his rapid recovery, so on the second similar call on Tuesday didn't break the speed limits to get over.
When I arrived at Lincoln Hospital however, I was informed that Jim had passed away at 6am.
I couldn't have got there with wings.
He died peacefully with a nice young nurse in attendance though.
I now have the job of organising his funeral and acting as joint executor with his solicitor, as he specified in his Will.
He wanted his family, whom he left in Manchester some 17 years ago, following a messy divorce, to not be involved.
Rest in peace Jim 2.11.1932 - 2.9.2013

Last few days
I was starting to suffer the early waking syndrome that I go through whenever I have an active project in hand.
It used to happen when I was editing Barbel Fisher, I would wake up after only a few hours sleep thinking about the things I needed to do. I just couldn't go back to sleep, so had to get up and do what needed to be done and then return to bed.
It was happening again with Jim's passing, and so the two days I had booked for Pauline and myself at The Gunton Arms was welcome respite
.

We set of on Wednesday late morning with my mind pretty much settled  after trying to book an appointment to register Jim's death, which I  achieved for this coming Tuesday, bloody Government cuts mean that half of our registrars have been laid off, slowing things down somewhat.
What a cracking couple days we've had though, the pub with rooms and restaurant were as welcoming as they were last March, when we had a few days stay for my birthday.
This time instead of snow, we had heatwave temperatures in the 30's which turned into monsoon like conditions for about an hour last night.
The Gunton Arms
This place is from our viewpoint highly recommended, our second visit was a good as our first, and makes it our firm favourite.
It does get very busy though, so not the spot for a quiet evening romantic dinner for two, unless like us you enjoy the company of folk having a very good time.
The food on offer is excellent, especially so after having a relaxing afternoon in the beer garden testing Woodforde's Wherry and varying Adnams ales.
A word of warning, there is a large open fire in the main dining room where the chef cooks the ribs of beef, venison sausages and sirloin steak to order. With high temperatures outside, make sure you don't get a table in front of it.
Not too bad in Winter though!



We dropped of to see my Cousin Helen and her partner Hywell at his recently deceased parents house in Swaffam, we chatted over family things and then to lunch at The George in the town before making our journey home.
Jim's stuff can start again on Monday, and hopefully all the important parts, like setting the date of his funeral  and clearing out his cupboards of food and general rubbish, will be done and dusted before our Russian cruise.

Fishing
I can't see myself fishing until mid October, hopefully the rivers will be in fine trim by then.
Should have been at Blenheim Palace today, and was due to have a trip to the Ribble on Wednesday to Saturday with a former Barbel Society Secretary, both cancelled for obvious reasons.

In case we forget
This Sunday 8th September is the annual commemorative service in our village for the 101 squadron formerly based at what was RAF Ludford Magna.
The reunion is held every year in the first full weekend in September, with a fly past over the village of an Avro Lancaster from the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight
There is usually a good attendance from family and friends of those who served in the squadron from June 1943 until the end of the war.
We shall be there