The one thing I have discovered over the years is that I am pleased to have more than one interest. Sue and I never had any kids, in the end, so we have been able to follow our hobbies rather more than most. Interestingly we share several hobbies. Sue has a passing interest in woodworking and a passion to be a wood-turning. We have both collected stamps and have an interest in postal history world-wide although our real collecting has been confined to early GB (pre 1952). But stamp collecting is a casual thing these days and only represents a few hours a month, if that. As I said in my initial post Meccano has taken up a good deal of our time over recent years. But I suppose the biggest thing to happen to us, well Sue really, was to win a gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2015 after getting silver in 2011 and 2012.
There is always some woodworking to do for Chelsea and that year was no exception, albeit MDF, I had to build a broken-down stone monastery window. The flower arrangements for Chelsea are huge and the window was cut and laminated from several sheets of MDF hand carved and shaped to look like stone, before being painted. I also made random 'stone' blocks to scatter around the base. Other 'gold' trinkets were made from wood or plastic and sprayed gold, then washed with thinned black paint to look aged. All good fun but time consuming.
The picture gives you some idea of the scale of the arrangement. The title was 'The Dissolution of the Monasteries'
Most of my hobbies have involved being indoors. All my life I have been an indoor sort of person with no interest in sport of any kind. Then just over a couple of years ago I discovered angling. I was planning on sitting on the bank of a lake or river somewhere watching my brother fish. What actually happened was I got hooked (sorry for the pun) and it has been a big part of my life since then. I had never picked up a fishing rod, let alone handled a live fish until then but right now I can't get enough of it, although it is a bit cold just now! The surprising thing is I have lost weight, fishing is not about just sitting there watching a float. I can be casting every minute or so for eleven or twelve hours. I have never worked that part of my body so hard before and I have lost 35lb without trying, which can only be a good thing. I am slowly getting better at it and I caught my personal best carp a few months ago.
There I am, in my Woodworking shirt, holding the biggest fish I had ever caught, tipping the scales at 16lb 2oz. Not huge for a mirror carp but for me it was a monster! I am now looking forward some some more happy days at the lakes. I must admit, I do enjoy it in the summer more than at this time of year when it is cold and wet.
Once we have moved house, I will get the tools out again and you never know, I might make something for our new home...
... In the meantime I have lots of old projects I did for articles that I could post some details of if you would like me to. I know you all like pictures. Some of you might have seen them before but there are some that I would not have published at the time as they were current.
Thank you for your warm welcome back, I will try not to stay away for too long this time.
Ralph