Yesterday I went to the Women's Institute meeting. 48 members attended and we were informed that we had all paid up our annual membership. I was given a badge to wear at each meeting as I am now a full member. The meeting started with the introduction of the afternoon's speaker, a lady who came to talk to us about pearls. She certainly knew her stuff and had a well prepared slide show of the various types of pearls and how they are produced around the world. Who thought there could be so much to say about pearls? We had been asked to come along wearing pearls and I duly got out my plastic poppets from childhood and hung these around my neck. There were many examples of pearls around the room, all of the fairly regular thing that we expect of pearls. I believe I was the only one adorned with poppets. I remained quiet about them as they seemed to be well accepted as three strings of pearls around my neck. They used to fall to my knees as a child but now I gave them a nice three loops. The lady had timed the speaking well but I found her rather flat and bland but knowledgeable. She bought pearl products along with her to sell at the tea interval. Several sales were made. She then took an hour to pack it all away while we did the afternoon's business after the interval.
The second part involves reports from the different groups, like the walking group, the book group etc. I attended one meeting of the cookery group last month as they are a jolly bunch and I already know some of them from my creative group. I will continue with that group for now. After my experience of a book club some years ago I am not inclined to join a book group again and walking sounds too much for me as they drive miles before they start their walks, sometimes to the other end of the county. We are having a summer outing to Kings Lynn. I found myself agreeing to go. It was better than the first suggestion of a summer outing to Norwich. The lady sitting next to me said she would not be going to Kings Lynn because her husband told her the pubs don't open until 5pm. This was without so much as a laugh or a smile. I replied that of course this is very important and tried to find positives about Kings Lynn in the form of the Hanseatic League etc. She wasn't impressed. WI members can be very unpredictable. Actually I believe I could find a pub in Kings Lynn that opens before 5pm but that is beside the point.
On arrival home I had tea which was chicken rolls. I bought fresh rolls in the bakery and had cold chicken in the fridge. I opened a bottle of rosé wine for a drink and watched a programme on a crypto scandal in Canada where a man who offered a crypto banking service kept the real deposit money for himself. All this was done on line and no money in the form of cryto currency appeared to exist at all while he made off with their real money. He then disappeared for a long time and the website kept thinking about it when people asked to get their money out and then in the end disappeared out of existence altogether along with the Crypto King who then appeared to have died in India. Was his death fake or real? Crypto charts kept going up and up but it was not real. Trust No One, the hunt for the Fake Crypto King. Anyway nobody got their money back and many lost all their savings. One man admitted that he had been greedy and led by greed and he lost everything. When it is down to giving money via the internet to professional looking websites making out they are like a good bank to help you make money in a currency that doesn't have anything real and you have never heard of the bank before except in a chat room they are best given a wide berth. I see that Farage is being given the no no about accepting crypto currency political donations this morning and if nothing else this must be a reason enough to give a wide berth to this man. I find his mouth spouts nothing but ill judged and illogical and unachievable promises. Local elections are coming up and I hope that many will return to the Conservative Party.
It is bad enough that I ordered a strimmer on Amazon yesterday, that is enough fear and gambling on-line for me in a day. I am expecting delivery today.
Yes I do like Kings Lynn and the history of the Hanseatic Leage.
ReplyDeleteI am sure pubs are open before 5 pm.
I will be ordering my Eta visum and pink glasses soon. But first a new knee ( a half one) on monday.🤩
Visits to some historic buildings have been arranged. We are having lunch at the lavender farm nearby. Good luck with the half knee on Monday. I assume you are planning a visit to England soon.
DeleteYes to the Cotswolds this time.
DeleteThe lavender farm café in Heecham has got excellent food. We have been there several times. My mother in law used to like it there.
So no Norfolk this time. I would like to go to the Christmas Tree Festival in Fakenham later this year, but I have to see how things are going.
When I first heard about crypto currency I was in utter disbelief that anyone would be stupid enough to fall for it, but it seems there are many, many stupid people out there.
ReplyDeleteThese people had met in chat rooms and their conversations following the closure of the website and the losses of thousands of dollars believing they had converted to millions in crypto currency read like a joke but they were talking about their life savings.
DeleteYour lady and the pubs in Kings Lynn gave me a big smile.
ReplyDeleteAs for giving money online to anyone it's utter stupidity. Now buying on Amazon, well it's pretty safe to say you'll get what you ordered. I wouldn't mind a strimmer. I think it would be rather satisfying to mow down weeds
I remembered after I got home that somebody had told me at one of the first meetings I went to that drinking is an important part of the annual outing so it figures that that was why the woman thought Kings Lynn a bad choice. No wonder she didn't laugh. You would never believe it would you of a group of elderly ladies!
DeleteI am finding that I cannot get to all the areas with the ride-on mower and I need a strimmer too. Roll on summer when the growing slows down. At the moment everything is going crazy.
Like you say, it is best to give such things a wide berth, but human greed combined with stupidity (while at the same time thinking themselves to be extra smart) has cost many folks their livelihood. Tough for them but even worse if they have family they are responsible for, and fail them.
ReplyDeleteThe WI meeting sounds interesting, but I guess you and Pub Woman won't become best friends anytime soon :-D
We're back to winter here with sub-zero nights and mornings, and quite a bit of snow has fallen on the higher parts of the Black Forest.
The whole of Northern and Central Europe is in the grip of an Arctic weather stream at present so we are all cold. We have frosts here each day and some hail. It is oh, so cold, and much colder feeling than the actual temperature.
DeleteI don't have strong views either way about the WI lady, but she was rather silent most of the time and did not start any conversations with me so I will probably not go out of my way to sit next to her. I prefer somebody a bit more chatty as the social side is of the meetings is important.
The crypto people featured who had lost their money were all males and the one who admitted to greed was a single male living on his own. The chat room group appeared to be all be men as far as I could see. I wonder if females are a little more cautious.
50 members is a good turn out
ReplyDeleteWe have 60 in the friendship group ( both sexes)
A number of apologies for absence were read out so I imagine the number is going on for 55 or more. It is quite a big WI branch as they go.
DeleteIt is .the village started a WI but it just didn’t work
DeleteIt appears to me that for WIs to work an historic tradition of WIs in the area helps. Then this is held together by a good central Federation of WIs office also in the local area with a high profile of keeping the committees on their toes, vetting speakers etc. and themselves organising bigger events like trips to London or even abroad. We have all this here.
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