Hythe and Dibden University of the Third Age

Learn, Laugh and Live

September 2019 Newsletter 11

Tim’s Tittle Tattle

Here we are, at the height of the schools’ summer break and as I write this, it’s pouring with rain, we’ve had gale force winds, and it’s cold! In short, a good old British summer! Like many of you, I have young grand-children and I do feel very sorry for families who just want to get out and about and let the kids run around

and burn off some energy. Let’s hope that the weather over the Bank Holiday weekend isn’t too bad.

It was a shame that we had to cancel the Summer Event but unfortunately we had no choice. We might have another look at this next year, or perhaps find an alternative “special” meeting we can organise

(please feel free to make suggestions).

Judging by comments made to me, most of the interest groups are working really well and their members are enjoying the various activities taking place. I am really delighted by this as interest groups are the back-bone of U3A – members organising, and involving themselves in, the things which they wish to do.

To ensure that the groups continue to flourish, it is vital that all members support and help the group con-venors e.g. please reply to emails, and also perhaps occasionally offer to stand-in for the convenor to give them a break.

If you have any ideas for possible new interest groups, please have a word with any member of the Com-mittee and we’ll be happy to help you set up a new group

At the moment, I’m covering the role of Groups Co-ordinator and I would really appreciate someone taking

this on for me. If you would like to know more about what this entails, please contact me and I will be happy to have a chat and you can then decide if you can help.

Tim Parsons, Chairman

Refreshment Rota

For Parish Hall Meetings

The Convener from each group should ask for at least three people to assist in serving the refresh-ments. If the group cannot find sufficient members to help on the given date the group should ex-change dates with another group.

Sept 9th Petanque

Oct 14th Play Reading

Nov 11th Social Cycling

Jan 13th Trail Walking

Meetings at 2pm The Parish Hall, West Street, Hythe

September 9th - Andrew Negus- The History of Southampton October 14th - Clive Tunley- “If music be the food of love...” November 11th - Kathy McNally - Mata Hari, the fast facts! December 9th – Christmas event with entertainer January 13th - Roger Buffett - History of the New Forest. February 10th - Margaret.Braddock -Sentimental and Mourning Jewellery.

All tea, coffee, milk and biscuits will be provided and water in the urn switched on. A list of what goes where will be provided. Nominated members should arrive 15 mins before the main meeting to introduce themselves to the Committee and prepare.

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Interest Groups Current Interest Groups: Board Games, Book Club, Computer and I.T. Skills, Craft, Discussion, Fine Dining, French Conversation, Gardening, History, Keep Moving, Lunches Out, Painting, Petanque, Play Reading, Social Cycling, Sunday Lunches, Theatre Visits, Trail Walking 6 -10 miles, Walking 3-5 miles, Wine Appreciation

Would you be interested in a Chess Group or a Creative Writing Group? Look for the sheets at

the back of the hall next meeting.

If you are interested in joining any of the Interest Groups please contact Vanessa on

secretaryhytheu3a@gmail.com or Tim on ts.parsons@btinternet.com

Wine Appreciation

The Wine Appreciation Group has been busy over the last three months. We have been holding our meetings at members’ houses rather than the Hub as it was thought we could use the gardens. This resulted in Ken erecting two gazebos for one meeting when it rained so hard we could not hear each other speak and the people sitting under the join were paddling, but hey it is all good fun and more acceptable after a few glasses of wine! In July we were treated to a tutorial wine tasting by Sergio, a Master of Wines at the Montagu Arms. He enthusiastically coached the group on the professional techniques of wine tasting while sampling wines from Austria, Argentina, France and Chile. It was a very informative and entertaining evening. If there is sufficient interest I will help a new Wine Appreciation group to get started as the current group is as big as it is possible to fit into a room. It is not necessary to be a wine expert, quite the opposite. If you like the idea of trying different wines in social company, you will enjoy belonging to a group. Contact me via the secretary. Brian

Craft Group The members have had a fun time at our craft sessions. We have experienced using many techniques from Susan, in how to create interesting gift boxes. We have made pictures using a the vast mix of powdered colours to dust over a variety of templates, the finished result could then be put on a card or made into a picture. We decorated clear glass bottles or jars and filled them with lights. The finished result, when the

lights were switched on, created a delightful effect. We recently have had new member to U3A Diana Taylor join us, who is also an experi-enced crafter. Diana showed us how to make very pretty paper flowers which we put onto boxes. The flowers could also be placed on blank greetings card. We all ap-preciate having the experience of Susan and now Diana in the group. The craft mornings are interesting and very absorb-ing, so much so that the time goes very quickly. Maureen

History Group

We have had a break for July and August but before we finished for the summer one of our members gave us a fascinating talk on the greatest UK train disaster. He brought along a prop to show the positioning of the trains and his talk told us of the horror of the event. In September we are having a guided tour of historic Hythe and then we are back at Hythe Marina Hub for our meeting in October when another of our members will be talking to us and also hopefully we will be able to plan events for the next few months, which may include more site visits. Jan

U3A Social Cycling Group

As the year has progressed so as our cycling group. We now have a few members that have the ability to

transport one or two bikes on racks. This has opened up a whole new area of cycling for us. None of our

members like cycling up Beaulieu hill and it seemed most off road routes started beyond this. Although we

don’t like to travel too far afield it is easier to get to the designated cycle tracks by transporting our bikes

some of the way. We have now completed rides around Beaulieu, Brockenhurst and Lyndhurst. These

have consisted of mainly off road tracks or very quiet roads. This makes for a very relaxed ride and pleasant

places to visit for our coffee and cake. Even the opportunity to visit an art gallery on their” open day” at

East Boldre. Distances have varied from 8miles to 16miles depend-

ing on terrain. With encouragement from each other we are all

happy to be out there cycling.

We do intend to continue with some rides that will start from the

Hythe area and regularly like to cycle to Lepe.

Jackie

Book Club

The Book Club continues to enjoy a varied choice of books, often getting stuck into something we’d never

dream of reading on our own library ticket. In the coming months we have 2 books with a maritime feel,

stories of Orkney and Newfoundland in Canada, a love story in the latter. Then an espionage mystery and a

heart-warming but also sad story of some friends in a restaurant in the Deep South (shades of The Help –

tissue alert). Finally Neville Shute’s Requiem for a Wren requested by a member, which has taken a year

to be available, coupled with another “beautifully wrought story “, shifting between London and Swedish

countryside. I’m just about to do battle with the Hampshire Reading Group sets spread sheet to find some-

thing gripping for August 2020 - wonder what the state of the nation will be then?

Stella

Painting Group

In August, the painting group has been attempting to paint from experience rather than pictures/books. We attempted to paint in two different member’s gardens, only to be chased indoors by the rain on both occasions. Cameras on our phones became very useful. We had a lot of fun thinking about what to paint and also how to gauge what should be included in the composition. A steep learning curve for sure. It didn’t help that both gardens gave us a lot of choice for im-ages. We are back to our usual sessions at the Community centre in September, the 1st and 3rd Monday morn-ings of each month. Susan

Play-reading

We have just finished reading ‘Hayfever’ by Noel Coward. As numbers were down during the summer months it has meant we had to take on two characters when reading. Much laughter ensued as it was not unusual to be talking to yourself and trying to adjust your voice accordingly. Our next play is ‘The Importance of Being Ernest’ by Oscar Wilde. I’m sure there will be fun and laughter again. Come and join us. Vanessa

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Our VISIT TO LIDL SOUTHAMPTON REGIONAL DISTRIBUTION CENTRE (RDC) Thursday 15th August 2019 What a wonderfully interesting and good walkabout we had at Lidl and how well we were looked after by Matthew and his colleague - members of the H&S/senior Maintenance Team. We were met and the main entrance and were shown into a comfortable well laid out con-ference room, where there was a welcome chat over a coffee/tea and loads of cakes and biscuits and then we got into (new) safety shoes they loaned us and high viz Visitor jackets. The usual H&S talk about our safety and then it was the walkabout all over the warehous-ing area and seeing those very tall shelves with all the goods on pal-lets was almost breath taking. I had expected something like that, but not so big nor so much. These high shelves store anything from toilet paper to wine, from electrical equipment to biscuits and chocolates – anything and everything that is in tins, bottles, cans, packages and similar – large and small. Though of course the height of shelving and volume will depend upon the items being stored. Each pallet of goods has barcodes which are scanned into the system and this allows stock takers and warehouse personnel to place the items and to know where the goods are. Matt explained that this Southampton Lordshill de-pot is one of 12 in the country (not sure if that was just England/Wales or all the UK) but

that 4-6 more are potentially to be constructed in the near fu-ture. Interesting Note 1: It should be noted that Lidl first came to the UK around 1994, and have slowly but surely increased their prominence in the British supermarket world and continue to do so. Matt made no bones about it; the hope is that Lidl will be the supermarket leader in the country and that of course means more stores and associated warehousing backup.

We didn't go into the freezer area due to the very cold tempera-tures in there, but the door to that section was opened, and my word that was blimmin' cold. Matt explained that the folks who do have to work there are only able to work for 50 minutes at a

time and then have a 30-minute break to warm up afterward. But they have to wear very protective warm thermal lined clothing and boots when in that storage area. Then we continued with a walkabout in the cool areas where fruit and veg and meat/chicken are stored on specialist pallets; which have to be up and out of the ware-house within a few hours from delivery. Matt came back to that aspect several times as the

timing of such stock from delivery to shop is given great priority for which Lidl is rightly proud. We finished off by checking out where the tractor transport vehicles were having their bat-teries recharged and maintained - those are the vehicles that pull trailers full of pallets and those that have the high reach arms for the placing on the tall shelving. These vehicles had been toing and froing all the while we walked about, but we kept well away from them, of course and they were very attentive to our safety and used their beepers constantly; not just for us but for all their colleagues. Lidl have very in-depth policies as to the environment and are very, very protective of not only keeping that up but improv-ing. So, for example, power utilised for the refrigeration areas is ploughed back by some superb 'alchemy' into heating the floors in other areas, and where recycling of packaging can possibly take place it is utilised in every way. That goes for old damaged pallets that are irreparable and they are also compacted, as well as card-board and plastics. If I understood correctly, those are recycled now in an Eastern European country, - no longer China where they used to be sent. Matt and his colleague explained that unsold non-perishable goods are resold to staff at highly discounted rates, and the monies raised from that are given to the chosen charity of the time, currently that is the worthy NSPCC charity.

On a storage note: Matt was asked about the potential problems of a forthcoming Brexit and how that could impact on Lidl, and he was able to say that there were no concerns, and Lidl weren’t stockpiling as such in any shape or form as it was felt unnecessary.

After the walkabout we were ushered through the 1st floor offices and back to where we started. As we took off the steel toed shoes and jackets and relaxed a beautiful lunch was delivered by the cook (no, chef) Peter who proudly displayed the lovely looking cooked foods that he and his staff prepared and were on offer to

the staff, and that we would have the opportunity to sample. What delicious-looking choices we were offered - from a steak pie, to halloumi cooked in a scrumptious chilli to-mato sauce, to a most tasty lamb and cabbage stew and all accompanied by perfectly cooked mixed vegetables, chips, couscous, garlic bread and salads. We all thoroughly en-joyed the hot food and there wasn’t much left as seen by the photo! The meal was completed with some delicious cakes and coffee/tea. Yes, we were very spoilt indeed. We finished off with thanks being given to Matt and his colleague for their kind help and explanations. A delightful morning held in such an interesting place in great company with fellow U3Aers.

Carol Holt Hythe & Dibden U3A

The broken Pallet crusher

Lymington U3A are holding a Study Day starts 10am finishes 3.30pm Cost £8 for U3A members

A number of us are going so we may be able to share transport. Contact Janet Norton for tickets janet.norton2@btinternet.com

Loneliness - Government asks for our help

This year the government is going to deliver its National Loneliness Campaign borne out of recom-mendations from the Jo Cox Commission on Loneliness - a cross-party group Jo set up herself be-fore she was killed.

What the campaign wants to break down the barriers that surround loneliness which has been proven to cause ill health, both physical and mental.

The team working on the campaign has come to U3A to ask for your help if you have experienced loneliness and have a story to share. Anyone who is willing to stand up and say, "Yes I am/was lonely. This is how it feels”. These could also be used as an offer to media outlets.

If you would like to get involved then please write a few lines on your experience and send to eliza-

beth.drury@u3a.org.uk She will only pass details onto the campaign if you wish her to.

Thank you – your help is really appreciated.

Our lives are full of amazing technology and time saving devices, but we can sometimes

forget the difference a simple conversation can make. The sound of another human voice, a

smile, the touch of a hand. These are things that make us human. Maybe you can chat to a

neighbour you have seen but never spoken to, someone standing in a queue in the shops or a

colleague at work. It need not be a lengthy conversation but just a smile and hello could be

enough to make a difference.

If you know someone who would benefit from U3A please suggest they come along to one of

our meetings.

BBC TV licence

The BBC has announced details of the TV Licence fee concession for those over 75 which will be implemented from June next year. As a result, from June 2020, any household with someone aged over 75 who receives Pension Credit, will be eligible for a free TV licence funded by the BBC.

We would really encourage members who are eligible to apply for pension credit to apply. You can see details of how to apply here: https://www.gov.uk/pension-credit/how-to-claim

For advice and edibility you can go to Age UK https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/money-legal/benefits-entitlements/pension-credit/

British Standards Institution (BSI)

Do you have an interest in consumer issues?

BSI’s Consumer & Public Interest Network (CPIN) is asking for volunteers from U3A to

represent the voice of UK consumers in the development of British Standards.

CPIN members are trained to be independent consumer experts, who represent consumers on

committees developing standards for many sectors.

If you are interested in becoming a CPIN rep, please contact consumer@bsigroup.com with a

brief CV, or with any questions you may have.

Can you read Pitman Shorthand?

The GNM Archive, part of the Guardian Foundation charity is asking for help from U3A members who can read Pitman shorthand.

The Archive collects, preserves and makes accessible records of the Guardian and Observer newspapers. It has acquired the unique collection of Clyde Sanger, the Guardian’s first Africa correspondent, reporting for the newspaper between 1960 and 1965. Clyde’s papers include around 130 notebooks mostly covering his work in Central, Southern and Eastern Africa. Many are partially written in Pitman shorthand, which the archivists (and most researchers) can't read! U3A members have so much experience and expertise that the archivists hoped to find anyone

who might be willing to transcribe the shorthand text. Read more about this at https://www.facebook.com/u3auk/

Please write to elizabeth.drury@u3a.org.uk to express your interest.

Interested in a Geology trip?

Are you interested in a potential Geological and Cultural visit to Lanzarote in September 2020? The trip would be organised by Dr John Cubitt and his Wife Professor Cynthia Burek after they organised a similar trip for the OU tutors group last year and will include the Geology of South Lanzarote and North Lanzarote, including the lava tunnels of Cuervos Las Verde and Jameos del Agua.

For more information and details please contact John on 07714430171 or at johnmcubitt@gmail.com

U3A Offer 👍

Bloomsbury Publishing are offering book loving U3A members a 30% discount on most books on the site, that includes fiction, non-fiction, children’s and cookery plus a discount on all events at the Bloomsbury institute using the code U3A30 at checkout.

Square Dancing is all about fun and friendship, it helps with fitness and mental agility. Please see our face book page, search Waterside Square Dance Club, where you will find photos and videos of club members dancing at various events such as Beaulieu Summer fete, Exbury fete and on our club nights. We meet at Beaulieu Village Hall from 7.45 to 10pm on Mondays and on Wednesday's for new dancers who will learn the steps with the help of experienced dances. The caller is Keith Lovegrove who has 40 years’ experience.

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We have received this email which I am publishing. Please be advised we are not recommending this, just informing you of the event. We are Flamingo Travel Agents, a local independent travel agent based in Bartley and we would like to invite you and any of your members to a presentation by SAGA holidays on 17th September at 14.00 at the Bartley Lodge Hotel, Lyndhurst Road, Cadnam, SO40 2NR. We will be offering a free cream tea to those that do attend but people do need to register in advance on 02380 002058.We hope that this might prove of interest to you or your members and hope that you can spread the invitation.

Regards Steve Lockyer Tel : 023 8000 2058. Mob : 07780 611110 Web : www.flamingotravel.co.uk

Spotted in The Herald

Newsletter compiled by

Vanessa Daley Hythe & Dibden U3A Secretary

secretaryhytheu3a@gmail.com