Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2011-08-13 07:26:42 - Graham Ellis
Someone said to me that there's nothing to do in Melksham. But I don't believe them - I don't share that experience. In fact, I could do with 48 hours in the day to do all the things that I wanted.
On Monday of this week, I was teaching a programming course (open to the public) - and I'm teaching another one next week (see schedule), and in the evening I attended a town council meeting as a member of the audience, taking interest in both the parking rebate scheme, and issues of parking in Thackaray Place and Ruskin Avenue, where "open" parking allows residents and non-residents to complete for limited space at present. Not content with one meeting in an evening, Lisa and I joined our course delegates for Quiz night at the West End. Yes, again, that's an event that's open to all ...
The week has been a blurr ... a busy course, with the delegates that I enjoy the most - those who are new to programming on one hand, and later in the week those who have good knowledge already and are challenging and increasing that knowledge for a more complete understanding - distinctly opposite ends of the spectrum, but fantastic fun - with class discussions of such esoteric topics of why refereneces work for pointers to heap arrays but not stack arrays, with delegates all chipping in and one or two writing on the board / talking to the class as we went through the issues. Truely rewarding.
A blurr ... but come late Friday afternoon, the course was over and there was more "town stuff". We were serving cream teas (that's something for everyone to come to - 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day until the end of September, when the menu changes). Friends and business associates pop by - Sam from the Conigre restaurant (excellent reports again from a delegate this week, Sam!) and Colin, Chair of the Chamber of Commerce stopped by too ... and I went out shopping in the town shortly after 5. yes - there are places open, and I made a heavy purchase of some Mountain Dew from Komix. It's truely amazing what you can get in Melksham. And on my way back, I stopped by the United Reform church in the main town and watched their Bible Reading marathon for a few minutes; that will be ongoing for a few days yet. Back at Well House Manor, and I shut down the systems that I'd been using for the course, leaving Heather in charge. Of course, her evening wasn't over, with checkins well after 9 p.m. There's always things happening in Melksham!
Today's plan is "no external activity". Far from there being noting to do in Melksham, for me there's too much and I need to catch up on configuration and paperwork. And I need to recharge my batteries a little too. So I'll be skipping past everything that's happening. Tomorrow - Sunday - I'll be on the go at the station at about 07:30. Yes - that's right - even at 07:30 on a Sunday things are happening around here ...
Someone said to me that there's nothing to do in Melksham. But I don't believe them - I don't share that experience. In fact, I could do with 48 hours in the day to do all the things that I wanted.