Memories

Mindfully Bertie… An Update

Update Mindfully Bertie started in August 2016 with “Dream Island“. August 2021 will see us back there for a week if restrictions permit. When the first Covid-19 lockdown started, it soon became obvious that we and our readers would have time on our hands. So, we started a midweek, additional, shorter story. Tim, our Technical…

Blue

Bertie: “Bobby. When we posted Big Garden Birdwatch, we got lots of compliments about the photographs. You took the pictures with your ‘proper’ camera. This one. Fuji X-T20. Nice camera.”

Wot’s in an ‘at

Bobby and I love ‘ats. They keep yer bonce warm. They keep it dry… hopefully. Some keep the sun out of yer eyes. Some are totally practical. Some not. Some reflect your mood. Others your ego. Just one or two are very old friends. Maybe only one is. “‘at Par Excellence”. So here we offer…

Can You Hear Me Now?

There was a time when we rode on trains. Travelled to Farringdon on Thameslink. Looked out the window mindfully into people’s private lives. Compared how green some people’s lawns were. Wondered at the impressive history of Farringdon Station. Walked through Clerkenwell to Islington.

War Baby.

“Bobby was a War Baby. That’s why his ears stick out.” So said his Mum Dorothy many times over her lifetime with Bobby. She rarely mentioned the war at all otherwise. Nor did Sid. His Dad. This soul searching all started with an interesting post on Sutton and Cheam History Group. Bobby always intended to…

Review

Bertie: “Cor blimey Bobby, this pandemic seems to be going on forever. ‘Abnormal’ is becoming the norm. At the beginning of the first lockdown, we were immediately conscious of time on our hands. Time for us at Mindfully Bertie (Technical Director Tim might disagree) and time for many of our readers.”

Ashes to Ashes

It was the 15 February 1999. The light was starting to fade across the Severn Estuary. A middle aged couple were sitting alone in a bird hide at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire. Watching the scene developing in front of them as wild Ducks, Geese and Swans descended upon the lake…

Siskin

Bobby’s interest in birds started in Ridge Road Library, North Cheam. One miserable winter, he caught flu quite badly and was off school for a while. Once he started to recover, he revelled in this little, long since gone library. One day he borrowed ‘The Birds of London’. He was amazed by the revelations in…

Wendy’s Jumper

Bertie: “Corrr blimey. It’s bleedin taters Bobby!” Bobby: “I know, Bertie. But at least you have a fur coat.”

Johnny Haynes: Captain of Fulham and England

Johnny Haynes Bobby: “I am a writer. Good, bad, indifferent, rubbish, eloquent. I write and am, therefore, a writer. When I see other writing that inspires me, I don’t think ‘I wish I could write like that’ because maybe I already do.