Rehearsals have now started for Female of the Species, our Spring production but the group is still stunned by the death of George Pulley. His funeral is not until February 22nd so still a while before the old guy’s finally laid to rest.

Other activities recently included the annual dinner, which I confess I didn’t attend this year; the first time I have missed an annual dinner for nearly forty years, shame.

The Member of the Year award went this time to Mike Lacey, highly deserved I may say. Mike stepped in as acting Chairman when our Kate had to resign due to her health. Congratulations Mike.

What else? Well the Oxfordshire Drama Network quiz this year is to be held at Didcot Civic Hall on March 19th nicely timed to coincide with the Blandy Boffins village quiz here in Kingston Bagpuize, and a quiz we always field a team for and have often won over the last few years. This might not be the case now with our resources split between two quizzes but there y’go. Also on in the county this month and into March are some great plays by local groups.

A murder mystery by the Drayton Players, The Mystery of Talbot Manor, on at Drayton Village Hall next week I believe. (If I could open the website I would give more details). Couple of Alan Ayckbourn’s also coming up. Further details are on the ODN website, if you can open it.

There’s a ‘whodunnit’ at the Unicorn theatre in Abingdon from March 10th –13th. With 'Prescription for Murder' the Old Gaol Theatre Company promises a good night for amateur sleuths. Tickets from Mostly Books in Stert St., Abingdon.

Anyone who hasn’t visited the Unicorn Theatre should, as it’s a cracking little theatre.

Topical little story this week……… A Platoon was marching north of Fallujah when they came upon an Iraqi insurgent, badly injured and unconscious.

On the opposite side of the road was a British soldier in a similar but less serious state. The soldier was conscious and alert and as first aid was given to both men, the platoon commander asked the injured soldier what had happened.

The soldier reported, "I was moving north along the highway here, and coming south was a heavily armed insurgent. We saw each other and both took cover in the ditches along the road.

I yelled to him that Saddam Hussein was a miserable, lowlife scum bag who got what he deserved, and he yelled back that Gordon Brown is a fat, good-for-nothing, left wing half-blind Jock, and Lord Mandelson is a cross-dressing power mad idiot.

So I said that Osama Bin Laden dresses and acts like a frigid, mean-spirited lesbian.

He retaliated by yelling, "Oh yeah? Well, so does Harriet Harman!"

"And, there we were, in the middle of the road, shaking hands, when a bus hit us."