Newslink September 2007

This newsletter was produced (free of charge by Lware Limited for Mudeford Men's Club, Christchurch. Formatting and images are not included. NEWSLINK The Newsletter of the Mudeford Men’s Club September 2007 C i U later! Statement by the Committee “Relations with the C.I.U. came to a head this year when, despite the MMC Committee's strong arguments against, they insisted that we reinstate an expelled member. They would not answer the key question put to them as to who would take responsibility for any untoward actions, if we followed their direction. Would they accept Corporate Liability? No answer. Under the circumstances, the Committee felt obliged to stand firm as the democratically elected committee which has the responsibility of running the Club. An EGM was called for the members to express their views. The meeting unanimously called for the Club to leave the Union. The C.I.U. were invited to attend, but did not reply until they advised us that we had been expelled from the Union." Marrow Competition Sunday 9th September saw the annual Marrow competition – see later for a full round up. Among the many winners was this effort, from Joyce Mitchell which, for some reason, was selected as the winning Mr. Potato Head. (Yes, those are eggs on his face.) Overall Winner of Marrow Competition – Hugh Jones. We don’t know what he said but Teresa seems to be more up for the idea than Tori! Saturday night entertainment SEPTEMBER 15 Mista Beat 22 Gold Disco 29 Blitz Disco OCTOBER 6 DJ Langer 13 Filmed Race Night Football Club Fund Raiser 20 Odessa 27 Gold Disco NOVEMBER 3 Lucky 10 Cookie Roadshow 17 tba 24 Alpine Roadshow DECEMBER 1 Brian Moon and the Satallites 8 Blitz Disco 15 Christmas Draw 22 Jam Night XMAS EVE 24 Coroma Disco BOXING DAY 26 Arfur Word Duo 29 Filmed Race Night NYE 31 Alpine Roadshow More cricket success! Another fantastic season for Mudeford CC with two teams promoted – again! Marrow Competition This year’s Marrow Competition was, as ever, very well attended and with Paul Hammond providing the music everyone enjoyed a great atmosphere. Your esteemed Club Secretary John Oliver walked it in the actual marrow competition with his entry weighing more than twice the nearest challenger – a mighty 20.7kg. Runner bean glory went to Brian Jerrard with his five beans totalling 118 inches! (Can someone explain why we measure weights in metric and lengths in imperial?) Eric Jesty won the onion category with a 3.5kg specimen with Jack Marland notching up 1.5kg with the winning tomato. Only two pumpkins appeared this year and John Foulkes edged out Rosie Foulkes with a 7.9kg entry. In the Jams and Chutneys it was a similar story to last year with five of the six prizes going to the men, just proving that we are the superior sex where cooking is concerned! Hugh Jones won both categories and also came third in the chutney competition. In the Mr. Potato Head category, three entries hit on the same idea “King Edward” but it was Joyce Mitchell’s spud based comment on the CIU situation that was judged the winner. Hugh Jones was awarded the Jim Ward Trophy as overall winner with two firsts and a third. Other competitors with more than one prize were John Oliver, Terry Wright and John Sellick. No questions whatsoever were asked when Viv Moody won the “Guess the weight of the veg basket” competition as she is most definitely not connected to or related to Tori in any way at all. Honest guv! The event raised over £75 towards the Chr***mas charity fund (I can’t bring my self to even write the word yet) Thanks go to Tori and Teresa for their hard work and organisation and to the judges for the day – Sheila Vines, Jacquie Reddell and Doreen Davis (apologies for any spelling errors ladies). Your letters & emails All of them, in full. This edition’s top letter, winning £10 worth of drinks at the bar (remember that any published letter or email is worth a drink too). “Dear Sir, I wish to complain that nobody can be bothered to write any letters. Yours sincerely, Richard Leyshon.” Need I say more. Lager please. Club Entertainment A couple of new acts have gone down very well over the summer. Phil Joseph was forced into a number of encores after an evening of soul classics and in August, new band Blowing Free went down a storm featuring an excellent vocalist and doing some “different” material from what we hear from so many bands. Sports and games news Crib No input received Ladies darts No input received FootballOut of season Bowls by Eric Jesty The annual bowls match with Southbourne Ex-Service Club was played on 10th June 2007 (1st leg) and 5th August (2nd leg). Sadly, the first leg was lost by 30. This was partly due to the loss of a few key players, but none the less, a most enjoyable morning was had by the team. The second leg was only lost by 1, due to the return of those few players. (Go on Eric, name and shame – Ed) As there were four birthdays that weekend, an even more enjoyable morning was had by the team. The team would like to thank the Committee for sponsoring the match. We need more players from the club, or if you would like to take up bowls and don’t know how to start, we have in the club our own qualified coach in John Davis, who is happy to help anyone interested. Once again thank you to the club and the team for their support. Looking forward to next year, maybe bringing the trophy back to Mudeford. New bowlers can contact me on 01202 478834. Mens darts (1) by Gary Howlett For the last few seasons Mudeford have entered four darts teams in the Christchurch Clubs Darts League. (Friday Night) Final league positions for last season as follows:- Mudeford A 5th, Mudeford V 6th, Mudeford Anchors 9th and Mudeford B 10th (out of we would rather not say). This information can be viewed on the web www.xch180.co.uk .. Success in the various competitions throughout the season went to Derek Sadler Mudeford V winning the Silver Singles , Martin Wood Mudeford A winning the Captains Cup, Gary Howlett winning the 180 Cup and The Denny Parrett 4's competition Mudeford A Martin Wood, Darren Hadley, Rob Peaty, & Gary Howlett. All the Mudeford teams enjoy the league and there is always a fierce rivalry when the teams meet each other and by the time the pairs games are played the lubricant available kicks in making the games even more enjoyable. The league is very friendly and if there are any club members who would like to indulge in a game of darts, Season starts September, Practise Friday night of-season during Summer, please contact Gary Howlett. Mens darts (2) by Paul Groves Mudeford B annual Race trip. Once again the annual Mudeford B race day pilgrimage took place on Saturday July 7th. ''The 50 blokes on a coach tour'' The venue again was Sandown Park race coarse near London. Once more this trip was well supported by other Mudeford men's club darts teams and also club members. We set off from the club just after 9 am and arrived at the ground in good time to find a good spot for an afternoon of top class racing. The weather was fantastic, and after all the bad weather we had previously we could not have asked for a better day. Those of us with the receding hair line ended up looking like red lollypops as the sun beat down all day. Still there was plenty of fluids being drunk so that nobody got dehydrated. Again the racing was unpredictable and we had winners and losers heading back on the coach. At least the raffle on the way back on the coach was some consolation for the losers. Those of the younger generation or young at heart were dropped off in Southampton for a night on the town, while others who were not so quite energetic returned buy coach back to the club early evening. The coach then returned to pick the remainder of the party goers up at 11pm (ish) for the trip back to Christchurch Hope to see you all again next year. The New Darts season ahead. Once again the Mudeford B team will be entering a team for the new season. With some new additions we hope to avoid the dreaded wooden spoon this year. Good to see 4 teams still in the club on a Friday night as the interest is in decline from many clubs and very few new venues coming on board. Snooker - Pussyfoot pairs This year’s Pussyfoot Handicap Pairs winners were Gordon Wallace and Tony Clare with Martin Price and Jonathan Beavis finishing runners up. The cumulative scores in two frames were used to decide the winner. In a very close match, Gordon and Tony won with a little assistance from the handicap. Cricket Another fantastic season (despite the weather) saw both the first and second teams achieve promotion. This was especially impressive for the firsts as it was their first season in a new league after promotion last year. Laurie Wilkinson, MMC President (and cricketer of 93 years standing) explained: “The average age of the 1st team is about 24 and this is all down to the youth policy set up by Bernie Tennant, Peter Assinder and Russ Stansfield. The 1st team has been promoted every year since the pavilion was built in 2000. They as you know they were runners up this year out of the whole of the Hampshire cricket league consisting of 500 teams. That gives you some respect of what they have achieved. The only problem is they have outgrown the ground. The second team have also been promoted to the South west regional 1 league had a great season and ended up 3rd under Captain Paul Downey” The players would like to thank Cllr Alan Griffiths for the after match champagne. What is the secret of a successful team? A question pondered by generations. Many will site the obvious answers – individual skill, dedicated practice, self belief, teamwork etc. But, speaking off the record to members of the Cricket Club, it soon became apparent that the real reason for their success lies elsewhere – a secret weapon known to insiders as the 10 Ps: Peak Performance Pertains to Past President Pitcher’s Pitch-side Produced Pressure Pronouncements. Yes, it’s true, the team’s success was due almost entirely to Bernie Pitcher’s screams of “Keep the pressure on!” and “Don’t get complacent now!” (see Bernie, you were wrong, I can spell complacent!). Insiders suggest that Bernie’s ceaseless input is thought to be worth 100 runs and four wickets per match. It will indeed be a sad loss next season when Bernard may not be available as he is rumoured to be accepting a position with the England team. See the Upcoming Events section for details of the George Ashby Memorial Trophy match. Golf by John Oliver Another good day for the Golf Society. Following a 'cracking' thunderstorm, our intrepid golf society played the June Stableford Competition at Crane Valley Golf Club on Friday 22nd June. The course was in excellent condition, if a little moist! Despite the slow greens, the winner was Mark Roper with an excellent score of 34 points (despite recently being cut 4 shots!). Longest drive was Ian Cumberlidge and nearest the pin Jeff Carter. An excellent evening at the MMC Club completed a splendid day. The Golf Society's July meeting was a successful stableford competition at Ferndown Forest Golf Club. The winner with 38 points was that well known raconteur and star of the snooker table, Paddy McDonnell. Nearest the pin winner was Pat Bond, and the longest drive went to that big hitter, Peter Chatfield. Despite heavy rain in the morning, it held off for most of the afternoon with only one shower slowing play. An excellent afternoon was had by all, rounded off with sandwiches and a presentation at the club in the evening. On Friday 24th August the annual golf match was held at Canford Magna Riverside course against our local rivals Southbourne Ex-servicemen's Club. After a closely fought event the Southbourne boys narrowly triumphed with a 3.5 to 2.5 matches win. Stars for the MMC were Captain Buc Taylor and Monty, who beat their opposition 6 up. Despite this win Southbourne retain the trophy that the MMC society will have to fight for again next year. All 24 players adjourned to the Mudeford Club for the Presentation and excellent buffet provided by Gordon Wallace, our Steward. A splendid evening ensued with much lively conversation. The next MMC Golf Society Day will be at Knighton Heath on the 18th October. Any members wishing to take part should ensure that they put their name on the list in the Men's Bar. Recent events EGM - 21st March – see statement on front page Pussyfoot dinner – another superb evening Upcoming events Cricket – the George Ashby Memorial Trophy For the third year, Mudeford take on Christchurch in this end of season clash where we aim to retain the trophy. 1pm start, Mudeford, Sunday 16th September. Come along and support the boys. Ladies night – 31st October A trip to see 42nd Street. Tickets go on sale 03 October priced just £19 (these seats cost £25 to buy). The price even includes your coach travel and a drink! For all the computer users … Sometimes you can get something good for nothing! My PC had suddenly started running slowly and I suspected spyware. I did a full system scan with Norton Internet security – no problems detected. This didn’t convince me. I downloaded Microsoft Windows Defender (it’s free). Again, no problems detected. Then, by chance, I found that Google do a free software pack – you can download the whole lot or just select the parts you want. One of the programs is ‘PC Tools Spyware Doctor.’ After 50 mins of scanning it had a list of 165 items of various severity which it recommended removing. All of these threats had been missed by Norton and Defender. Two minutes later it was done You can get the download from: pack.google.co.uk (note no www needed) And there’s more … Even if you regularly use Disk Cleanup and empty your recycle bin, it is astonishing how many “temporary” files can still exist and clag up your PC. There is an excellent program to get rid of the unwanted stuff, called Ccleaner. I can’t tell you what the C stands for but it rhymes with Trap. Even as someone who does regularly use Disk Cleanup, when I first ran Ccleaner it removed over 1GB of “Trap” from my system. You can get this from www.Ccleaner.com Smoking ban Those of you who can remember back three months will be aware that I was less than reverential in my approach to the Committee’s plans for dealing with the smoking ban. Having tried and failed to persuade the Membership to write in, I thought upsetting the Committee is sure to get a response. It didn’t. C’est la vie. Anyway, as some of you will have seen, we now have some picnic tables at the rear of the club for the benefit of the “lepers” and this system appears to be working in summer conditions. Most interestingly, the overall takings for the last three months are virtually identical to the same period in 2006 so hopefully, our worries about the financial implications of the ban were groundless. A politically incorrect hair related tale Once again, credit goes to Peter and Annette for this one. For every 10 jokes Pete tells me, there’s usually one I can print! A blonde lady rings 999 and asks for the Fire Brigade. She gets put through and, in a state of panic screams, “Please come quickly, my house is on fire! Please hurry!” “Don’t worry madam” says the operator. “We’ll be there in no time at all. Now, try and stay calm and tell me how we get there?” “Err – HELLO!” says the blonde, “In that big red engine of course.” Space filler! Isn’t it always the way? Newslink was looking very skinny. Then, a day before we intended to publish, several items came in and all of a sudden it won’t fit into the usual two pages. So, just this once, a special bonus 3rd page. What we don’t have is enough to fill it so I’ve dredged through the vaults to find something that might give you a laugh. First up, a true story that you may have heard about already. The Spice Girls said that they would add one venue to their world tour and “fans” could vote for the location of the gig. Toronto “won” the competition, amidst claims that the result was fixed as the majority of voters wanted the girls to perform in downtown Baghdad. That would certainly be a way to “Spice up your life.” The following are reportedly true statements by sports commentators. If you like them, we’ll include some more next time we have space to fill. "Fred Davis, the doyen of snooker, now 67 years of age and too old to get his leg over, prefers to use his left hand." (Ted Lowe) And here's Moses Kiptanui - the 19 year old Kenyan, who turned 20 a few weeks ago" (David Coleman) "Once Tony Daley opens his legs you've got a problem" (Howard Wilkinson) "Its a great advantage to be able to hurdle with both legs" (David Coleman) "We now have exactly the same situation as we had at the start of the race, only exactly the opposite" (Murray Walker) (After playing Cameroon in the 1990 world cup finals) "We didn't underestimate them. They were just a lot better than we thought" (Bobby Robson) "And with an alphabetical irony, Nigeria follows New Zealand" (David Coleman) (On the difficulties of adjusting to playing football and living in Italy) "It was like being in a foreign country" (Ian Rush) "Hodge scored for Forest after 22 seconds - totally against the run of play" (Peter Lorenzo) "We actually got the winner three minutes from the end but then they equalised" (Ian McNail) Contact info: (like you care!) Write to Newslink via the Club. E-mail xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Call Rich Leyshon on xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx