< February 2006

March 2006

April 2006 >

Friday 31 March

An email arrived today with good news. Charles Lyne, a member of the Cotswold Canals Trust (CCT), had helped with comments on a draft of the Leeds and Liverpool DVD and when I let him have a copy of the finished DVD I also let him have a sampler for a proposed Cotswold Canals DVD. The CCT trading company is keen to use the proposed DVD for its fund raising activities.

The filming will follow the route of the Thames and Severn Canal and the Stroudwater Navigation which make up the Cotswold Canals. It will include the CCT trip boats at Lechlade, Saul Junction and, if we can make the appropriate arrangements, Sapperton Tunnel. I'm also hoping we can include filming of some of the work parties organised to help with the restoration work.

Very little of the route is open for boating so we will cover the route by car and on foot. It will be an interesting challenge to put all this together into order to trace the route from one end to the other. I'm not sure in which direction we will follow the route yet, but we need to decide before doing much of the filming so it will all fit together.

We plan to film the route during Spring and early Summer with release planned for late summer. Watch this blog for details of progress.

Friday 24 March

Congratulations to Stephen for placing the first online order through our website using PayPal to process the payment.  His email address ended like "company.co.uk" so I put "www." in front of it to see what appeared at the website.  The website had details of his family and I was delighted to see that Stephen and his wife are bell ringers.  My wife Christine and I are also active bell ringers.

Stephen's website has links to other sites about bell ringing and canals, as well as other family interests.  He has a link to Granny Buttons - perhaps I can persuade him to add a link to our website.  There are also some excellent wide-format panoramic photographs which are well worth browsing.

Stephen's DVD is packed and ready to take to the Post Office tomorrow (Saturday) morning.

Sunday 19 March

On-line shopping is now available on our website.  We have now integrated features from PayPal which allows us to accept payments by credit card, debit card or from PayPal accounts.  This will allow simpler and speedier response to orders.  Who will be the first to place an order that way?

Saturday 18 March

Today was our chance to visit other bloggers. Our daughter, Susan, is just completing her first year studying Nursing at Birmingham and she had come home by train a few days ago.  Today we were driving to Birmingham to collect her belongings and bring them back to our home near Bristol.

We had also been sitting on a complimentary copy of our Leeds and Liverpool DVD for Sue and Vic, on No Problem waiting for the opportunity to deliver it. Sue and Vic had provided useful feedback on an early draft of the DVD.  A quick check of Sue's Blog confirmed that they were still moored at Napton and we could visit on the way to Birmingham.

So, with Christine and Susan, I arrived at No Problem with a couple of Tesco carrier bags in hand shouting "Tesco Delivery for No Problem" while watching for the look on Sue's face.  Sue is a regular on-line shopper with Tesco and this seemed a more relevant greeting than the attempts to sell Life Assurance. by Andrew Denny from Granny Buttons We were immediately made welcome with much discussion about DVDs and Sue's walking activities.

And then a further bonus as we were leaving. Moored just behind No Problem was moore2life with bloggers Chas and Ann. Sue introduced us as we passed by on the way back to our car.  I'm sorry we didn't have time to stop and chat.

Now I'm sitting safely back at home and I've just discovered Andrew Denny's excellent blog about Waterway Routes on Granny Buttons.  Now I just have to find out what an RSS feed is! (and finish adding credit card payments to our website).  I hope Andrew gets his computer fixed soon so he can watch the Leeds and Liverpool DVD.

Wednesday 15 March

I've just phoned all hire companies and shops I posted complimentary copies of the Leeds and Liverpool DVD to last week. The good news is that they all remembered it arriving but none of them had looked at it yet. I need to phone again next week to see if I can persuade them to stock it.

Wednesday 8 March

I've just prepared complimentary copies of the Leeds and Liverpool DVD for some of the hire companies and shops along the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.  I hope they will consider stocking the DVD and, perhaps, using it to tempt new hirers to the canal or for souvenirs to take home.

Sunday 5 March

Where have all the little birds gone?  Usually our garden is full of small birds, all tempted by the food we put out.  Even the Robin has worked out how to use the feeders hanging on the apple tree.  But, for the last 10 days or so, there have been very few and we wondered where they had gone.

Then, looking out of the window at Sunday lunchtime, we discovered why.  Sitting in the apple tree next to the feeders was this large bird - just waiting for lunch to arrive.  Presumably this has been around for a little while and frightening the small birds away.

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