*Best to read these Friday updates on the web*

Hi, I’m Ian, and I’m taking over the newsletter this week, while Jane is away on a “road trip”....one of the reasons it's rather late this week.

We had a quick chat before she went. Jane’s got a fab “Book Time For Kids” coming up next month, which sounds really exciting, so I did a bit of remembering about reading as a kid.

But you know what Jane is like with adventures…. I might be doing next week’s edition again too!

One day I’ll have to write a book based on the unexpected adventures Jane’s curiosity and creativity get her into, and then out of.

It will probably start something like….

Once upon a time, at 6:42 last Tuesday morning, Jane set off on an adventure.

She wasn’t planning to have one. It just sort of happened.

She’d been up since 4:35am.

She liked the cool stillness of the early July mornings. The house all quiet, with hungry teenagers deep asleep.

A nice stretch of “me-time” for yoga and meditation.

And a whole hour journaling over tea and toast and yogurt.

All set for her day, Jane got up and stuck a note on the fridge that said:

And with that, she popped on her helmet, jumped on her fully-charged ebike, and set off.

She zipped into the road and nearly knocked over Pete The Postie.

“You’re in a bit of a rush, today, Jane. Today of all days. Slow yourself down.”

“Sooooorrry.”

“Yes…..today is the perfect day for it” he continued.

“The perfect day for what, Pete?” asked Jane.

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

And so she did.

.

.

.

Ooops. I got a bit carried away there.

I was imagining the conversation with Elspeth who runs the corner shop, where Jane learns about some of her secret powers….and the power of the “What Box”…small on the outside, but infinitely huge on the inside. Big enough to hold anything you can imagine…including any of your fears you can pop into an invisible pocket until you’re ready to deal with them (although they mostly just disappear).

Reading as a child

For me, reading was a bit of an escape.

I grew up in a big, happy, noise-filled house. Until it wasn’t.

Everything changed the afternoon my Dad came back and my Mum picked up the telephone that was on a small table on the landing, ripped it out of its socket, and threw it at my Dad as he started to walk up the stairs.

He left and we didn’t see him again for quite a while.

And when we did, we now had a stepmother.

I wasn’t the type of kid that always had my head in a book. Like many firstborns (including my own son), I’m a “subvocalizer”. I have to silently say the words to myself, so I can hear them, which really slows me down. I’m also a bit dyslexic.

My dad was an antique dealer, so we got all sorts of old books, with the occasional book meant for children in the mix. For example, we had a copy of Robinson Crusoe from the 1930s, and a couple of books about the American Indians, with coloured illustrations…and that was about it from my dad.

Other than a full library edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica…each heavy green volume (there were 28 of them) was 6-8 inches thick, with thousands of very thin paper pages with tiny text, and very few photographs…but loads of illustrations (including full technical drawings of aircraft, World War I battle cruisers, famous buildings, inventions, etc). Great for looking things up and imagining from, as well as for making forts when friends or cousins came over.

My real favourites were all the Rosemary Sutcliff historical novels (“Eagle of the Ninth”, etc) which I read as many times as the school library would lend them to me.

And I loved my Mum’s Nova magazines. I loved the bold design, the incredible typography, the highly saturated, Cibachrome-style photographs, and the heavy, non-glossy paper they used. I had no idea what the articles were about…I really wasn’t interested. It was the look and feel of them I loved. I still have one edition I found when I cleared my mum’s house.

I asked Jane what books she liked as a child.

I saw this poem on Reading Addicts on Facebook.

It captures the feeling of escape and safety a book gave me, and I’m sure gives many children today.

This was taken from “Poems to Perform”. A delightful set of timeless poems collected by Julia Donaldson (the Children’s Laureate).

You can find it here https://amzn.to/3RBX0c7 (Reading Addicts affiliate link).

Book Time For Kids at Guildford Library

If your own children, or someone you know who has a child that loves reading books, enjoys talking about them, or sharing their book experiences with other children, then....

Jane created “Book Time For Kids" just for them!

A gently facilitated activity for kids, where they’ll all delve into books and enjoy a bunch of book-related activities.

Best suited for 7 to 11-year-olds (parents are welcome to stay).

It’s on Saturday 20th August, from 10.00 am to 11.30 am, in the seminar room at Guildford Library

Please spread the word. All the details are here >>>

The bad news is there’s only 8 spaces.

News from the Road Trip...

Jane just popped out for a decaf coffee, and ended up with 3 hours of boxing coaching from an Olympic Silver Medal boxer.

Not for Jane. For her son, who’s over the moon.

[Although I’m thinking that by chapter 7 of my Jane’s Accidental Adventures book, a bit of martial arts might come in handy. Especially if her “Undefeatable” Dungarees are in the wash, and her bottle of pongy potion was all used up getting rid of the giant they found asleep in the communal greenhouse.

Except it wasn’t a giant, but a rather tall guest at Mr Rodgers fancy dress party. He’d come as the Jolly Green Giant, drank too much of Mr Rodgers blackberry wine, and in a confuzzled state had wandered out the back gate, around the allotments, and ended up in the greenhouse. Until Jane and Clare chased him away in the morning.]

And talking of giants...

I found this surprising explanation of how David might not have been such an underdog compared to the giant Goliath.

Fascinating and convincing.

A Hot Week for the Bees

Peter Smith shared this update…

It was a hot week for all of us really – with 40 degrees being a sticky record. Was this a problem for my bees? Basically, yes, it could have been.

Before I answer a quick return to basics.

“Why,” someone asked me recently, “do honeybees make honey”? After all, bumblebees don’t make honey and they seem to be doing ok. (Actually, they’re not doing ok at all. In fact, they’re in big trouble for all sorts of reasons…. but don’t get me started on that right now.)

But to the question – well, it’s sort of in the name really. Honeybees make honey – it’s what they do.

And bumblebees, well they sort of bumble instead.

Honeybees make honey because they maintain an active colony right through winter – a reduced colony to be sure, but still very much awake and active (no males, as they all get kicked out in September).

And the honey – the honey is the fuel for the central heating system that keeps them warm. They consume the honey and the calories it provides enables them to keep the hive warm by contracting and relaxing their flight muscles to generate heat. They aim to keep everything between 34-36 degrees, though this might drop in really cold spells.

Come summer it’s a different story – the bees turn off their central heating system and switch on their air-conditioning, by creating a chilling effect from fanning with their wings. Providing there’s plenty of water available (they also use this to reduce heat levels) they can cope with the hottest of summer days.

Except that we’ve never had such hot summer days. Ever. So what would happen?

What could happen is that the combs could melt which would create a huge sticky mess. At worst they could suffer heat exhaustion and die.

So the local beekeepers weren’t taking any chances and many of them draped with old towels and kept them sluiced with water.

Still, the hot weather from the south didn’t just bring problems. It also brought lots and lots of Jersey Tiger Moths, traveling up from the Channel Islands.

And if the temperatures stay high, well they might just decide to stay. And that would be a really bad thing.

💡Creative Nudges

🎵"Home, before and after by Regina Spektor.

Not one weak song on the album. Simply perfect

I’m in love with her and the album." Jason

⚡via Annelize Kidd in response to a question ⤵️ — twitter.com

🖐A plug...

“Bringing together the local business community, offering support & connection”

Guildford Buzz® in-person networking is this Thursday, 28th July from 10am - 12pm.

Jane and friends are at ZERO, 14 Friary Street, Guildford, GU1 4EH.

Details here >>>>

👉Feedback please

Click the Yes or No below, and tell us what you think about this edition.

Any questions? Any suggestions?

Anything come up for you?

(Writing this made me remember what my Mum went through to hold our family together after the divorce.)

And any suggestions for my "Jane's Accidental Adventures" book?

Any secret powers Jane has/gets, or situations and challenges she has to overcome?

That's it until next Friday at 6.08am ish.

From Ian....on behalf of Jane.