MEETING REPORT FOR 17th JANUARY 2012.

Apologies: Barry, Les, Caz, Sally, Liliane.
Present: Tony, Dick, Ali, Sandy, Cathy, Beryl, Martin, Carolyn, Ray and Dave (chair).

The evening started with a little panic when nine brave souls were queued outside the library awaiting the key to get into our meeting place. Finally Dick arrived with it and we made it inside but only after a certain member managed to activate the alarm instead of unsetting the system.

Liliane couldn’t be with us so Barry, who had the key then went on a mercy mission to the hospital to collect Les and wife Joan leaving Dick with the key and Dave the dubious honour of taking the chair.

Neither Caz nor Sally could make the meeting and so the evening seemed quite depleted in numbers compared to the last Bill Budner competition.

It was nice to see Ali back with us again after a long break brought about by work related courses throughout 2011, a wedding and a significant birthday. Now 2012 is here, Ali hopes to get back to writing with the ultimate aim of publication.

Trish has now moved out of Trimley where she lived and is enjoying her new home in the country. Just a shade too far away to come to our meetings though she remains very much in our minds.

The beauty of the Bill Budner Competition is that it has now been staged fifteen times including this meeting. Those meetings have produced some tremendous and diverse entries and, more than that, have now seen eleven different winners. Amazing!

The competition commenced with Tony reading Paris April (author Carolyn) a story of a photograph, the last one on the roll of film...

Dick read Cheat (author Ali) a wife finds a necklace in her bed etched with the letter ‘C’ and seeks revenge...

Ali read Forever Came Today (author Ray) A tale of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier who awaited his wife...

Cathy read Bobby Moore’s Assistant (author Martin) The hilarious but unlikely tale of selecting a football team to represent heaven against the red devils from the other place...

Beryl read The Bullring (author Tony) An account of every move and turn in a Spanish bull fight...

Martin read Body of Evidence (author Dave) The story of the growing suspicion a husband had for his wife Jessica...

Carolyn read Over My Dead Body (author Beryl) Dennis puts up a fight against going into a care home or having a team of carers to look after him in his own home...

Ray read The Night Before Christmas (author Cathy) A wartime story of a little girl with her mother and grandparents when a telegram is delivered...

Dave read Not A Wise Move (author Dick) A woman discovers her husband is having an affair and decides his lover must die. She hires a hit man to do the task...

Sandy did not enter the competition.

With the votes cast in which every story gained votes the result was:

In joint third place: Carolyn, Tony and Cathy.

Runner-up Martin

The Winner: Ray: with his story ‘Forever Came Today’.

A photograph appears next down on our weblog and also in the Roll of Honour.

An excellent evening of entertainment with some really good and diverse stories and some very close voting. Well done Ray! Our 11th winner!

Rounding off the evening Dave played a tape of 50 word stories that were written and recorded in a meeting back in 2004. Rachel Sloane, then a Radio Suffolk presenter, came along and asked that we all wrote these stories about a place we remembered. It is surprising what you can do with fifty words as the tape proved.

Those stories were broadcast in Writers’ Tales on Friday 21st June 2004 and for Dave and one or two others it brought memories flooding back of the Scribblers of the day...from our late and lamented Allen, to young Jack who is sadly missed.

Our next meeting will be on Tuesday 7th February when the homework assignment will be up to 1,000 words on “News”.

Until next time,

Keep Scribbling!

Dave deputising for Barry.

For all your research and information
visit your local Felixstowe Library
and the Suffolk Record Office .