Getting ready for the start of term does rather take me back to my time as a broadcaster (pull up a chair: thank you, I will - a pint of Knight's cider, please - from Storridge, near Malvern; very crisp) getting ready for a live broadcast. You have a plan, maybe a running order, but there's still an element of hoping for the best. The interesting, and nerve-jangling, ones were the outside broadcasts - when we were very dependent on a circuit to link back to the studio and from there to the transmitters. One of the best circuits I ever had was a little less than 30 years ago, doing a Remembrance Sunday service from Stanley Cathedral in the Falklands, in November 1982. The Royal Signals said they'd provide a line - and on the Saturday a Corporal arrived with a large drum of wire. He tied one end to a chair near the mixing desk, and set off through people's back gardens and down quiet streets until he reached the cathedral, where he tied the other end to the microphone stand in the pulpit. No switching, no connections: one solid length of copper from mic amplifier to mixer.
Where was I ? Oh yes, term starts on Sunday 15th. I'm away until Saturday night, taking up a kind invitation from the Boat Club to watch the 1st and 2nd VIIIs training in Salcombe and racing on the Dart. Now the last time I rounded into Dartmouth was in a Sigma 38, one evening in July of which year was it ? ... must you go ?
See you any time after 7 on Sunday !
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