Rickinghall/Botesdale- A twitter travelogue

So some quick background on how an urban boy like me finds himself marooned in the middle of nowhere:

Soph & I used to live here: http://www.twitpic.com/873ti on the Southbank of the Thames right by Tower Bridge.

We also owned the 500 year old house I live in now and we stayed here at weekends.

To cut a long story short three years ago we decided that, given how fragile my mental state was at the time, we should downscale, sell the flat, use the money we made on that to pay off the mortgage on the house and move here permanently.

Soph now works just 3 days a week commuting into London and my business plan means I average 50/60 gigs a year.

Now I’m all better(ish) & in my right mind(ish) I often find it stifling and lacking in stimulating people to talk to on a daily basis – That’s where you twitpeeps come in and thank you for it :)

So I live in a tiny village of (I’ve just checked) about a 1,000 people called Rickinghall.

Rickinghall is about a half mile long and runs without break into another half mile long village called Botesdale. To me it’s one village but the locals get quit uppity about it.

Everyone knows everyone else. Almost everyone has cousins and brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles in the village and the families are very interrelated.

I genuinely have seen no evidence of incest but I remain vigilant.

I live in the middle of Rickinghall so I am now going to walk to the end and walk back past my house to the end of Botesdale twitpicing all the way – I hope it doesn’t rain!

I'm not calling you a ghost, Just stop haunting me

Many people have asked about how my good deed for tiday went and as it was so awesome I have decided it is worth me writing it up.

Today we took a guy called Cecil Gosling from a nearby village 10miles to the chiropodist in my village.

Cecil rocked! He was 89 and couldn’t get around without a walking frame, motorised cart or a wheelchair which mean that I had to help him into the chair and winch (I kid you not) him into the bus.

Gordon (the twat who co-ordinates the Community Transport Service – Today’s quote: “I’m sorry to say that it’s successive goverments that have lead to this colourd children stabbing people. If they’d brought back the death penalty…..” Cock!) really patronised him but as I was wheeling him in and out and strapping him into the bus Cecil asked me in his broad Norfolk accent if I grew up in my village & when I said no he told me that he had lived there until he was 20 in 1940 and went into the army to fight in Normandy.

He was the son of the local policeman and grew up in the tiny police station that used to be in the village.

He then regaled me with some incredible stories of growing up in what was then a very busy village.

He was sharp as a knife and had some really poignant insights on the effects of the war on small communities where entire generatiosn of boys were wiped out.

His chiropodist was last so we spent an hour talking all sorts of stuff & trying to politely ignore Gordon.

Cecil was a really interesting guy with some really pithy things to say and I was just so aware that most of the time no one actually spoke to him on his level or listyened to him long enough to realise what a really intelegnt and eloquent man he was. It made me very sad.

We continued chatting as I drove him back home afterwards and he pointed out where all the shops that have now been turned into houses were in my village.

He said there used to be nine pubs. Nine!! It’s only a mile long stretch of road!

Before the war Cecil (who was a blacksmith) and his mates would each put a farthing into a kitty, start at one end and whoever was still standing at the end of 2 pints in each of the 9 pubs kept the money.

When we got him home (and after me nearly dumping him out of the chair twice – Need to learn how to do that) he showed me a commendation for bravery he had which was signed by Field Marshall Montgomery & a newspaper cutting about when he was sent home from the war temporarily with a shrapnel wound.

It was obvious that he didn’t want me to go but Gor-twat was outside honking the horn and pointing to his watch so I had to go.

He said he’d really enjoyed the trip and it just made me sad.