February Editorial

The Editor announced, with regret, the death of Audrey McBride, a stlawart supporter of The Village Pump and several other village residents

It was with great sadness that I learned of the death of Audrey McBride. Audrey, who died on Thursday 17th January after a long and trying illness, was a tremendous supporter of The Village Pump. She was, for many years, our Subscriptions Secretary and then one of our collation stalwarts. An avid reader of every edition Audrey was always quick to tell me if an article had fallen short of what she saw as the Pump's very high standards.

Audrey will be missed throughout Stoke Ferry by her many friends but the loss to her family will be immeasurable. She is, at least, finally released from the traumas of the past few months, for which we must all be grateful. Our condolences to Audrey's family. Her funeral is planned for Monday 4th February at 1.45pm at the King's Lynn crematorium and afterwards in Stoke Ferry Village Hall. All welcome.

This has been a sad few weeks for Stoke Ferry. Alan Whitford, who was an occasional contributor to The Village Pump, also lost his battle with ill health last week as did a newcomer to the village who lived in Trafalgar House. Not the start to the new year we had hoped for.

But, on a brighter note, mother nature is thriving with snowdrops and aconites already bringing colour to our gardens and the birds are already pairing off for the new nesting season . We have also been most fortunate that once more we have missed the trauma of flooded homes and businesses. The cold snap forecast at the end of December has failed to materialise, thank goodness, and temperatures in the middle of January rose to an unseasonable 12 degreesC (54 degrees F). No wonder the birds think that spring has arrived early. Other good news within Stoke Ferry is the clean-up of the building site in Lynn Road which has been an eye-sore for far to long. Who knows, we may see some smart new homes on the site before the end of the year. No sign of progress on the old wood yard, though!

Your Pump this month, for the first time since I became editor, has items from all six villages in our area of distribution. Please keep them coming so that we can provide items of interest for all our readers.

You will all have noticed that Easter eggs are on sale in all the supermarkets, so summer can't be too far away! Start dusting off those barbecues now and make sure you have a good stock of charcoal for all those balmy evenings we can confidently expect!

Ray Thompson