Where has Mr St John gone?

I heard on the radio yesterday that all you need to keep well and fit is 30 seconds of exercise at full blast every day. So if you get on an exercise bike and pedal like mad for half a minute, hey presto you become fit. Sounds good to me. At the risk of sounding like Deryck Guyler, who played the caretaker in Please Sir ('I used to be in't Desert Rats y'know'), I once cycled from Italy to Spain across the foothills of the Alps and the Pyrenees. But now I would struggle to get to the next village. So I don't. My exercise these days is walking briskly with the dogs in the field at the top of this blog. Mr Grigg on the other hand is always talking about getting fit but that's all he does - talk about it. The closest he got was last Sunday when he did bar press ups in the pub and sipped his pint of cider on the way down before coming back up again.

It is the Year of the Ox and I am delighted. Why? It's my year. I seem to have missed it last time around, 12 years ago. Wrapped up in the newness of Mr Grigg probably. Anyway, we enjoyed a takeaway with Mrs Bancroft and Nobby yesterday evening before he flits off for a holiday Down Under with his girlfriend. Which is nice, and not at all as rude as it sounds. Lets hope nothing goes wrong at the village hall while he is away because Nobby's surname is Odd-Job. If it needs doing, Nobby Odd-Job will do it, very obligingly. We could do with more Nobbys in this world. The last we saw of him he was desperately trying to make some ancient bathroom scales work so he could weigh his luggage. What he didn't appreciate was that Mr Grigg had sneakily weighed himself a minute earlier and broke the scales.

Mr St John has gone completely AWOL. Someone said he was seen in Exeter today. He could be anywhere. Sparky Mark, the electrician, tells me Mr St John went on a mannequin hunt a few years ago down in his neck of the woods - near but far enough away from Newton Abbot (which is still a boil on the world's bottom, apparently). So Mr St John does know the mid-Devon territory. But my guess is he was probably pounding the streets arm-in-arm with Lady Friend , shopping.

Breaking news is that a car was broken into in the Square last night. It was parked under a light - part of the 'improved lighting' scheme meant to deter criminals. It just made it easier for the bloody thieves to see what they were stealing.

The other thing I have to report - and I need to get more information on this so confirmation please - is that Celebrity Farmer is now getting Super Mario to cook for him. Mario is the painter and decorator, not Antonio Carluccio, but is being asked to put things in the oven while Celeb is out doing farming stuff. I fear the fame is going to Celeb's head. Last Saturday as the crowds assembled for the hunt meet, I saw Celebrity Farmer driving through the square on his tractor and doing a royal wave. I fear the fame is going to his head.

Can someone without a blog try to post a comment please? Mrs Bancroft tried to do it a couple of days ago and the technology baffled her.
That's about it
Love Maddie x