Thanks for bringing that over munchkin, it all sounds great and he probably did go out for a cig as he usually stays a while doesn't he? Hmmm, a guy in a red jumper eh? maybe he was just a friend, or hopefully it's a sign that Will won't be "lonely this christmas" after all :D .

Thanks for bringing all the snippets over munchkin.

 

Shall we start a discussion of our fav Enid Blyton books on here. :lol: Her stories have certainly stood the test of time inspite of them never been considered 'cool' literature. :)

Loved Enid Blyton and still do, the Mystery series, Mallory Towers and the Famous Five, yaay! Fatty, PC Goon, Darrell, Gwendoline, :drama: George, Timmy the dog, Uncle Quentin and Aunt Fanny. :lol: what great charactors.

Frderick aka Fatty was my fav character. Loved the mystery books the best. Fav being the Mystery of the Missing Necklace set in the Waxworks Museum.

Frderick aka Fatty was my fav character. Loved the mystery books the best. Fav being the Mystery of the Missing Necklace set in the Waxworks Museum.

 

Fatty was my fave as well TT, I loved how he always used to make a fool out of PC Goon, especially when he dressed up in disguise. :lol:

Fatty was my fave as well TT, I loved how he always used to make a fool out of PC Goon, especially when he dressed up in disguise. :lol:

 

Can you remember how he used to keep giving him the runaround sending him off to the wrong place? :lol:

Forget the man in the red sweater. He was one of the organisers :lol:

 

Report from Thursday: Thanks to Mary on D:

 

What a lovely evening - definitely a William night, not Will.

 

I met Julie (Wiill4Me) at Woking station, and we got up to London very quickly and smoothly,apart from when the taxi driver from Waterloo obviously didn't know where he was going and dropped us off at St Bartolph's not St Bartholomews!!! However, we then met up with Julie (Bumbling) and Suhani (?> spelling) Willsdoc's sister and had a drink in a nearby pub. The we met Maddie (Bringitonwill) and her friend Sally and went to the church. All my ticket stress vanished as the lovely Kate had put the right amount of tickets on the door, so I relaxed, and soaked up the atmosphere of the church as we walked in. It was beautiful, very old and very well decorated for Christmas. with lots of lights and Christmas trees all decorated. There were lots of panels of paintings at the back of the church, lit from below, which was visually stunning.

 

We found seats at the very front of the pews in front of the lecturn and settled down to soak up the atmosphere and wait for the proceedings to begin. The pews were in a line, like a very long cross, with an aisle up the middle, and it meant that noone was too far away. The altar was gorgeous, which was at the opposite end to the lecturn. Maddie walked up to the pews that were behind the lecturn but almost in a line with it and the seats were marked "Guests of readers" so we knew where to start looking!! There was a guy in a red jumper who caught our eye, and sure enough in a few moments, William was there, sporting a flat cap and a lovely long coat. He was sat almost opposite, but to the left of me, and I could feast my eyes on him throughout the service

 

There was an opeining welcome by Lord Rix and then the church was filled with the sound of a lone soprano voice at the back somewhere singing Once in Royal David's City. After the first verse, the sound of a full choir joined in and it grew in volume until you saw the whole choir walking down form the very back of the cghurch to their places behind the lectern. Gorgeous. Then there was a prayer by the Rector of the church, followed by the first reading by Anne Riley MD of the company sposoring the service. Then we had While Shepherds Watched and a reading by Penny Vincenzi!! I was really surprised by her appearance.

 

The choir (The English Baroque) then sang Boroditse Devo which I didn't know but built to a glorious crescendo. Hark the Herald Angels followed, then Elspet Gray (Lord Rix's wife who I used to watch when she was in his farces years ago) who is still incredibly elegant read The Art of Sending Christmas Cards by William Connor, which was very good and produced a few chuckles. O Little Town of Behtlehem followed (one of my favourites!) and Ciara Phillips (?) read The Christmas party, very showrt and sweet. The choir followed up with No Small Wonder by Paul Edwards and then we all sang Silent Night.

 

The fifth reading was by the Chairman of Mencap, A Christmas Tree by Charles Dickens and I must admit that, during the next carol God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen I started to feel a little nervous and my hands started to shake holding the service sheet as I knew who was coming on next!!

 

William (and it definitely was a night for William) then stepped up to the lectern. He was weraing a white shirt, dark trousers a blue sweater and a dark jacket. The microphone was slightly adjusted for him and he smiled a thank you at the person (the only one to do so, I might add) and he read a piece (not sure what it was called ) about toboggans by Enid Blyton. He was really good, and raised some laughter by his inflections. At one point, when he was reading a bit about when the kids fell over on the ice they went bump, bump and it took me immediately to Danny in his reading of the audio cd. Even though I an slighlty biased () I really think that his was the best reading, and was definitley the longest.

 

It finished with a blessing and that was it. There were plenty of canapes and drinks after, and William grabbed a couple of canapes on the way out and said he had to rush off and he was gone.

 

All in all it was a lovely evening and I felt very Christmassy, singing the carols. I would have liked to have met the other Devotees who were there but I didn't like to accost anyone in case they were "normals"

 

We hailed a taxi right away, got back to Waterloo and caught a train within 5 minutes. I really enjoyed it.

 

Sorry to have blathered on for so long but I thought you might like an account of what the whole evening was all about. It was lovely.

 

Mary xx

 

Thanks for bringing Mary's post over, what a lovely account of the evening and I bet everyone felt very "christmassy" afterwards. :D