THE MYSTERY OF THE FLASHING DUCK AND VANISHING CHAMPAGNE

Here we are the end of another year and a little more decrepit than last and probably not a lot wiser. Last night we had the mystery of the flashing duck in our bathroom, I can't remember where the odd rubber duck came from but has sat between it's yellow counterparts for some time then when Graham went to the bathroom he saw it flashing red in the dark. I'm sure it never flashed before and hasn't so tonight, it remains a delightful conundrum. The champagne bottle came from M&S and Mandy had forgotten where it was but all our wine is normally under the stairs, we searched all over the house but when I suggested it could be in one of the kitchen corner cupboards near the floor she twigged that it was in the mop bucket where of course you'd put your New Year plonk. So only one mystery now remains.

I've just been round to St Oswalds to lock up but the bell ringers are collecting the key just before midnight to ring in the New Year then dropping it back so no early nights even if we wanted. We did have an afternoon trip out to Derbyshire and we managed to find the cafe where we'd had our last snack stop on the pilgrimage this autumn and I got my Bakewell tart which had so appealed but I'd chosen bread pudding last time. It was a dull wet day and windy at times but brighter this morning, around 45 made it to church this morning a few more early and later services. I've loaded up some Maltese truck clips from 2013. I won't have the final monthly count for our channel until Wednesday but it looks very good and some lovely end of year messages coming through. Keeping to the Malta theme we travel there for our photo slide show and very Happy and Prosperous Year to you all for 2018 may it be a healthy and tranquil time for you and your families in the 200 plus nations and territories who regularly view our films plus of course all our friends and relations world wide.