Your Personal Review of 2008

...sister. To save you wracking your brains over that one, allow me to explain: my father in law's brother married my mother in law's sister!

Having been out there for a week in chilly, wet weather, fortunately it brightened up for the big event, held in the magnificent (modern) White Church in the centre of Mielec. The following week we escaped for a few days to our favourite hotel, the Redyk, situated in a village called Zab (Trans. ...
...lucky, the snow stayed and continued to fall late into the season this year, the scenery was magnificent, as were the photographs of snowy mountains under stunningly blue skies.

It was during those few days in the Tatras that in 2008 I took my first trip in a cable car, to the top of Mount Kasprowy Wierch. This was an experience that I had always been frightened of - on the day I really enjoyed it and would not think twice about stepping ... more

With my sympathies to all of you who had a thoroughly bad year last year, this year can only be better for you. Not being one of life's great optimists, I am not usually given to passing much thought on either having a good or a bad year, what has gone has gone, is in the past and cannot be changed, what is to come - that is what matters.

When RICHADA then says that 2008 was not a bad year, I guess that you can assume that out of his 46 it was probably one of the best. Personally speaking, on the whole, in our own household at least, it was one of good cheer and remarkably little sickness, discontent or sadness.

What follows is a very personal recollection of the last twelve months, any opinions expressed are purely personal ones and if they offend then I apologise profusely in advance.

2008 ON PAPER

It is of some regret that, towards the end of the first decade of the 21st Century, putting pen to paper is becoming a rapidly outdated concept. 2008 is probably the first year in which I did not actually sit down and WRITE, with my own fair hand and fountain pen, a letter of any kind.

As a very young lad at school I remember with some pride being taught properly how to write - joined up letters. Biros and felt tip pens were not allowed, messy, blotchy fountain pens were used for all subjects. I cannot remember the name of the manufacturer of the cheap school issue, one - only that for a Christmas present in 1972 (my first year at boarding school) I received, from my parents, a beautiful stainless steel Parker fountain pen, with my name engraved upon it. Although it is long worn out, it remains one of my most treasured possessions. Indeed several years ago, Adrianna, my wife, presented me with a superb new Schaeffer fountain pen, regrettably it has seen little use.

Naturally I did "write" in 2008, birthday and Christmas cards being the most personal items. Review notes were also hastily scribbled out - particularly the ones for the car reviews - I knew at the time that it would take many months to actually commit them to "Word", hand written notes are invaluable to me, both for review writing and every day life. RICHADA Enterprises whilst having relatively modern systems can hardly claim to have a paperless office, manual stock records are still kept, telephone orders are also written by hand.

As a result of the reduction in writing, especially with a "proper" pen, I now find that my, once really rather presentable, handwriting has turned into a rather more messy scrawl, of which I am no longer remotely proud.

Regrettably internet publishing leaves no space for proper handwriting, will the fountain pen follow the typewriter into obscurity I wonder?

2008 ON SCREEN

No I did not make my debut on the silver screen in 2008, not even to publish a video review here! In case you had not already guessed, the screen to which I refer is the very one in front of you right now…...

……the one that for me, progressively over the last ten years, replaced pen and paper.

Unlike the very many of you who use the PC as a games console and general entertainment centre, I use mine more as a glorified word processor. Actually that is to grossly diminish the role that it plays in my life, without it my photography would be altogether incomplete, as would my latest and most frustrating application - the dreaded iTunes program. Naturally the screen also spends a fair proportion of its daily life beaming the contents of the world wide web into the RICHADA household.

On screen over the past twelve months I have actually started keeping my diary again, this lapsed around four years ago when I became more involved with reviewing. This is indeed one "application" that was carried out using the faithful fountain pen, until my first PC and printer arrived in around 1995……the internet took a further five years to arrive, hard to think now that I have only been using this incredible resource for eight years…..hard to remember life without it!

Sorry, I digress, back to the diary. It is no conventional daily one, oh no! Since first learning to drive in 1980 / 81, I have kept what I always used to refer to as my "Car Diary". In fact it was always more of a record as to where I have been and with whom, naturally of course too a running commentary on whichever car that I owned or was using for any given journey. It contains not only words, but many pictures over the years. The PC is actually a fantastic tool for this application as the words and pictures can be integrated seamlessly onto the same page - having now access to a colour laser printer the whole result looks most professional - even if it is bad form to say so myself.

Yes, as many have always suspected here, my life does and always has, revolved around cars!

2008 ON WHEELS

Not a bad year at all in my motoring lifetime 2008, especially as after four and a half years and 96,000 miles, my rather un-loved 2004 Honda Accord Diesel was traded in for a superb new Subaru Legacy Diesel at the end of September. That was undoubtedly the motoring highlight of 2008. The Legacy had been on order since April; it was built to our own specification - pearlescent white paintwork with ivory leather upholstery. Believe me it looks much better than it sounds - everyone to have seen it says so too.

My wife and I were delighted to receive an invite to Company Car in Action back at the end of June, many of the cars driven there I still have to review, but 2008 broke records both in the number of different cars driven and in the total number of miles covered, especially the 9800 during the last three months.

As is usual nowadays, business saw us cover a lot of England during the year, three continental trips in all too - two in the Subaru and a summer trip to Poland in the Honda accounting for most of the miles covered. Always most relished is the opportunity to drive in Germany, where large sections of the motorway network remain de-restricted. Few English registered cars I suspect cover as many miles per year travelling "flat out" as mine.

Speed may well be dangerous in the wrong hands (and in an inappropriate vehicle) but yes, it is addictive!

During 2008 I drove:

22,288 miles

and used 490.3 gallons of fuel - that is a combined average of 45.46mpg.

Nobody could be more pleased than I to see the price of fuel falling then!

Not included in that are the 13 different cars driven at Millbrook. During the last twelve months, in total, no fewer than twenty two cars have passed through my hands:

BMW 320d SE Convertible
BMW 635d Sport
Citroen C5 2.2 Exclusive Saloon
Citroen C5 2.7 HDi V6 Exclusive Estate
Ford Kuga 2.0 TDCi Titanium
Ford Escort 1.4i Van
Ford Focus 2.0 5dr Titanium
Ford Mondeo 2.5T Titanium X
Honda Accord 2.2 i-CTDi Executive
Honda Accord 2.2 i-DTEC EX GT TECH (2008 model)
Honda Civic IMA
Honda Civic Type R
Honda Jazz 1.2
Honda Jazz 1.4 CVT
Mercedes CLC180K Sport
Mini Cooper 1.6 CVT
Subaru Impreza 2.5 WRX STi
Subaru Legacy Outback REn Boxer Diesel
Subaru Legacy Tourer RE Boxer Diesel
Subaru Legacy Tourer REn Boxer Diesel
Subaru Legacy RE Saloon Boxer Diesel
Vauxhall VXR8

It is a piece of cake picking the car I liked the least, and by a country mile……

……sorry, but you will have to hang on a touch longer for the review in order to find out which one it was.

Choosing my favourite from the above list, now that is altogether more difficult. The car that I am driving now, the diesel Subaru Legacy Saloon has to be the real world top dog here, especially at less than £20,000 for which it can easily be obtained. In a 'money no object' scrap though I would have the very devil of a job choosing between the pig ugly, but fabulous to drive, BMW 635d Coupe and the Vauxhall VXR8.

Go on then, I'll take the VXR8, a more original - and spacious - choice.

2008 ON HOLIDAY

Well I guess that those three continental trips, the last of which actually saw us into 2009, count as holidays.

In late April we drove out to Poland, the centrepiece of our two and a half week holiday being a close family wedding. Close indeed, the parents of the groom are my in-law's brother and sister. To save you wracking your brains over that one, allow me to explain: my father in law's brother married my mother in law's sister!

Having been out there for a week in chilly, wet weather, fortunately it brightened up for the big event, held in the magnificent (modern) White Church in the centre of Mielec. The following week we escaped for a few days to our favourite hotel, the Redyk, situated in a village called Zab (Trans. Tooth) high up in the Polish Tatra Mountains. We hit lucky, the snow stayed and continued to fall late into the season this year, the scenery was magnificent, as were the photographs of snowy mountains under stunningly blue skies.

It was during those few days in the Tatras that in 2008 I took my first trip in a cable car, to the top of Mount Kasprowy Wierch. This was an experience that I had always been frightened of - on the day I really enjoyed it and would not think twice about stepping into a cable car again. Indeed it is another subject that I have long put off reviewing; if nothing else, it would give me the opportunity of sharing the superb views of the Tatra Mountains with you.

Over the last several years we have fallen into the habit of taking a short break holiday in October, sometimes a long weekend in this country, but the last two years we have been on the continent - but not Poland! This year from the early summer I had been toying with the idea of a "surprise", for my wife at least, trip to Switzerland. In the event, due to the arrival of the new car, the whole thing was actually planned at the last moment - less than a week before we went!

The whole experience, whilst being a good one, seemed to be fraught with hang ups. We tend to plan such adventures well in advance, and from previous experience they tend to go far more smoothly. Some problems such as the Channel Tunnel fire - causing us to go by ferry from Dover and loose around four hours to gales in the Channel were well beyond our control. However, hastily booked hotels, both in Germany and Switzerland brought us one good night out of six, that being in the Black Forest on the way down. You may have read the three reviews on the hotels concerned, but it will take us a very long time to forget the Park Hotel in Bad Salzig!

Switzerland, as a country, was everything that we had expected it to be, superb scenery - mountains and lakes just the way we most like it, and as a bonus, near traffic free roads too! However, we were taken aback in this land, famous for tourism and hotel keeping, to find that right at the close of the summer season, we felt far less than welcome in many places that we went. Initially we felt that we had just made an unlucky choice of hotel, but even in shops and restaurants we felt more of an inconvenience than a valued customer.

Maybe recessions never touch Switzerland - it is, at the prices charged for everything, certainly a country for the rich - a touch of common courtesy though never goes amiss, no matter how prosperous you may be.

On the return journey I had been recommended to take a small detour in order to see the "Romantic Rhine Valley". Looking at the map and working on our schedule, this actually appeared a perfectly sensible over night stop on the way home. Around an hour on the autobahn from Cologne and our usual route back to Calais - not that on this occasion we used it - the Rhine Valley is one destination that we intend to re-visit as soon as possible. Not only, even after the Swiss mountains, is it extremely beautiful, the people there generally were far more accommodating, even if far fewer speak English than in Switzerland. Even a bum choice of hotel failed to dampen our joint enthusiasm for this beautiful region of Germany.

Our final excursion abroad took us back to Adrianna's parents in Poland for the Christmas and New Year holiday period. Following the Swiss trip and many business miles since, the car was by then fully run in and raring to go. I thought that in the Legacy I had purchased a very sensible, spacious and safe four wheel drive saloon. On the German motorways it proved itself to be an amazingly rapid sports saloon, cruising happily at an indicated 140mph. In cold, snowy Poland too, thanks to four wheel drive, we were able to go wherever we wanted in it, not giving a second thought to the bad road conditions!

The second to last day of the year found us in Krakow, probably our favourite city. It was (literally) freezing cold and after walking on the pavements for about three hours we were both suffering from very cold feet - in spite of wearing proper winter boots and socks! A superb lunch was also enjoyed in our favourite little Chinese restaurant, even at today's dreadful exchange rate, under £12 for as much, very good, food as the two of us could comfortably eat, is superb value for money too! As recently as three years ago, we were able to eat here for around £4.00 each including drinks!

This is not the first time that we have rounded off the year in Krakow, and for whatever reason it feels entirely appropriate to do so - the place has a fantastic atmosphere as they prepare for the huge Sylvester (New Year's Eve) party in the large Rynek (square).

2008 ON CAMERA

My trusty Nikon D50 digital SLR camera has now taken some 18,807 photographs since being purchased in March 2006. In 2008 I took no fewer than 7713 shots with it, whilst it remains a superb camera, it is now starting to show signs of use (rather than age) and I am, this year, likely to supplement it with a rather higher specification Nikon D90.

The D90 is the first D-SLR camera capable of taking High Definition movies of 5 minutes in length, so who knows, 2009 may see my debut on the silver screen after all!

Digital (still) photography continues to give me great pleasure, since a young age I have always enjoyed taking photographs, maybe on a 35mm SLR camera a couple of hundred pictures per year. I wonder what would have been said only 10 years ago if you had told me that I would be taking nearly 8000 photographs a year…..that at almost no cost whatsoever!

Every day life is far better documented now thanks to digital photography. We take photographs of what seem to be totally mundane events and objects, things that with a film camera one would never have "wasted" a shot on. What this does do though is provide us with a much better record, and more importantly, our descendants with a far more detailed impression of just what life was like year by year. With digital photography it is not even necessary to date the pictures…….still useful if you re-name the files though to give a clue as to what they contain!

2008 ON HOME

2008 was a year spent negotiating with an architect. Since moving into our home, a two bedroom detached bungalow in December 2001, we had been thinking about converting the loft space into living accommodation. We were invited to have a look at an old friends roof conversion 'in progress', a slightly smaller semi-detached bungalow than ours, this triggered a renewed interest and introduced us to our architect.

A man of indeterminate, late middle years, he turned out not to be at all as I had imagined an architect to be. Adrianna and I had fairly definite ideas of what we wanted to achieve in terms of using the space in our loft. Once the two chimneys are removed, we figured that there would be ample room for two good sized bedrooms and a family sized bathroom……..and so there is.

Why then, did it take the architect a whole ten months to come up with a plan that I had actually presented to him on our first meeting? And before you start thinking that he was milking us as a cash cows, no, the whole project was on a pre-agreed 'fixed cost' basis. Why also do these people take it upon themselves to brick up perfectly good windows downstairs in rooms totally unaffected by the conversion?

In hindsight, I really rather wish that I had purchased a suitable computer program and done this myself, I think that I would have been around £600 in pocket and probably come up with an equally satisfactory result.

2008 ON CHARITY

Those of us who are fortunate enough to have, I feel increasingly more strongly, should at least make some effort to share with those who do not. In practical terms, for me at least, this is a very difficult subject, I have you see, always had a deep seated suspicion of those that run charities and indeed the huge money making machine that many of the larger ones have developed into.

You may well pillory me for this, but when it comes to money, I really do firmly believe that charity begins at home. I am neither a lender, nor a borrower by nature, in terms of "charity" I am increasingly of the mind that hands on is the best policy.

My 'charity giving' is actually a little more complicated than that. As we all know there are two kinds of charities, those for the needy and those "hobby" charities, which many of us support to further our own interests. Of the latter group I include the National Trust, English Heritage and The S.S. Great Britain Trust, all of which I have been a member of for many years now. To my mind none of these "hobby charities" count as truly needy, yes, they do provide employment and yes all have outstanding educational merit. This however is not, hand on heart, why I continued in 2008 to support them, no, it is for our own interest and yes, pleasure.

My wife is a Polish Catholic and was raised in very different circumstances to myself and in all probability 99 out of 100 who read this. In times of communism, society itself was very different the majority had precious little, everyone looked after each other and shared what little they had. Materially things and views have now changed in Poland, but my wife has changed my life in very many ways - most importantly the ones that do not show. Over the last eight years I have become far more charitable in the true sense of that word.

For several years Adrianna had wanted to become involved with the Brighton Soup Run, a local volunteer organisation which is just about as "hands on" as you can get in terms of charity. About three years ago, through our local church, we volunteered our services and were placed on a rota, which had us serving soup on the sea front here twice a year. This increased in the following year when we signed up for the "emergency rota", which finds us being called out sometimes at very short notice.

Early in 2008 we became full members, on the second Wednesday of every month at 8.00pm our team, my wife and I plus another lady, are out on the sea front serving hot soup, tea and usually cakes to anyone in need.

The Soup Run is an incredible organisation. It runs on almost zero funds, we donate time and food, and thanks to our own favourite local Italian restaurant, Donatello's donating fresh soup every night, 365 days a year, the lonely, needy and homeless of Brighton are served bread, soup and tea.

Since now doing this on a much more regular basis and getting to know some of the 'clients' rather better, I have discovered that this whole set-up actually goes far deeper than merely providing a free hot meal - no questions asked. In many cases it is the only human contact that many of these poor souls have in a day.

Before getting involved in the Soup Run, I have to say that in my ignorance I rather regarded the vagrants as a blight on our city. Having invested a little time in getting to actually know some of them, I have discovered that many are thoroughly decent people. Many are also extremely lonely and merely seek a sympathetic listening ear which is not offered anywhere else.

There are 101 reasons why any one of us could find ourselves unexpectedly down on our luck. If we should find ourselves in this unfortunate position I can only hope that we too could be looked upon kindly and offered a helping hand by more "respectable" members of society.

2008 ON POLITICS

Politicians? Stuff the lot of them! What a total and utter mess they have made of all this.

Oh of course, it is a 'world recession' Darling, nothing to do with you then.

2008 ON WORK

2008 quite simply, and it has to be said quite unexpectedly, proved to be our best year in a decade. RICHADA Enterprises is a family owned and run precision engineering firm. Through the early noughties we, when everyone else was booming, made year after year of loss - quite how we survived, a long and difficult story, is anyone's guess, but in 2008 we turned a profit - the first year that we did so in this century.

The Company was founded by my late Great Uncle Bill in 1932, times were much harder then than now even, yet historically the firm has always bucked the economic trend. In my twenty eight years in the business this will be the third recession that we have seen, during both of the previous ones we continued to thrive.

This time around it turns out that we have an extraordinarily fortunate customer base. Unusual in industry, we still have around 1800 "live" (well some of them only just!) customers. These are primarily at the cutting edge of technology; the aerospace industry which, thanks to Airbus remains very strong, and the Formula 1 motor racing circus which, although no longer the money no object business that it once was, still thrives in this country.

However, amongst this largely happy picture there are one or two notable exceptions, J C Bamford, better know to most of you as JCB being the most upsetting. The largest private company in the UK, it is rather like our own family business, but on a much larger, global, scale. Over the past three decades JCB has known nothing but success. That all ended very suddenly at the start of 2008, the building industry being the first to feel the freezing cold bite of the "credit crunch" as it then was referred to. Those that know the company, either as customers or suppliers will know how hard this has hit the business. Whenever you enter a JCB site you cannot have helped but to have sensed the great atmosphere about the place - in my experience with the biggest companies in this country, conversation with the staff usually involves "retirement" and a fair amount of bitching about "management". At JCB that has never been the case, a loyal and happy workforce have shared in the fantastic success, and now, regrettably, find themselves paying the price of a downturn in their market which has absolutely nothing to do with their efforts or product.

During 2008 my personal role in our own company changed very little. Due to a combination of unforeseen circumstances, I found myself having to sub-contract work, quite simply because we did not have the capacity to handle the increase in demand. This is the first time in seventy-seven years that we have had to do this.

2008 ON GREAT UNCLE BILL

The last section very neatly brings me right back to the very first week of 2008 and to the founder of our modest business.

In a sense a final chapter was drawn in the life of my dear, late, Great Uncle Bill in 2008. Although strictly speaking Gwen, his widow, died in 2007 - immediately before Christmas, the funeral did not take place until 3rd January. Although I just know that Bill would have been urging me to do so, on the grounds of taste and decency I, regrettably, felt unable to publish a review about this hilariously awful occasion, just maybe I will pluck up the courage one day……

….….a quote, though, standing outside the crematorium; - Gwen's stepdaughter from her second marriage to Gwen's stepson - Great Uncle Bill's eldest son:

"Who'se goin' to pay 'im then?" pointing at the funeral director standing right next to her!

Oh Bill if only you knew!!!!!! 

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