One of the reasons I enjoy visiting Southampton isn’t to see how it has progressed with modern easy flowing shopping centres, good one way traffic systems and general accessibility, it’s to see how it has captured it’s past and is actually using it to make things how they were some 100 years ago. …

A great guide in starting to live your dream I brought Paul Heineys book ‘Home Farm’ a few years back. I had hoped on a few occasions to give a copy away as a prize in Forum Competitions, but the first edition sold out and copies were few and expensive to find, so I was […]

Shopping locally and being frugal The purpose, for me anyway, of shopping frugally is to buy the least expensive and cost effective item with the smallest amount of financial outlay. This brings about a dilemma. If you follow the above code, you are, if you’re not careful, assisting the demise of the Village, Corner and […]

John O’Groats to Lands End – Fulfilment of a dream I remember the Beatles releasing ‘When I’m 64’ quite well, I was 19 years old and gallivanting around West Kent without a care in the world. Saying that, I recall having a discussion with a friend about where and what we would be when we’re […]

Something which has not so much annoyed as mystified me over the last few days is this sudden impulse we Brits have of panic buying when there’s a bit of bad weather and also how it’s all influenced by some quarters of the Media. I can fully appreciate those living in Rural Area’s having big […]

After some first hand experience of late, I think I now reached my shopping choice conclusions and as much as I’d like the results to be opposite to what they are…….. Getting there High Street Get stuck in two traffic jams caused by road works getting tooted at because I didn’t jump the lights when […]

When I first saw that Microsoft were bringing out a new Operating System and reading some of the reviews about the BETA version, I thought I may wait until they’ve reached their first Service Pack before purchasing. But, in the last two years I’ve had to buy a new PC Tower Unit plus a Laptop […]

Last Wednesday I took a trip down the local DIY Superstore to buy a few bits and pieces and being the middle of the week, I thought it was a good time to go, not many people around and it would be a stroll – wrong. I arrived there to find the Car Park remarkably […]

My house is on the edge of the Broadband limits; both BT and my ISP said I should be getting speeds of 1500kpbs, but as much as I fiddled or tweaked settings etc., I never achieved more than around 875kpbs. The slow speeds affected my uploading and editing of this website and when I was […]

The major up-grade to Down the Lane is progressing well, but a little behind schedule, this being mainly down to me and my fussy ways rather than anyone else. If all goes to plan, the ‘new’ Site will be up and running by early next week (w/c 16th. March), but with so many people emailing […]