At a good time, the Abingdon Town bus can loop unhindered round the town.

This is the bus caught in traffic last Friday afternoon, when the four O’Clock tail-back began at two thirty.

Sorry to raise hopes, but this is not the new road bridge across the River Thames that the town needs. This is a footbridge to connect the Abbey Meadows, this side, with the Barratt’s Riverside Collection, that side. Four or five trees have been cut this side, and deep holes are being drilled that side. I can’t wait to get across.

One moment it was raining, the next there was sunshine.

There was a local derby game. Parents were on the touchline: some supporting Saxton Rovers F.C. under 11s , some supporting Abingdon Youth F.C. under 11s at Caldecott Rec.

At Trinity the first candle of the Advent Crown was lit, and ‘Oh Come, Oh Come Emmanuel!‘ was sung

There was chaos on the town’s roads, probably caused by the telecom road works on the Drayton Road Bridge, and exacerbated by ‘sheer weight of traffic’ as people went home from sports, leisure, church, shops or whatever. In any case it was all quiet again within the hour…

– even sooner for residents of the Tomkins Almshouses. All they have to do is shut the gate behind them, and they are in a quiet place.

In town this morning:

Abbey Brass were playing carols outside Woolworths.

The town council were out asking the public what they thought of this year’s Christmas Lights, and Extravaganza.

Ray, and the Vineyard Church, were out handing out leaflets, and talking into a microphone.

And there were more rainbows. It seems to be a season of rainbows.