The previous blog about this Nursing Home on Marcham Road was on 2nd January. Four months on, three more stories have been added and the scaffolding is being taken down.
The home will be run by Carebase for 60 elderly people suffering from dementia.
There will be 20 rooms on each of the three floors, 15 parking spaces for the home and garden patios by the river.
Carebase already run 12 other homes, including one in Burcot, near Dorchester.
The panel on tonights Any Questions program from Abingdon School were:
* Lord Heseltine: Why ever did the Tories not choose him for leader after Margeret Thatcher?
* Sarah Bradford: Royal Historian and Biographer
* (Dimbleby and producer)
* Sir Jeremy Greenstock: The Former Ambassador to the UN/Iraq who has written a book: the inside story about how we were misled to war. It has an embargo on it.
* Jack Dromey: Labour Party Treasurer/Deputy General Secretary of the TGWU who blew the whistle on Downing Streets questionable loans for honours system.
The ticket said “You should arrive between 6.45 and 7.15pm… Please note: Photography is not permitted at the programme…
There was a warm up lady who told us a little of the history of the program. It began in 1948. There have been 15000+ questions. The first ever question in 1948 was “What would be the effect on the country if more women gained political power.”
We were told that as there were no cameras, nodding our heads would do no good, and so to make our feelings known we could clap. We were given a little training in expressing ourselves with claps. First we tried out a moderate clap, than an enthusiastic clap, and then an over the top clapping. After that we tried showing disapproval with muttering, then muttering louder, then snarling.
The panel came out. We did Over-the-top clapping to which Jonathon Dimbleby said “Don’t strain yourselves…”, There followed a practise question to check sound levels before going on air. It was about what film or stage role they’d like to play. Lots of jokes around Michael Hesseltine’s former image as Tarzan.
Anyway the program began with Jonathon Dimbleby announcing we were in Abingdon, it being the 450th anniversary of Abingdon’s charter… and the 750th anniversary of the founding of the first school in Abingdon, to which Abingdon school traces its lineage.
But there was another anniversary today, reflected in the first and last questions. Happy 80th birthday to the Queen.
Here is where the builders are with the extension to the Peachcroft Christian Centre. Last time they had just laid the foundations, and now they have added a steel girder frame.
The logo of the Church in Abingdon has a cross inherited from Abingdon Abbey, and three little circles. Those circles are the three circles of Abingdon’s most famous son, St Edmund. One represents Father, one Son, and one Holy Spirit.
St Edmund should be better remembered in the place of his birth, Abingdon. His childhood home is thought to be in St Edmund’s Lane, where there used to be a chapel in his memory, but that is so far back, that nobody is sure of its location. St Edmunds Catholic Church has his name and his three circles on their sign.
Back in 1783, the then Vicar of Abingdon was asked by his Bishop: ‘Are there any reputed papists in your parish?’ He replied ‘One only, – old and very poor.’ But go to St Edmunds now on a Sunday morning for any of the masses, particularly the 9:30 and 11:30, and you’ll see a full church.
The home of the priest, Mgr. John Nelson, is connected to the church by a covered alleyway. So the priest can easily go from home to church without being pelted by eggs!!! This did happen to early nuns.