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If you like what we do you can buy us a coffee, regrettably we can't accept a Costa Coffee points card ... a lovely latte?  How very kind.

Our fortnightly(ish) digest emailed out today ... click Postman Pat's black and white cat to get your free copy.

Suffolk Myth No.99:  For some near the coast Going up to town means Wickham Market or perhaps even Benhall.

Throwback Thursday:  7 years ago today we'd seen at the Halesworth Cut The Blacksmith Who Chased The Moon ... not your usual panto.

Christmas tv included a Norwegian Bob and Paul festive special, Ted the dog appearing was so heavily signposted it was hardly a surprise.  Considerably more subtle in Detectorists was Professor Alice Roberts' slightly out of focus and unremarked appearance (around 1:04:24) on the steps of the British Museum.  Already nostalgic to see the now gone Framlingham St Michael's Rooms.

Have a good one, see you on the other side ...

The increasingly shortening days of winter we find frustrating and unrewarding but there's good news, Wednesday is the shortest day and things start to improve.

Ukraine is still at war and it's now winter, to donate humanitarian aid visit the Disasters Emergency Committee web site.

Our thanks to the more than one digest reader who have pointed out the new drop dead date for swapping stamps is effectively 31 July.  See What happens if I use a non-barcoded stamp after 31 January way down the Royal Mail page.

Prompted by the arrival of our exchange postage stamps and a bought book of second class we've done maybe half of our Christmas cards.  The book of second class was cheaper than we anticipated but then it only contained eight not a dozen stamps.  Remember send in your non-digital non-pictorial stamps by 31 January, download the form here.

If you need to post internationally for Christmas it can creep up on you really quickly.  It's already too late for international economy to much of the planet including North America but you have until tomorrow the 25th for Eastern Europe and a few other places.

Life Skills No. 51:  A bit incomprehensible why the post office feel the need to add to stamps what they call a bar code but what looks like a QR code and then say we can't use the old ones after Jan 31?  With a first class stamp at 95p it can soon add up so worth trading them in.  If you've lost the leaflet that came through the letterbox you can download one which is slightly different.

The last time we can recall using a fax was for accreditation with Essex Police for Operation Utah and it seemed clunky then.  Seems the fax is joining Betamax, the tamagotchi (though you can still buy them) and 8 track cartridges.

Astonisher No.55:  In 1939 Hattie McDaniel played Mammy in Gone with the Wind and for her performance was the first African American to win an Oscar.  She couldn't attend the film's premiere in Atlanta Georgia because the cinema was whites only.