Bicester Business Breakfast Club
A NEW look for the Bicester Business Breakfast Club!
In this, the 10th anniversary year of the Bicester Business Breakfast Club, it is evolving to be better placed to take on the challenges of the 21st Century.
Starting with the meeting held on Wednesday, April 22, it will:
Be organised in partnership with the Wednesday Business Club – Bicester's longest standing weekly business networking group.
Be working with the Oxfordshire Economic Partnership in regards to securing business-related speakers.
Be on the fourth Wednesday of each month.
It will still be only £10 (unless costs rise in the future).
The next meeting will be on Wednesday, May 27, at The Littlebury Hotel when the speaker will be David Doughty, chief executive, Oxfordshire Economic Partnership.
The Bicester Business Breakfast Club continues to be run and supported by the Bicester and District Chamber of Commerce.

The Film Place
THE Film Place is showing Quantum of Solace (12A) today, Friday, at 8pm and tomorrow, Saturday, at 7.30pm.
Bond is out for revenge in this sequel to Casino Royale.
Devastated by the loss of Vesper Lynd, 007 tracks down one of the elite from 'Quantum' – an international crime syndicate responsible for blackmailing her.
A hitch occurs when M is wounded by a double agent and Bond is taken off the case.
Unsurprisingly, he then goes 'undercover', and has to watch his step avoiding CIA and MI6 agents as he pursues the trail to Haiti.
Enter a ruthless businessman, whose outward credentials have secured him allies in high places while he successfully plots his evil power games.
The film can be seen at the Ian Fairbairn Lecture Hall, Chandos Road Building, University of Buckingham.

Buckingham Acoustic Club
DAVE Crawford's turn came round again to host the evening and he opened with a mixture of some of his favourites – May You Never, Sweet Baby James, Hallelujah and Make You Feel My Love.
Fraser followed with his new foot pedal, a Mooger Fooger, which gave a lovely echo and delay effect on a few of his songs.
He performed mostly originals including Stop Diggin', Brand New Day, Mohammed, Sneakin' and finally a great cover of Mad World.
Great stuff Fraser.
Udo was next and was in a mood to sing.
His set included Carnival, a couple of Jackson C Frank songs called You Never Wanted Me Babe and Here Comes The Blues – a quality performance as always.
Robert and Christine took to the stage next with a mix of styles and genres – a few Bob Dylan songs including You Ain't Going Nowhere and Love In Vain, then an original song about the recent G20 protests, then they finished off with a few sing-a-long songs including Streets Of London. Good stuff!
Next up was Henry. He had been attending the club for a long time but finally brought his guitar and took to the stage. For support, he was joined for this first performance by Dave for a cracking version of King Of The Road.
The whole pub joined in and a huge cheer erupted when he'd finished.
With the applause ringing in his ears, his intention of only doing one song went out the window and he was persuaded to do a couple more – Elvis' Stuck On You and the Chuck Berry classic Teenage Wedding.
Well done Henry, a fantastic set and we look forward to more.
The unenviable job of following on fell to Mike Moyse but, as usual, he carried it out with aplomb.
His accomplished set included Unconditional, My Love Deserves A Medal and Fields Of Gold.
A great night and one we look forward to repeating next Wednesday, 8.30pm at the New Inn, Buckingham.

Buckingham WI
BEAUTIFUL Hats For Beautiful Ladies was the talk given by Caroline Hines of Gawcott to members on Wednesday evening in the community centre. She demonstrated how hats were made and decorated, and how to wear them correctly.
Hats are seldom made from locally grown straw but from material derived from banana leaves!
Eagerly, members tried on colourful hats and the modern and popular 'fascinators' which had been hand-crafted by Caroline.
She was thanked by Pam Gower.
WI president, Janet Eason-Bassett, thanked members who had done well in the recent WI quiz.
A visit to watch the live TV production of the Alan Titchmarsh Show had been interesting and enjoyable.
Dorothy Shaw reported that she had attended a course on Roman Archaeology at the WI's Denman College, near Abingdon.
Future events will include a lunch at the Buckingham Hotel on April 30.
A home-made cake and produce stall will be held in the market on the morning of Saturday, May 30.
Bees and Beetles will be the theme for the next meeting on May 20, when members will discuss the very serious plight of the honey bees, which is causing concern throughout the world.
An apiarist will be the speaker.
Members will also enjoy a beetle drive.
New members and visitors are always welcome at WI meetings.

Maids Moreton WI
FOR our April meeting we were delighted to welcome Ted Flaxman, along with his wife, who came to show slides and talk about The Real Lark Rise.
Everyone knows about the television series, which by the way was filmed in Wiltshire, but Mr Flaxman brought the true story to light with colour slides which had to be passed around due to the failure of the overhead equipment.
This did not detract from the talk and Mr Flaxman answered many questions once the talk had finished.
Prior to the speaker, the ordinary business was swiftly dispensed with.
The forthcoming county ramble which Maids Moreton is hosting was discussed along with the fine tuning of the catering arrangements.
Next month, on May 13, we discuss and vote upon the resolution for the WI AGM and we are hoping Colin Whitehead may join us to talk about bees, which will be very topical.

Inner Wheel Club of Brackley
THE Inner Wheel Club of Brackley held its 16th AGM/dinner meeting at The Crown Hotel on Monday, March 16 which was attended by the district chairman, Elizabeth Raynes, and her driver Ros.
President Jenny Isles opened the meeting by welcoming all our guests.
The next item on the agenda was the induction of new member, Jenny Liddicot, who was warmly welcomed and presented with a yellow rose together with her badge.
President Jenny then presented a cheque for £425 for Katharine House Hospice, the proceeds from a frugal lunch held in Farthinghoe Village Hall when we were entertained by The Whittles, and the profit from their craft sale will be added to their own Katharine House donation.
This event was very well supported and was so successful that many of those present asked that we repeat again in the near future.
A cheque for £175 was then presented to Shirley Watson for the local Crossroads through the Traneker Fund, this sum being raised by holding a coffee morning with tombola and a raffle in Brackley Town Hall.

Winslow Bowls Club
THE outdoor bowling season is about to begin, after another good winter of indoor short mat bowling.
Winslow narrowly missed retaining its league title, coming second by only four points.
The first outdoor event is on Sunday, April 26, at 2.30pm, at the clubhouse in Winslow.
This is a match between the chairman's team and the president's team to 'open the green' for the summer.
If you are interested in playing bowls, please telephone 01296 720268 for further details.

Buckingham Probus Club
THE monthly meeting of the Buckingham Probus Club took place recently at The Old Thatched Inn, Adstock.
This is an occasion for members to meet up with their friends and the main thrust of the meeting is to have a good chat with each other.
Club president Colin Richardson announced the birthdays for April – John Ballard and Robert Keating.
Following the Loyal Toast, vice-president Vic Pennington gave a last call for those who wished to attend the St George's Day dinner.
This is a traditional event, and partners and widows are also invited.
Vic also announced preliminary details for the proposed visit to Rockingham Castle.
Frank welcomed back Peter Bradley after his world cruise.
Angus Davidson was the speaker for the meeting, his theme being loss of memory.
Angus presented a series of anecdotes, all highly amusing, about men of a certain age who can't remember what they are supposed to be doing.
Following the vote of thanks by Peter Cammas, the raffle was drawn and Russell Tobin was the winner.
The meeting was closed with the club's toast to Fellowship and Friendship.

Padbury WI
PADBURY WI continues to meet on the second Thursday in the month at 7.30pm in the village hall.
At our March meeting we were entertained by Sara Oliver whose talk was billed as Musical Entertainment.
Our members were treated to a light-hearted evening, with Sara playing a keyboard, singing well-known songs and telling hilarious jokes.
It was a really enjoyable evening, and everyone went home in a happy and relaxed mood.
Our April meeting was a 'hands-on' demonstration of ribbon floral art by Doreen Kempton.
Doreen shared the secrets of making decorative bows and flowers from ordinary ribbon, with which to decorate gifts and boxes.
They can also be used as table decorations, buttonholes and sprays.
Of course, she made it look so easy; but when the time came to try it ourselves, we soon found out otherwise.
Our next meeting will be on a more sombre note, when we will discuss the resolution which is going before the annual meeting of the National Federation of Women's Institutes.
The resolution calls upon the Government to make more funding available for research into the disappearance of the honeybee.
All around the world, beekeepers are noticing the disappearance of the honeybee, which is a very worrying situation since, without pollination, food crops will suffer.
Finally, it was with great regret that our president, Pat Reilly, announced the passing of our oldest member, Mrs Margaret Crook, who died in March, three days short of her 95th birthday.
We believe that Margaret had been a member of the WI for more than 75 years, although she remembered going to a meeting with her mother at the age of 14.
Everyone will remember her with great affection and she will be sorely missed.

Brackley WI
THE monthly meeting began with a big welcome to all members and visitors.
We were given information about various activities, including the annual dinner, which will be on August 10, the resolution that was chosen and will be discussed later, a cream tea to be held in the garden of Anne Seckington on July 11 and the WI annual meeting in October.
A big thank you was given to Sue Bridge for the lovely flowers on the table, and those who brought books and plants for our sale.
We were then introduced to Mrs J Bailey, her talk entitled A Kookaburra Stole My Tent Peg being most intriguing.
In 2000, Mrs Bailey answered a call for wildlife researchers, run by Earthwork Charity.
We were treated to some beautiful slides of frogs, different sizes and colours, as these were the main animals for researching.
We saw and heard how she joined a small group, living in tents in the Australian rain forest, in order to go out at night to catch, measure, weigh, and log and microchip the creatures.
The researchers wade through water, trying to avoid crocodiles in the river and funnel web spiders on the bank.
There are approximately 146 million frogs in the world, 4,000 different kinds, and Australia has 200 of them.
Tragically, a lot are vanishing. The temperature is getting too high for those that like the damp, and some get a fungus on the skin, and pollution is not helping.
Some frogs are tiny, as we saw on a slide, and can be balanced on the top of a man's finger, and others are huge, such as the Cane toad.
These toads, coming from south America, were introduced to Australia, but bred very quickly and are poisonous to wildlife and pets.
Mrs Bailey had some fantastic slides of birds and animals she met in the forest – kookaburras, parrots and monitor lizards.
While sitting outside her tent one evening, she actually saw a kookaburra fly down and pull her tent peg out of the ground and throw it cheekily over his shoulder.
The evening was an amazing mix of fantastic slides and anecdotes, and everyone laughed about the bird, which was responsible for the title of Mrs Bailey's talk, which was given a very loud applause indeed.
Next month, we will discuss the chosen resolution, followed by social time.

Netmums
WE are a local meet-up group for parents and expectant parents (childminders and grandparents are welcome to come along too).
Our future meet-up dates for Tumblers, Buckingham, are Tuesday, May 19 at 9.30am and Wednesday, June 3 at 12.30pm.
The group gets 10% discount on entrance fees to Tumblers (parents/carers and under ones are free).
Other dates planned are swimming at the Swan Pool, Buckingham, on Friday, May 8, meet in reception at 9.20am (if after 9.30am meet in the baby pool); and time to let your hair down on the girls' night out on Saturday, May 24.
Please contact Kelly for more details on 07979 423846.
Email Netmums-Meetups@hotmail.co.uk.

Buckingham Primary School
BUCKINGHAM Primary School, Foscott Way, will be holding its Spring Fair on Saturday, May 9 between noon and 3pm.
It will be opened by John Bercow MP and the school Djembe Drummers.
Also in attendance will be the Buckingham town jester.
Come and join in with all the fun – we shall have bouncy castles, a magic show and storytelling from the jester, country and Maypole dancing, tombolas, barbecue and cake stalls as well as many other stalls and attractions.
The fair is organised by the Friends of Buckingham Primary School.

Buckingham Amnesty Group
THE newly-formed Amnesty Student Society invited us to their first open meeting and dazzled us with their passion for justice, their legal knowledge and technical expertise.
Farnaz Mirshaki and her committee welcomed us and a group of students to a lecture theatre in the Law School in London Road.
After drinks and nibbles they showed the international award-winning film Waltz With Bashir.

University of Buckingham
THE University of Buckingham and it's new Alumni Association (UBAA) are holding a day conference tomorrow, Saturday, from 8.30am to 5.30pm.
The day will consist of simultaneous seminars and presentations with renowned academics and professionals from all over the world.
Discussions will be on topics such as terrorism, the world crisis, law and government, entrepreneurship, and career development.
The price for the day is £30 and it includes the information pack, access to all sessions, coffee breaks and a hot buffet lunch.
Anyone is welcome to attend.
To register or get more information on the programme please contact the publicity office at 01280 820338.
An excellent paper, prepared by a student team, was presented by two young men.
We congratulate Farnaz and her student colleagues, some of whom have joined us at our group meetings in the last four months.

RBL, Buckingham & District
THE next meeting is on Tuesday, April 28 at Buckingham Town Football Club, Ford Street, commencing at 7.30pm.
The guest speaker will be Chris Day from BBC Three Counties Radio and Buckingham Garden Centre. His subject will be The A-Z of Gardening.
Please bring your questions and problems for Chris, who will advise. All are welcome to attend.
At the March meeting, Howard and Duncan Aran from The Doughboys Military Re-enactment Group gave a superb film show on their recent travels in the USA and Europe, visiting museums and World War I and World War II memorials, buildings and cemeteries.
On May 10, the Freedom Parade will take place with the Rifles Regiment at Buckingham Church at 11.30am. RBL members welcome.
Please contact Colin Armstrong on 01280 817285 for tickets.
New members and friends are always welcome at branch meetings which are held on the fourth Tuesday in the month at 7.30pm.

Brackley Means Business
BRACKLEY Means Business will be holding its next networking event on Tuesday, May 5, 7pm to 9pm at The Deli, Market House Courtyard, Brackley.
An opportunity for you to network with local businesses and a presentation by Jackie Jarvis: How To Turn Your Website Visitors Into Customers.
Contact Jan on 07901 854576 to secure your place.
£10 non-members, free to members.
Buffet and light refreshments will be served.

NCT, Towcester & District
A NEARLY new sale of clothes, toys and accessories for mums-to-be, babies and toddlers will take place tomorrow, Saturday, in Sponne School, Brackley Road, Towcester from 10am to 11.30am.
Towcester's National Childbirth Trust Nearly New Sale offers parents the chance to buy everyday necessities for their children.
Items for sale include clothes, non-fitted shoes, toys, games and equipment, books, videos, CDs, DVDs, bicycles, electronic toys, prams and pushchairs, and nursery equipment.
Everything is virtually as new or in very good condition.
For more information about the sale or about Towcester & District's NCT branch please visit www.nct-towcester.org.
If you would like to meet other new mums in the area then you're very welcome at our weekly open house coffee and play sessions and monthly social nights out!
Email Jenny on events@nct-towcester.org