Visit to Ordsall Hall 27th Oct

Again, a very successful visit organised by Mary and we were blessedwith fine,warm, sunny weather and strolled from one door to another when moving from the main hall to the star room, which was a bedroom.
There were a few items of 14th Century furniture displayed in the Hall, Star Room and kitchen.
A beautiful table has been loaned by the Victoria and Albert Museum, which has melon legs and carved on the front is a dragon and the carving also depicts the Lancashire and Yorkshire Rose. One on the tailof the dragon and the other at the other end of the dragon shape.
In the Star Room, we were shown a cot which pulled out from beneath the four poster bed. The small children were wrapped in blankets like a cacoon to protect them from the bugs and vermin and the cot was then pushed back under the bed. Hence, children could be seen, but not heard.
Should visitors pass through the Hall as visitors, they would be given Food and Board. The food would be placed on a wooden platter with a small indentation on one side for salt. The salt was passed around in the form of a solid brick and the visitor would scrape some off with his knife. The board would be any flat surface, such as the top of a chest, table, wardrobe or cupboard. Perhaps this was the origination of the term Lodgings.
In the Kitchen we saw a bread oven fixed into the wall and a huge fireplace which could be walked into. There was also a spit which worked on gravity, a most ingenious contraption.
Various herbs hung from the ceiling and there was a fair sample of herbs and spices on a table and the shelves of a dresser.
There was a sample of a woven bee hive and eel basket in the dairy and a number of pot containers for liquids, very similar to those we saw in the Roman Exhibition in the Manchester Museum.
The visit finished with a very pleasant hot drink and biscuits, all in all, a very nice outing.
Elaine.

Photos

Elaine we do look forward with bated breath for the photos of orsdall Hall, will they be on the zoomer page! It will have been a lovely day as the day( was as you will know) the warmist day for well over a hundred years see you folks D.J>B

Manchester Museum

We had an enjoyable visit to the Museum with Mary's Group on the 29th Sept although the gentleman who delivered the lecture had been used to primary school groups and had not seemed to realise that a group of blind and visually impaired people might have warranted a little more preparation. However, I found him mildly amusing and was glad not to have to engage my brain overly much whilst he tried to make us guess what each object was used for by the Romans.
After the guessing game, we were able to examine a variety of artifacts which had been set out on tables in groups of six. At the beginning, I was concerned that I might have missed something on one of the other tables - like you do - but was happy to find out that each table had a similar set of samples.
One of the most amazing was the sample of glass, which was so clear and perfect, maybe we lost something in the way of engineering and manufacture after the fall of the Roman Empire.
Unfortunately, the photos taken by Linda have been lost again somewhere between her camera and computer and so we are unable to show you some of the most interesting objects made available to us.
We are looking forward to our next visit, which will be to Ordsall Hall on Thurs 27th Oct and maybe this time, we may be able to bring back some photos.
Regards to all,
Elaine.

Default font size in a new message in Outlook Express

Not that I've got a thing about default fonts and font sizes, you understand. However, Ken Leckie was asking how to change the font size in a new message without using the mouse. The answer is to use the Font dialog box which is on the Format menu of the new message window.

However it's probably a good idea to change the the default font size, so that it's always set to a suitable value. To do this:

1. From the main window, open the Options dialog, which is on the Tools menu.
2. On the Send page, check that in the Mail sending Format section the HTML radio button is set.
3. On the Compose page, the font and font size for mail is shown in the Compose Font section. To change these press the upper Font Settings button on the right hand side.
4. In the Font window which appears, make the changes, and press Enter.
5. Then press Enter to OK the Options dialog.

Zoomers - What's it all about?

OK – You can’t walk down the street or have a quiet drink at the local without everybody asking ‘Just what happens at the Zoomers group on a Monday morning?’

So this is the first of a series of reports on the groups activities from an inside source.

It was a quieter than normal session last Monday with Ken L and John R away on tour ( Ken S away as well – Oslo again?) but still busy enough. Vivian created some notes on using email, printing them out at font size 26. When she has finished them, we’ll make them available through the Zoomers weblog.

Meanwhile, Graham has had a problem with his bank. So, he ran an internet search for the name of the Chief Executive of the bank and composed a letter of complaint to him. It was posted on Monday afternoon and we await a response.

Elaine mastered the Henshaws scanner, saving loads of photos which she emailed off to the family as attachments. We all think this was practice as she has since flown off to Spain for two weeks with several cameras.

Don has had a problem with his home PC with the Word ‘normal’ template being altered or corrupted. This happens to everyone sooner or later and is really irritating. David (the Tiger) has produced some notes on how to fix it. Stay tuned for an update.

Big Bad John has been at it again – set up his third weblog, this time with pictures of his collection of Trade Union related pottery. The site is at: http://jbscoll.blogspot.com/

and just has three plates at the moment. When all three hundred are loaded, we’re all going round to his house for a Greek meal.

This highlights an improvement to Blogger as a weblog tool. When we started, we had to use the program Hello to upload pictures, which was OK but needed a bit more work. Now you can upload straight from the Blogger Posting page which is much easier. Expect notes on how to do this form someone in the near future.

Speaking of notes, the absolutely complete, total, final set of notes on Zoomer’s Windows shortcuts is loaded below. Well laid out and in large font size, (Tiger’s fingerprints all over this one), it covers most commonly used Windows programs and will give your mouse a rest. Just click on the link and then save or print. Makes an excellent Christmas present!

See you next week.