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Then you'd have another load of sausages complaining about it and setting up a group called Just Stop Poop.

Greggs particularly annoys me - they seem the darling of the London social elite, but I won't use them after they tried to tell me that a pasty filled with minced mush was "traditional"!

I hate to see independent high street bastions disappear. It's like the very history of the town is being slowly erased. But then we can't close Pandora's box, the internet is a gift and a curse at the same time. St Albans is just bookies, coffee shops and pubs now. Very few independents remain, and the exorbitant rent that they get charged for space drives them into the ground. I remember someone I knew had a franchise of a big name product, and the rent for their very small space was about £70k per year about 20 years ago. That's an awful lot of jeans to sell. It's all succinctly wrapped up in a great episode of Ever Decreasing Circles, where a local DIY shop that's been in the family for something like 150 years is facing closure due to competition. Martin goes into the shop to buy *one* six inch nail and the old fella running the shop happily sells him one for about 3p. I remember doing the same with my Grandad 40 odd years ago. The episode is full of pathos. Series 4, episode 2 if you're interested. It's worth a watch.

On a different note, I hope that independent retailers will grow in any High Street revival. The give so much more character and soul to a town. I was sad to see Hanningtons, a very large independent departmental store in my home town of Brighton closed in 2001 after nearly 200 years of trading. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanningtons. Boswells of Oxford (first traded in 1738) sadly closed during the COVID pandemic.

Hooray! Good news here. Just having a few days in Norfolk and the hotel says in its welcome pack that payment in cash is welcome and preferred - to avoid paying card fees. (Paying in cash has a lower charge and provides support for retaining the only local bank). They also recommend future bookings be made by direct contact or via their website to save having to pay the £7 a night booking site fee. I might come back for a few days fishing if all goes well.

Are you kidding? I had a Triumph Herald that was 80 horse power. That's 80 horses given a new job for just one car!

I've just received the catalogue and it deserves to be prized as a very well illustrated set of coins.

The coin will be sent shortly to the Royal Mint for authentication and commentary, which I hope they cover in some detail.

I think Australia is the only country that has kept the imperial sizes for 6d, shilling and florin coins. Australia never adopted the half crown when their coins were introduced in1910 although British half crowns and other coins circulated in Australia until the 1930s. Probably until the Australian pound was devalued to 15/- sterling in 1932 .

Hmmmm..trying to remember- yes- there is the 1880 with missing waves on the right, another 1880 with a fragment of the '0' above the top of the '0', an 1861 with a loop of a small '8' under the '8' I think you've seen them before over the past 4 years....