Eaton Bray Lawn Tennis Club

Posted on June 2, 2007

I'd like to commence this month with a top tip for all your shoppers who find parking charges prohibitive at big shopping centres like, for example, Milton Keynes. My thanks go to one eminent club member for recounting the following true story regarding how to get free parking for three days in a two hour parking bay. This member, who for legal reasons had best remain nameless (I can't afford a good lawyer, or even a bad one for that matter), parked her car at Sainsbury's in Milton Keynes last Friday whilst she nipped in to purchase a few essentials for husband R....oh gosh nearly gave it away. Once finished she popped into another couple of shops before returning via a different route to Sainsbury's to find her car gone. Vanished into thin air, disappeared, missing, departed, in fact, assumed stolen. Police were alerted, insurance companies contacted and claims lodged, CCTV camera footage studied, witness statements taken, and a full scale Missing Mini alert launched (oh no, there I go again, that rules out all non-Mini owners).

Our member was distraught; not only had her car been nicked but she'd left her very expensive Gucci sunglasses in the glovebox. And worse of all, she had to call her husband, break the news and ask him to come and pick her up in his Cit....(oh good just stopped myself).

Exhaustive enquiries continued over the weekend with the police diverting all available resources into tracking down the exclusive gold Mini (oh heck). By Monday morning they were running out of ideas when they received a phone call from Sainsbury's along the lines of 'There's this car been abandoned in our car park, could you come and take it away please'. They duly arrived and were clearly delighted to discover the 'missing' Mini, which had evidently been sitting in the same car-parking space since the previous Friday, un-moved and very definitely un-stolen. Yes, when our member had returned to find her car, she'd been looking in the wrong car-park!! To say she was a little embarrassed is like saying that Jose Mourinho is a little shy. Oh how the police sighed with relief and smiled about it. MI5 were stood down and the insurance company's claims team were re-deployed. As for our member, all's well that ends well; she got her car back, plus her sunglasses, and as a bonus three days free parking and she didn't even lose her no-claims discount! Apparently her other half was very good about it all and there was absolutely no barney (uh oh that's torn it .... do EasyJet fly to Brazil)??

Following our Spring Dance (see last month's report on the drumming) we followed up in April with a joint Quiz Night with the Village Hall committee. Over 170 people across 20 teams tried to answer questions on subjects from the symbol for the chemical element Barium, to the birthyear of George II. Or was it the III, or it may have been the year of his death, but by then it was all a bit of a blur. We stopped after four rounds to enjoy a magnificent cheese and pate platter provided for each table together with crusty bread, and supped some more beer and wine from our cooler bags. I was seconded to a team who couldn't think of a suitable name, so we appropriately called ourselves 'The Team with No Name'. The second half of the evening saw us rapidly climb up the scoreboard as we sailed through the Sports and Geography rounds thanks mainly to a very intelligent dentist in our ranks, aided by a bank manager who knew the currency of Azerbaijan (1 manat = 100 qapik, in case you ever need to order any), and by some miracle after the full eight rounds we found ourselves overall winners by half a point! We accepted our prizes of bottles of wine with gusto and determined to keep them away from our chairman who was eyeing them with more than a passing interest. The evening raised around £750 each for both the Village Hall committee and our tennis club, and everyone seemed to have a good time as well, so look out soon for booking details for the next Quiz on 5th October. 170 people can't be wrong!

Finally, see the advert in Focus this month for our Play Tennis Day on Saturday 16th June. Chiltern Black Thunder, Andrew Selous MP, free tennis, competitions, and my famous BBQ. Don't miss it!

For any further information about the club, including when we get together for our social tennis sessions up at the School Lane courts, or our various activities, please contact either Chairman Ross Barney Bagni, Coach Nick Boys, or if they're all out and I'm not fighting extradition from Sao Paulo, me, Andy Cross.

Source: Focus, June 2007