Thanks Moley, I will go out tomorow and hunt one down, In the current financial climate I could do with a laugh.

Oh, as a general aside, the Thames Vintage Boat Club have an article in their latest issue of "Boater" about Monks Corner, one of Jeromes houses in Marlow , which I believe is currently for sale.

How about this one, The Wheels of Change, by H G Wells  1896  I have only read the first chapter so far, but its one of the few books that had me chuckling to myself in the same way that Jeromes humour does. In fact a sure measure of its success is when my wife turns over and says" for goodness sake turn the light out and stop that silly giggling..."
Give it a try.

too right! if you read up all the incantations and ceremonies required to safely rename a boat ( to avoid incurring the wrath of the gods and a humoungous amount of bad luck) you will decide it would be more fun to knit your own parachute whilst falling from 30000 feet.
I wanted to call my first boat "The Idler" untill I found someone had beaten me to it ! ( someone in the JKJ society in fact!)
Anyway, Hendrika is a great name, I will lookout for you. Try to manage to pass through Henley on 19/20th july.

Congratulations Tom!,your stage adaptation cannot fail as the content is so good, all you need is enthusiasm and I can see you have that! Rodney Bewes has proved this , I have seen his version and I enjoyed it very much, and he does it without any props, background or effects at all, just stands there and does it. Others would say he is not brilliant, but most critics dont actually venture on stage themselves!
I am going to see Rodneys "on stage and off" at Eastleigh later this year, we will see how he gets on with that.
Ive not seen Jes doing his TMIB, but it goes without question that an actor of his calibre would be perfect.
We will try to get to Bracknel for your event and I wish you every success.

How brave! and welcome to sanity. I trust you have had no threats yet?  I had no trouble when I joined. (unless you count next doors cat, who, judging from its behavior in my garden could well be an FBI agent in disguise....)
I find it so pleasing that Jerome has reached so far round the globe, just need a letter from an eskimo now and he will reached nearly everybody!

Hi Jenny, sorry it took so long for anybody to answer you....we are all busy reading JKJ books!
Yes As long as you use  ebay.com which is world wide (21 million buyers I have been told!) someone somewhere will buy them. Get an idea of prices on ABEBOOKS.COM
best of luck...sean

Oh, and by the way, I will be back for the 31st annual Traditional Boat Rally next July, and my offer to any Jeromians still stands, come and have a ride on a boat built during Jeromes lifetime. Dont worry about a repeat of this years rain.
After all, as Jerome pointed out, you cant believe a weather forecast anyway!

HAH! Well, you asked me, and as it takes very little encoragement for me to talk about boating on the Thames, here is a report , with apologies in advance to our leader for the grammar...
It got right through May and June without much sign of the sun, and anyway we were busy househunting.We decided it would be fun to take the boat the 16 miles upriver to the rally we go to every year at Henley on Thames, and it would actually be a lovely trip on a sunny day as that is the most beautiful part of the river, BUT, when we got to the marina where she was moored on the Friday morning it was raining heavily, however, being “British”, and as it had been raining for weeks we carried on as the weekend forecast was good.
We got very wet rigging up the boat, I had taken the sides of our small garden gazebo with us and I rigged this up around the boat to keep the rain off. It worked quite well, trailing in the river beside us, luckily it has plastic windows so we could see where we were going, but we did look like a floating tent! (not that there was anybody to see us as all the other “British” people were huddled indoors out of the rain.)
The rain, unbeknown to us was severe all over the country, and as half of England drains into the Thames, the level and the current rose as we went along, as we got to the last lock, the lock keeper said that there would be little or no movement on the river at the rally as the current was going to be very strong over the weekend.
Saturday dawned fairly sunny and the event got under way so we were all set for a great time. Sunday was sunny also, but the rally was very short of boats, many who came brought their boats on trailers (as we usually do) but did not unload them as the river was now getting very high and fast.
By late morning the organisers finally gave in to what was inevitable, and cancelled the rally. They had a warning from upriver that a lot more water was due and the fields we were in would rapidly flood…..there was a mass exodus of stall holders and others and by 4 pm the fields were empty except for the forlorn boat owners who could not leave because of the strong current which was by now coming through Henley bridge in a very dramatic fashion!
As luck would have it, our children had left by taxi at 2pm to get the plane back to Spain, leaving us with a car, so eventually after an afternoon of watching debris and logs etc swirling by, and the water level rising steadily, we went home.
We returned once or twice to add more stakes into the river bank to prevent Irene (the boat) from drifting onto the field should the river rise very high, but in fact the field we were in just got very soggy, and the water rose maybe 2  or three feet , over flowing into the field where we were in a few places,  the other field was flooded completely to about a foot or two , leaving all the marquees, bandstand etc looking very odd marooned in the middle with swans swimming in and out of the entrances!

It took three weeks of waiting for the current of the river to subside enough for us to consider moving “Irene” to the nearest slipway to bring her home, during this period we drove the 60 miles up to the Thames several times to check on the extra ropes and  big stakes we had driven into the bank to keep her off the field.
During this time many of the other boats were stranded too, and their owners had stayed aboard, marooned in the middle of a large field with , in most cases, no running water, or power , and having to walk a couple of miles to carry food etc back from the local shops in Henley.
Whenever we spoke to them they were always cheerful and optimistic about things, a clear example of how we humans react to diversity!

sorry, my boat is called "Irene", an open launch with green canopy, circa 1920.

sad about jeromes desk and the other stuff, I myself worked for a county council for 12 years so I understand the inevitability of the way they work (work??) not a lot we can do except the old trick of Many complaining  letters which often frightens a councilor.
meanwhile, cheer yourselves up by visiting me at the annual Traditional Boat rally at Henley on 21/22nd july where all things Jeromian are visible, this year the main topic will be the weather I fear, but rain or shine I will give a trip on the river to any member who says hello. (bring your own umbrella)

Brilliant Jes!   thankyou for making this clear to our members. there are plenty of sites for blue pill etc.  Happily we all understand the level of inteligence of these advertisers, I just hope Jerome isn't looking down on us to see todays level of commercialism.  
I am sure we all agree strongly with your statement.

I see there is a version in Hebrew on ebay right now!

its pretty cool having you two experts banging on about Jerome stuff that us lesser mortals have never even heard about!  A bit awesome for me but I bet even Jes is glad to have you aboard! so. more power to your elbows (pens? keyboards?)
I would be interested in your views on the meaning and/or moral issues of "Passing of the third floor back"

not sure about the pubs, could be fun finding out! however I am really interested in your intended trip. Several have thought of it but not many manage to actually make it... If you can make it happen I would really love to know the dates etc as I would love to photograph your efforts from nearby on the river (on my boat of course!) if you did not mind? I could produce some nice pics of your rippling muscles etc as you rowed ( or even give you a tow when you need a rest?)
If you prefer to keep your venture less public ,please email me on  scwiles@yahoo.co.uk



spelling ok Jes?

ohh, so many mysteries........so little time.....