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National Treasure Hunt

July 12, 2008
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This Saturday was the National Treasure Hunt in London, of which your Humble blogmaster was one of the winners last year. We turned up at the Tattershall Castle on the Thames Embankment: there were 36 of us there – 33 participants and 3 organisers. We traipsed round the Parks and Palaces of London. We headed in the direction of Westminster, then Green Park and St James’ Park, and thence past Buckingham Palace to Hyde Park and finally Kensington Gardens. Phew! We got the bus back to the starting point.

Unfortunately, we missed out on the top spot by a mere 1 point! The winning team was actually from Coventry. They did fairly well, seeing as we were playing practical jokes on them like advising them to go the long way round Hyde Park! YHB was lucky to escape a dunking in the Serpentine at the hands of Dave Filer of Coventry, though I should point out that he was trying to do the same sort of thing to everyone else, so fair’s fair! Luckily, even coming in second meant we were entitled to a prize (cash as it happened).

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Video from Last Night

June 1, 2008
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Press Release

May 22, 2008
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Mostly accurate.

Sporting Success with Thurrock Plus

Thurrock Plus were celebrating a major sporting victory last weekend at the Area Badminton Tournament, which was held in Dagenham. Thurrock member Joe Gurney was – along with partner Trevor Eley – winner of the Doubles Championship. The Badminton Tournament was organised by East Anglia Area Plus, Thurrock Plus’ parent organisation, and had participants from Plus clubs from all over Essex, East London, Hertfordshire, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk.

Badminton is just one of the sporting tournaments organised by Plus throughout the year: others include Tennis, Football, Go-Karting, Ten-Pin Bowling and Pool, amongst others. Said Joe, after his victory: “It was great to see so many take part today, both male and female, from all over the Area. Next I am looking forward to the Tennis which is next month – as well as Paintball in the near future.”

Thurrock Plus is a social, sporting and leisure group for young adults aged 18 to 35. It meets every Thursday at the Ship, Dock Road, Grays, from 9pm, as well as organise weekend events. To become a member or for more details call now on 07958 669339, or visit the website…

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from → Press Release, social group

Yet Another Press Release

April 28, 2008
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100% accurate!

Members of Thurrock Plus joined with other Plussers this week to present a cheque for £500 which they had raised to Hopefield Animal Sanctuary in Brentwood. This was the result of a sponsored walk which they undertook several months ago, in aid of this animal refuge. The sponsored walk was organised by neighbouring Plus group Barking & Dagenham.

Thurrock member Joe Gurney went on the sponsored walk, which included a visit to the Sanctuary itself, where he and other Plussers had a chance to see the work the staff do in helping horses, donkeys, and other animals which had either been abandoned, or which their owners were no longer able to care for. Joe said:

“I filmed the trip to Hopefield, and made a short video of it which I posted to YouTube. This proved to be so popular that now Plussers from all over East Anglia want to join us for another fund-raising venture for the Sanctuary this summer.”

Thurrock Plus, a social group for everyone aged 18 to 35, meets every Thursday at the Ship, Dock Road, Little Thurrock, Grays. For more information, please contact… To see the video of the Animal Sanctuary, visit…

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from → Barking, charity, Dagenham, Uncategorized

WASH 2007 – Another New Video

April 25, 2008
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Here is the second and final video regarding WASH 2007. This one features clips of the evening entertainment that we had over the three nights.

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from → Barking, Dagenham, youtube

Hopefield Animal Sanctuary – The Video

April 17, 2008
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Some time ago (last September in fact) I promised to make a video of the clips I had taken at Hopefield Animal Sanctuary. Unfortunately for reasons best known to itself the version of Windows Movie Maker on my computer was not behaving itself, and I could not get it finished. Then suddenly this week it cleared itself up! It might be the fact that I installed another Video editing programme on my PC which had been lent to me by Richard Leach of Barking & Dagenham – whereupon Windows Movie Maker, faced with competition, decided to smarten its act up! It might also have had something to do with me working with different types of video file. Anyway, here it is: the final product!

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from → Barking, charity, Dagenham, youtube

Area Quiz

March 1, 2008
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This weekend, members of Thurrock joined up with Plussers from Kings Lynn to form a team at the Area Quiz 2008. This was at the Cherry Tree Pub in Dagenham, a new venue for the quiz, although a popular venue for Plus events already (it is Barking & Dagenham’s own venue). There was a large turn-out – some thirty-three Plussers took part (almost more than there were at the National AGM!). The Quiz was run by Pete Newson and Richard Leach, both of whom took the job on at fairly short notice.

As is customary at Quizzes in Plus, the teams tried to out-do each other with coming up with funny team-names. Our own team was called “WASH W—–s on Tour;” although the eventual winner of the Quiz was also the most boringly named, i.e. “Redbridge” (a team from Redbridge Plus, funnily enough).

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from → Activities, Barking, Dagenham

National AGM / Focus Day

February 24, 2008
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This weekend was the AGM of the National Federation of Plus Areas, held at the Falstaff Hotel in Leamington Spa. Our Area won the Charles Padgham Training Trophy, which was picked up by a certain Joe Gurney, de facto Area Training Officer. On the Sunday we had the “Focus Day” which was devoted to motivation and generating new ideas.

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from → Activities, Barking, Dagenham

RGT Pool Competition

January 13, 2008
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This Sunday, members of Thurrock Plus took part in the RGT Pool Competition, at Barking Pool Club. This is the competition that was won last year by our then Chairman Chris. Unfottunately he was not able to defend his title this year, as he was otherwise engaged. Your Humble Blogmaster did not do particularly well: although I won one game, I was eliminated in the group stage.

The event was eventually won by Paul Savvas of Redbridge; Trevor Eley of Redbridge came second.

All in all, 23 people turned up from our Area and beyond. Many people remarked on how nice the venue was, with the result that we shall probably be using it again not just for the 2009 competition, but also other Plus events.

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WASH 2007 – The report.

November 4, 2007
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The members of Thurrock Plus joined with 250 other Plussers from all over the country to go to the perenially popular holiday WASH, at Searles Leisure Park, Hunstanton. Here are Your Humble Blogmaster’s highlights of the weekend:

  • Successfully reminding the staff of “Beers of Europe” that they had promised (to Tracy Thorn at the Midsummer Halloween Party) a 10%
    discount on Beer to PLUS members for this weekend. Unfortunately this did not apply to spirits, which was a shame as most of my expenditure on alcohol that weekend was on a bottle of Jack Daniels.
  • Finding that the accomodation we had was considerably better than last year. This was mainly because it had all been recently done-up in the last 12 months. We had a flat screen TV, a large fridge with an ice dispenser (with which we had lots of fun – some of the ice even got as far as our drinks), and a brand-new hi-fi.
  • The magnificent victory of “Ian Blair’s Sharp-shooters” in the WASH Quiz. This almost made up for the fact that Pat the DJ clearly doesn’t appreciate the efforts to which Plussers go when thinking up team names (or our unique sense of humour).
  • The fact that a worthy attempt to promote the World Cafe at the Focus Day next February descended into farce when Plussers started writing comments about the issues that REALLY mattered to them
    (hangover cures, who is single, spit-roasting, etc)
  • The fact that two of the groups from our Area – Barking & Dagenham and Redbridge – were honoured for increasing their bookings this year.
  • BADNESS (who despite their name, were really rather good).
  • Hillingdon’s Chalet Party.
  • Chris & Lala’s Chalet Party.
  • The WASH Committee’s own Chalet Party.
  • The Pound Coin That Can Never Be Spent. 😉

Next year will be WASH’s 25th Anniversary, and I am assured by the event’s organisers that they will be doing something special to celebrate it.

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from → Activities, Barking, Dagenham
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