Monthly Archives: May 2019

Bank Holiday Weekend

Bank Holiday Weekend
It is the late May Bank Holiday Weekend and the Salter Steamer river services between Abingdon and Oxford have started again.
Bank Holiday Weekend
At Abingdon Lock, River Banksy has created a couple of new sculptures for the new boating season.

The Open Air pool has opened. There were some bands playing at the Crown and Thistle. And Bank Holiday Monday will have free walks put on by the Friends of Abingdon.

There will be guided walks leaving the Market Place at 10.30 and 14.00. Morning walks are:

1556 Boundary Walk – with a Town Councillor and a Town Crier
Lost Abbey Tour – with a member of the Twin Towns Society
Alternative Flowerbeds – with Abingdon Carbon Cutters
Rivers of Abingdon – with an enthusiast from the Wilts and Berks Canal Trust

and in the afternoon there will be:

A Wildlife Walk to Radley Lakes – with Abingdon Naturalists
Abingdon’s Industrial Past walk – with the Town Archivist
Art About Abingdon walk – with the ‘Backstreeter’ (the Abingdon blogger)
Bank Holiday Weekend
When it comes to the ‘Art About Abingdon walk’ I will not have all the answers. Blacksmith artist Jon Mills created the railings near Waitrose but I cannot work out what he had in mind with that rectangle with holes.
Bank Holiday Weekend
That animal on the left is very familiar too but, as I write up my notes for the walk, I cannot remember why.

This is how it felt to be on Abingdon Market Place today

Abingdon Market Place
There was plenty going on today on Abingdon Market Place today. There were stalls (quite a few of them with chilli).
Abingdon Market Place
Some were serving hot food (Indian and Wood fired pizza). There were not as many BBQ stalls as hoped for, but then the main caterer dropped out at the last moment.Abingdon Market Place
Hedges, the Abingdon Butcher (normally to be found along Queen Street) had a selection of meats for the home BBQ.
Abingdon Market Place
There were fun stalls and rides.
Abingdon Market Place
There was also a bar, and music including Tom Hingley and the Kar-pets. Tom was born in Abingdon, and left to find fortune in Manchester where he became the lead singer of the 90’s group the Inspiral Carpets.
Abingdon Market Place
The event was organised by Yummy Events who also organise the Abingdon Chilli Festival.

The young lady who organised it was upset that her BBQ caterer could not make it, and about letting some people down, but there was sunshine and excellent music. It was another good day on Abingdon Market Place thanks to her.

Monk of Abingdon’s roundabout – May 2019 happenings

Monk of Abingdon's roundabout
On the Monk of Abingdon’s roundabout there is an advert for the Oxfordshire BBQ Festival on Abingdon Market Place – Sat 25th May – organised by Dawn who does the Oxfordshire Chilli Festival.
Monk of Abingdon's roundabout
Congratulations to the Hilton Garden Inn that fully opened on 14th May.
Monk of Abingdon's roundabout
Nearby at the Fairacres retail park, Homebase, Topps Tiles, AHF and Vineys are due to be replaced with five new units. Homebase are closing in August.
Monk of Abingdon's roundabout
There are also savings on ex display furniture at AHF Abingdon who are closing in July.

European Elections 2019 in Abingdon

European Elections
Polling stations in Abingdon have been open for the second time this month. Three weeks ago they opened for the district and parish elections, and this Thursday it is the European elections, which were supposed not to happen as the UK should have left the European Union on 29th March 2019.

Abingdon is part of the South East of England and we were given the following choice of parties and Independents:
Change UK (10 candidates)
Conservative (10 candidates)
Green (10 Candidates)
Labour (10 Candidates)
Liberal Democrats (10 Candidates)
The Brexit Party (10 Candidates)
The Socialist Party of Great Britain (10 Candidates)
UK European Union Party (2 Candidates)
UKIP (10 Candidates)
Independent – Jason McMahon
Independent – David Round
Independent – Michael Jeffrey Turberville

We each had one vote.
European Elections
10 MEPs will be elected to represent the South East of the UK. MEPs are elected by proportional representation. The number of MEPs each party gets is calculated using a formula called d’Hondt after the Belgian mathematician Victor d’Hondt, who dreamed up the formula in 1878, long before the days of computers. According to Wikpedia….
After all the votes have been tallied, successive quotients are calculated for each party. The party with the largest quotient wins one seat, and its quotient is recalculated. This is repeated until the required number of seats is filled. The formula for the quotient 

quotient = V / (S + 1)

V is the total number of votes that party received, and
s is the number of seats that party has been allocated so far, initially 0 for all parties. 
European Elections
European elections do not usually enthuse people as much as national elections but on this occasion they are being treated by some people as a protest vote. In the UK there are two new parties. The Brexit Party has been created to allow people who voted Leave to show their discontent with parliament’s handling of Brexit. Change UK has been created by people in parliament to challenge the referendum result.

The UK should still leave the European Union (EU) on 31st October 2019. If the UK and EU ratify the withdrawal agreement before then, it would be earlier. So these elected MEPs could be in post for a very short time. But parliament has not managed to agree the withdrawal yet so it could be longer.
European Elections
Polling has finished and we will know the results on Sunday.