... will be resumed shortly - I'm still up to my neck in Project 'X'.

Big sister found a picture showing the registration of the family Alvis. Unfortunately, it seems that the car didn't survive and all I've got is the hare and a folder of correspondence between my father and the Alvis factory:

.. and an invoice might be of interest.

It's a bit difficult going back over the 8 or 9 weeks or so since my last entry and trying to remember all the events in the correct order but I'll have a go. In early September, trips to the Lincolnshire Wolds provided an opportunity to have a look at Grimsby and Cleethorpes - places I'd flown over on the way up to see chums at Breighton.

As its name regrettably suggests, the casual visitor to Grimsby might carry away a gloomy picture of this, at one time the biggest fishing port in Europe, but it's worth digging a bit deeper - Wikipedia has some interesting things to say about the town which now produces more pizzas than even Italy.

Cleethorpes, which forms part of the Grimsby-Cleethorpes conurbation, retains lots of interesting late Victorian seaside architecture and has suffered a lot less at the hands of mid-20thC developers than Grimsby.

There's still a few less attractive but nevertheless 'moody' corners to frame. In contrast, Louth was a delightful little market town, bustling, unspoiled, full of history and period architecture. Wikipedia informs me that the 'Keep Louth Local' campaign has successfully countered the introduction of major supermarket chains to the town and it's paid dividends in keeping open independent high street shops.

I was rostered to go back to Finland at the beginning of October to magnetize another 20km of undersea cable but various delays in the programme put paid to that. No bad thing really because the butter in my butter dish (I don't keep butter in the fridge because it's just impossible to spread) has started to firm up, indicating that it's nearly time to look out thick socks and woolly hats.

Not the time to be sitting in an open-ended tent on the shores of the Gulf of Finland.