I'd like to take this opportunity to thank him sincerely for all his generosity, help, sympathy and encouragement over the years and for the opportunity to plaster my vision of the space toy world all over the blog for the last few years!
Ever since I virtually bumped into Paul sometime in the early 1990's as I took my first tentative steps onto the internet, he has been a constant and positive influence. Spacex and Sword was the second thing I looked for on the web (i imagine you can easily guess what the first thing was) and I stumbled upon Pauls magnum opus, the Collectors Checklist. This is still going here and was the gateway to discovering not just a mine of information about my favourite toy series, but a network of like minded individuals like Paul Vreede, Terry Harle and the Philosophic Toad whom I have been in touch with ever since.
Its been a real pleasure working with you and more recently spending real time in your company Mr Woods and i'd like to wish you a very happy birthday and good luck and best wishes for 2011.
Heres to the next fifty!
Best Regards, Bill (Wotan!)
Happy Birthday! Hope you get presents both today and on Saturday rather than rolling the two into one! ;-D
ReplyDeleteThanks for all your hard work and unlimited enthusiasm on the blog. I raise my glass to you (well I will when I get home). Cheers.
Thanks Billster! What a great picture! And the pleasure's truly all mine. Like you I've 'met' some great like-minded folk online [and occassionally in the flesh! Do they still call 'users' 'wetware'?] and would like to thank everyone for your continued 'readership', enthusiasm, friendship and the kind birthday wishes I've recieved today including the earliest messages at 00.03 and 00.10 [thanks Mr.Vreede and Andy B - what were you doing up so late!]. After having breakfast in bed and opening my cards and prezzies, courtesy of the marvellous Missus Moonbase, my only official duty of the day was to 'sign on' at the Jobcentre at 9am [no birthday wishes there!]. I probably saw the strangest job ever today on their screen, 'Telephone Psychic Readers Required'! Minimum Wage, home-based, flexible hours! I'd apply but I already know I won't get it because I'm not psychic! Or maybe I am! Now back on my sofa drinking coffee Missus Moonbase has offered to take me to the UK National Space Centre in Leicester, somewhere I've always wanted to go. Sorely tempted as I am it's a long drive South and it would be wiser to stay closer to home with all the snow and traffic around here. So wer'e headed to Headingley in Leeds for a festive browse round the Oxfam book and record shop, our fave, all the charity shops [to find a SWORD Moonbase in a box for 50p maybe!] and some enchilada's at Dare cafe [named after Dan Dare no less! What did he eat I wonder?]. Turning 50 has been surprisingly pleasant and with the help of family and friends like you the celebrations started a fortnight ago and are still going on! As a late December baby my Birthday always merged into Christmas, which must have been a pain for my Mum and Dad, although they always got me something cool like a Matt Mason Space Station or a Corgi Rockets track! I often think how they were forced to give up their 'youth' for the Second World War and worked so hard to give me and my sibs the peace and stability they never had as young adults. Now that I'm an old bespectacled giffer I can see further back and realise more than ever that, like my entire generation, I'm clearly stood on the shoulders of giants! Cheers everyone and Happy Crimbo. Per ardua ad astra, Woodsy
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ReplyDeleteSWORD Astronaut Arto requests permission to congratulate, Supremo Woodsy Sir!
ReplyDeleteCongratulations, Woodsy!!!! ^_^
ReplyDeleteI think you have permission, Arto ^_^
ReplyDeleteToad is still puzzling over what the first thing was that Wote looked for on the internet ...
ReplyDeleteSir yes Sir!
ReplyDeleteBirthday drinks at the S.W.O.R.D. Officer's Lounge, Supremo? First round's on me!
ReplyDelete(Sorry, should have warned you I get clumsy on the first round...oh well, that's one more uniform to have dry cleaned...)
-- Captain RAB
My Buzz Lightyear -mode seems to have stuck on and can't reach my back to switch it off... (Toadie help please)
ReplyDeleteHave a great Birthday Commander Woodster...that's a few light years you have under your belt, here's to the next era!
ReplyDeleteMany Happy Returns.
Just look at it this way Woodsy, you may be Fifty physically but mentally......forever young! good to hear you had a great day keep having more of them....and that's an order Supremo!
ReplyDeleteToad helps Arto with those hard to reach places (grins). Buzz Lightyear Mode now disabled! heh heh.
ReplyDeleteAnd (coughs to get attention) ... why did no one tell me BEFORE NOW that there's a S.W.O.R.D. Officer's Lounge? Sheesh! It's cos I'm an officer in SpaceX, isn't it? (mutters)
Phew... Much better now. Thanks, Toad. Now, where's the Bar...
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