One Small Step

Where it all began..

Five years ago, in a casual response to an email i'd sent Woodsy, pointing out a knock off SWORD toy on ebay, here's the point where I became involved with the blog. Woodsy and I had been corresponding off and on for the previous ten years, after my first pitiful surf on the internet revealed his very first SWORD signpost - the venerable 'checklist'. Its still running today, although sadly, very dated!

Since Woodsy was kind enough to take me onboard the blog, we've posted on a daily basis, almost solidly for 5 years. Always entertaining and exciting and sometimes astonishing, as Woodsys almost occult knack of discovering information or finding toys and articles brought all manner of hitherto undiscovered gems to light.

The Lord of  SWORD

 Since then, our friendship has gone from strength to strength and after a memorable meet up, I finally got to put a face to the name. Now we have regular SWORDStock get togethers and I have had the distinct pleasure of discovering more about Woodsy and his encyclopaedic knowledge of books, history, video, toys, kung fu and poetry!

When he discovered I was going to university, to study creative writing, he and his lovely wife arranged a day out while I was visiting Moonbase, to the village where the poet laureate Ted Hughes lived and to see the cemetery where the poet Sylvia Plath, Hughes' estranged wife was buried too. After that, we spent almost two days discussing poetry and Woodsy showed me his collection of rare poetry volumes and I discovered that he is in fact a published poet and songwriter himself!

Heptonstall Cemetry - with spooky moggy

So I would just like to take this opportunity to thank him for his continuing support, friendship and daily entertainment on and offline. Its been an absolute blast - so heres to the Future! Bill