I CAME, I SAW, I CONKER

Its conker season and British schoolkids are as busy as squirrels collecting chestnuts.

However despite the collecting I see very little if no actual conkering these days. You know, where a hole was drilled [how did we do that?] through the chestnut and a knotted string was pulled through.

Boy, did we have fun back in the day when conkers where a seasonal relief from pitch and toss and kick the can.

I was never really much good at conkers, never mastering the killer blow that could shatter a lesser nut in a single thwack. I did try though.

I imagine top winning conkers were guarded by rottweillers. I never had one.

Back in Preston where I grew up they were actually called cheggies or cheggers and not conkers. I understand that conker comes from conquer, which makes perfect sense. No idea where cheggies came from!

Did you smash each others' chestnuts as a kid in your part of the world readers?

It never really made it as a toy did it. A plastic conker?

cheggers gone

I was sad to hear the news that TV presenter Keith Chegwin has died. He was just 60.

Cheggers wasn't part of my own Sixties' generation's UK TV but he was a household name in the late 70's and in the 80's when my daughter grew up and millions of her peers will have loved his on-screen antics.

He was one of those famous children's TV presenters, like Chris Tarrant, who's presence just made you feel better. A bundle of fun and bursting with TV talent, I would say he was almost a British national institution in his heyday.

I don't think there's anyone like him now on British TV.

Do you remember him?

RIP Cheggers.