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Articles by William Byford

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About William Byford

A partner in an international firm of loss adjusters, William is a keen blogger and member of the internet community. More Posts

Life In Squares (review)

Yesterday I noticed that the second episode of Life In Squares, the BBC’s new three-part drama series on the lives and loves of the Bloomsbury Group, was nestling in the advance BBC2 schedule at 9.00pm and decided that I might as well give it a go. I should perhaps point out here that literary [...]

August 4, 2015 // 0 Comments

Life as it is lived

Earlier this week I had lunch with an old business colleague, whom for present purposes I shall call Peter, in what might formerly have been termed either my ‘manor’ (that’s certainly how Arthur Daley would have described it), viz. London’s West End, specifically the area around Soho and [...]

July 17, 2015 // 0 Comments

Another day at the coast

Yesterday in the dead of night I was obliged to drive for an hour and a half for a rendezvous at the M2 service station nearest the A3 turn-off at 0400 hours. The purpose of this ridiculous expedition was to lend my brother my ‘Continental legally-required’ set of self-administering [...]

June 16, 2015 // 0 Comments

Life on the ocean wave

Towards the end of last week I travelled to stay with my father at the coast for about ten days – part of the reason being to sail in an annual regatta which takes place in June. This year my father is celebrating his half-century as owner/skipper of his 21 feet (at the waterline) keel boat which [...]

June 14, 2015 // 0 Comments

Getting on

My father is nearly ninety and in the last three years has been declining physically and, less obviously, mentally also. He started having trouble with his legs about five years ago, when he began lifting and putting down his leg foot in a strange ‘flapping’ manner that gradually became more [...]

May 27, 2015 // 0 Comments

For those in peril on the sea

Let me declare an interest at the outset. I have a personal interest in sailing through my family and specifically my son Barry, who earns his crust as a yacht skipper.  Through this, I have a keen sense of the joys, but also the dangers, of ocean sailing. In common with all members of his [...]

April 29, 2015 // 0 Comments

The last farewell

Yesterday I was privileged to join my father at the 68th (and last) reunion of WW2 Fleet Air Arm servicemen trained at HMS St Vincent in Gosport, which took place at the Navy Club in Hill Street, behind Park Lane in London. The original HMS St Vincent was a first-rate ship launched on 11th March [...]

April 25, 2015 // 0 Comments

‘Over there’

Yesterday I had occasion to join my fellow Rusters Henry Elkins and Guy Danaway on what they had described in advance as “one of their raids into Occupied France …”. As I understand it, these are effectively reconnaissance trips undertaken in advance of one of their guided tours of the WW1 [...]

April 15, 2015 // 0 Comments

You see it your way, I’ll see it mine

Overnight I was both interested and intrigued to see a piece on the website of The Independent about the steps that the late actor/comedian Robin Williams has taken to secure his legacy or – to put it another way – prevent his image being exploited after his demise. Apparently, via legal [...]

April 2, 2015 // 0 Comments

Back to good old Blighty

Yesterday I returned to the UK and almost immediately wished that I could have turned on my heel and booked myself a one-way ticket back to Portugal. THE FLIGHT By chance I had booked a seat less than ten rows back on the right hand side from the front of my budget airline flight. When I [...]

February 27, 2015 // 0 Comments

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