Apologies for the lack of Wyenot News last week and the rather hurried and poorly edited edition the week before. This edition has also been hurried, I'm afraid. This past two weeks have been a very difficult period which, although I have been anticipating for some years now, still came as a shock. My family and I, although scattered around the country have always remained very close and Mum losing her battle for life hit us all very hard. In some ways, things were made more difficult as Mum had been close to death so many times before but being a fighter, had always managed to pull through by the skin of her teeth. We had all become used to this happening on a regular basis and psychologically, somehow we expected the same thing to happen again.

A sincere thank you to the many who took the trouble to write to me about the situation. Your kind thoughts and sympathy are very much appreciated. I have tried to reply to all of the emails but being away for much of the time, I also arrived home to many hundreds (well thousands actually) of junk emails from those who arrogantly assume that a 'dot com' can only be an American web site and therefore I must need viagra. A few may have accidentally slipped through the net for this reason as I tend to get mad and a little quick with the delete key. I apologize if any genuine mails have been accidentally deleted but excesses of this type of junk email cause a real problem when it comes to spotting the genuine amid a barrage of rubbish.

I have included a special photographic tribute to Mum in this week's edition of the news. Some of you knew her and others may like to learn about a very brave lady who fought hard and touched the lives of many.