Newsletter 9 -
Bon Annee
Good morrow my linking comrades and a Happy 2009 to you all, the 'Year of the Ox' - 9 squares in Noughts (O) & Crosses (X) - a splendid link from the 2008 Thinkalink Champion, Claire Adams, it has to be said. Anyway, I hope the fat, bearded fella in the red clown outfit did the honours down your respective chimneys a couple of weeks back (steady). This 'brass monkeys' nonsense weather is getting silly, isn't it....jeepers!! (I am prone to an exclamation mark or two and make no apologies for it!).
Update
Great to see that some of you have subscribed to the emailed 'Link of the Week' howdy doody (or in some cases 'biweekly'). I probably shouldn't be saying this but the 'crumbly' cartoonist, Bill Stott, scribbles a mean toon, doesn't he?? His sense of humour is superb, which is quite refreshing what with him being a northerner an' all. (Settle Linky, settle).
Thinkalink was 'out & about' last Sunday night on the BBC's flagship radio programme for children, Go4it, on Radio 4. It's a 10 minute jobbie which you can hear by clicking on this and scrolling down to 'Radio 4 - Go4it'.....http://www.thinkalink.co.uk/content/media. It was great fun and the three 9 year old girls enjoyed it immensely and they even asked for my autograph.....poor things! It has generated a lot of traffic to the site and helps the profile of the whole shooting-match. Only this week, I did a workshop with a handful of 10 to 15 year old children who have spelling difficulties, including three with dyslexia. It went down a storm and they all want to come back for some more which is great news. We had such fun and, as a group, linked some short words like 'pour', 'fruit' and 'nation' and we even came out with a goodie for that killer word 'wednesday'. We spotted that the really difficult bit of the word 'dnes' is 'send' backwards. I tested them and they said 'It's in!!' There are many, many people out there who have wonderful imaginations but may not achieve strong academic results because of their lack of confidence. 'Linking' brings them to life and instills that confidence which is my mantra. Oh, the joy.
Your chance to get involved
The site is a meeting-place for linkers & learners alike. So if you have a link for anything, absolutely anything, regardless of how random the fact is, then submit it and let's see what the punters think. If it's a slam-dunk of a link then it will go in the book (as will your name).
Feedback
I would love to get your thoughts and observations on the site, good or bad. This has been a passion of mine since 1995 and it's finally come to fruition which is hugely exciting. It's new territory for me so any guidance or tips on what does and doesn't work will be warmly received - please let me know at andy.salmon@thinkalink.co.uk .
Top Linkers
Congratulations to the following 10 linkers for having the highest average score, per link, for December.
But, more importantly, may I congratulate Claire Adams for being the Champion Linker for 2008. She will receive the Thinkalink silverware, posthaste! I have thoroughly enjoyed her links, she is a very knowledgeable lady who has a wonderful imagination. Her only downside is that she's from the wrong side of Sussex but you can't have it all.
Hard cheese to Lester (!) who came a gallant second and well done to the Bracknell bruiser for sneaking on the podium.
1. Claire Adams, West Sussex, GB
2. Lester Fernando
3. Alan Newell, Bracknell, GB
4. Phil Isaac
5. Phil Stubbs, Derbyshire, GB
6. Charley Park
7. Shane Fernando, London, GB
8. Dominic O'Brien, World Champion Memory Man
9. alanjb
10. Kaufmatic (from over the Pond)
Competition
Congratulations to ChrisP428 (some people just don't care) for winning 100 sovereigns for getting the four correct answers to the poser in the last newsletter which were:
2 wood, Conversation, Ox & 1980
Here is the next competition
http://www.thinkalink.co.uk/content/competitions/competitions/competition-9-jan-09-open
Email me the answers (andy.salmon@thinkalink.couk ) and you will be entered into the draw for another 100 smackers.
Future Newsletter
Please let me know if you would prefer me not to contact you in this way and I will take you off my newsletter circulation list. If that is the case, please accept my apologies.
I’ll leave you with a couple of recent humdingers.....
Thimphu is the capital of Bhutan.......'How's the marriage Tim?'...'Poo. I'm going to boot Anne (HRH) into touch.'
Quasi means Seemingly/Not really/As if......Don't tell the Mrs but the mother-in-law has got her impression of Quasimodo down to a tee.
Have a superb 2009, one and all, and let's see if we can knock that Adams girl off shall we!
Sir Linkalot
PS You can view old newsletters at www.thinkalink.co.uk/content/news-events
