I taught with Andrene at Charlbury for more years than I care to remember. We were good colleagues and jolly good friends too. I'm not going to talk about her teaching because we all know she was wonderful, but give you a few personal memories that have stood out...like she did have this annoying habit of coming into the staff room 10 minutes before the end of lunchtime with her goodies in a pot- it was always something really smelly like smoked mackerel which she wafted under my nose because she knew I hated it! She found this highly amusing- every time. On a Friday we'd sneak out of school and go out for a pub lunch- first at the White Hart- when it was still a pub, then the Farmers, The Bell and lastly The Bull. We worked our way around them all. We rated them according the the quality of the puddings. It was such a good way to end the week.

But the most abiding memory is going back to the time of Pat Frawley who was deputy head at the time. He organised a trip to the Forest of Dean for the older pupils. The site where we stayed consisted of a log cabin where the girls slept; the female staff had to climb a ladder into a kind of attic where we slept (haha) on camp beds. The boys were in a series of tents.The weather was appalling- it was my idea of hell. During the day we walked further than I'd ever walked in my life in the pouring rain and mud, then Andrene and I and the other helpers had to cook supper for everyone in the cabin. Andrene told me to stir the spaghetti and it was the only time in my life I went to sleep standing up! Andrene was a trooper of course- nothing fazed her, she took everything in her stride. During one night there was an almighty thunderstorm with torrential rain. We had no sleep,  the boys' tents were awash and they were soaked to the skin. They all trooped into the log cabin in the middle of the night and we tried to dry everything around the fire. Obviously this situation could not continue- Mr Frawley had to reorganise accommodation. Andrene and I were delighted when he asked if we'd mind sleeping at a local B&B down the road, with Denise Summers, Sheila Farmer and Mac the coach driver. There weren't many rooms available so we had to share. In fact, Andrene and I even had to share a small double bed. We weren't bad bedfellows to tell the truth- it wasn't ideal but at least she didn't snore and we had such a good giggle together at the end of each day. We even enjoyed some of it! Such a memorable trip- thanks for all the good times Andrene, RIP. Love, Rosie x