I don’t know where to start really. I can’t decide whether to write individual blogs of the latest news, or do a big mash-up instead. Hmm, I’ll try mash-up. So…

News 1: Very excitingly I had a letter from Stephen Fry, another little note from Michael Morpurgo, and an actual handwritten letter from Abigail Thaw, as in John Thaw/Inspector Morse’s daughter!  My mum makes me laugh. “Did they write to you out of the blue?” “Yes Mum, they somehow came across The Handwritten Letter Appreciation Society and thought ‘I must drop this (slightly) eccentric letter writer a line to say how much I admire their work’. No Mum, of course I wrote to them first!”. But I love her optimism, bless her. Still it is always very lovely to hear back from famous folk because, poor things, they must be so exceptionally busy. And not really (well a little) to name drop, but mostly to encourage, I promise.  Stephen said “Bravo for setting up The Handwritten Letter Appreciation Society” which was fab, Abigail wrote “P.S. Lovely website!” on the back of the envelope, and Michael wished he had more time to write a proper letter. (I’ll take him at his word on that.)

News 2: Equally exciting, we have proper members! THLAS is now actually 7 strong (that’s enough for a conference isn’t it?). Clever friend got me to finally finish off the membership page and people have only gone and joined. I wasn’t really expecting that weirdly, but I’m thrilled they have.  Certificates, badges, postcards, plus a little letter each have winged their way across two continents and Cornwall.  I feel truly honoured to have actual paid up members.  Thank you lovely folk. You know who you are.

News 3: I wasn’t sure whether to share our #LegoMorse antics on the THLAS pages but well, the letter from Abigail Thaw kind of clinched it for me.  Plus I’ve been watching Endeavour almost back to back since the boxset arrived a week or so ago and we really did have a giggle making Thursday and Morse standing by the Radcliffe Camera in Oxford.  It always amazes me how we manage to find all the right pieces, but then we do have 50 million boxes of the stuff. Anyway, it amused me. We even went out in Oxford at the weekend to see our favouritest folk band Kadia (was so hoping to see Morse out and about). They were playing at the Holywell Music Room, the oldest purpose built one in Europe.  Apparently Handel played there once upon a time which is cool isn’t it.  As I sat there in that magical place listening to that magical music I thought much like real handwritten letters, nothing beats real live music.  You can download it and stream it and listen to it online but seriously I don’t think it touches hearing it performed live in front of you. Like letters, a bit of effort’s required but the rewards are tenfold. The lovely cellist from the band, Leonardo MacKenzie, even said he’d started writing me a letter. Out of the blue, can you believe!

So. Here endeth the month of May’s Missive Mash-up.

Dinah