| The History of the 'Dear Ladies' Bench in Taunton Deane Crematorium from 2006 - Present Day |
  | The Bench in October 2006 after being installed. It cost £1,400 and money was raised from donations from fans and a percentage of sales of CD & DVDs that were available at the time. |
 | May 2007 and the groundsmen have varnished the bench to protect it from the weather, it looks quite nice. |
 | 16th May 2008 (Late due to being on Holiday on May 11th) Beginning to weather a bit, but still looking good. |
 | 11th May 2009 Starting to lose its colour and not been varnished since 2007. |
 | 11th May 2010 Still not treated and going a bit green. |
 | 11th May 2011 Still not re-treated and greener than 2010. |
 | 11th May 2012 Still getting greener. |
 | 11th May 2013 Tarmac getting mossy, birds doing their business over the bench. |
 | 11th May 2014 OMG they painted it brown, but at least they did something to liven it up a bit. Shame they never clean all the moss off the floor. |
 | 11th May 2015 Looking OK after a wash down clearing the moss from the back supports and bird mess. |
 | 11th May 2016 Moss growing back again under bench and i forgot to take my scraper and brush. Doctor Hinge must have visited as there were cigarette ends on the floor too. I can imagine Hilda shouting "Birmingham......erm, Bournemouth..., Ermmmmm....Basingstoke". |
 | 11th May 2017 OMG It's getting darker brown and the moss on the floor is never cleared away. |
 | 11th May 2018 Last years repaint is flaking off and the moss and mess needed clearing up. |
 | 11th May 2019 Untouched again and flaking and filthy and tarmac was green with moss. |
 | 4th July 2020 LATE DUE TO COVID LOCKDOWNS The Moss was scraped away and the bench was washed and cleaned with antibacterial spray. It is showing signs of wear on the paint. |
 | 11th May 2021 Faded even more. |
 | 11th May 2022 It has been lightly painted but wasn't sanded down to remove old flaked bits. |
 | 11th May 2023 The moss under the bench took some scraping away before the bench was wiped down. Lots of moss on the back of the bench too which took some cleaning to get it off. The paint has washed and worn off since last year. |
 | 11th May 2024 OMG what a sorry state it looked, but at least they had cleared the tarmac and rubbish which i asked them to do for me before we arrived. |
 | 11th May 2024 As you can see the damage on Left hand rear leg and split in the arm. This day i also dropped in the order form for George's plaque and Patrick's Plaque refresh as it was faded, and then a few days later they called to take payment for it.  They wanted £250 for a refurb of the bench and it didn't mean sanding it down to the original colour, it just meant slapping more poop coloured paint on it, so i asked if it was ok to look after it myself from now on, they agreed. Thank you for all the fans who donated towards the new plaque and the money to pay for all of the tools I had to buy ready for sanding it all down this May. |
 | A month or so later in 2024 George's plaque was fitted and they sent me this picture. The same company made Patrick's plaque in 2006 yet they stick George's one on a bigger piece of wood. I will be cutting it and sanding and shaping it to the same style as Patrick's this year. |
   | 8th - 11th May Myself & Neil drove down to Taunton in the early morning of the 8th May and headed straight to Taunton Deane Crematorium where we started work on the bench almost immediately.Sander, Paint Stripper and a lot of elbow grease got the bench back to its original colour. We left there at about 6:30pm and checked into our hotel. The next morning we were there as soon as the gates opened and got to work fine sanding the bench down before we started putting the Yacht Varnish on. It brought the bench up to a nice glossy brown colour and it looks so much better than it did each time the Crematorium ruined.....i mean...painted it. I popped down to the offices after we had fitted the bench back and asked them to let the groundsmen know not to touch the bench as i will look after every year from now on and the lady said she will let them know. She printed out and laminated a warning sign to say wet varnish and walked it up to us. On the 10th May Mo arrived and we all went to Cheddar Gorge for the day as the bench was all finished. On May 11th we got to the Bench and covered it with a brand new white sheet ready for the unveiling, Mo arrived first and soon after Diana arrived. We were chatting away about how many people used to come to the flower laying and events compared to now, and i saw out the corner of my eye someone walking across the road and i looked and saw it was Louie who had arrived to surprise us. He came over from France to see family and tied up coming to Taunton at the same time and his friend John saw friends in Taunton whilst he was there. I asked Louie if he would unveil the refurbished bench and he agreed and said some nice words before doing so. So all six of us had lots of pictures taken before moving to Patrick's grave where we all got on with giving it a good clean before laying the flowers which we got from Judith Goss Florists again. More pictures taken and we all did the Lord's Prayer before saying our goodbyes to Patrick. As we got in the car the heavens opened and it rained for about 50 minutes. We went to Rumwells for a carvery before we all said our goodbyes to everyone and made our way home. Thank you to all of those who donated towards the Bench Refurbishment costs and the flowers for this year, without you none of this could be done. |
