Joyce's Colum: January

Firstly, a belated Happy New Year to you all, and I can hardly believe that virtually one month has passed into 2026, very scary really how time flies anyway hope you all enjoyed a good festive season.

A well-known and popular lady in our industry celebrated a new decade birthday just before Christmas and the lady in question is none other than our Karen, Karen Cooke (Codd her married name.)  Karen celebrated her 60th birthday and had plenty of surprises courtesy of her husband Billy. Firstly he whisked her off to New York for a few days, where I believe they had a ball, secondly he treated her to a nice hotel in the UK with an overnight stay and a celebration dinner, thirdly he took her to the races and had a private box with all the trimmings and bubbly of course, fourthly he had a race named after Karen and then she had to present the cup to the winning jockey of her race. Gosh Karen, that was some great birthday, and what a lovely, thoughtful and kind husband you have to give you so many special treats and a birthday you will surely remember. I am sure all of us that know you would like to wish you a belated Happy Birthday.

Now for some not so good news about Karen, at the first day of the recent EAG she ended up at the hospital, apparently, she suffers from gallstones and they decided to play her up. I can sympathise with you Karen as I had my gall bladder removed a few years ago and prior to that the pain was excruciating. The next stage now for Karen is an operation which is booked for early February, so here’s hoping she will soon be up and about again and feeling much better. I know she and Billy were hoping to attend the Irish show in March, so just take care Karen, and I am sure Billy will be there for your every whim and will cosset you to recovery.

It is nice that even though people leave the industry and move on in life that they still keep contact and meet up with previous friends and colleagues, and the photo here shows Evelyn Wilkinson at lunch with some of her ex-colleagues from her days spent at Deith Leisure.

A tribute and a glass were raised to the late industry personality Ron Vinson by some of his friends, his wife Jill and daughter Rebecca at the BACTA event on the first evening of the exhibition, the evening then continued on in The Fox. Ron was one true gentlemen of our industry and is sad loss to all of us that knew him 

There is also a photo here of Jill Vinson with Grahme Wood (yes Grahme is spelled correctly) who is a programmer and he has the nickname of Splinter, don’t ask me why, but by the looks of it Jill and he enjoyed a good catch-up.     

Return to the previous page

29 January 2026

See all news...