THE PEMBROKE COLLEGE WINNIE-THE-POOH SOCIETY

MINUTES OF THE ELEVENSES MEETING 22/2/97

Held in T4, Pembroke.
Present: Jon, Andrew, Anthony, Sibylle, Alasdair.
Apologies: Ben (at home in the Holy City of Ken-ton), Vicky (possibly - she wasn’t sure) and Rob (who turned up anyway).


  1. We open the Meeting. Jon apologises for a total secretarial failure, having failed to either write the minutes or the letter to Sainsbury’s about crumpets.

  2. Sibylle places everyone at exactly the right distance from the table.

  3. Vote to cut the cake: F., 4, Ag., 0, Abs., 0; motion carried unanimously.

  4. Jon attempts to reconstruct the minutes from his notes, but has trouble reading his own writing and reads “cake” as “lake”. Sibylle tells us, quite unprompted, that her orgy took place by a lake. Since she last week denied that anything had happened, this is interesting. We get her to admit that although in one sense something happened, in another sense nothing did. Jon sympathises. It’s all rather a pity really, because Jon had avoided any mention of the orgy in last week’s minutes out of a sense of mercy. Oh well. Rob alleges that she is making it all up for attention, but she denies it.

  5. Anthony was covered in mud before he arrived, apparently. Sibylle gives him half a cup of double-strength tea. Anthony claims it is not in fact tea, but gravy.

  6. Sibylle wonders if the water is cooked yet. She says: “I think the time’s approaching...”

  7. There is a debate about the confusion it must cause God that the Russian for God is the word “bog”.

  8. Anthony makes random remarks about Madame Curie.

  9. Anthony is going red again. He claims it’s the tea, as usual, but coming on quicker due to the strength.

  10. There is a debate about whether you can burn carbon monoxide. Jon says you can’t, Alasdair and Andrew say you can. They are right, unfortunately for Jon.

  11. The reading is “In Which Christopher Robin Leads an Expotition to the North Pole”, read by Jon. Jon extemporises two songs in the course of the reading, and Anthony compliments him on his Roo voice, but claims he was only joking.

  12. Sibylle looks up “poignant” in the dictionary, and finds that it can also mean pungently-smelling. Anthony therefore proposes a vote that Jon is pungent: F., 3, Ag., 1, Abs., 0; motion carried.

  13. “They always had fingers then.” I can’t remember who quoted that, but it’s definitely quotable.

  14. Rob arrives, having left his parents in his room. He immediately asks if Jon has been censured, and discovering that he has not been, proposes a vote of censure: F., 3, Ag., 1, Abs., 2; motion carried.

  15. Rob requests that the following be dictated into the minutes: “On asking Jon about his one-afternoon stand with Vicky at the Gonville Hotel, Jon commented that none of those details were correct.” Although it was a once-only thing.

  16. Next week’s meeting will be in O4a, chez Anthony. He reports that overland Poohsticks is ready to run. The rules are re-read in preparation.

  17. We discuss Martin the Stalker and Stefan the Horrid, who is apparently half-German, half-Welsh, lived in Spain and went to Rugby. Poor mixed-up kid.

  18. Sibylle and Rob are talking linguistics; the words “imploding fricatives” and “things which go round the side” float across the conversation. Is this really linguistics, I ask myself?

  19. We vote to close the meeting: F., 6, Ag., 0, Abs., 0; meeting closed.

  20. We vote to re-open the meeting: F., 3, Ag., 2, Abs., 1; meeting re-opened, specifically in order to record that Jon said “Gemma is very good.” This is simply smut, and I don’t know what the Society’s coming to.

  21. Sibylle wants to invite Yehudi Menuhin to the Garden Party. Rob suggests that we dress as our characters; we wonder how to get Jon Skeet into Sibylle’s pouch. Jon has just got as far as a plan involving a Gro-bag and a lot of gaffer-tape when he is forced to record Sibylle saying to Rob: “well, you can tie yourself up if you want to, but I’m not going to.” We find that the dictionary defines “pouch” as “an abdominal receptacle”, which we find amusing.

  22. Anthony reports that he went to prison a few weeks ago, and tells us stories of the hanging chamber.

  23. Jon has a hole in his socks. The meeting is obviously sinking into triviality, so we close once more, F., 3, Ag., 2, Abs., 1. Meeting closed.


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