Other organisations?

Barrow would you like me to come with you to NWR? Once they have seen the pictures of my GC and heard how brilliant they are they won't bring their pics out again!!!!!!

I'll join something when I get time! too busy to even go to the gym at the moment.

I joined the local WI when we moved to a new area several years ago so that I got to know other women in the village. It worked from that point of view and I made several friends but I gave up going to the meetings when they seemed to become very stale and the one that finally finished it for me was "Tea towels from around the world"

yogagran

I don't think it is a good idea for any group to meet in a private home, and that nasty U3A must be the exception to all the good ones. Our U3A in Ipswich Queensland Australia is lovely and inclusive, with loads of courses - French, German, Indonesian, Biology, history, writers' group, English literature, performance group, mah jong, various card games, scrabble, line dancing, contract law, and many others things. I'm in writers' and the performance group. We meet at either the Library or the Humanities Centre and our local council lets us have rooms for free, so we get by on membership of A$30 a year (UKP20-ish)

The secret of happiness is to associate with people you get on with and share some common ground: for this reason I'm happy with U3A. We are open to anyone over 18, though of course most members are retired as classes are during the daytime. I find my mind gets stretched, and I learn a lot from the others.

Good luck finding something, Sel. We've had a few false starts in the past: a caravan club proved to be racist, so we never joined, and our local Labour party branch started to get a bit cliquey, so we simply stopped going. Instead I go to an occasional lunch get-together for retired party members who'd rather meet during the day.

There's always a solution - somewhere.

Thanks Joan - I think YankeeGran probably hit the nail on the head, it's not the organisation but the local members. That's sort of confirmed by the contrast between*Yogagran*'s teatowels and Gagagran's experience of the WI. Yours too, as when I looked at the U3A here, their programme seemed terribly dry and nothing appealed to me - what yours offers is much broader. It's a shame Queensland would be a bit of a hike

Thanks again for all the suggestions everyone.

I live in a market town in a rural county. We have 2 active U3A groups which are very welcoming and friendly. One of the reasons we meet in people's homes is that it is much cheaper! You need a large group to hire a hall. I have belonged to bridge, scrabble, Mah Jong, singing for fun (that was a real laugh), quiz group, chat groups, croquet in the summer to name a few. To those who are dubious please give it a go, you may be pleasantly surprised

I found great friendship in the NWR in the eighties. I decided, now I am semi retired, I would like to join a group as a volunteer and have just completed my training to be a Home Start volunteer, hoping to be matched with a family after Christmas. The other volunteers training with me were all different ages and had different skills to offer and were a lovely bunch. We have decided to keep in touch and meet up for coffee once a month and share our experiences. Not only do you meet other lovely people but volunteering makes you feel valued too and that is great as you get older!

We are very lucky in Ipswich (Queensland Australia) in that our council gives us free rooms in the Humanities Centre, ( www.ipswich.qld.gov.au/community/humanities_centre/) for our U3A group.(http://www.ipswich.qld.gov.au/community/directories/cultural/index.php?action=view&id=54

We also meet in the Library, just a few seconds walk away, which also gives us free use of study rooms.