Yes it was colder, & I got awful chilblains. I remember ice patterns on the inside of my bedroom window. The winter of 63 was particularly bad.
Do you remember Mr Slack? I struggled with some spelling tests when I first went to St Nicolas, but he helped me tremendously with little tips on how...
I was at St Nicks too. I went there aged 8, when my parents split up. I went into a B stream but within one term moved up to the A stream. I don't remember doing lots of old exams except for the maths questions, which was a good way of practising decimals and fractions, in any case.
The 11+...
It was always difficult to find a deposit although in the SE, it's almost impossible now. It's one of the reasons I went up north when I was first married as it was easier to buy houses up there.
This will sound like a naive question, but why don't governments cap rents? It's greedy landlords...
I know of a case where the house was bought back in the 80s & recently sold, but the 'profit' is being used to pay £600 a week for a small room in a care home.
If that money hadn't been made, the State would be paying that anyway.