Tribute to Mr W from Katy

Hi to anyone that still might be following this blog.

I have decided to begin posting on here as wifey and see if it will help me in the way it helped Rich.

I am going to post on some of the tributes that were read out at Richie's funeral. For those who did not know Richard that long or very well then these will hopefully help paint a bigger picture of the great man.

Letter from Katy, my best friend:-

Richie Racoon

I first met Richie through the drama guild he was playing one of the ugly sisters to my prince charming, it was his, sams and mine first dabblings with the guild, but the start of things to come.

It was during Allo Allo the next play where I got to know both him and Sam better, Sam was playing Helga, I Mimi and Richard a German soldier, Sam and Rich had just started seeing each other, and Sam and I had just started getting to know each other. I feel honoured and privileged that I was there to see their romance blossom, the highs, the laughter, the silliness!! I also think it’s a testament to Richard’s generosity that he accepted that where Sam was to go, I was to follow, (as one of my ex boyfriends commented he felt as though he was sometimes going out with me and Sam!) but I always felt welcome and enormously enjoyed his company.

It is fair to say that most of my memories involve fun and laughter.

I’ve enjoyed countless weekends away with Sam and Richard…..

Barcelona, for Sam’s birthday, where the three of us discovered a hilarious drinking game called fish face which saw the three of us slightly tipsy and thinking that wearing sombreros in the city was the height of coolness!!

A camping expedition with Kat, Henry, Little Rich, Sam and Rich to The New Forest, where Sam and Richard (the world’s tallest couple) camped in what was the worlds smallest tent – surely a sight to behold, which saw Sam sleep in the car and Richard head to the camping shop first thing in the morning after an awful nights sleep to purchase a 5 star deluxe man sized tent and double mattress!!

A weekend in Munich to visit our great friend Santhosh, involving champagne at the airport to see us on our way, much pretzel eating, drinking from stein’s, attempts to learn to count and say the days of the week in German and a pedalo trip on the lake where Santhosh and Richard got a bit carried away and kept steering us at speed into trees to much comedy effect, until that is we got told off and had to clean the boat!! (well the boys anyway, it was their mess!)

Other memories of Rich that bring a smile to my face include Rich appearing in Neville’s Island, singing Oklahoma manicly in blood stained y-fronts!! (All in character obviously!)
Many a BBQ at the Wildman’s with Rich surely being the best BBQer the world has ever seen.
His calm composure on his wedding day as Harry stole the show, by using a bouquet to hit Rich around the head with, while claiming “hat, daddy, hat” as Sammie and Rich tried to say their vows!!

I was always in awe of how big his brain must have been , he knew everything and was interested in everything! His interest in NLP, his love of acting, writing, filming and directing all of which he was hugely passionate about and talented at and he was not afraid to try new things and strike out on his own. I loved conversations with Rich, which could be on any subject, the wild, wonderful and wacky, but they were always highly enlightening and entertaining.

Seeing him become a father to Harry was wonderful, already a dad to Becs who he loved very much, when Harry came along I can testify that you could visually see the change in him from a man to a father and Harry was the light in his eyes. He was so proud of his boy and loved him very much.

Richard’s strength of character, warmth, generosity of spirit and zest for life shone through even during his illness this past year. Whenever I asked what I could do, he would always insist all I needed to do was to look after Sam, he never asked for anything for himself, he didn’t stop cracking jokes and believing in the positive. In testament to this, his love of theme parks and big scary rides meant that on his birthday in October this year, he was insistent we all went to Fright Night at Thorpe Park and man it was COLD. Similarly, he was determined to come out and have fun on Sam’s birthday in November – he was the one who wanted to go dancing!! Although we settled for dinner and drinks with friends in the end. Even in the face of bad news, rather than sitting and moping, he wanted to get out and face the world to eat Mexican and drink Tequila with Sammie and his friends.


I am proud to class Richard as one of my friends, I feel privileged to have known him and know that the world and those people he has touched in the world are the better off for knowing him.