Malcolm 0-6-0

A fine heritage if I may say

That's it, and that pic shows it's not as narrow as it looks in the first pic. Looks splendid, excellent job as usual - carry on.

Appear to have caught her road testing an early Zimmer frame .......

There is a small triangular patch of ground between the brick wall of the building next to the pub and the railing on the edge of the platform - would that exist in real life or would either the owner of the building colonised it or the railway? BTW nice job with pub.

Further proof that evolution can be reversed - that's Trump in 10 years.

He collected canaries?

Just to add to the previous mention of Golden Orb Spiders, this is one -

Reminds me of one day when I was doing archaeological surveys out the back of beyond. It was late in the year and the local grasshoppers were all hatching. These are really big, not your average garden variety. My driver/field hand was fresh out jail and covered in prison tats. Actually not a bad bloke, just trying to go straight. Anyway we're belting down this very rough track when all of a sudden he takes both hands of the wheel and starts slapping himself and screaming "get it off me get it off me!!!". The 'it' was one of these huge grasshoppers which had flown in the window. I had three choices, grab the wheel, fall about laughing or try and locate the grass hopper. So I grabbed the wheel while this great tough looking ex con frantically finds the offending bug. Turns out he was afraid of grass hoppers. The other big spider I like are the Golden Orb spiders. Another harmless breed but with their colouring and size quite dangerous looking. They used to create these vast webs in the scrub and sit right in the middle waiting for dinner. The web itself is very strong and when you walk into one it's a hell of an effort to get it off, let alone worry about where the owner has scuttled off to.

Speaking of Australian spiders meet Mavis, she's a Huntsman or in this case a Huntswoman spider. Great things to have around the house a they keep a lot of pests away. Quite timid creatures like most spiders actually, but when they do come in they just wander around and clean up the corners.

I was joking - there's no need to be a pedant. Good grief.

I heard that when nationalisation came that train had to be repainted en route ...

Which brings to mind the famous quote “What have the Romans ever done for us?”. Umm kept the Scots out?

You failed to mention everyone's favourite sea side holiday destination Intercourse Island in Western Australia ....

To be honest, in some cases, I really hope not

Oh I wouldn't dream of that .... But some people can be a tad over "enthusiastic" ..... In any case, in coming up to 3/4 of a century on the planet I have, I think, managed to upset either intentionally or quite unintentionally many "well meaning" people, Thankfully I've got inured to this failing of mine. Which is a good thing because otherwise I'd feel terrible. Our host is a big boy, I'm positive he'll cope.

That's another rather nice bit of modelling - always a pleasure to see.

"a bit" hmmm...

Aaah yes I recall that - c. 1400, it's the only recorded contemporary image of the fabled takeover of the GWR by Tamerlane. He was seeking a better dividend on his shares it it said....

Same in Victoria up to the early 70s IIRC. It also helped to increase the incidents of drunk driving on Sundays. Clearly the wowsers had not anticipated the horseless carriage...

Not the Watergate Hotel (nudge nudge) Did ye meet a fella boi the name of Nixon?

Here in Australia we've had a similar scandal but one that is the reverse of the British case. A couple of years ago Australia Post (a statutory body) appointed a new CEO, a woman with considerable business skills Christine Holgate. She replaced a CEO who earned several millions in performance bonuses by cutting services and thus "saving" money. The new CEO was searching to expand PO business (operated by franchisees) and hit on the lamentable fact that our banks are closing branches all over the place. This is a damned nuisance for a lot of people because Australia is a very big place, and country towns were losing local banks which resulted in people having to travel long distances to access banks for business or withdrawals etc. So Ms Holgate decided that as most Post Offices had rudimentary banking facilities due to a tie in with the Commonwealth Bank (another former government owned body) this portion of their business could be expanded so that Post Offices in now bank less towns could become local substitutes. It was, and is, a great idea and the franchisees supported it as did the general public. However this expanded role required a specialist Post Office team to negotiate with the banks and set in place the expanded facilities. They did their job exceptionally well and as a result earned the right to performance bonuses (there were four members of this team) not exceeding $105,000 each. Seems high but the amount of business the new process brought in plus the convenience for locals who had been deprived of access to banks was inestimable. All round an excellent job. However instead of paying out the bonus in cash to the the team the CEO actually asked them what they would prefer in the way of recognition. Surprisingly the team came back with a reply along the lines of "they were just doing their job" . So Ms Holgate decided that they deserved something and each of the four were presented with Cartier watches at a small fraction of the cost that would have been incurred if it had been a cash payment. So far so good, then the press got hold of it and the value of these Cartier watches began to inflate with each retelling of the tale. Our idiotic Prime Minister (Scotty from Marketing) then got up in the Parliament and demanded her resignation in terms which implied that she, and the negotiating team, were basically a bunch of crooks, blah blah blah etc. He publicly demanded her resignation. Finally this year there was a Senate enquiry into the matter and she came out of it the absolute and well deserved winner as she should have been. She quietly pointed out the facts of the matter, and the way in which the Board of the Post Office had succumbed to this politically induced fit of public hysteria. So far our idiotic PM has refused to apologise for his very public political crucifixion of her, nor has she been reinstated. Yet she has done the country a great service in maintaining banking facilities in many towns where banks had been summarily closed without any consideration for local needs, and at an overall cost far less than she had been authorised to spend. Our conservative government has for years been bleeding our publicly owned business like the Post Office and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation of funds so that they can find excuses to privatize them. The Australia Post saga is just part of that agenda.

Nice work, and it comes at just the right moment because I was about to ask - "'ere Kevin, where's bluudy thatch eh? eh?, I dunno all talk and no thatction!!!" But happily I was forestalled

It really has gone beyond the term "renovator's delight" hasn't it.....

And the Lord said unto Fireman Ernie "Stop skiving and get that bloody fire going!!!"

Depends upon where those trains are bound for ...