Canal Digger

The bit of the Countryside Code that I like and do my very best to adhere to is 'leave only footprints, take only memories (photographs allowed)'.

Seeing as you have given us permission Sir, how do you know? Well nobody else was going to ask ...

When I recently bought this 3-car set, I thought that they were Micromodels (or similar) but I can find no mention of these models anywhere and a couple of the lines [around the windows] are 'less than professional'. They appear to be hand/ ruler drawn and coloured, rather than printed and have a wooden (Balsa?) core, extending to include the bogies. Metal 'hook & eye' couplings. Cab windows have been cut out. Research so far, suggests that they are models of the 1905 London B Stock as used on the District Line, so strictly speaking Sub-surface rather than Underground, as I understand the subtle difference.

Why not turn this around? This layout for SWMBO3 might be interesting at some of the local French shows alongside your metre gauge layout, of course 'the owner' would have to go as well. But, in you making your case to go to these shows to SWMBO1, you explain that how Emily wants to show her layout, so you have to take it and while there is room in the car you can squeeze in your layout alongside.

Isn’t it (wasn’t it?) against the dentists code of ethics to remove perfectly healthy teeth? I don’t see that as being acceptable dental practice in many other countries. From what I have read (sorry can't supply ref) calling them Dentists would have a bit of an overstatement, more like barbers with a sideline in tooth extraction. As in Sweeny Todd but not to the extent of the pies!

Yes, I to remember when living in Bristol, being taken to the Victoria Rooms in the 60s, then later to a show in Swindon, by car. Tried to get daughters into model trains by taking them at 6 weeks old, to the show in the Watershed, where I helped Wessex Armchair Modellers operate their layout, that failed, their interest I mean. Son was interested for a while.

from msn.com, who picked up a My London news item [I've tried to copy & paste the link but no luck] I very much doubt that anyone one in London will see Aurora Australis tonight, Northern Lights if lucky! MyLondon Follow 40.2K Followers Aurora Australis to be visible in UK tonight - here's the best place to see it Story by Jake Holden • 4h • 2 min read From a few days ago, somehow stuck in my editor??

I would have said that a 'water heater thingy' was too heavy for Ramrod to lift just yet. However lifting a model loco out of it's box and placing on track, sounds like good therapy

Being taught to enjoy anything artistic (music or paintings) is never going to work, least of all to kids who would rather be outside. You have to want to hear/ see more, either it 'clicks' or it passes you by. As someone said 'Education is wasted on the young'. I now enjoy doing maths puzzles, as a kid hated the subject. I have a wide taste in music, however one slightly strange thing is Musical Theatre, have watched some of the 'classic' film musicals, which left me cold, watched (or got involved backstage locally) the same musical live, fantastic! Is it an emotional thing, where you are involved?

Andy, you will have to tell us what it is, video is 'not available'. Tony beat me to it!

It's getting to be hard work keeping up here!

from msn.com, who picked up a My London news item [I've tried to copy & paste the link but no luck] I very much doubt that anyone one in London will see Aurora Australis tonight, Northern Lights if lucky! MyLondon Follow 40.2K Followers Aurora Australis to be visible in UK tonight - here's the best place to see it Story by Jake Holden • 4h • 2 min read

My sixpennyworth ... A few years ago we did part of the Irish Wild Atlantic Way, in a campervan hired from Dublin. Made our way up to the NE corner and worked our way anti-clockwise until we ran out of time part way down the west coast. Then back to Dublin, back into our car, south to Rosslare via beautiful Wicklow Mts, caught ferry to Fishguard and M4 etc to home. The worst part, the depressing, mile after mile, village merging into village, Ribbon Development in County Donegal. Empty, modern bungalows, low maintenance gardens, tightly drawn curtains. Luckily in the van we could see beyond these 2nd homes but if you were in a car, hard luck. Local economy = lawn cutting

Sign outside a local Nursing Home ....

Was Sgt Smith put on a charge, he should have looked up the reg's on arrival? Sorry for being late on parade, have spent 1 1/2 days in hospital having a minor op common to a lot of men our age.

Reminds me of on my older cars, I regularly had to adjust the fan/ alternator (dynamo)/ water pump belt.

When I was taught SI units (& prefixes) in school and college, it was nice and simple as I tried to explain above, Upper Case for positive powers to the 10 and Lower Case for the negative, nice and easy, why do anything else? In an effort to prove my point I looked up a definitive source, here is a link. I tried to paste the table but no. Some genius has changed the 'K' to a 'k' for 10 to the power of 3 (as Ozexpatriate says, so I stand corrected facing the corner). Yes I did look at several authoritative websites in an attempt to prove my point. https://www.nist.gov/pml/owm/metric-si-prefixes#:~:text=In the SI%2C designations of,hundredth%2C and one-thousandth. However, such is the mess that have created, the table is inconsistent, surely it should be Terahertz and Gigawatt in the examples? Aggrrgh progress

And it is "kg" not "Kg" or "KG". The kelvin gram would be a very odd unit, and the "KG" is a Knight Companion of the order of the Garter. Sorry but it is Kg for Kilograms 'μ' = multiply by 10 to the power of -6 'm' = multiply by 10 to the power of -3 'c' = multiply by 10 to the power of -2 as in cm, centimetre 'K' = multiply by 10 to the power of 3 'M' = multiply by 10 to the power of 6 as in Mega..... 'G' = multiply by 10 to the power of 9 I could go on but point proven.

It must be Spring, I saw a Hedgehog last night, while out with the dog

A tale of woe ... Last week (Wednesday) the cooker (main oven) failed tripping the mains, soon reset. Decided that the element had probably fused, so given age , a new cooker required. SWMBO done the research and decided that we were going to a certain, national electrical goods supplier (hint: Indian food). Local shop limited display, so off to Bristol we go [where someone went into the back of our car = minor dent], found the one that fitted requirement best and paid the extra for delivery/ installation on Friday as Saturday we were going to Sandown Racecourse Swapmeet (a good day out). Friday morning and new Dual Fuel cooker delivered and installed, only to find that one of the burners wouldn't light, OK we say and fault got reported up the chain, cooker disconnected from gas main for safety. Today, Service Engineer from manufacturer arrived, to find that the installation guys had taken the gas hose away with to make sure that we didn't use any of the 3 working burners and no he didn't have a spare hose. Spent about 50 min on phone being passed around various desks (retailer, manufacturer, retailer), to get a new cooker sometime, currently awaiting a call ... . Another night out. I feel a compensation claim building ...

Diamonds are Forever - Shirley Bassey

There is also the 'carbon footprint' resulting from the transport of the coal/ coke from wherever to take into account. madness, utter, complete ...

A 2-seat smart car that we had a few years ago had a conventional looking, central between the seats, handbrake, however instead of pivoting/ rotating the driver lifted the lever so that it was still at the same angle but higher. For such a small difference it took some getting used to

Back to handbrakes if I may A few years ago I spent the day driving a Dumper Truck up and down the towpath of a local canal (Wilts& Berks Canal https://www.wbct.org.uk/), hence my name here. No problems, the handbrake being on the RH side, with a catch to release operated by the little finger. Went home in a Ford Ranger with an Umbrella Stick handbrake, again no problem. Went out that evening in an ordinary Ford Mondeo, had to put on the interior light at the traffic lights to find the handbrake release! Only been driving for 40 years (not non-stop before someone picks me up on that point). The strangest (to me) parking brake was on a Ford 350 based RV in the States, a left foot operated, pedal brake. Doing hill starts, trusting the Automatic Gearbox not to allow me role backwards took some getting used to.

I seem to remember a brief discussion in the first year of my degree by “Clever Trevor” (so named because he did music analysis with us) about some experiments done in the late 1960s/early ‘70s with non-music-reading children which showed that the human eye/brain could “chunk” graphic information presented on a five line stave but adding additional lines (as opposed to ledger lines) almost immediately reduced the efficiency. I don’t remember any real details, but do remember it came about due to a question from our year’s resident genius composer Matthew Hind (who had been writing music since the age of 6) along the same lines as yourself. He wrote music you could enjoy listening to, but could also do “experimental” stuff and his question arose I think from some ideas he had about notating the latter. He even wrote something using coloured music notes to represent dynamics (volume) to see if that worked better than traditional ways of notating (it didn’t, but was fun trying it out!) Matt should have won the Composition Prize in our final year, but his music was simply too melodic (he refused to write anything other than what he wanted to hear himself) and it was instead awarded to someone who wrote avant garde “stuff”* that had no melody, discernible aural structure or point (to most listeners) but her efforts “fitted” with the academic leanings of the composition department. (Myself and my best mate similarly wrote “tunes” instead of “plinky plonk bang crash” monstrosities, and were marked down for that!) Yes, there is a mathematical/physics basis to the “octave” which is a fascinating rabbit hole to dive into for a few hours, especially now that some very good YouTube videos explain it all in an entertaining and far less academically dusty manner! You are quite right about the old Joanna’s white keys being confusing starting on A but everything referencing middle C, but that is because “middle C” sits on the ledger line exactly half way between treble and bass clefs! Seen separately, middle C in the treble clef sits on the first ledger line below the stave. Middle C in the bass clef sits on the first ledger line above the stave. Place the treble stave above the bass stave (as for piano) and there is just one ledger line separating the two staves - write a note on that line and in treble clef it is the middle C and in bass clef it is also the middle C … hence the name “Middle C”. (In practice in order to show which hand is playing which notes, notes can be shown on more ledger lines above the bass or below the treble stave that could/should be easier to read written on the appropriate clef!) On a traditional piano, middle C was close to the centrally placed keyhole for locking the lid, so once the pattern of white/black keys was established, it was easy to direct anyone learning to the middle C key - “Look for the keyhole, now look for the closest pair of black keys, and middle C is the white key directly to the left of the lower of the two black keys” (plus, of course, being physically shown that whilst being explained and most people can find a middle C on a piano!) Of course, keyboards don’t have a keyhole … 🫢🤣 Steve S * Personally, I simply can’t call such assemblages of apparently random notes “music” even if it meets the philosophical criteria of “organised sounds” I know that this is English, I can recognise the individual words, but I have no idea, what you are talking about. Many years ago in a 'compulsory' Music lesson at school, I tried to learn how to learn t o play the Recorder, eventually I learnt that a 'symbol' meant the note 'C' and that meant that I had to position my fingers so, then the next symbol meant A, so fingers ...., by this time the rest of the class were on the next line!