Early Risers.

[Coombe Barton]

Fist and mog, dull and grey.

That's the weather and me done.

[greatcoleswoodhalt]

On 22/11/2020 at 11:22, jafcreasey said:

10°C

NW 5kt, gusting 12kt

 

Another grey morning, though hopefully dry.  An early start was had for a COVID-19 test ahead of work-related travel tomorrow - not a pleasant experience!  A quick walk is planned for this afternoon before essential shopping, no doubt.

 

As expected, the week was long and slow, outdoor plans mostly curtailed due to persistent rain...  I did however manage to tidy-up the garden, squeezing-in a final mow of the lawn for this year!

 

Our visit to Wakehurst, Ardingly on Wednesday was better than expected with the grounds significantly large enough that the one-way system didn't feel too restrictive.  On Friday we abandoned Petworth House and Park when the heavens opened, managing only a quick drive-by of the former Singleton station to check on the extensive renovation.

 

 

Turning back to the present, all this talk of sausages means I know what to add to the shopping list...

 

Stay safe.

 

7°C

NE 8kt, gusting 14kt

 

The sunny spells forecast haven't materialised and so another walk of Wakehurst, Ardingly will be under grey, overcast skies.  A further COVID-19 test beckons this evening and so plans to settle-down and watch the football are scuppered.

 

The week started in Rennes, however the French lockdown prevented any hopes of exploring the city.  Understandably the hotel restaurant was closed therefore found myself confined to in-room dining for the duration.  My only takeaway from Rennes was seeing the trees below my hotel window each individually wrapped in netting to prevent leaves falling to the ground!

 

Highlight of the week was on Friday when Q Class No C1 arrived courtesy of UPS from Locomotion - an early Christmas present after weeks of dithering.  One of those rare occasions of luck as looking back on the Locomotion website yesterday it's now sold-out.

 

 

Talk of sausages last week and tomato ketchup this, a pattern seems to be emerging!

 

Stay safe.

[iL Dottore]

Good morning,

 

A very grey and dismal morning in this part of Switzerland, turning my ennui into a full blown procrastination on quite a few things. It’s turning out to be one of those days where nothing short of a gallon of coffee, a handful of amphetamines and a fistful of “uppers“ could stimulate me to be anything as energetic as apathetic.

 

Regarding English; i’ve heard it said that English is like chess: very easy to learn the basics, but it takes a lifetime of practice and ability to fully master the language. Certainly, in my opinion, there are many supposedly native English speakers who have still yet to master the English language themselves. Indeed, it has been said that anyone who can speak flawless, grammatically perfect, perfectly parsed and coherent accent-less English must be a foreigner.

 

Regarding Mr Bear’s Tomato Sauce on Toast, after studying the  photographic evidence I can only conclude that the same comments that Mr Pepys made about cucumber could also apply in this context... I’m all for life’s little guilty pleasures, but quite frankly tomato ketchup on toast is more like one of life‘s slightly embarrassing pleasantries. At least Mr Bear can point to his Lemon Drizzle Cake addiction as a reference to his ability to “push the boat out”.
 

Whilst on the subject of “cake“, I have done a (very unscientific) study of patisserie in the various countries of Europe and I have come to the conclusion that the most luxurious, calorific and sinful cakes come from those areas where for centuries Roman Catholicism was the dominant religion; whereas cakes from formerly Protestant areas tend to be somewhat dryer, less ostentatious and less self-indulgent. My theory is that the difference is down to whether or not your religion allowed for absolution of sins. If you knew that by going to confession one could gain absolution for eating a whole Schwarzwalder Kirschtorte with an entire bottle of schnapps, then you could quite happily go ahead and “sin“. In comparison, if you knew that your sin would forever be staining your soul, you would think twice about reaching for the chocolate cream eclair and perhaps settle for a less sinful slice of Madeira cake.

 

Well, it’s a theory.

 

All this talk of cake has made me somewhat hungry, so I’m off to prepare lunch which will be Turkey Mole with home-made cornbread, guacamole, salsa and sour cream.

 

Enjoy your Sunday!

Edited November 29, 2020 by iL Dottore
Typo

[The White Rabbit]

Perhaps Mr Pepys' diaries are where Mr Dahl got his inspiration for snozzcumbers?

 

Regarding placename pronunciation, anyone care to try "Majabigwaduce"? (A native-american name from Penobscot Bay in USA). 

[AndrewC]

I've often heard the phrase "he's a bit Dagenham East" to describe someone strange (4 stops beyond Barking)

 

For strange place name pronunciations I give you a small Canadian example: 

 

Okotoks

Wetaskiwin

Ponoka

Nunavut

Iqaluit

Legal 

 

oops almost missed this one: Tsuutʼina

Edited November 29, 2020 by AndrewC

[The Stationmaster]

6 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

While there is plenty of sugar in the ketchup, the bread is the bigger diabetic offender. You'd have to use a *lot* of ketchup to match the carbs in the bread.

In US bread definitely but not so much in British bread.  Tesco give figures for all their breads and the sugar content (except for things like fruit loaf) varies between 2.5 and 3.0% by weight of ingredients which gives around 1g of sugar per slice.  In Heinz tomato ketchup the sugar content equals more than 20% of a 15g serving and none of the figures for various UK brands quoted by a consumer testing organisation had less than 10% sugar content.

 

 

[tigerburnie]

Morning...........................on place names back to my native Leicestershire(that's Lester or "chisit land") there are two places one is Ashby de la Zouch(pronounced Zoooooooch) and the there's Zouch(pronounced Zotch) and not that far apart either.

[BoD]

Morning all

 

Thank you for the good wishes. 

 

It's a strange thing the human mind. Up until Friday we could go out but didn't.  We are still not going out, nothing has changed, but because now we can't go out it seems a whole lot worse. Forgive my ramblings  - you have only another 11 days to suffer them. 

 

I suppose I  could do some muddling.

[Tony_S]

30 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

US bread definitely but not so much in British bread

I thought the diabetic offender in bread was probably a reference to the carbs in the flour rather than the sugar. However, I do agree though that US bread tastes sweet compared to bread in the UK. When we make bread in a bread maker there is 1 teaspoon of sugar to 500 g of flour. Just enough to feed the yeast. 

Edited November 29, 2020 by Tony_S

[Tony_S]

6 minutes ago, BoD said:

Forgive my ramblings  - you have only another 11 days to suffer them. 

Please ramble as much as you want! I missed your first post about Valerie’s test and had to search back having seen others comments.  
Tony

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. The sore foot kept me awake again last night so after a couple of mugs of tea I'm off for eyelid inspection.

[monkeysarefun]

It was nice to see that the new theft deterrent for my shed arrived today..

 

 

 

[The Stationmaster]

Morning all,

 

What a grey day.  The sky is  a 100% uniform shade of pale grey overcast and there's neither promise, nor indication above us, of any rain likely to arrive in our vicinity today with teh wind speed down to very little.  Ah well, mustn't complain because at least it isn't foggy either.

 

Right no daily orders have yet been distributed except for a managerial requirement for me to produce the relevant piece of embossed plastic in order to pay my credit card bill which she does online - hopefully she won't look too closely at the details of who have recently relieved me of money as I might have to show her a pretty little item in a fetching shade of 'improved green' which will no doubt set a Precedent for something else in the future.

 

There is far more amusement in the wider world where the front page of yesterday's 'Daily Telegraph' proclaimed that a 'Christmas transport tsar' in the person of Sir Peter Hendy will 'force' train operators 'to lay on extra carriages' to meet the Christmas travel demand which is expected to be high due to the short period of the Christmas un-lock down.   Now this might be a typical media misrepresentation of the facts and they have not said quite how and where all these 'extra carriages' will be magically built in a mere 4 weeks or from where staff will be conjured up to work them and so on.  Sorry sunshine (various) but in terms of planning in 4 weeks for something extra to happen train service wise around what amounts to a major holiday you are a good 6 months behind the curve.  Don't forget that not so long back 'somebody' was moaning about Christmas train service details not being published when they should have been - which is officially 16 weeks in advance although generally the UK accepts a reduction to 12 weeks for reservation systems etc.  

 

It would appear that as all too often certain people in certain places are massively detached from not only reality but the consequences of various actions by politicos of all hues over the past 30 years.   I don't doubt transport operators and their staff will do their best but appointing a tsar will have no impact at all apart from wasting time which has to be spent planning the job in an extremely compressed timescale.   And if any trains have been stored or have gone off lease it will be even more difficult.  Rant over.

 

Now to do what needs to be done or what I'm informed needs to be done.  Have a good day one and all and stay safe.

 

 

[The White Rabbit]

48 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

Please ramble as much as you want! ...

 

Tony

 

Isn't that what Early Risers is for? 

[Adam88]

13 hours ago, BokStein said:

Before I bid you Good Night,

 

 

With maternal relatives rife north of the railway, Coss'm it is!

 

 

Do you mean Lemster?

 

Not when written.

Edited November 29, 2020 by Adam88

[jamie92208]

4 hours ago, jonny777 said:

 

Aeast Ham  has been a rather derogatory term for me, ever since hearing a comment by the late great Bob Willis on TV. When asked why he referred to someone  a bit weird as being "East Ham", he replied "Because it is one stop short of Barking". 

 

RIP Bob. 

At least it's better than being referred to as Dagenham, which is one stop past.

 

Jamie

 

PS Just seen that Andrew C beat me to it.

 

Edited November 29, 2020 by jamie92208

[BoD]

2 hours ago, Tony_S said:

Please ramble as much as you want! 

Yesterday I woke with no sense of taste or smell.  I booked a test for later yesterday afternoon and a couple of hours ago the result came back positive.   
 

Que sera, sera.

 

[Two_sugars]

I am available for delivery of . . . .Wine, Whiskey, and modelling supplies . . . . . 

 

only 6 miles down t' A19 and very competitive rates . . . . . 

 

John

[Andrew P]

19 minutes ago, BoD said:

Yesterday I woke with no sense of taste or smell.  I booked a test for later yesterday afternoon and a couple of hours ago the result came back positive.   
 

Que sera, sera.

 

Oh Wow, Really sorry to hear that, I hope you recover quickly and without extra treatment.

[simontaylor484]

Best wishes for a Speedy recovery BoD

[TheQ]

Afternoon Awl,

 

Dull grey flat calm, very quiet, the mist and low cloud deadening any noise.

 

Workshop tidied up a bit, bench saw retrieved and placed on main bench and.... nothing..

Checked the resettable fuse.. ok

Checked the switch..ok

Checked the plug and fuse. Ok....

So still no power....

What could it be?

Then I thought try plugging it in the wall not the extension cable ,.... power!!!!

Yep an old extension cable that doesn't like modern plugs with half insulated pins..

 

Saw table measured for fitting into bench, just 1.5 inches short of being too big and 11 inches tall. So the trolley for it will be 29inches tall. The first 4 pieces of timber rescued from the pile, they were ex boat support, and needed big screws ground off..

 

Three Door handles made , nothing fancy, just two spacers of two by one, topped by a bar of two by one.

Hefty screws used, I used an angle grinder to cut off excess on the other side.

Also used the grinder on the excess rod sticking out of the bottom of the keel, it sits on its bottom even better..

 

We have a lost tesco.com van coming past for the third time,  manoeuvring again at the junction.

 

Keel laid on its side and fibreglassed, conveniently one width of the glass fibre covers one side and both ends with just a little over.

Next week smooth that off, trim off excess,  turn it over, do the other side.

A glass of red has been drunk, another will accompany me to a long bath.

 

 

 

[BokStein]

Have survived the train journey to and from the local metropolis and now have provisions for tomorrow.

 

Must now go and prepare the car for tomorrow's journey; headlights, windows, external mirrors and rear number plate are a tad grubby! Apparently, it's useful to see where you're going and illegal not to be identifiable!!

 

Would love to fit a Fresnel Lens over the number plates though!

 

Interesting: poor car doesn't know what's hit it!

2017 to 2018 MoT, just shy of 900 miles

2018 to 2019 MoT, just shy of 700 miles

2019 to 2020 MoT, more than 2,500 miles (mostly since March)!

[BokStein]

From another thread:

 

4 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Halfpenny

 

Hapeney!

[45156]

Afternoon All

 

Hope you're OK BoD - can't say more than that - just go with the flow.

 

Sorry for prolonged absence, mainly due to no mojo for almost anything, and that includes most if not all social media sites, including here and FB  but I was delighted to see that her Debship posted there a few days ago.

 

And of course, generic greetings are proferred, along with a hope that all is as well as can be expected, as I really have been skipping so many pages.

 

New boiler a bit more difficult to control than I'd like, due to the programmer supplied, which is a bit more complex than the wheel on the old boiler and the on off switch, but I'm sure I'll get there - one advantage is that the new one is portable, so I can switch everything on and off from wherever I am - provided I remember to take the controls with me.

 

Other than that,

 

Regards to All

Stewart

Edited November 29, 2020 by 45156

[Barry O]

BoD.. I hope it goes well for you and Mrs BoD.. we thought it was just awful wine in Margaret River as it tasted ..tasteless.. no one mentioned losing you sense of smell and taste in February..

 

Baz