Early Risers.

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone 

 

Well it didn’t stop raining until about 7:30 this evening, although it did ease off several times during the day. Thankfully the wind has also died down now too, so it looks like we could have a quiet night. But in the last few minutes it has just started to rain yet again, although thankfully it isn’t heavy rain. 

 

Luckily, when I walked to the butchers this morning, it was only a light drizzle, so I didn’t need to put on a coat, just a jacket sufficed. Likewise, whilst at the Trafford Centre this morning, it was only drizzling when I walked from and to the car. However, within a few minutes of getting back in the house this morning it chuckinitdarn, so I timed that nicely. As expected, Sheila was still out when I got back home, so once I’d put away all the items I’d just purchased, I had the place to myself for a couple of hours. During which I surfed the Internet or read the latest copy of BRM, which dropped on the front doormat on Wednesday morning. 

 

Apart from the 2 shopping trips this morning, I’ve done bu99er all day and it’s been rather nice. 

 

Looking back at the week and given the weather that we’ve had since then, I think we hit it lucky on Wednesday when we went to the RHS Bridgewater garden! 

[BSW01]

Goodnight all 

[The Stationmaster]

9 hours ago, tigerburnie said:

I think I last went on the London underground in 1973, Paris was a year or so earlier, no one offered me a seat funnily enough, I have been on the Glasgow one, that is quite a sight, it's a lot smaller than any other I've been on, but is not expensive to use.

You'd definitely notice the changes to the Metro if you were to visit Paris nowadays - the 1st Class compartments have long been abolished and because smoking is no longer allowed, and 'other rules' seem better enforced, that old Metro aroma of stale Gauloise smoke and equally stale pee is no longer present.  But definitely woe betide you if you sit in one of thoe seats reserved for mutilé de guerre.

 

I've never been on the Clockwork Orange in Glasgow but it would be interesting to see how its narrow island platforms (If they still exist?) compare with the rather unnerving ones that used to exist on a certain part of London's UndergrounD network - they always struck me as being highly dangerous (and if that isn't showing my age nothing does)

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

[chrisf]

Greetings one and all, with many thanks for the kind thoughts.

 

A strange e-mail [dis]graced my inbox yesterday.  It purported to come from “BT Voice Center” and told me that I had received an unread voice message.  How can you read a voice message unless it has been transcribed into print?  Where lies the difficulty in speaking into the telephone and leaving the message for me to find on the answerphone facility?  My suspicious nature developed full power.  I marked the e-mail as spam.  It will not be lonely there.

 

Meanwhile, the affair of the undelivered DVD progresses.  It did not arrive yesterday and I have accepted the offer of the vendor to send another.  Anything could happen now.  The replacement could meet a similar fate to the original, whatever that was, or both copies could arrive simultaneously and I would be duty bound to send one of them back.  What if it were to disappear?  This has all the makings of an unholy mess.

 

This afternoon I am to give my presentation to Virtual ExpoEM.  The first four pages were rehearsed on Thursday and if I remember the technicalities in the right order it will be fine.  Possibly.  Tonight sees a rare pleasure.  For many years I was spared the myriad delights of Eurovision, thanks to being in a pub in Bracknell and enjoying the revelry that goes with it.  It will make a change from the Saturday night standby of “Casualty”. 

 

Continuing warm thoughts to Dave, his Dad, Gordon S and all missing persons.  Best wishes to all.

 

Chris

[iL Dottore]

15 hours ago, pH said:

... I got on the train in Basle and got off in Boulogne...

It’s Basel, dear boy, BasEL!, not BasLE (or it’s Bâle if you are a Francophone). Why the anglophones insist on mangling foreign place names is beyond me, especially as - for Basel- both spellings are pronounced the same way.
It’s hardly the same as substituting Florence for Firenze or Bangkok for Krung Thep Maha Nakhon.  I suppose it’s a holdover from the days when anglophones spoke a foreign language by speaking English VERY LOUDLY AND V E R Y   S  L  O  W  L  Y...

13 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

... I discovered that they had sold me a pensioners ticket 2 yrs before my 65th, probably due to my hair colour. 

 

Jamie

Bald???

13 hours ago, polybear said:

 

.....The best underground I've been on was in Seoul, S. Korea - squeaky clean and amazingly cheap....

I think that’s the case with nearly all modern Southeast Asian metro systems. It seems that people have an inordinate pride in their metro systems and keep them clean and unvandalised.

6 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

..... the rather unnerving ones that used to exist on a certain part of London's UndergrounD network - they always struck me as being highly dangerous (and if that isn't showing my age nothing does)

I think most of the island platforms on the London Underground have been rebuilt into “standard“ underground platforms. Certainly Angel and Euston used to have island platforms, and Clapham Common and Clapham North stations still have them (but for how much longer?). Although I am an aficionado of all things London Underground and have quite a few books on the history of the various lines, I don’t recall the reason that island platforms were used for certain stations. It was either, if I recall correctly, for reasons of cost or – more likely – due to some insurmountable obstruction that prevented the construction of a full-sized station platform.

 

As for the London Underground showing up your age, Mike. I can remember travelling on the 1938 tube stock (which was ubiquitous at the time) and on the O stock and P stock of the District Line. I am also just old enough to have ridden the on the tube’s Standard Stock and the District line’s Q23 stock before both were withdrawn in the 60s.

1968 might have been the “summer of love“ for all those post pubescent individuals, but for me – at age 12 - the summer of 68 was one of great freedom and exploration. I used to buy a Twin Rover for 6/- and spend the day exploring London’s Underground and various museums (including the Imperial War Museum, the Natural History Museum and – before it was appallingly vandalised by the so-called “curators” – the Science Museum). One of the features of the “summer of love“ was how many recycled old military uniforms and made them trendy (a trend started by the Beatles?), I was also -unusually for me - “on trend“ at the time as I usually wore my uncle’s old Denison Para smock with loads of pockets (very useful for storing sandwiches, drinks, sweets, copies of the Beano and Dandy, etc., etc...)

Happy Days!

Edited May 22, 2021 by iL Dottore

[Joseph_Pestell]

6 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

You'd definitely notice the changes to the Metro if you were to visit Paris nowadays - the 1st Class compartments have long been abolished and because smoking is no longer allowed, and 'other rules' seem better enforced, that old Metro aroma of stale Gauloise smoke and equally stale pee is no longer present.  But definitely woe betide you if you sit in one of thoe seats reserved for mutilé de guerre.

 

I've never been on the Clockwork Orange in Glasgow but it would be interesting to see how its narrow island platforms (If they still exist?) compare with the rather unnerving ones that used to exist on a certain part of London's UndergrounD network - they always struck me as being highly dangerous (and if that isn't showing my age nothing does)

 

Those narrow island platforms on the Northern Line always scared me.

 

I think it was Angel that was particularly bad as there would be a sudden influx of passengers at the end of any performance at Sadlers Wells and not many trains to disperse the crowd.

[pH]

9 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

It’s Basel, dear boy, BasEL!, not BasLE (or it’s Bâle if you are a Francophone). Why the anglophones insist on mangling foreign place names is beyond me, especially as - for Basel- both spellings are pronounced the same way.
It’s hardly the same as substituting Florence for Firenze or Bangkok for Krung Thep Maha Nakhon.  I suppose it’s a holdover from the days when anglophones spoke a foreign language by speaking English VERY LOUDLY AND V E R Y   S  L  O  W  L  Y...

There is a simpler explanation - incomplete proofreading before posting. I did mean to check the spelling, because I wasn’t sure of it, but forgot and hit ‘submit’.

 

[pH]

A picture of a Glasgow subway station in a previous iteration - trains electrified, red colour scheme, solid doors:

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120521102800im_/http://citynoise.org/upload/29456.jpg

[leopardml2341]

Mornin'

 

Too early especially as (again) I've had precious little sleep after 01:00.

 

At least the rain has stopped, see you later.

 

Sorry, it's been a bit doom and gloom from hereabouts in recent days. Might take a bit of 'time out'.

Edited May 22, 2021 by leopardml2341

[Dave Hunt]

Dad fell foul of NHS administration again yesterday. He was taken from the nursing home to Telford hospital to have a lesion on his wrist examined prior to its removal next Tuesday only to be told after an hour's wait, "It's been cancelled. You should have been told yesterday." When he asked what that meant for Tuesday's appointment, nobody seemed to know. Sometimes I despair.

 

Despite being in Devon for a week, Jill hasn't let the reins slip as I received notification by telephone last night of a couple of G word jobs and some shop visits that are apparently on my duty list. And I was getting on so well in the workshop too. Oh, well, on we go.

 

Have a good weekend all.

 

Dave

[polybear]

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

...... and various museums (including the Imperial War Museum, the Natural History Museum and – before it was appallingly vandalised by the so-called “curators” – the Science Museum).

 

The last time Bear was in the Science Museum was perhaps 2 years ago; prior to that it was probably around 1992.  Talk about being a shadow of it's former self.... 

As for the Duxford branch of the IWM, a friend is a volunteer there.  It seems that they require a minimum of 200 visitors to break even - they're currently running at around ten a day....

They have a flying day there today (at least the weather is a bit kinder than yesterday); it seems that they adopted a policy of advance tickets only some years ago, and if the show goes ahead then no refunds.  A "show" is deemed to have taken place if an aircraft flies - ONE aircraft.  So even in the most abysmal weather they make bloody sure at least one does fly (often the Catalina, so I'm told) so as not to offer a refund.

 

42 minutes ago, pH said:

A picture of a Glasgow subway station in a previous iteration - trains electrified, red colour scheme, solid doors:

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120521102800im_/http://citynoise.org/upload/29456.jpg

 

Jeez - not a place to be on a crowded day, unless you fancy a close encounter with the tracks....

 

In other news:

Bear has decided that a close encounter with a blow torch is deemed necessary this morning.....

 

Bear had his first jab 8 weeks ago today, with no news of a double top as yet.  If it gets to 9 weeks then Bear will check with Checkpoint Charlene that all is well - I believe both should be done within 12 weeks?

If that doesn't happen does that then mean that No.1 has to be repeated, one wonders?

 

Edited May 22, 2021 by polybear

[jamie92208]

Good moaning from the Charente.   It isn't raining at the moment but that may well change.  Morning orders are being posted but in  10 minutes we will be talking to Emily.

 

Yesterday I got some shopping done then had an interesting hour after a young lady reversed into the front passenger door of the Volvo.  It's dented by half an inch but still looks and works. She was rather upset and terrified of what her mother was going to say. She was called Emily as well.  I will have to do sone paperwork today. The big decision is whether it is worth having the Volvo repaired.  I then ate my sandwiches on the station and was joined by Andy for a cold couple of hours saw zero trains.  

 

Today may well be dedicated to domestic engineering.  It's now raining.

 

Regards to all.

 

Jamie

Edited May 22, 2021 by jamie92208

[Mad McCann]

On 20/05/2021 at 23:57, pH said:

Ah, Ninewells - the hospital allegedly built with a Cat ‘dozer in an interior room.

Probably smuggled out piece by piece, Johnny Cash style by now... 

 

Davy

[Barry O]

Ey up!

 

Mugatea has already been drunk. No refill has been offered ...yet!

 

Sometimes I wonder why I umpire cricket matches. It has just rained ..again..the grounds are very, vert wet, todays game is still "on". So I have to go to the ground, check conditions and then receive half of our expenses for doing so. If we cancel it now I can join in the jamboree which @chrisfis a part of. Chris, it will go well today.

 

@Dave Hunt hope your Dad is treated a lot better soon. Organisational incompetence seems to be the in thing everywhere in the world at the moment.

 

@NGT6 1315..nice car. I believe youngest Herbert is getting one of those as his next company car.

 

time for me to get on with Saturday.

 

stay safe!

 

Baz

[Barry O]

7 minutes ago, Mad McCann said:

Probably smuggled out piece by piece, Johnny Cash style by now... 

 

Davy

A company I worked for did a lot of building services installation there. Someone managed to remove a lot of items from the work place..in broad daylight. 

 

Baz

Edited May 22, 2021 by Barry O

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl, inner Temple Hare,

6 hours solid sleep, but one hour trying to continue after to no avail.

 

Ben the I want out Collie was half an hour early today, and he rapidly went to his favourite area to make a deposit.. Not surprisingly he didn't go out last night in the howling soggyness.

It's somewhat breezy out there damp and drizzly.

 

I've been looking up set top digital boxes, remember them?, Yep this TV i've gained , is right at the change over to digital, and digital was an option the original owner didn't get.. Wading through all the different types available, and their reviews. 

 

You do worry about some of the reviewers, bitterly complaining that a terrestrial Freeview box won't work with their satellite dish / internet / WiFi / Sky TV or won't record.. all on a box costing less than £30, clearly stating it's Freeview only.

A box has been selected and ordered..

 

Bacon and egg has been consumed, a muggacoffee is disappearing. Then it's,

 

 Time  to get the overalls on.

[TheQ]

32 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

The last time Bear was in the Science Museum was perhaps 2 years ago; prior to that it was probably around 1992.  Talk about being a shadow of it's former self.... 

As for the Duxford branch of the IWM, a friend is a volunteer there.  It seems that they require a minimum of 200 visitors to break even - they're currently running at around ten a day....

They have a flying day there today (at least the weather is a bit kinder than yesterday); it seems that they adopted a policy of advance tickets only some years ago, and if the show goes ahead then no refunds.  A "show" is deemed to have taken place if an aircraft flies - ONE aircraft.  So even in the most abysmal weather they make bloody sure at least one does fly (often the Catalina, so I'm told) so as not to offer a refund.

 

 

Jeez - not a place to be on a crowded day, unless you fancy a close encounter with the tracks....

 

In other news:

Bear has decided that a close encounter with a blow torch is deemed necessary this morning.....

 

Bear had his first jab 8 weeks ago today, with no news of a double top as yet.  If it gets to 9 weeks then Bear will check with Checkpoint Charlene that all is well - I believe both should be done within 12 weeks?

If that doesn't happen does that then mean that No.1 has to be repeated, one wonders?

 

The virus doesn't know the date, 12 weeks is only a guide line +_ a couple of weeks makes no difference.

As for contacting Charleen at 9 weeks , it would be a good way of getting her very upset. The procedure is they contact you about a week before you're going to get poked in the arm. In my case they contacted me at 10 weeks for the jab at 11weeks.

[chrisf]

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

1968 might have been the “summer of love“

I thought it was 1967.  Then again, it is said that if you can remember the 60s you weren't there ...

 

Chris

[leopardml2341]

My second jab had to be booked at the same time as I booked the first. One of the reasons I had to postpone the first for a couple of weeks was the fact that there was no appointment availability for the second close at the the first +12wk marker.

 

All I have to do is remember to go, 08/06 IIRC.

Edited May 22, 2021 by leopardml2341

[JohnDMJ]

Good Morning,

 

Second jab due later but must do a fodder run in a differing direction first. Thus, two train trips in opposite directions.

 

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

It’s Basel, dear boy, BasEL!, not BasLE (or it’s Bâle if you are a Francophone). Why the anglophones insist on mangling foreign place names is beyond me, especially as - for Basel- both spellings are pronounced the same way.
It’s hardly the same as substituting Florence for Firenze or Bangkok for Krung Thep Maha Nakhon.  I suppose it’s a holdover from the days when anglophones spoke a foreign language by speaking English VERY LOUDLY AND V E R Y   S  L  O  W  L  Y...

 

Pronunctipashun of foreign names never ceases to amuse me, even from my colleagues! (And I know that they do it just to wind me up - water off a duck's back as they've done it too often!)

 

I offer Viessmann (vice man), Märklin (Mark Lin), Fleischmann (fleeesh man), Noch (Nock or even Notch), Faller (fall er), Preiser (pressier) und so weiter, und so weiter. (Wiking and Seuthe are for open discussion!)

 

There is a noticeable pair of exceptions: Piko vs Peco; although Piko should be Peeko, we stick with P-eye-ko to distinguish it from our Devonian colleagues, the PPP Company (Pritchard Patent Product Co. Ltd.), i.e. Peeco (alias P Co.) (although some still insist on referring to them as Pekko!)

 

Fortunately, most recognise München in Bavaria and translate it to Munich rather than Munching!

Edited May 22, 2021 by JohnDMJ

[Andrew P]

Not a bad morning compared to yesterdays Hooooollliiiieee that lasted all day.

 

The wind outside has dropped, not sure about inside yet, time will tell on that one.

 

No progress outside on the Patio or Summerhouse erection / construction, and as nipper has the weekend off to take his 4 Girls and Wife out he will not be back until Monday, assuming the weather is dry enough.

 

Have a good day one and all, stay safe and well, and  don't let the bu66ers get you down.

[leopardml2341]

Breakfast beckons,  then some more wood butchering.

 

As an aside, posts seem to be taking a long time to save.......

Edited May 22, 2021 by leopardml2341

[Andrew P]

2 minutes ago, leopardml2341 said:

Breakfast beckons,  then some more wood butchering.

 

As an aside, posts seem to be taking a long time to save.......

Yes, re Post saving, I thought it was me.