Early Risers.

[emt_911]

A very trying day thanks to a very confused relative. Although he's been in hospital for the last week, he has managed to get hold of his mobile phone and call the police to accuse them of theft amongst other things. This obviously took a fair bit of time to resolve.

 

Back to the Midlands again tomorrow so an early ER for me.

 

Night all

[Horsetan]

Hmm Pendon.  I have no issue with it, but many hold it up to be THE finest model railway there is, bar none.  It's good. it's very very good, but there are better. The Gravetts could probably do it in the same timescale it has taken, and lets face it there are a few folk helping at Pendon too.  If Pendon wasn't GWR I wonder what it's standing would be?....

The one layout I would have liked to have seen was the late Bill Richmond's West Coast Main Line, built to dead-scale Scalefour. However there was the little problem of it being in New Zealand and, after he died, nothing more was heard of it.

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone

 

Another gloriously sunny today, but not a lot done really, but it's been nice to relax for a change. No2 son came round for lunch with his daughter, Amelia. When he left he was heading to our daughters to pick up the twins to take them out for the afternoon. Ava and her mum are not very well at the moment, they both have a bad cold, so it will give them both a break from the twins, as they can be a bit of a handful, especially when you're not firing on all cylinders. Sheila also thinks she is coming down with it too, she's steadily felt worse as the day went on. She says if she feels like this in the morning she'll skip Zumba, which is not like her at all.

 

Tomorrow I'm heading down to Warwick for a 2 day seminar provided by the company about retirement. They will discuss all my state and company pension options, tax and national insurance contributions etc. I'm hoping that it will give me an idea on what my final pension options will be. As it's a 2 day thing, so I'll be stopping over on the Monday evening and I guess this will be the last time I'll have to stop overnight away from home. I packed my bag earlier this evening, it took me all of 5 minutes and that included getting the bag out of storage too!

 

Time for bed, goodnight all.

[laurenceb]

Night all

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[Donw]

One issue of Railway Modeller featured a large photo of the viaduct at Pendon   living in Reading Pendon wasn't that far  away so I got the bike out (push bike I was only 13) and cycled to Long Wittenham. Pendon in those days wasn't much there was a viaduct scene and some nicely modelled trains. The talk was done by Roye England as each train came out it was stopped on the viaduct and Roye talked about it. After that he brought out some of his cottages. They were not on a layout and you could see close up they were exquisite. Roye explained his methods and talked about the cottages in the villages. There was nothing chocolate box about it he was interested in the make do of the local cottagers. However these were different days the country people might be poor but the grot and rubbish of later days was rare. For a start you couldn't afford to scrap things or leave rubbish about, anything beyond it original function would be broken up to re-use the parts elsewhere. Gardens tended to be looked after as you depended on the garden for food.

Now it may be different today although I have been there a few times since those early days but my view is coloured by memories of Roye. One factor maybe that it is not the work of one man or a close team like Maggie and Gordon. Anything done by a large group seems to lack some of the character that individual direction gives. There has also been a huge general increase in the standard of modelling.

I can still remember the enthusiasm of Roye explaining that the rabbits had phosphor bronze ears. 

 

I was more grabbed by Ditchling Green than Pempoul knowledge of the prototype I think.

 

Don

[andyram]

Evening all. Another late visit as I prepare to hit the sack. Today has been a busy day. Sarah was woken by Amber's cheery rendition of "Happy Mother's Day to you" at around 7.30am. Then after a lazy hour or two in bed the girls headed off to the church service whilst I got stuck into the paperwork. It was heavy going as I suffered with a mental block. I know nothing I do will be good enough which did not help my inspiration. I confess to shedding the odd tear in frustration although not proud of that fact. After starting at 11am I finally closed the laptop down at 3pm. Even accounting for a break for lunch that was four hours to complete five lesson worth of planning. A ridiculous amount of time.

After the laptop was shut down it was off to Sarah's mum's for Sunday dinner. The England match was watched with a pint before an enjoyable roast dinner and then off home. As Sarah put Amber to bed I went off to visit my mum. Sadly there was an email from the boss with four requests. At least two landed two tight deadlines on me - things that needed doing that he knows I have not done, nor planned to do next week. It was an unpleasant, and probably calculated way of ruining my weekend! The union rep gets contacted tomorrow night when I get home from the school visit!

[newbryford]

A good breakfast was followed by a walk in Gisburn Forest...didn't meet anyone called Guy though.

 

 

 

 

 

Walk? Walk???

 

Gisburn Forest is great place to mountain bike - which reminds me, I haven't been there in a few months. There are plans to visit it on the way home from work in the summer evenings.

 

Solihull was visited this evening. Satnav gave an arrival time of 2 minutes after face-off for the two hour or so trip, but apart from the henwomble doing 45 in lane 3 on the 50 section from J19-J16 on the M6, it was a great journey and we arrived with 5 minutes to spare.

 

A brilliant game to watch for the unbiased onlooker as Solihull and Blackburn fought for third place in the league with a real end-to-end action - with Blackburn coming out on top with a 6-4 win. This means that we face the 2nd placed team in the league in the end of season semi-final playoff in two weeks, rather than the top team. Not a bad finish to the season as we were looking at potential relegation about 5 weeks ago!

 

Solihull's player-coach Perry Doyle is retiring from playing at the end of this season and he wanted to go out and give the fans something to remember. He is known as a good player and hard man and doesn't shy away from physical action on the ice. One of our players, Reece Cairney-Witter [1], has had his fair share of battles with him over the years and it was with about 2 minutes to go, that they both met on the ice. Words were exchanged a couple of times and when the puck dropped, both players dropped their gloves and helmets on the ice and headed for centre ice for what looked like a good punchup/send off. Just as the first punch was about to be thrown, they grabbed each other and waltzed down the ice in a friendly embrace, much to the amusement of the crowd and showing their mutual respect between them.

 

I now need to swap a work day or two with a colleague to try and attend the playoffs.

 

Have a good week folks.

 

Cheers,

Mick

[1] We sponsor his away shirt and will get it to keep at the end of the season, so it was good job that there was no blood drawn.........

Edited March 26, 2017 by newbryford

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[emt_911]

Morning all. A slightly chilly start to the day which I hope will warm up.

 

For some reason, although I had very little sleep I feel refreshed and raring to go. How long this will last I haven't got a clue.

 

Have a good day everyone

[chrisf]

Good morning one and all

 

Yesterday was recuperative, for which read unproductive.  I managed to stay awake through Dr No before rustling up ribeye steak and the trimmings.  

 

This week is going to be busy.  Today I need to collect another batch of meds and some milk, the latter because I thought on Friday that what was in the fridge would last till tomorrow.  It won't.  Tonight Aly Bain and Phil Cunningham are in concert at The Stables and I must remember to take with me the album of theirs that I bought two years ago and get it signed.  On Tuesday there is a talk in Welwyn that I rather fancy attending, given by a friend.  Wednesday sees another visit to Greater Milton Keynes for the HMRS area group.  Thursday will be spent chez Poorly Pal and between now and then I will remember who the speaker is at Stevenage Locomotive Society that evening.  Friday should be relatively tranquil and at stupid o'clock on Saturday, All Fools Day, I head for Wakefield and Scalefour North for the weekend.  Phew.

 

Sometime in all of that I need to talk to Ffestiniog Travel.  The prospectus for the Christmas Swiss trip arrived on Friday.  The tour has undergone something of a reconstruction and not all of it is for the better.  I need to be clear in my own mind what sort of customised version I want but it needs to be one that makes better use of the 15 day Swiss Pass than the 10 and a bit days currently offered.  This may take more than one phone call.  Something tells me that the changes are not all down to the formidable administratrix at FT so I shall try not to shoot the messenger.

 

Warm thoughts to all, particularly those in distress for whatever reason.  Andyram, make that call.

 

Chris

[Robert]

Morning All,

 

It is a nice bright sunny weekend here - somewhat chilly, at 4°C, but the blue sky and sunshine make up for it.

 

The weekend was somewhat busy, we went up to the Ruhrgebiet on Saturday to see friends, but Sunday was a somewhat quieter day.

 

Time for a coffee!

 

Have a good day everyone...

[TheQ]

Morning awl,

Fell asleep at 21:00 ish woke up at 01:30 ish, retired to sofa, fell asleep again 03:30 ish woke up at 05:00 ish so about six hours sleep ish..

 Woke with a painful left wrist, probably caused by dragging twiggy branches out from the undergrowth to put on the bonfire yesterday.

 

Had to put the outside light on to find the car this morning, dry but misty and I think overcast, no cockwobbles on the road but plenty of small deer having achieved their Darwin's awards (3 ), luckily not my car this time...

 

 Time to read the company junk  emails then a system calibration that takes 2.5 to 3 days to complete.

See you later.

[Barry O]

Morning/evening all as appropriate.

Busy day today so without further ado...have a good day.

 

Baz

 

Mick, lots of cyclists mostly well behaved but one or two thought the walking paths were ideal for them and I do wish they all had a bell or horn fitted to their cycles....rather than just trying to ride you off the path....

 

Edited as kobo thought Mick = pages for some bizarre reason!

Edited March 27, 2017 by Barry O

[AndrewC]

Good moaning all from a slightly misty boring borough. Trying to catch up on ER but failing miserably, so the usual crappy sounding commiserations and congratulations as appropriate.

 

First week of jury service completed. What a soul destroying experience that is. For a whole week of sitting around I was finally called into a short trial Thursday afternoon. Can't say much about it, but from an efficiency standpoint, what took a day and a half, was really about 2 hours of actual court and deliberation time. They seem to have way too many jurors at the moment. There are still a bunch from our intake that haven't yet seen the inside of a court room. At least I was given today off. Back to work for the day to de-womble all the problems that cropped up last week. I'll know by 4pm whether or not I have to return to the court tomorrow. The only upside to all of this is I'm not currently sitting on a 10 hour flight to Vancouver at the moment. One of my coworkers is stuck with that project. Basically it will be several weeks of unpicking a total fustercluck without losing any customer data. Meh.

 

Right, back to work. pass the coffee and codeine.

 

Enjoy your day everybody.

[45156]

Morning All

 

Quick look in before taxi and fodder run - couldn't get an online slot to suit.

 

Thought for the morning.  We wanted to see what the outcome of using an SLS free shampoo might be, and before going out to buy, I went through the ones that we have here, which is many, and found only two - both with much more natural ingredients than the others.  These wonderful products are by Groomers Choice and Furry Friends - you've guessed it, both are for the four legged one!!!!

 

Back later

Regards to All

Stewart

[Donw]

Looks like it might be another nice day. Slightly late up this morning body clock still not settled. Plenty of work to do.

 

Enjoy your day

 

Don

[BSW01]

Good morning everyone

 

The sun is shining, breakfast has been eaten, so it's time to set off towards Warwick, where I'll be until tomorrow afternoon.

 

Sheila's cold gas gotten worse overnight and is still in bed and will not be going to her usual Monday morning Zumba class, to be honest, I think she will be better off staying in bed.

 

Back later.

[AndyB]

Morning all and its an overcast one here today.

 

Working from home today as one child has succumbed to the snuffles. 

The sibling did try the "goose for the gander" ploy due to body clock issues but sadly the change in the clocks has made me somewhat deaf. 

 

All is ready for Wednesday with requested documents etc ready to go in a folder and the sat nav is programmed. Shirt ironed, suit dry cleaned.

I'd ask you all to cross your fingers, but I think I'm well enough prepared to not need luck this time. 

 

Clearing the old layout out of the garage was quickly done and my winter shunting plank project is sitting neatly on to of the units that run down one side of the garage.

There's an L-shaped space some 2' wide and 8' long and 6' long which will need filling in due course - once I've figured finished writing up all the "lessons learned". 

[iL Dottore]

Morning All,

A most pleasant weekend, except for an incident at the dog school where we (more in hope than expectation) are improving Schotty and Lucy's obedience and "appropriate behaviours".

 

There is a new dog in the class who is very good with people and very aggressive towards some other dogs, yesterday I had to help break up a fight between this Labrador mix and a Springer Spaniel, who was attacked pretty much without provocation (there was some barking and growling beforehand but nothing out of the ordinary). The spaniel was injured, but not severely so (although it would seem that the Spaniel had received an injury to the muscles of the ear). Yet this rescue dog had been socialising with another dog completely without problems or any hint of aggression just minutes before.

 

The Lab mix was a rescue dog from Sardinia and it would seem that it had probably been bred and trained for dog fighting. I feel for BOTH dogs - both victim and aggressor (no dog should be turned into such a barbarous instrument) . I see no point in such evil, senseless, cruelty. If I could have my way (speaking theoretically and abstractly) everyone involved in dog fighting would be rounded up, stripped naked, given a knife, put in an arena and made to fight until there was only one left standing - who would then have the choice of being shot, taking a cyanide pill or being fed to ravenous Wolves (sans knife). As for puppy mill breeders it would be a toss up between summary execution (a 9mm bullet in the back of the neck amongst the corpses of the poor worn out dogs) or kept in a cage in their own filth and slowly starved to death (with a suitably impossible to trace live video feed on the internet pour encourager les autres). Forgive me for being extreme, but I cannot abide wanton cruelty whether to man nor beast.

 

I'm no "bunny hugger", I greatly enjoy meat, but I firmly believe that food animals should be treated humanely and despatched with dignity and minimum pain and suffering as is possible. Intensive factory farming (especially of Chickens) is repugnant, I would rather pay more for better quality meat and use all of the animal than buy a 50p Burger that contains meat from God knows what animals treated God knows how.

 

Interesting the discussion over the merits of Pempoul and (vs?) Pendon. I'm afraid that Pempoul doesn't do anything for me, I find the subject matter less than appealing, rural France can be rather boring and dull (the Alsace is just across the border from us and by French standards it is the back of beyond) and that is reflected - in my eyes - in the layout. Which is certainly a testimonial to the modelling skill of the Gravetts - being able to reproduce the tedious, boring, unexciting ennui of rural France. I agree that Pendon is now considered as an example of "chocolate box" modelling, but I think that it should be remembered that the Pendon Team (Roye England, Guy Williams, etc) set the standards for fine modelling - no matter what the subject. And perhaps Pendon is only considered "chocolate box" modelling because it has been an inspiration to so many modellers and so many layouts - not all to the high standards set by Pendon.

 

I think that it is perhaps a bit unfortunate that so much GWR modelling concentrates on little branch lines, there was certainly enough GWR urban grot to keep an army of "gritty realism modellers" busy for many a modelling year. Birmingham and Cardiff just being two places served by the GWR that weren't particularly picturesque and twee.

 

The diet proceeds apace and I continue to loose weight. I've met Interim Goal No. 1 and it looks like I'm on track to reach Interim Goal No 2 by end of June. From there to my final goal may not be so easy...

 

Off to prep for tonight's dinner (Coniglio Alla Cacciatora - Hunter's style rabbit).

 

Have a good OGIM*

 

iD

 

OGIM = Oh God It's Monday

 

Edited March 27, 2017 by iL Dottore

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. A bit dull earlier this morning but things appear to be brightening up, still a bit chilly though.  Not a lot else to report though over the weekend I received a couple of e-mails from the 'High Court of Benin' telling me that $4.7 million dollars was waiting for me if I just send them my bank details. I didn't send them any bank details but instead I sent them a very rude reply starting Dear @rse-hole. Still not used to getting up an hour earlier, its going to take me a whole week to adjust. My own opinion is that the whole charade should be done away with, we live in a 24/7 world so why are we lumbered with something that was introduced 100 years ago to improve production of munitions? I'll get off of the soap-box now, be back later.

[trisonic]

Oh, I rather liked Double - Summer Time. When was it last used? Sometime in the seventies?

 

Best, Pete.

[PhilJ W]

Further to my comments on DST http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/z9rhn39

According to the map one American state (North Dakota?) doesn't have DST and part of Australia does and part doesn't. If the one American state is on a time zone it probably will cause very little problem but the Australian states that use DST appear to be concentrated in the bottom SE corner.

Edited March 27, 2017 by PhilJ W

[Judge Dread]

 

 

 lots of cyclists mostly well behaved but one or two thought the walking paths were ideal for them and I do wish they all had a bell or horn fitted to their cycles..

 

 

When purchasing a bike for transport to and from work, I asked the shop proprietor if he could fit a bell to it. I was surprised to be told he didn't have anything like that in the shop. "People don't bother with such things these days" he said.

I finally found what I wanted in Halfords (other shops are available) in the child's cycle section. I still have both the bike and the "Mickey Mouse" bell.

I find it most scarey when walking on a footpath to be passed at speed and very close by cyclists whose mothers will not let them ride on the road! A ting on a bell would help or better still, they should learn how to glance over their shoulders and see the traffic behind them, and thereby be where they should be, on the road! 

I feel a lot better for that rant.

[AndyB]

Diets: I'm told the first week of any diet yields the best results. 

My solution: Start a new diet every week! 

 

 

I wonder if this is why the "5:2 stuff yourself, starve yourself" diet, or whatever it is called, may have some alleged success, perhaps?

 

NB: I note that I just used "may", "alleged" and "perhaps" in the same sentence, indicating my level of veracity on the matter!