EddieB

Can I post a REAL one? Why do local councils issue gardening and recycling advice that says the best time to prune trees is autumn and winter - exactly the same time that those councils stop their green waste collections?

I'm guessing Wendover, which does have some "double" name boards; clearly something on the Marylebone signalling route.

Thrumpton [Crossing] signal box (panel as depicted here http://www.signalbox...der-in-1964.php).

I think I might have preferred to take my chances with the Hungarian dog! Incidentally, going back to Brigg, the platforms look quite low, like the surface "tube" lines, but without the juice rails - is that actually the case, or are they normal height?

Life ain't fair. It isn't unknown for some men to have a fetish for women's shoes (fnarr, fnarr), but whoever heard of a woman with a fetish for real locomotives or model trains? Just goes to prove that the dice are loaded....

Curious. It's working again now - I think it must have been taken downteporarily.

"Sorry but this video is no longer available".

Isn't that Bill Bailey (fresh from Kraftwerk tributes, no doubt) in the yellow hi-viz?

You've got it. He started his career with the Great Eastern, his father John having been stationmaster at Diss (and who was the brother of my great-great-grandfather, the first of three generations who careers began on the Great Eastern). The modern Mid-Suffolk preservation society recently modified a carriage into a replica of Gillingwater's inspection saloon. Charles Szlumper, of that (slightly more) famous railway family served as resident engineer on the "Middy", but I'm afraid "szlumped" was a red herring. Well done, Paul - over to you.

At the risk of introducing a herring of the red variety, this one has really szlumped. Any more attempts before I call time?

There is no such thing as a safe mine. Despite all the precautions that are taken, those who work in such places do so with the unspoken fear that some day something like this will happen. It's one of the reasons that mining communities are strong and close-knit. My thoughts and prayers are with not just the families, but also their fellow workers, friends and rest of the community.

Except when the timing belt breaks!

Sorry to disagree with all the recommendations, but I wouldn't touch Panasonic with a barge pole. Had one of their "time slip" DVD-RAM recorders. Just over two years on, it failed with a blown component (memory fails which one). Although the part was a few pounds, cost of repair was roughly the same as a new unit. Soon as we took it into the shop to ask about repair, the technician told us exactly what the problem was before he examined it - such was the frequency of this failure. By coincidence some friends had also bought the same model, and had encountered exactly the same problem after about the same length of time. Panasonic of course denied any obsolescence. Experience probably differs for other models, which may be more reliable, but having been burned once I'd never buy another Panasonic.

Yeah, sometimes they almost stammered above the background noise of cars whizzing by...

Oddly, not. In fact, apart from occasional checking on this site and another forum, I'm struggling to get time on my desktop between SWMBO's Facebook and daughters' Cbeebies (which supplies the tag header I'm getting on RMWeb).

I don't know where these things come from, but just noticed that the little icon coming up on Google tab headers is a white BR "inter city" logo in a rail blue background. A nice touch. Is it just me?

Indeed it would be Marwell Zoo (the initials stand for Marwell's Wonderful Railway). A Severn-Lamb "steam outline" diesel running on 1'3" gauge.

It's all gone rather quiet. What's the matter, station cat got your pointing devices? Here we are again. No animals in view, but I can inform you that beyond the fence there be capybaras and rheas. But no cats.

Pity it wasn't true.... http://www.snopes.co...therprotest.asp (As Trisonic just beat me to saying...)

Of course, silly me. The place is Jasper and the cat was called "Banff". I'm struggling to find images of felines or other animals and trains. Plenty of each, just not together in the same picture. So, in the almost complete absence of cats, where's this?

Banff? I'm inpressed at the ability of the cat (which is surely named "Jasper") to both drive a train and take photographs at the same time.

As it has been established that we're dealing with the Mid Suffolk Light Railway, who was its General Manager?

Nothing to do with old blokes' obsessions and steam trains?

No! This individual is old enough and ugly enough to realise a fence of any description means "keep out", yet deliberately chose to take a "calculated risk" that he could get a marginally better vantage point and "get away with it". As Rugd has explained, he must have accessed that piece of lineside fencing from private property. He may not know the rule book inside out and backwards, but as someone who I expect would call himself "an enthusiast", he surely knows that he should not be trespassing on the railway, nor crossing private land to get there.

Not being familiar with this location, the open style of the fence suggests to me that the area behind it must be of restricted access. There looks to be the edge of a structure in the shot from the footbridge. Had the trespasser already trespassed before he even reached the fence?