Kingzance

Brisol was bombed on several occasions Andy.

Stationmaster has really got me scratching my dome. I know Glasgow had two main sheds allocated to it in BR times due to it being the historical location of terminii for two railway companies (although a number of sub-sheds within the city but) primarily Eastfield 66 (LMS) and Polmadie 65 (CR). Bristol had Bath Road 82A and St Philips Marsh 82B due to the former being GWR and the latter serving the MR connection to the S&D at Bath Green Park whilst Exeter was Exeter 83C in BR days but shows no details for the LSWR connection, over which the ACE operated. I suspect that link is too tenuous. It is not Saints as I can find four religious Saints that bear 2900 class names in Bristol alone, nor is it Abbeys. It is just possible that Glasgow and Bristol had two turntables each and Exeter one, purely a railway-related guess.

Firstly, one hopes the Good Doctor enjoys carrot cake with lamb curry, even if that seems a strange combination even to my adventurous palette. As for the question posed most carefully, it implies these items / places no longer exist although they could be events. My first thoughts were along the lines of cathedrals but Glasgow has only had one of them - St Munro’s and all their cathedrals are still present. My next thought was HM Ships but each name has occurred on several vessels. It can’t be Saints as there are links to St Thomas and St David in Exeter. All three cities have had two mainline stations and only Glasgow had a locomotive works building new engines. As for docks, all have them with Brizle and Execketter having had floating harbours. Were it not for the past tense, I might suggest football teams but Glasgow has four that I can think of. As far as I know, Glasgow still has an engine shed whereas Bristol (GWR and MR) and Exeter (LSWR) no longer have them? So, more disturbing of the few follicles on my dome must occur later. In the matter of dumb-buttocked behaviour, one has to be thankful that we see “the pen is mightier than the sword” or armed pursuit by our journos of a certain Prime Ministerial Adviser would undoubtedly result in “collateral damage” being caused whilst seeking blood in the Cummings and Goings story.

Morning from AnyHearts, Greyness is gradually being replaced with occasional sunshine, speeded by a brisk westerly. Yesterday’s visit by our son - who did keep six foot six and three quarters of an inch away at all times - was a pleasant diversion from the mundane routine to which we ascribe at the direction of our leaders - even as the number and frequency of their deliberate breaches of such strictures grows. Of course we have a free press that can and should question such behaviour, although obviously most reporters are already breaking government guidelines as they create their reports. This we accept in our sort of democracy. Clearly it isn’t without its faults but we are better off than those in Hong Kong, where Beijing has decided that The Basic Law and the citizens’ rights should be brought into line with the rest of The People’s Republic (i.e. none) in the sure knowledge that The West will not protect the several million citizen’s of Britain’s former colony. An article about those in HK who are resorting to efforts to wipe data and records from their mobile devices was reported earlier in The Times today has been pulled. It is impossible not to conclude political pressure for censorship is the reason for that. Not satisfied with being the source of Avian Flu, SARS and now Covid-19, China is ruthlessly determined to dominate the world and brooks no challenges. Our politicos would do well to avoid becoming further beholden to such a ruthless regime. Anyway, yesterday’s curry was in my book a success with new and nuanced flavours; SWMBO spent the meal making exaggerated coughing noises so that is another dish I shall be making solely for personal enjoyment! We came second in the wider family quiz but as the winners created the previous week’s quiz, we will do next week’s edition. Who knows, perhaps we shall all be a little freer after next weekend? Today’s protein will come from the carcass of a small hen and will be presented with broad beans, spring cabbage and a few Jersey potatoes. A walk must be endured enjoyed later but first I shall make myself a damn fine cup of full-fat coffee. Be good, stay safe and above all, stay sane!

Good morning people, Yesterday for once passed with a modicum of success at KZTowers! Although the UK office for my astral telescope in Bury St Edmunds has steadfastly been concentrating on re-burying St Edmund‘S remains for the last couple of days, one of the largest specialist online retailers was able to provide some very helpful advice which I was able to adopt once SWMBO had been fed, watered and propped in front of the Haunted Fish Tank. After following their guidance, I managed to recalibrate the Telescope’s base and then set it tracking a mythical stellar object. It continued to do this whilst I loaned and delivered various electric sanders to my son-in-law so, once I returned, I stopped the mounting’s tracking progress and pointed it at another virtual star before locking on the tracking mode. I then left it whilst matters of a dietary nature came to the fore. One of my fellow photographers in our village is married to a lady of Indian lineage and she had provided me with a recipe for what she describes as her “cheat’s curry”. Having had the missing items delivered by the Rose of Waits on Thursday and with the telescope Mount happily tracking away, I set about making a curry to her instructions. It turned out to be quite easy and not too time consuming so at around 10:15 I popped it in the oven, poured a large measure of a Speyside malt, glued the Sennheiser cans to my ears and settled down to indulge myself - courtesy of Rick’s albums - in some mighty fine music from a live performance by Pink Floyd. Eventually the curry was cooked - and damned fine it is too Catherine - and the glass was refilled a couple of times whilst Waters / Mason / Wright / Gilmour and others continued to imbue warm notes into my head and soul. Thank you Furtler of Waddlemarsh! And so to today. Our son will be appearing to deliver a couple of bits for his mother’s attention and to collect a protein resupply package from me. As it is only him and because neither he, his mother nor I have any symptoms of WuFlu, we believe we are safe to meet as long as we do so outside and don’t encroach within 2 metres of him. If that isn’t correct I shall plead the Dominic Cummings amendment. Once that visit is through, it will be time for some of the aforementioned curry to be consumed and then be ready for the family Zoom quiz. Last week’s quiz set new standards and so it will be interesting to see how this week’s quiz mistress rises to that challenge. That’s it, stand easy people. I firmly believe I am following the directions of our Leeds Highlander with the above plans and also hope the news from Durham is positive and that suffering people and pets are generally on the mend. Nihil illigitemous carborundum as the Romans wouldn’t have said.

Lucky to have my camera with the right lens fitted yesterday when this one flew overhead:

Gently she adresses the flautist with the admonishment: "Mind where you're poking that damn thing boy!"

Good morning, Overcast is probably the best description for our sky today. It is windy (both outside and in) although no haricots were damaged in the preparation of such emissions by all parties here. I know, too much information! A lot of diddly squat was achieved yesterday but I did get a rather good shot of one of our local red kites on the wing, even managed to capture her deadly eye clearly! The kipper was rather nice, even if not Manx - talking of which, my uniform had a couple more gold rings than NHN’s but in The Merch there were no half-rings, unlike our Armed Forces. We in the non-Grey Funnel Line didn’t have to order our men into battle and bar a couple of occasions, didn’t get on the wrong end of live fire. Consequently, the idea of military discipline and barked orders found no favour amongst our ilk where leadership was much about knowledge, responsibility and training others to do your role. The debate about quangos, ngos and charities is one that I find particularly worrying. I choose to make donations to good causes when and where I recognise their positive contributions. I don’t elect people to decide how to dispense my taxes to charities just to make those politicians feel good. I particularly struggle when there are several charities ostensibly with the same aim and each with its own overheads, often based in London (why?) to be deducted from the overall pot of donors’ goodwill or when the salaries of some executives in these charities get published. In my opinion, it has also been too easy for too long to set up a charitable foundation to serve some very narrow cause. There remains a danger of the goose of the decent donating citizen that lays the golden egg finding the flow of eggs stopped or that its ovaries have been emptied by the recent clamouring of the charity sector. The Eagles captured my concerns in their song Long Road Out Of Eden wherein can be found the phrase “Through the litter and the wreckage and the cultural junk, bloated with entitlement, loaded on propaganda....” Last night’s local news highlighted the struggles of theatres and venues in these present times yet the producers chose to interview the deputy head of The Arts Council who spouted the usual stream of platitudes but failed to mention that they disperse 95% of their funds to facilities located in London. What will today bring for the KZ household? Well, I have to get meat and eggs, some of which will be for the son. I may receive a Crawford dual-speed focuser for my 1200mm long, 254mm diameter optical tube, but then again I may not. I just might get to talk through my scope tracking issues with a knowledgeable person but such people seem to be in short supply right now. I shall attempt to view things from a more positive perspective! Best wishes to BOD’s household, I hope both are able to recover promptly without serious side effects. I also hope those currently depressed are able to keep posting on here, it will help. To all others, stay safe and, despite my ramblings, stay sane.

Having read the contribution from Hipposhire regarding legal extortion practitioners the legal profession, may I ask / warn fellow ERs in England and Wales about a blatant scam they are now operating in respect of house purchases: Consider the not uncommon scenario where a seller agrees a price via an agent for the purchase of the seller’s property and solicitors / conveyancers are instructed. After due process, the purchaser’s legal practitioners find that they can recommend that their clients can proceed with their intended purchase and a date is agreed for the part of this known as “exchange of contracts”. Please be aware that the (dis)honourable band of legal practitioners now instigate a scam wherein the seller has to cough up a further amount to purchase an insurance via a once only premium “to indemnify the purchaser against any hidden covenants”. So the scammers, acting in what is an accepted manner, then place a request for such cover with their mates in that specialist insurance sector. The supposed policy is then implied to be in place to protect the purchaser. I wondered if this was solely in the case of our recent property sale but now I hear from another couple who were selling the house belonging to one of their deceased parents that the same scam has been perpetrated on them. In our case, we had lived in the same property for 31 years and absolutely no one ever challenged us or required access for any purpose. Our solicitor even said that this cover was not necessary. Arguing that with the legal profession Representing the purchasers was fruitless, arguing that their searches had revealed nothing was equally fruitless. In the end, I split the fee 50:50 with the purchaser but the bad taste this created in my mind still lingers. The friends’ sale was equally jeopardised by them challenging the fraudsters legal profession that this was simply legalised extortion. So house sellers beware, to paraphrase something currently “be aware, Britain needs more wares”, stay safe and, if being ripped off by this legalised scam in particular, stay sane!

Good day brethren, The day started very cloudy and looked as if we could get significant precipitation. The sky has subsequently adopted an uninterrupted shade of azure. Plants soil has been watered. MoT test is booked for next week. Meat and eggs requested from Our Lady of The Protein in the nearby farm. A van from the local Rose of Waits is expected quite soon. Whilst HMG seems to be helping out all and sundry with “splashing the cash”, it, through its all-powerful offshoot HMRC, has decided it can avoid paying anything to my self employed son who has meticulously declared his earnings and paid the appropriate taxes for more than a decade. For a short while he was contracted to Coventry University to upskill basic mathematics to undergraduates arriving with for degree courses who were at an insufficient standard. Once those students’ skills in that topic were sufficiently elevated and that Uni ceased taking on so many dubious students, his contract ended two years ago but this has somehow given HMRC an excuse to withhold any payment from him. He starts in a Tesco warehouse next week as his normal work dried up at the start of March and there is nothing in the foreseeable future in his sector. Like GDB, I am lacking in upper thatch and I too object to paying a barber a search fee, although trusting My Dear Leader to do mine is quite stressful for me. As for the great Marmite, peanut butter and Bovril debate, I like them all and find a crushed Oxo cube with a small teaspoon of either Marmite or Bovril dissolved in hot water to be very enjoyable. I am happy to have Marmite and peanut butter sandwiches which of course then involves bread - not good if trying to stick to a low carb diet! As iD says, peanut butter is a very useful product when cooking Asian style foods and I buy the rich roast variety from Meridian as it contains no palm oil or salt. No doubt other things will be found to occupy me for the rest of the day but I have yet to be advised. Meanwhile, a kipper requires my undivided attention. Stay sane....

And they said it wouldn't last Congratulations!

Good late morning form a sunny NEHerts, Yesterday proceeded generally as expected with a decent walk and a selection of piscatorial products purchased, some of which were converted into an evening meal. I did manage to cut down calorie intake to two sessions and to only snack on an orange and a few raw peanuts between times. Alcohol was restricted to a glass of The Guv'nor and a bedtime measure of Knockando - other varieties of lovely things (some in skirts) to come out of Scotland are available. Some but not total progress was made in respect of the impending granddaughter birthday, accompanied by some music from certain inspirational suggestions amongst the posts from ERs - my thanks to you all. The topic for our next photographic competition is "Distance and Isolation". Thinking that I could use the first word to cover several hundreds of millions of miles, I exited my scratcher at a little before 0300 in order to go to a nearby open area from which I hoped to point my 250mm f4.5 reflector towards 170 degrees and at an azimuth of 15 degrees where I would find Jupiter with Saturn a fraction higher and a few degrees to its east. Having arrived at the selected location, much gear was set up only to find I had not packed the viewing lenses or the power cable that runs between the power tank and the 'scope's drives. There followed a session of pack it all up again, return home, pick up missing bits, return to viewing base and set up again. By this time - and we were still almost an hour before sunrise - the skies were already heralding a new day and the clarity of the celestial object I wished to photograph was rapidly diminishing as pre-dawn erupted. I returned to my scratcher at around 05:30 and then considered whether I should just picture an old-fashioned directional road sign. Despite the setbacks, I will have another go at an even earlier hour tomorrow before switching to the local road signs! As you can imagine, the whole procedure was conducted in splendid personal isolation. So today will mainly see me completing the trough for the tomato plants as the last required timber was acquired yesterday. That will presage the purchase of two grow bags before plants can be positioned and allowed to flourish (hopefully with more success than last year). The purchase of granddaughter's gifts will be concluded. Further shoe base will be worn away and Her Ladyships every wonts will be attended with much care. Flying pigs will be seen interrupting air movements at Luton and Stansted airports! Time to cease these inane ramblings and follow the instructions eminating from Leeds Highlands. Have a good day one and all and be safe!

May I echo that and hope you can soon enjoy some married company.

Morningorl, Weekly weigh-in yesterday was a little disappointing as it confirmed a change in direction. I am sure being incarcerated isn’t helping as it is diminishing the amount of exercise I get. The fridge being reasonably well stocked is another factor, as are the readily available choices of various alcoholic tinctures and an urge to indulge in calories morning, noon and night. Henceforth the noon intake will be blocked but the morning one may occur a little later and evening’s intake a little earlier. You and the UK’s beach users will be relieved to know that I have no intention of getting into a pair of lurid budgie-smugglers but I do need to be friendly to my legs if I expect to use them for any sustained length of time. Plans indicated for yesterday were generally concluded satisfactorily and the grass looks much better for its drink. With the weather forecasted for this week, I may repeat that at the weekend. Today being Tuesday means I shall stroll to Ian The Fish this afternoon to purchase an underside fillet of plaice for her (being unwilling to try much else) and whatever he has that takes my fancy. I shall resist buying another crab even if he has one as I regard this as an occasional treat rather than the regular diet. On a related matter, as we were walking from the pharmacy to the Marcus & Spencius (and Up Pompeii to you too) Food Emporium, we passed the town’s Fish & Chip shop which has seemingly re-opened to telephoned orders. SWMBO has decreed that we shall avail ourselves of their service - in direct competition to my plans for an intake of very reduced carbohydrate quantity. Tasks to complete today include ordering the gifts for eldest granddaughter’s birthday two weeks hence, leaving time for a last minute panic when my wife and daughter discover duplication and granddaughter changes her mind - she is, after all and foremost - a woman in the making and, in my opinion, one who may well challenge The Stationmaster’s neighbours in the looks department (not that I have any detailed knowledge of his neighbours I would have you know) - but I would say that, wouldn’t I! Must go, it is time I produced a breakfast suitable for a dieting lert, possibly to the warm sounds of a well liked LP. The breakfast will not be fried over a massive valve amplifier, I use silicon / germanium interfaces these days. Be good, be careful and become a lert!

Hard to argue with that selection iD but could I suggest something from A Momentary Lapse of Reason: On The Turning Away. This is what I describe as "an accessible track" for PF Newbies.