Bert Cheese

Another happy customer here, my plain black 1504 arrived yesterday from RoS and I've since taken a good look at it after watching a few online reviews... Nothing bad to report really aside from a couple of potential glue marks that turned out to be lube of sorts and wiped off with a cotton bud. All detail is fixed and aligned properly, drain cocks, lamp irons the lot. The only thing I would say is that the paint on the side tanks is a little thin looking...perhaps a consequence of the die-cast construction though? I've only got a 3 metre length of straight test track at present. but a quick run up & down with my fairly vintage Gaugemaster controller revealed no running issues either. Well worth the wait as far as I'm concerned at least.

Here's Boris the Cavvy, not mine unfortunatly but I do treasure spending time with the little fella...he's recently turned 4 and of course I sent him birthday wishes as usual...

You still see a few regulars at Eastleigh...not entirely sure why but they seem happy enough. I may have become a bit jaded though...if I'm passing by when Arlington release the latest shiny class 50 etc I'm usually happy but temper it with "Ah, saw one of them years ago when they were proper" 🤓

The husband of a woman at work has just had a total knee replacement...think of Thor...a 6" plus biker type who spent most of his career fixing plant/mobile generators and very much a salt of the earth type/no nonsense character though recently retired. After waking from his op and being asked for any comment's he did mentioned that ear defenders would have been nice considering they'd recomended an epidural, so he could basically hear his leg being sawn through and reassembled in plastic/stainless...not a pleasant experience apparently.

I have to confess to only ever having endured "playing" rugby once at senior school back in 1984...the local bullies seemed to enjoy it more than the rest of us and and a bad back/calf strain note was produced therafter much to the disgust of my P.E ""teacher" As for the Haka...I find it a somewhat cringeworthy spectacle myself, but if the Andy Duncombe's of this world derive some sort of manly pleasure from it so be it for their sake...NZ Morris dancing indeed and long may it continue as such...

Hi John, Yes, in brief he started as a cleaner at Eastleigh shed in 1953 and was out firing fairly quickly with it being a busy depot but done his 18 months national service in Germany just before the photo was taken...being in the catering corps it was a fairly easy posting and I've still got a couple of Marklin 3-rail locos and a load of photos of German steam from the time. On returning to UK he was back firing at 71A until passing for driving in 1964 whereupon he took a move to Basingstoke in order to stay on express work (Eastleigh being a big depot meant as a junior driver he had to start at the bottom in the tank gang and it was obvious steam was nearing its end) He stayed at Basingstoke for the next thirty or so years commuting from Eastleigh every day, seeing out the end of steam on Bulleid pacifics and the BR Standards that remained for the most part before learning the usual 33/47/73 EMU/DEMU fayre alongside the Swindon Warships & Hymeks while they lasted, being a mixed traction depot the work was varied and took him all over the place. A return to mainline steam working in the 80's saw him out on about on various Bulleids & Standards as well as a couple of A4's, the S15 (828) M7 Tank, Sir Lamiel and of course the ubiquitous Flying Scotsman on the Blackmoor Vale Express workings of the time. I was frequently out & about with him at this time at weekends back then, many a happy day spent pootling about in the cabs of Hampshire units or on cross-country turns on 47's and such. Of course nothing lasts forever and when privatisation came along he went to SWT and finished up on mostly EMU work before taking voluntary redundancy when offered as he'd had enough of the job by that time and was strongly opposed to privatisation anyway. Sadly he died at 71 a few years ago...

Very nice, there's something about a Lord Nelson...my Dad thought they were fantastic machines and loved working on them unlike some at the time. I remember him telling me they were "a real fireman's engine" as the long partially sloping firebox wasn't easy to keep in good nick on a run and there were around 120 oiling points on prep. I've doubtless posted this before, but here he is fresh from national service demob while still an Eastleigh based fireman, I haven't got the details to hand but am guessing around 1958...

Cornwall eh, I worked on the Eden Project for a couple of months prior to opening and loved the area, lodged at the Ship inn at Mevagissey week on/week off...very basic but a good laugh in the evenings...some local sort used to shout obcenities at passing cars outside our bedroom in the small hours and so on. If you go there and have any food it'll perhaps through my (and 3 others) endeavours putting a load of walk in coldrooms and one blast freezer in...not sure why they wanted the BF to be honest. Haven't been back since, always makes me laugh as we were told it was an MOD project to move important plants and stuff from Kew Gardens for some reason and the penny only dropped when we saw the newly erected brown tourist signs as we approached site...we did get involved in some weird stuff back then to be fair, even my boss fell for it until we told him on arrival. On the flip side, for reasons I cannot fathom my aunt moved to some remote village down there years ago, perhaps because my uncle sailed out of Plymouth as part of the RN for many years although he was far from being a native...anyway she's in her late 80's now, last year fell over in the street and was walked past by people she recognised as being neighbours as such but offered no assistance or even conversation until an ambulance arrived 3 hours later. She now wants to move back to Southampton as she's never been made to feel welcome despite moving there in 1987...she's quite down to earth too so I'm wondering what sort of place it must be?

I used to get to my first job at the newly built Hedge End station fom Eastleigh around 1990 and having aquired a few spare keys from my father had a carriage key on my keyring for some reason at the time...the EP, SUB S-Key, BR1 and others were left at home and I still have them now. One morning I got on the 07:30-ish Hampshire unit from EH Platform 3 as usual, but on arrival at Hedge End had to get out the other side upon much to my surprise the door wouldn't open, not wanting to end up in Fareham/be late for work instinct took over and I alighted with a few others behind me using my carriage key...there was then a bit of shouting as it appeared most of the other doors on that side were locked too. Not sure what happened these, I was only 16 at the time and obviously shouldn't have had the key on me so just legged it out the station and up Shamblehurst Lane trying not to look suspicious as the guard and such were getting agitated from the sounds of things...was this the first trip off depot, I never knew the diagrams as such?

Sounds plausible, and that I got off lightly when visiting some interesting locations around Berkshire & Wiltshire as a youngish refrigeration engineer back in the early 2000's... The usual routine involved having your vehicle searched then driven to site by a pair of armed types with me being very quiet in the passenger seat, I was of course cleared and booked in already. "Follow your escort, look at the back of his head not left or right and certainly not through any windows and do not speak" was something I got used to after a while. I once mistakenly opened a door for a scientist coming the other way in a corridor before my guide could stop me, just being polite but this bloke dropped to the floor and huddled behind the door...seriously! Realising I'd messed up I apologised profusely and things were sorted, I was told that some people in this place were very clever but on the edge of sanity which was quite reassuring... A few stories fom other places best not mentioned too...all this usually just to service a water cooler or paint aluminium fan blades black on outdoor units so they didn't reflect sunlight.

I've not been drinking much beer in recent months as it all started tasting too samey/familiar, and I've rediscovered a neglected taste for wine...even bought a decanter for the big reds recently! Having said that I wandered up the local Sainsburys beer & cider aisle recently in the normal resigned fashion, not expecting to buy anything when this caught my eye. Brewdog are long past being my brewery of choice but they've always been good with dark ales and stouts in particular, so I swallowed my pride and picked up a pair of these Rattle & Rum jobs. Not bad at all I have to say, quite sweet as I sort of expected but decent at 7.4%....why they don't concentrate on stuff like this instead of the rubbish "IPA's" that all taste alike (and nothing like proper India IPA) is one of those mysteries I'll probably never understand...Candy Kittens & Urban Fog be gone with you 😩

No photo I'm afraid as the only one I've seen will presumably be copyrighted (or faked!), but apparently 73134 "Woking Homes 1885 - 1985" has been cut up recently, after spending many years up on jacks at Brush Loughborough? It just struck a chord with me as many of the late 1980's BR events around Basingstoke/Salisbury/Winchfield etc were fundraisers for this place under the guidance of Gerald Daniels, who was a true gentleman and probably the only area manager to have the respect of most of the staff in BR days.

Stay Out limited edition marshmallow porter from Tiny Rebel of Newport...at 18% ABV this is the ultimate version of their Stay Puft marshmallow porter...brewed at the back end of 2021 to celebrate the end of lockdown in Wales....I think this must be the strongest beer I've had to date aside from a couple of nips of the freeze distilled "beers" that Brewdog done a few years ago. This the final of 3 cans I bought when it was released, I'd like to know how they got the ABV so high but have found no information so far...most brewing or wine yeasts will only run to 15% at most and I don't think freeze distillation was involved for various reasons. Very smooth and drinkable anyway condsidering the slightly daft strength...and no more alcohol burn than the readily available Imperial Amplified Stay Puft at 12.8%

With regard to the post above I suppose its apt to put this up...something I picked up in Sainsburys recently purely because it made me chuckle as some of the girls at work occasionally rave on about the cocktail... In truth it was nowt special...fruity as the can said and quite well rounded, not something I'd bother with again though.

A wee drop of the hard stuff tonight I picked this up during a week on Islay back in 2019....at £35 for 20cl I stood there looking at it in the distillery shop for a while before taking the plunge! Having only recently opened it to sort of celebrate my 51st birthday I'm glad I picked it up now...somewhat sadly the last dram tonight is that shown in the photo...