Monthly Archives: April 2019

The weekend off…

07 Sunday Apr 2019

Posted by in Food and drink, Musings, West Yorkshire

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

Well, almost! I’ve not been blogging these past few days as Dawn and I have had a very sociable time with friends this weekend and there simply hasn’t been the time. Yesterday we were busy with household chores and shopping before popping around to visit friends and watch the Grand National together. Neither Dawn nor I are into betting and we’ve never even watched the race together before, but as Froso and Richard had invited us round we got into the spirit of things and even placed a couple of bets. I backed a rank outsider as well as the favorite so we’re now a whole £17 better off, but I promise that it won’t change our lifestyles! Afterwards we had a few drinks in Sowerby Bridge before an evening drinking far too much wine with Fro & Richard back at their home, which meant today had very much a subdued start!Originally, the weather wasn’t up to much, but then neither were we. Instead of going walking we spent time shopping for some ingredients that would allow us to do some batch cooking this evening. Admittedly, we did end up having a ‘hair of the dog’ in our local before coming home, but now we’ve got back into the swing of things. I’ve just made an old favourite – cucumber curry. No, really! It’s made with creamed coconut, cucumber, red pepper and peanuts and tastes divine.

Now Dawn’s taken over the kitchen to cook a wonderful Afghan aubergine dish whilst I’ve retreated to the office to try and catch up with scanning a few more old rail slides like this on from 1995.

04961. 309618. 305513. 305509. 55009. Stored in the carriage sidings. Blackpool North.19.6.95crop

This view is of Blackpool North carriage sidings when they were being used to store a variety of redundant trains, both diesel and electric.

Talking of redundant trains. Next week sees the first of the old BR built Class 313s go for scrap. They’re currently the oldest electric multiple units on the mainland, having been introduced way back in 1976 to work services from Moorgate and London Kings Cross to Hertfordshire. Hopefully, I’ll be there tomorrow to see the first one leave Hornsey on its final journey to the scrap yard. So, watch out for tomorrow’s rolling blog…

Rolling blog: Back to the present

05 Friday Apr 2019

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

After spending most of the week scanning old pictures from the 1990s to add to my Zenfolio website I’ve managed to escape for a day out in the present world!I got a lift into Huddersfield with Dawn this morning as my first mission was a haircut. I’ve acquired the Yorkshire habit of canniness with money and found a barber that only charges £3 for a haircut. Admittedly, I’ve not as much to cut nowadays and a No 1 isn’t exactly a hard style to execute, but even so…On the way I cut through the old graveyard surrounding one of the churches. Gravestones from the 18th & 19th centuries are now used as flagstones, which struck me as rather sad as the stories and names of those buried there are slowly being erased by the passage of feet as well as time.

Huddersfield town centre’s not in a healthy state nowadays. More and more shops are closing down with little sign of new tenants to take them on. How Brexit is meant to reverse this trend is a mystery that even it’s believers can’t explain. I’m now en-route to Manchester to recce a rail route I’ve not taken many pictures on for years, the WCML from Stockport to Crewe via Sandbach. Hopefully, the weather will play ball…11:35The old omilitary therum that no plan of attack survives first contact with the enemy held true today. As soon as I got to Manchester the weather turned and the clouds rolled in! Luckily, I had a plan B, so I’m now en-route to Liverpool to get shots of folk heading for a day at the races by rail. Like this pair!

I only hope the weather picks up for them otherwise there’s going to be some cases of hypothermia reported today!

15:09

Well, that was an interesting interlude as I’ve never shot the Aintree crowd before, only the Ascot and York! The trick is to get them on their way there, before they get trashed. The scenes aren’t as pretty on the way back. Merseyrail were running six-car trains every seven minutes on the Ormskirk line, and they had lots of staff on hand to shepherd travellers, so it was a well organised event.

On my way back into town I stopped to have a look at the new depot that’s taking shape at Kirkdale in readiness for Merseyrail’s replacement train fleet which is being built by Stadler.

Now I’m back in the city centre, ready to begin my journey back to Yorkshire (bit by bit).

16:02.

I’m now on a late running Trans-Pennine Express service back to Manchester which is (surprise, surprise) full and standing.

16:40

It’s Friday, the weather’s hardly condusive to scenic photography or interesting cityscapes, so I’m calling it a day and heading home in time to meet up with friends in my local pub for the groups quiz night. This time I’m on a packed Northern Rail service from Manchester Victoria to Leeds which is worked by my least favourite type of train, a Class 150 – even a refurbished one…

18:01

Having walked the 1.2 miles (All uphill) to the ‘Big 6’, I’m in need of this…

Midweek miscellany

03 Wednesday Apr 2019

Posted by in Brexit, Musings, Politics, Railways

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

Today’s been one of those mixed days, full of promise that never quite lived up to expectations. I was up early in order to edit another batch of old slides that I’d scanned the pervious evening. Whilst I kept one eye on them the other eye was on the weather forecast, which was all over the shop! Whilst the thermometer genuinely hovered around zero we were promised anything from snow to lightning storms by the weather reports. Sadly, neither arrived, despite my constant trips from my office to keep a watchful eye out across the Calder Valley from the bedroom. The camera bag and I stayed in the warm, whilst my mind was cast back 20 years as I looked at pictures where many of them I hadn’t seen since I took them.

All in all, it’s been a productive day as it wasn’t just about scanning slides. My email inbox is now several pages lighter whilst my diary’s put on weight. The most bitterly frustrating thing is not to know how to reply to a press invite to an event in Austria at the end of April. Neither I nor some of my UK colleagues have a clue how to respond due to the Brexit shambles as our status as accredited EU journalists is up in the air. Will we need work permits? We haven’t got a clue and no-one can tell us. We’re just another group caught up in the infernal Brexit mess that shows every sign of ending badly for the UK.

I’m so utterly pissed-off with those of my fellow citizens who see this all as some jingoistic game that we’ll ‘win’ purely because we’re British, so obviously ‘superior’.  After all, didn’t we ‘win’ two world wars? The political and economic illiteracy is frightening, as is the hubris. Part of me has got to the stage where I really can’t blame the other EU members for wanting to say “oh, just f**k off then” in order that we get the reality check we richly deserve and Parliament desperately needs. Because, whatever Brexiters claim, we’ve not taken back control – unless you think deciding when to blow your own brains out is ‘control’. The EU’s in the driving seat now and will be for the discernible future. Very soon the penny’s going to start to drop that we’re the supplicants. Not only that, but we’ll be the country at the mercy of everyone else as our weakness will be obvious to everyone but the jingoists. And the really dumb thing? This is just the start of our problems. The ‘divorce’ from the EU should have been the easy bit! Now we’ve got to negotiate a new relationship, which isn’t easy when you’re the ones who’ve just shat in the bed…

OK, enough of this political and economic omnishambles for now. Here’s one of the latest batch of slides I’ve been scanning. This is Barnetby (Lincs) on the 3rd August 1999.

06999. 56063. 6D66. Immingham - Doncaster Enterprise. Barnetby. 3.8.99crop

This is classic ‘old railway’ despite the change of traction power from steam to diesel. Class No 56063 heads West past the impressive array of old semaphore signals at Barnetby East with 6D66, an Immingham – Doncaster ‘Enterprise’ mixed freight working. The semaphores and signalbox lasted until December 2015 when they were finally replaced with modern colour-light signalling controlled from York ROC.

Tonight I finished the last of the slides from the 1999 album I have to hand. They’ll appear on my Zenfolio site tomorrow. Next I step back in time to 1995…

Tuesday tribulations

02 Tuesday Apr 2019

Posted by in Down memory lane, Musings, Photography, Railways

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

After working until late last night scanning slides I’ve restricted myself to working from home. Mind you, the weather’s not exactly been conducive to wandering the country. It’s been cold despite the sun and with moody skies that have threatened rain, sleet or even snow.

I’m now on the final few slides of the latest album to be disposed of, and it’s only taken 20 years to get them all done! In the past I’d only scanned a selection of images from each album. Now I’m scanning the whole of the album that I’ve decided to keep (some no longer make the grade) and I’m freeing up a lot of space in the process.

Here’s a couple of samples from the latest batch which show just how much has changed in the past 20 years.

06893. L702 51356. 51398. 15.38 Barking to Gospel Oak. Harringay Park Junction. 1.6.99crop

On the 8th June 1999, unit L702, made up of Class 1777 DMU cars 51356. 51398 work the 15.38 Barking to Gospel Oak past Harringay Park Junction on the ‘Goblin’, as the Gospel Oak – Barking line is known. At the time this was one of my local railways as I only lived a quarter of a mile away. It was one of London’s ‘cinderella’ railways, and a real backwater. A pocket of diesel operation that was surrounded by electrified lines that was still controlled in places by semaphore signals. The Class 117s themselves were old and unreliable and the service was often appalling. If you visit this same location today you wouldn’t recognise it. Everything has changed. The DMUs are gone, as is the signalbox and semaphore signals. The junction has all been relaid and even the roadbridge beyond has been rebuilt. The line’s also been electrified and this view has disappeared behind overhead wires. 

06936. 150130. 16.08. Barking - Gospel Oak. South Tottenham. 18.6.99crop

Here’s South Tottenham station just 17 days after the last picture was taken. The first Class 150s have been cascaded to the ‘Goblin’ to take over from the elderly Class 117s. A slightly care-worn 150130, still bearing Central Trains livery, calls at the station whilst working the 16.08 Barking to Gospel Oak service. In 2010 the 150s were displaced by the Class 172s which have lasted until now due to delays in electrifying the route and the new Class 710 trains being over a year late into service. Ironically, 150130 has followed me North. After being transferred to First Great Western after it left North London it’s now part of the Northern Rail fleet! 

Another 70 plus old slides have been added to my Zenfolio website. If you follow this link, you can find which galleries they’ve been added to. There’s everything from trains to stations.

 

Welcome to life in a failed state.

01 Monday Apr 2019

Posted by in Brexit, Politics

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

,

I really don’t know whether I should laugh or cry at the news that Parliament is so screwed up that it’s not managed to find a way out of the absolute shit-show that’s Brexit tonight. Saying that the lunatics have taken over the asylum doesn’t do it justice as the lunatics have been in charge ever since the result of the Brexit referendum back in 2016. We’re ruled by a significant part of Parliament and the Lords that has absolute shit for brains – and that’s not a party political point. I’m an equal opportunities cynic so I can see MPs (and Lords) from all parties who fit that bill. Some of our elected members – and also Lords appointees – have completely lost the plot. Right now I could really let rip at the cakeism and venal opportunism that infects our Governing bodies. None of them are thinking about what’s best for the country. Instead we’ve been caught up in a perfect storm. We’ve got a Tory party who’ve let an internal brawl over Europe spill into the streets via a flawed and corrupt referendum – and at the same time we have the weakest and most dogmatic Labour leadership in living memory. All of them are playing politics. None of them are doing what’s best for the country. Instead, they’re pretending they can make Unicorns exist. It doesn’t matter if it’s a blue or a red one – all you have to do is believe – and vote for them!

Looking at this utter shambles, and how an old and out of touch (but arrogant) democracy can be so easily reduced to this would actually be a salutary lesson – if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s my country and that of some 66 million other souls. We’re not a banana republic, but that’s what we’re reducing ourselves to. Right now I can’t help thinking that the best thing the EU can do is cut us adrift in the hope that will (eventually) allow common-sense to intrude on a county that clearly is in desperate need of a reality check.

What the events of the past few years have shown is that our political system and the old allegiances are broken. We have nutters to the left of us as well as to the right. all are driven by dogma, not what’s best for the country – and that’s what needs fixing. The old joke that you could stick a red/blue rosette on a pig (depending on the constituency) and it would get elected has come back to haunt us.

Meanwhile, if I were you – I’d keep stockpiling those tinned goods…