Thanks to Tony, Marica, Dave, John and Munguin for allowing me a sip of his champagne. This is thirsty work.
Thanks to Tony, Marica, Dave, John and Munguin for allowing me a sip of his champagne. This is thirsty work.
I cost nothing to run so donate to https://www.broadcastingscotland.scot/donate/
The bilingual blog about all things British
Love, theatre and ideas
British Wildlife & Photography
Why Scotland should be an independent country
Thoughts about Scotland & the world, from a new Scot
Bipartisan dialogue for the politically engaged
Impartial Everytime Always
We Provide The Facts, You Make The Decisions
Exploring Rhymes, Reasons, and Nuances of Our World
Mark Doran's Music Blog
Songwriter / Guitarist
This site supports Scottish Independence
A comic about history and stuff by FT
The embittered mumblings of a serial malcontent.
an irreverent look at UK politics
Exploring the Depths of Curiosity
Nature + Health
http://netbij.com
Movies, politics, comedy and more...
Number 1 was poot(s) out.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Pic 1 – Poots – he’s oot! Pic 2 – Hillman Imp Californian? Pic 5 – Alexander’s Bluebird coach – Glesca, but where? Memory fails. Pic 6 – Old sitcom, “The Rag trade”, starring (?) the likes of Miriam Karlin, Reg Varney, et al. Early 1960s. Laugh? – not often. Pic 12 – Vickers Supermarine Spitfire. Mark ?. Exhausts suggest early Mark, but no cannon & unusual camo scheme suggest high-altitude photo/reconnaissance type. Pic 20 – Gilbert O’Sullivan, probably singing the execrable, “Clair”.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Re No.2 andi, I think it may be Maryhill Road opposite Kelvindale Road, possibly a bus returning from Drymen, but I can’t remember the number.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Referring to no. 5
Pre-war Leyland Tiger, (TS7 or TS8) from the reg. probably 1939/40. Pictured in Maryhill Road in 1958. These vehicles lasted ’til the early 1960s, built to last.
Is it my imagination or is the image slightly distorted? The bus looks wider than it ought to be.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, you are the expert on bus bodies, Roddy, but to me everything else looks reasonably normal.
It’s a great looking bus with loads of character, unlike most of today’s buses.
LikeLike
😉
The buildings (and lamp post) are leaning inwards and the bus is stretched un-naturally wide..
Distortion effect caused by use of fisheye lens?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well noted, sir.
LikeLike
Alex – spot on. I had another look at the pic and you can make out a 3-storey grey building at top right – the former DHSS office, then Jobcentre. Just behind is the sandstone tenement with a turret corner and cupola on the roof. It’s at the junction of Lochburn and Maryhill Roads . Harvey’s Bar on the ground floor. The bus number looks like 8 or 9?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Alex, I think you are right about the location. To the right of the bus, you can see in the distance a red sandstone tenement, which is still there on the corner of Lochburn Road. On the same side, slightly nearer the bus there is a blocky modern building which is still there, but the building adjacent has been demolished and replaced with Maryhill Polis Office. The wall on the left of the bus is part of the wall of the former Maryhill Barracks. The tenement on that side is long demolished and has been replaced by a single storey row of shops, including the Elephant and Bugle pub.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sptfire Mark 1 or 2? 4 machine guns each wing (hidden under red barrel covers. Camouflage is normal early-war colours. Assymetric radiators also suggest very early Mark.ditto canopy..
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very detailed. Dave will doubtless know.
LikeLike
Impressed, Andi.
Dave may confirm some of the ones that you had doubts on the details.
LikeLike
Hi tris, another interesting selection, even if some of them are repeats.
Pic 1: I didn’t recognize Poots, but the statue represents Carson. Hillsborough.
Pic 6: andimac is probably correct with “Rag Trade”, but my first thought was “Never Mind the Quality, Feel the Width”
Pic 12: andimac is again on the ball. I’m going for a Mk II. I think the earth component of the camouflage scheme has faded.
Pic 15: Loose lips sink hips
LikeLiked by 1 person
Loose lips sink ships. Ships, not hips.
In “South Pacific”, there is a line in a song that goes “She’s got a pair of hips just like two battleships”
LikeLiked by 2 people
I kinda guessed that. Sinking hips was probably not the aim of any military… unless they sank the rest of the body too. 🙂
LikeLike
LOL.
I’m sorry if there are repeats. Sometimes I forget to go back and delete a photo once I’ve used it and, as Munguin will tell you, I’m a bit ‘dottled’, I just forget they went up before.
Roddy’s had to pull me up on it before. I only lose a week’s wages though, so that’s OK 🙂
LikeLike
Only a week?
Shocking.
You should be grateful it’s not up to me 😁
LikeLiked by 2 people
Jeez, I am. Munguin may be a hard task master, but at least I occasionally get a ride in his executive jet.
I’d be lucky to get to play the part of a conductor on your bus.
LikeLike
A conductor?
Umm – when were you last on a bus?
LikeLiked by 1 person
We had conductors on Stagecoach up to the beginning of the pandemic.
I’ve not been on a bus for the last 18 months, but I was told Stagecoach won’t be bringing conductors back.
LikeLike
Pic 20: Gilbert o’Sullivan.
Now, there was a family guy.
He wrote a love song about his wife: Matrimony
He wrote a love song about his two-year old daughter: Claire
And he wrote a love song to his dog: Get Down
LikeLiked by 2 people
Nothing Rhymed?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ha ha ha.
I was listening to a couple of his songs yesterday. “Alone again, Naturally” is rather powerful.
LikeLike
Disappointing not to see any reference to Peter Sarstedt to whom I was married in the 1970s albeit briefly and barely remembered through the drug-crazed fug and fog that characterised our lives during those years.
I remember little of those days but for Peter’s insistence that ‘Where do you go to, my lovely?’ was written about Norma Dow who had a sweetie shop in Aboyne.
I was pledged to keep that secret until both of us had left this earthly vale of tears but it dawned on me, how will I tell people after I’ve died?
So now I break my pledge and enter into a lie spiral.
LikeLiked by 3 people
I meant to say “shame spiral”!!!
Peter laughed in the face of bourgeois convention, like with his continental quilts. He never covered them in a vulgar middle-class patterned fabric. We slept with the quilt itself caressing our radical skins. George Galloway (an acquaintance of Peter’s from their accountancy training days) got the idea from us. US!!
LikeLiked by 1 person
‘lie spiral’ rhymes better.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Now that you are no longer pledged to secrecy, the question on every Munguinite’s lips must be… “Did Peter ever have a relationship with Moira Anderson?” When you think of it, she could just as easily have been the inspiration for “Where do you go?” as the Aboyne sweetie shop lassie. If anything even more so as they would have mixed in the same circles when at the height of their vocalist careers.
Thinking a wee bit more, there’s clear evidence in the song, if slightly disguised. “Where do you go to, Moir’ lovely…” Listen again and hear for yourself how Peter pronouces what superfically seems to be ‘my lovely’ but is slurred into Moir’. There’s further evidence in the lines “When you go on your summer vacation, you go to…” Everone thinks the destination mentioned is Juan-les-Pins, but with Moira where else would it be but the Isle of Man? Listeners have been mishearing all this time!
We have not heard from biographer Beauregard for a while, so maybe he can
shed some further light on what seems to be a fascinating link between the Bhutan goddess and the boulevardier of St Michel.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You should have been a detective, John.
That logic is irrefutable.
Where is Beauregard when you need him…?
LikeLike
OH, wow. George Galloway had an idea?
(Even if it was copied!)
LikeLike
Poor Galloway. Anyone know how many votes he got in his attempt to become relevant at the last election?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Not very many!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_for_Unity
I see he’s off to offer himself somewhere in England in early July.
He must have no shame.
LikeLike
Beauregard back?
‘Moira’ was amusing at first but isn’t this joke wearing a little thin…?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, it works for me… 🙂
LikeLike
Well, in that case I fear you’re being grievously misled by Ms Palagrout. (who of course isn’t really Ms Palagrout)
‘Norma’ wasn’t really Norma, that was a pseudonym to protect an EXTREMELY important VIP.
The sweetie shop wasn’t really a sweetie shop – the goods on offer were definitely NOT ‘soor plooms’!
Aboyne wasn’t really Aboyne, it was in fact a decoy to distract the tabloid press while the real action took place nearly 20 miles away.
And of course Peter Sarstedt wasn’t really Peter Sarstedt.
But apart from that…..
I may have said too much already, you never know when MI5 might be watching.
😜
LikeLiked by 1 person
The thing is…. are you really Roddy?
LikeLike
Oh yes, but not really a bus anorak.
Bloody buses!!!
I much prefer a spot of gardening but I’m not allowed to talk about that..
LikeLiked by 1 person
🙂 🙂
LikeLike
That explains the mysterious closure of the sweetie shop for a whole week in March 1969.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I remember the concert! And Billy Connolly and Gerry Rafferty were in the Humblebums. Happy memories.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wow. Were you in the 12/6 seats, Dave?
LikeLike
No way. I was a poor student at the time. I don’t think being pals with the guy at the ticket office helped either.
LikeLiked by 1 person
🙂
LikeLike
The HumbleBums?
Goodness.
12/6 for a ticket too!!!
Love that bottom line (nothing to do with the support group) “Why not go too, my lovely”.
LikeLike
What a dilemma for you, Irene.
Wouldn’t it have been rather a long commute for poor Norma. Boulevard St. Michel is a fair distance from Aboyne.
And what did Sacha’s mate do all day while she was selling boilings?
LikeLike
If you close your eyes when you’re in Aboyne you could easily imagine you were in the Place des Vosges. And Aberdeen’s Beach Boulevard isn’t all that different from Cap d’Ail. If you’re fully drugged up.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LOL.
I’d not mind some of the stuff you’re taking!
LikeLike
Bloody Hell, Irene. Some people lead interesting lives.
Glad I live a boring one.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ha ha great…that weird TV set thing looks like an accident waiting to happen. Trip and fall on the spike, or less serious, knock your shin on the bottom part…glad it didn’t become the fashion. Better to be safe than sorry. Could that be a wee message now to the people of Scotland, given the UK is just not safe.
LikeLiked by 2 people
That TV unit would give you a migraine just looking at it, never mind the programmes.
LikeLiked by 2 people
It would go well with the new Andrew Neil programme.
LikeLike
Brillo News has had mixed reviews:
LikeLike
LOL Clean up time:
LikeLike
Um… it’s also HIDEOUS.
LikeLike
Given the original words for ‘eeny, meeny, miny, mo’…that Hoover advert is incredibly racist. And hilarious. I have a vicious sense of humour. So sue me. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Exactly what I thought! Wasn’t Jeremy Clarkson censored for reciting that rhyme?
And a gollywog caricature is definitely a no-no. But wots he got in his foot?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Dave, you’ll recall that part of the rhyme was, “catch a ****** by his toe”. I think it’s illustrating that he is indeed caught by the toe. What the relevance is to vacuum cleaning, I have no idea. None, obviously, but some copywriter obviously thought it was a witty way to work in “MINI”.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s an unpleasant rhyme by our standards, but I’m oretty sure it was considered harmless back then.
Actually you could replace the offensive word with “Tory”… and it would work.
Oh wait, even THEY think that’s offensive.
LikeLike
Aye, we’re all as one here. The old playground counting-out rhume is now totally beyond the the pale, as is the accompanying illustration. And wasn’t it miney-mo, not minor? The ad is dated from when? Mid to late ’50s at a guess. The price would have been a week’s pay (or more) for the average guy at the time. And a TV would surely have been a higherpriority, I think, if the money was there. The family could then watch the whole Black & White Minstrel Show on the BBC instead of just a wee sample in a vacuum-cleaner ad.
Maybe the gadget was used in of the B&WM Show song and dance routines? Good product placement to tie in with the ad. ‘Cobwebs and Dust’ would have been a good song to go with it but I think the ad came a bit before that. As you say, a good laugh all the same, but what was the ad agency thinking of? The only connection is in one part of the product name, and even that’s stretching it a bit.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Interesting.
Question: Did anyone have a golly when they were kids…along with a teddy maybe? And if so, were you fond of it?
It shows how much has changed that it was acceptable to use that in an ad.
No idea what it is in his foot… Anyone?
LikeLike
About the foot, Tris…see my reply to Dave Albiston above. I never had a golly as a kid but I well remember the gollies of Robertson’s Jams. If you saved up, I think, 10 golly stickers from the jars you could send away for a range of enamelled golly badges. Some paper bags in shops even had application forms printed on them with outlines where you stuck the golly stickers.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It was, to me, a bit strange that suddenly they were banned. My dad had one as a kid and he loved it and kept it.
It was an object of much affection.
LikeLike
Robertsons also did a range of ceramic figures. They were golliwogs playing various musical instruments. Again the idea was to collect the gollys from the jam and send off for these figurines
LikeLiked by 1 person
Cute. I wish I could work out what is offensive about them.
There’s nothing offensive about dolls or bears or (shhhh), penguins?
LikeLike
Back in the mid 70s I worked in Social Services, looking after children’s homes and nurseries. At the end of the financial year there was some money spare so a girl in the office was sent out to buy some toys. One of the items she brought back was a gollywog. She was promptly sent back with it!
Times change. That same department changed all the toilets in a home to half height for the kids. A few years later they were changed back again because kids in normal homes have to learn to cope.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, I never really thought about that.
I have a feeling that the toilets in my primary school must have been smaller, but I don’t really remember.
LikeLike
One of my old friends did his National Service in a colony- about- to -become -independent. Personnel were firmly instructed not to use the term *** so used the term ***** instead. I am sure you can work it out.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, it was.
You can’t possibly imagine it being used today, but back then…late 50s? it was totally acceptable.
LikeLike
6 – The Rag Trade.
LikeLiked by 1 person
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rag_Trade
That Emma Cannon was a funny looking wee thing…
LikeLike
15 – Looks like the Overgate, Dundee.
19 – Anti-social behavour in the 1930’s. The chap with the top hat should be standing on the right.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, Overgate.
LOL yes. Shocking etiquette
LikeLike
Bring back giant crunchies. Campaign starts here.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Bring back giant crunchies, Terry? Like the tyrannosaurus rex in Jurassic Park?!
LikeLiked by 3 people
I can see the association with “crunchy”
LikeLiked by 2 people
Yes, exactly like that. Mutant crunchies that evolve from a nuclear leak or a science experiment gone wrong. The bigger, the better, I say.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LikeLiked by 1 person
Let’s do it!
LikeLiked by 1 person
There was a crazy advert for chewie sweets back in the early Eighties.
It was a take-off of a Fifties B movie, and in about 30 seconds had a mad scientist, a dumb blond, and a lantern-jawed hero. Plus a rather cute Godzilla-like monster running amok. Talk about cliches.
Said hero offers up a semi-trailer load of Chews, which appeal to the monster’s sense of taste.
Punchline: “Chews, chewier than a 50-storey skyscraper”
If memory serves.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LOL
I wonder in the days of political correctness, if we are allowed to assume that scientists are mad or blondes are dumb… or for that matter that monsters like sweets!
LikeLiked by 1 person
That advert was hilarious. If I could find it and post it, I would. Unfortunately, I can’t remember the product name . . .
LikeLike
Chewits.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DIG-NTcx3Ojg&ved=2ahUKEwjh_c6du6TxAhWeA2MBHQahAxcQwqsBegQIIBAG&usg=AOvVaw0_8OCch6MbeRM9k9t1H9KX
LikeLiked by 2 people
Brilliant, Drew. All four adverts…
Thanks
LikeLike
Drew found all four.
LikeLike
Thanks, Drew. The first one was the advert I was thinking of. I must have been abroad when the sequels were broadcast. Just as well, really. The first one was best.
I watched some Eighties adverts this evening, and there was one for Kia-Ora orange juice that deliberately tried to look like an American cartoon from the 1930s. About as non-PC as you can get.
LikeLike
I have vague memories of Kia-Ora. It was water with a hint of orange colouring, and no taste whatsoever.
Is that the right stuff or have I slandered them?
LikeLike
No,tris, you have not slandered them. Do they still exist?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Coca-Cola has discontinued all but two Kia-Ora cordials. Sugar-free orange and blackcurrant) and doesn’t appear to advertise on TV, online or anywhere else.
It is a Maori greeting which has migrate4d into New Zealand English.
LikeLike
Kia-ora.
The Stooges, on the other hand…
LikeLiked by 1 person
Chewits!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sorry, way too late.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Do keep up.
LikeLike
Pics 3 and 4 are presumably linked by 2-10-0 wheel arrangement, 3 probably German from DR days, 4 Gordon from Longmuir military railway, a 2-10 -0 of Austerity type. Not sure how much the BR Standard 2-10-0 was a development of the wartime Austerity type.
Had forgotten what the start of the Overgate looked like in those days
Always liked these old Leyland buses which seemed to run so smoothly compared to the rattle and vibration of my local buses , which I later learned derived from their 5 cylinder engines. These old Leylands, in my recollections , didn’t even sound like diesels. Were they ?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I had a 5-cylinder Volvo for a while. Lovely engine.
Speaking of odd engines…
LikeLiked by 1 person
I wouldn’t have liked to go a long way in that! What a noise!
LikeLike
My stepfather had one. I remember how “springy” the gear stick was.
LikeLiked by 1 person
As always,Cairnalochy, you come up trumps with the trains. The 1943 ‘Austerity’ class commissioned by the War Department and based on the Stanier 8F class. The Stanier was deemed too complex for wartime production so the War Department’s redesigned Austerity engines used less steel and simpler engineering. The result was a rough ride for passengers, although they were mostly used as cargo haulers. All 150 were built in Glasgow by the North British Locomotive Company. The 25 remaining post-war were shedded at Motherwell until their withdrawal in 1962.
The ‘Kriegslok’ (war loco) was a German counterpart, dating from 1942. It too was subject to austerity. The description reads: “Classic production methods give way before the unavoidable exigencies of the time. The appearance was Spartan, simple, and neat. 6,400 were built very rapidly and the class became the world’s most numerous locomotive. ”
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very smart, Cairnallochy. John will perhaps elaborate.
The old Overgate looks infinitely more agreeable than either of the newer ones, I have to say.
Hideous mess.
I’m sure Roddy will answer the bus question.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ah, he did!!!
LikeLike
Yes. Leyland introduced their first diesel engine in 1933, it was quickly adopted by all the major bus operators on grounds of cost and efficiemcy.
SBG (Scottish Bus Group) place a big order for 250 such buses in 1933 and by the end of the decade petrol- engined buses had become quite rare
The Leyland engine was an 8.6 litre/6 cylinder job, used in pre-war front engined Tigers and Titans. I’m not sure what the 5 cylinder reference refers to…?
LikeLiked by 1 person
How do you all KNOW so much stuff?? Even if I did once know stuff, I have long forgotten it, I have a dreadful memory 🤔. I often have to phone my daughter, who has a brilliant memory, and ask her to remind me 🤣
LikeLiked by 1 person
We all know loads of different stuff… some of which must seem utterly useless …until you need it.
Not that most of the stuff I know is ever needed.
But one day…
LikeLiked by 2 people
My detailed knowledge of the Alexandrian wars of the successors, in particularly Demetrius Poliorcetes and his dad, Antigonus Monophthalmus will soon earn me a point in a pub quiz… It hasn’t in forty-odd years but —
LikeLiked by 2 people
Keep on trying, Conan…. one day
LikeLike
Conan, what is your opinion of the Ptolemies in Egypt? Was their regime a good thing or a bad?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Without them we wouldn’t have the Rosetta stone.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Now here’s a thought, Conan.
Without Napoleon Bonaparte, we wouldn’t have the Rosetta Stone.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I found this quite interesting. It’d be a good move up here too, I think.
https://nation.cymru/news/labour-in-ceredigion-want-wales-to-go-it-alone-and-ditch-uk-party/
LikeLiked by 1 person
What happened to Labour for Independence?
LikeLike
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jun/19/brexit-purity-breaking-up-union-ask-people-of-belfast
LikeLike