Wicksteed Park Again : The Boating Lake In Winter

Let us continue this sentimental journey back to Wicksteed Park (Oh Goody! – The Readership), down past the station for the miniature railway to the boating lake. The lake was created  by Charles Wicksteed rather high-handedly (by today’s standards) diverting the Ise Brook.  It is said that, when the lake was first opened to the public, Wicksteed [...]

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Spotters Spotted

There were no trains today between Bedford and East Midlands Parkway, due to “essential engineering works”.  Instead there was a complex web of “replacement bus services”.  Arriving at Leicester Station, I spotted a man taking photographs of the replacement buses.  Waiting for the bus back to Harborough, I saw another man writing the registration numbers of [...]

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Literally True : Turning in his Grave

Why this should be so I don’t know, but I do find that there is something strangely satisfying when something is both metaphorically and literally true.  The other day I was expressing my doubts about the proposed High Speed Rail Link between London and Birmingham.  In yesterday’s Standard I see that Lee Snashfold (spendid name!), director of the [...]

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The Victory Ball, by F.W. Skerrett : a Poem of Remembrance

My latest find at the Harborough Antiques Market, which seems to have the wonderful knack of providing me with things I didn’t know I needed, is this volume of verse – Rhymes of the Rail by F.W. Skerrett “The Locomotive Poet“, published in 1920 by Goodall and Suddick of Leeds.   I thought, from the cover, that [...]

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Andrew Norris : A Canterbury Tale – Epiphany

I came across this  recently – (prompted by Jonathan Calder\’s  recent mention of Mr. Culpeper in one of my favourite films – Powell &  Pressburger’s A Canterbury Tale).  It has been assembled by the artist (apparently – he’s previously unknown to me) Andrew Norris from three separate scenes in the film, and it made me think [...]

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Too green? John Betjeman at St Pancras

I would just like to announce that this blog has now entered a new era, and has taken a further step along the road to becoming a true Multi-Media Experience.  I have managed to acquire a digital camera (by inheritance from my daughter) so readers had better brace themselves for a brief, Toad-like outbust of [...]

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Poetry quiz

Just thought I’d totter from my (metaphorical) sickbed to pose the following question (probably a rhetorical one) – who is the author of the following poem?  The mystery bard was quite a well-known figure in his or her own day, and, although not best-known as a poet, it was a well-known fact that they wrote [...]

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LPs of the decade no. 4 : Funeral – Arcade Fire

And so the excitement mounts – or not – as the countdown continues.  More accordions on this one too.  I suppose it says something about how I have gradually come adrift from the mainstream of British culture over the past decade that I think I’d struggle to think of more than about ten pop albums released in that [...]

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This is the night train: a commercial break (featuring Audrey Tautou)

Thinking of things no-one else likes but I do (see Glorious ’39 – “I’d give it a wide berth if I were you – The Harborough Mail”) I am rather fond of the perfume adverts you get on the telly in the weeks leading up to Christmas.  I do appreciate that they appear at this [...]

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Credibility gap (and a bit of Glorious ’39)

A text message  from my daughter (14) – “Top up yr fone!  Its dangerous to have no cred” I think by “cred” she meant credit with the telephone company, rather than – as I think it would have meant in my young day – credibility, although, frankly, I sometimes suspect  I’m running fairly low on [...]

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