The Old Railway Line visit August 30 2026

Went to Railway line with Ian for breakfast this morning. We ordered. 'Railway Breakfast ', scorning the much cheaper 'early starter',
W.J George sausage, bacon, field mushroom, grilled tomato, saute potatoes or hash browns, beans.
When it arrived we noticed they had forgotten the eggs , which I might add came as standard. Neither of us felt like sending them back.
At the end as we assembled empty plates for collection I said to Ian, "At least let me write on this napkin 'You forgot the eggs you bastards!!'.
We laughed and left.
We like it there

Ron

Just remembering Ron, one of the people with 'learning difficulties ' Ann worked with. Ann loved him and I came to like him too over the years. Ron loved children and he would stand at his door watching the children go to school. Must have been very disturbing for a parent if they didn't know him and. that he could never harm them.

He is buried in that cemetery near Cradoc Close where he lived. I hope to go and see if I can find his grave and leave something there.

They used to go on holiday every year and a member of staff would go with them. 

My favourite mental image of him is when on one of these jaunts he opened the door to his room, naked expecting the bathroom and accidentally locked himself out. He then wandered round the corridors of the hotel looking for help. A chance encounter with this 'evil' looking homunculus in the dingy corridors of a rambling hotel would have been horrific.

I liked Ron.

Mechanics

It is bewildering the pace of change.
Occasionally when seated in deep thought I have been startled by the sound of a runaway marble rolling down a metal tray. It turns out to be the last 4 or 5 feet of the toilet roll spontaneously making a last desperate run for freedom leaving the inner cardboard tube bare.
Several times I have tried with pencil and paper to work out the mechanics of this phenomenon, unsuccessfully.
Let me digress. When I was doing my degree with the OU one of the great memories is of the time when we all constructed our own mass spectrometers out of a razor blade, a small lens and the cardboard tube of a toilet roll. To see the spectral line of sodium with an instrument two thirds of which could be found in our bathroom really was a proper use of the word amazing.
Anyway this morning as I retracted the last couple of pieces of paper I suddenly saw that there was no cardboard tube !
My first thought was could I get another 24 rolls of toilet paper out of Morrisons for this obvious product defect. But then the sad truth dawned It was intentional.
It was part of the same process that causes chocolate bars to shrink.
This does not advance the cause of civilisation.