The Bluestocking: the one where AI finally learns what a blackbird is (we hope)

[Magpiecomplex]

Welcome all, New Year (nearly), new thread!

Sir Nigel Presley - his train would no doubt be 16 coaches long, and would take his baby away
I love that story, and I love that your DS now works with his childhood obsession

@MarieDeGournay I keep missing Mallard at the NRM, it always seems to be out being repaired! The Gresley must have been North Yorkshire Moors, although I couldn't say for sure. We've visited so many steam railways they have a tendency to blur.

Do I detect a note of 'God, not another steam railway!' in your reply?

Although I love the Gresley A4s - it's hard not to, they tick a lot of boxes including looking so incredibly cool - steam leaves me cold, so to speak. I really like diesel locos. Less showy. Steam engines are so melodramatic, all that hissing and clunking and 'look at me' vents of steam before they'll even move an inch.. prima donnas🙄
Diesel locos just get on with it

Pedantry Corner Warning

These are truly lovely, though the mane on the lion indicates it's a picture of me and Mr MyrtleLion, except the real Mr Myrtle is as bald as a coot.

The phrase ‘bald as a coot’ has been around since 1430 and was made in coots, ie bald at the front of their heads. But it’s not just to do with lack of hair. The word ‘bald’ actually derives from the old English word ‘bala’, meaning ‘white patch’, which the bird’s white frontal plate resembles. This distinctive shield stands out against the dark head when held low in displays of aggression.

So here are pictures of me and a coot.

Pics

What, pray, is this? The forecast for yesterday was 'light rain & a gentle breeze' or vice versa, then this showed up. It didn't settle & was mostly gone this morning, but still. I mean.

Ironically, there's a myrtle in the back garden & I should've snapped it in the falling snow. Oops. Too late now, she'll just have to be a lion. I haven't got one of those in the back garden, thank goodness.

I got a bit worried back there when inkymoose corrected myrtle about.. myrtles. A definite frisson from that blunt 'No they aren't' .

Ay-up, I thought, this could end badly:

Moose: No they aren't. They have a different genus: Vaccinium myrtillus bilberries; Vaccinium corymbosum - blueberries; Myrtus communis - common myrtle.
Myrtle: Oh yeah? want to make something of it? step outside and say that again!
Moose: Say what again? Vaccinium Myrtillus, Vaccinium Corymbosum and Myrtus Communis ?
Myrtle: Yeah, that's right - Vaccinium Myrtillus, Vaccinium Corymbosum and Myrtus Communis - say that again if you think you're hard enough!
Moose: OK then, Vaccinium Myrtillus, Vaccinium Corymbosum and Myrtus Communis - I said it again, so what are you going to do about it, then, Myrtus Communis?
Myrtle: Myrtus Communis, is it? Yeah well for Alces Alces Gigas you're not very gigas, are you, Bambi?

But it didn't come to that at all, this is the Bluestocking, not the Queen Vic, and Moose and Myrtle are not* Mitchells, *so it ended with a gracious
<deep bow honouring inkymoose>
from Myrtle instead.

Would've been fun though😊

It may not be the Queen Vic, but we are all (growl) faaaaambly

When I am proved wrong I try to graciously acknowledge it.

Or stomp off in a grump.

But I'm quite comfy here in Pedantry Corner and I would have to put down my cocoa, get up, put on my wellies, find a gerbil to provide a woolly hat and gloves etc.

Which would ruin the stompy effect.

@MarieDeGournay - ds1 was also a fan of diesel locos - especially Class 50s - dh used to maintain some of them, when he was an engineer at a London train care depot, and had a book of pictures of all the Class 50s, which ds1 read and reread until it was falling apart. I kept sellotaping it back together because he loved it so deeply - and recently we found it again, and gave it to him. Maybe our granddaughter will get hooked on trains too.

He couldn’t say Class 50, when he was very little, so called them Car Fifi trains.

Apparently there used to be an elderly lady who loved the class 50s too - she used to feed them Smarties (by which I mean she poked smarties into a hole in the loco. It didn’t do any damage, so they just let her carry on doing it.

@MarieDeGournay I must admit I'm a steam girl. Love a bit of melodrama! My favourite holiday was the one in the holiday "cottage" (flat) that backed onto the Ffestiniog platform at Porthmadog.

But we have visited an awful lot of steam railways...

I'm a bit ambivalent about steam railways.
Very much dislike the ones which burn goodness knows what sort of fuel and produce noxious black smoke (I seem to remember the Llanberis Lake Railway being a bad juxtaposition of horrible emissions in a lovely place).

Otoh there's nothing else that sounds like them. We took a ride on the West Somerset Railway this year, which is a very nice line - such a shame it wasn't allowed to join up to the network at Taunton.

AI seems to be deeply confused about steam trains. These are the best of the attempts to get a magpie driving the Mallard.

Coots are aggressive stinkers and terrible terrible parents, don't encourage them. Or invite them in.

I meant to say, Woley, I love the story of the lady feeding smarties to diesel locos. Shades of Thomas the Tank Engine there!
MIL is terrible for shortening names and always used to refer to Thomas the Tank. Which conjures up an entirely different set of stories. Henry and Gordon as a pair of Challengers would be quite impressive!

Noted!

Also he's male. So he's been ordered to The Staunch Ally. Where he seems quite content. 🤔

Thomas is Tomos y Tanc (Thomas the Tank) in Welsh.

Tomos yr Injan Danc is too long and loses the alliteration.

Interesting! MIL is from Yorkshire though, and I'm fairly sure doesn't speak Welsh.

Another lovely train story thank you Woley!

I had to google the Class 50 because I thought it might also be my favourite, but that is the Class 55, the Deltic.

It's sweet when little ones are totally obsessed with something that they can't pronounce, isn't it? - I knew a little lad who was obsessed with a football team, knew everything about it, had to be brought to all the home games - but he couldn't pronounce it for years!

I don't know what to make of feeding Smarties to a locomotive, I'm hovering between awwww!!!!!... and eh???????

Cootchie cootchie coo little train ...

@Chersfrozenface Hopefully you found your hospital related items and you are enjoying your night before the big day.

I hope all goes well tomorrow and that your surgeon isn't actually a beetle!!

Used to go loco spotting with my brothers at the nearest big interchange every so often. Liked steam trains then, still quite like them now. Of the diesels, the only one I liked was the Deltic - at least it had some character. So I concur to a degree with Marie.

Thank you, @Boiledbeetle. I did indeed find my items.

Getting a teensy bit twitchy now, and also hoping for a non-coleopteran surgeon.

DH got very excited when he saw a Deltic a few years ago, his long-dormant train spotter emerged. I think it was actually 2 working together, he reckoned they were hauling a load of some radioactive material to Sellafield .

What a marvellous Myrtle you are you are, what a marvellous Myrtle you are.

I'm glad you are happy in pedantry corner. It's been pretty busy for the last couple of days hasn't it?

I must apologise for being blunt. I'm glad it did not lead to an EastEnders style showdown. When I was a little tiny moose, it was noted by my fond parents that I only had a very tiny little shrivelled organ of tact. It was considered to be missing until about 1983, when a vestigial shred was found on a dental x-ray (I don't know where they were pointing the x-ray camera).

As a consequence, whenever I am a little bit under the weather, tired or out of sorts in any way, whatever little tiny bit of tact I had at my disposal completely vanishes.

Thank you for your honourable and kind response! And here is your hot chocolate.