Mornington Crescent?!

[Eggsbutnobacon]

Will somebody please please explain to me what this is all about?

And thence to

Regent's Park

Maud that is a legal but rather boring move. Fortunately you have left open an unusual but fascinating play, which only the most senior among us will have seen before: namely a Trillington's Triangular Transverse. It was done in an exhibition match at Cairo in '57 (about which, perhaps, the least said the soonest mended) but not so far as I know in competitive play since - according to legend - Amsterdam in '28 when the ex-Kaiser turned up and reminded us why he was regarded as the best Royal MC-er in the world before that unfortunate business in 1914-18.

So today I will plead Rule 137(vii) and play it to Lowestoft.

Oh, and where did the Chief Justice of East Carolina leave her umbrella, has anyone seen it?

Well, that is certainly the first time that anyone has called my play boring. The archdeacon and the principal bassoonist commended me only the other day on my originality, after I reminded them that, since the '77 Convocation ruled that Singleton's Sledge was a lawful move when the Piccadilly line is in snibbings, I was entitled to play it to Hatton Cross.

But, for now,

Skegness

Andrew - I have the umbrella, after some rather tense negotiations with people who didn't like to tell me their names. Tell her to be more careful next time, eh?

Nice work, Maud. And thence to

Whitby

Irene: Did you manage to get the smell of olive oil off it?

Whitby reminds me of Hoffnung - one of the best semi-pro MCers of his day as anyone will confirm who remembers Hartlepool in '47 - and his line that There is a French widow in every bedroom offering delightful prospects so in his honour Grenoble.

Vraiment? Alors, une traversée Entwistle vers

Juan les Pins

Und jetzt fahren wir direkt nach Flensburg

Allora!

Milano Centrale

I am delighted to announce that at the top-secret meeting of the MC Council in Starbucks at Cannon Street the Cardinal waived Special Rule 128(vi) and thereby made possible a Rivingbury Reflex to Aberystwyth which at this time of year is just as bloody awful as at any other time of year and a place to get away from a good jumping-off point.

In the interests of history the Council also lifted the long-standing ban on mention of Cologne '64, the orang-utan, and the tube of Trebor Mints and I will be placing my contemporary record in the Library of the University of Pyongyang.

Apologies for the prolonged absence. Those of you acquainted with the viscount will understand why, so I need say no more.

Leyton

Maud I know. The viscountess opened her heart to me at two a.m. today and I have just got off the phone. Your generosity is as ever a wonder to behold.

The Dean of St Thomas's College Oxbridge sends her regards - his regards after next week, of course, and you should see the three-piece pinstripe waiting in the wardrobe in the Decanal Lodgings!

Ealing Broadway.

Bad luck, Maud. I hope you've managed to restock the gin supplies.

Old St

Come off it, Irene, not even the viscount and all his household could dent Maud's supply of gin in less than a month. Mind you, she buys raw rubbish or perhaps like me she has a small cache of quality hooch hidden away for herself.

I'm in the sort of skittish mood where only a Campbell's Contrary will satisfy so from Old Street to Birmingham New Street.

Oh phooey! Everybody knows that I've been teetotal since that incident in Bulawayo in '76, when the pineapple in the pina colada was off and the quarter-finals had to be postponed for a month while the entire UK team was in traction.

For all dads everywhere

Brentford

You are teetotal like the Pope is a Protestant, Maud. There's a dedicated landfill site for your empty bottles. I should know. I have seen it. It's in Isleworth.

Bulawayo '76 would be the biggest scandal in MC history of it wasn't for Oslo '78. Did that Icelandic Minister ever get her job back? Or her tights?

I have been absent but the daughter of the Viscount has nothing to do with it.

I think a move to Twickenham seems appropriate.

The paternal units were in Bulawayo and Oslo of course. Pure co incidence (the judges decided) mater was officiating the long and very boring game in Bulawayo between Niven and that awful woman whose name escapes. Obviously that was a front so she could keep dibs on the Colonel as the Bolshoi, as ever, were in town. We all know how, err, resolute and unshockable, mater can be. But I remember her coming back to the villa, downing the last extant bottle of Gordon's orange gin, with a haunted look in her eyes. "Slinky m'boy" she uttered as she slid down the wall, "never play an embedded Carte Rouge. Promise me. Oh and don't wear that dress again, does nothing for your complexion"
Anyway for the last hurrah of Pride, it's off to York and a nightcap or six at Evil Eye.

Slinky Your mater could terrify an army at five hundred paces with the look in her eye. I'm sure you have obeyed her injunction - I remember her cousin's daughter (you know, the one we don't talk about, had a funny habit involving a guinea pig, lucky to get away with probation if you ask me) telling me how she used to wake up screaming in the night at the thought of having incurred her displeasure.

Today being the solstice, and with the weather to prove it, we are going to get as near as we can to Stonehenge (all those "Druids" not seeing the sunrise in the pissing rain HAHAHAHAHA) by going to Salisbury.

Which of course takes us neatly back to

Bulawayo

Well I thin continuing with this South African theme, we should remember the area with Blomfontein Road and South Africa Road, so its off to White City and the Central line we go.

Then I'm going to Redcar.

Then I'm taking the red eye to

Yellowstone Park

For all that's unholy Andrew, why?!?
Well I feel like some decent burritos, so Union Station for me.

good god-this is just insanity!!!
can i call things firmly back to order and say Pimlico?

Slinky, since they took away your senior status, and this is not the place to discuss why, things have changed and Union Station is no longer what it was. And you don't know why Redcar because you don't know why Redcar.

Oh root, what a peacemaker you are! And yes, Pimlico is a good old standby. And a very good good jump-off for St Albans Abbey - although I believe it is closed on Sunday. Like New Zealand.