Mornington Crescent?!

[Eggsbutnobacon]

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

I may indeed be rapidly approaching the Shangri-La of retirement but disdain the description of former colonial. I have had, it is true, a distinguished and meteoric career in the KGB Diplomatic Service, but have never joined the gin and Jag set. Be that as it may

Tottenham Court Road

In that case Tottenham Hale. But the Overground is in Drippings this week so for ffs stay off the Jubilee Line, everyone.

Maud I saw you at the Defectors' Club bash in November 2015. And you saw me, if you pretended not to recognise the chap in the plus-fours with the parrot on his shoulder and the bucket of boiled spaghetti in his left hand.

Boiled spaghetti- were you told it grew on trees? No such thing of course, a bit like Ebbsfleet which is really Gravesend where some of the colonials started their voyage from dear old Blighty and were denied the opportunity to play MC when it was invented in 1906.

The Overground is in drippings indeed, and will remain so in the north eastern parts for a while yet, whilst the so-called GOB bit has this thing called electricity brought to it. A full 111 years after MC.

I will heed the words of Andrew and stay off the Jubilee line as it prepares to run all night from next month at weekends. Two tube lines south of the river at 3am is a worrying trend indeed. I shall take advantage of a re-opened station for my evening cuppa and off to Lea Bridge I go.

It's only mass-produced boiled spaghetti which grows on trees; the quality stuff is mined from a handful of pits in West Dakota, Cornwall, and of course Camberwell

I thought that Camberwell was famous for its carrots!

I play the Bakerloo line extension rule and go off to Lambeth North

The Camberwell carrot? Have you been hanging around with Withnail again, Saints? Uncle Monty is of course quite a nifty MCer, although not to be trusted after the second bottle of crème de menthe has been opened.

Since things are so lively south of the river, let's go to

Beckenham Junction

No carrots here, have only been hanging around with I, not Uncle Monty or Withnail.

It is but a short south of the river journey to *Bromley South^ for a morning cuppa.

Tea is forbidden in Bromley, didn't you know? It's all coffee there. Rule 123(xvii)(e)(iii), of course.

Try Caterham.

The next President but three of the Law Society comes up before the Grand Council on 31 September on a charge of using the Central Line during Knockings. Please go and heckle. Usual pub.

No wonder I had to settle for a mediocre Americano in Bromley.

I play the rail replacement rule and go to Purley Oaks, so as not to be retracing my steps. I am surprised with the Southern traumas that anyone even gets to Caterham on a train these days.

Purley, squire? Famous place, as someone once said.

It's no good looking to the Law Society for advice and guidance. They've been completely useless ever since the second general secretary - remember her? - got caught bending a Holman's Triangular in a (justly doomed) attempt to get to Chancery Lane on a Friday in Lent. She was lucky her friends in Fleet Street and the D Notice committee agreed to a news blackout, or it would have been two years in chokey, or more if they knew about the pineapple.

So, in memory of her

Haywards Heath

Not even in that sacred memory will I lower myself to Hayward's or anybody else's Heath - standards or standards. And that's before considering the guinea-pig and the giant size bottle of Persil.

Canterbury East, I think!

You're certainly not one to shy away from controversy, are you, Andrew?

Basildon

Hmph. I suppose my only option is a lateral splice to

Fenchurch St

The trouble with laterals (apart from their being redolent of that appalling rubbish the Tipping Point) is that they bring the Third Proviso to the Second Annexe to the First Exceptoin to the Schedule to Rule 138 (xiv) into play as it was before the Montevideo Revision in 1938 - which leaves no alternative to

Bristol Parkway

where we are therefore now headed - notwithstanding the little matter of the giraffe, the Archdeacon, and the Double Cheeseburger.

Dear me. I have just had to ask the under-butler's factotum to bring me an ironed copy of the Radio Times, in order to establish that The Tipping Point is a game of chance aired on commercial television and so never to be watched above stairs. I am surprised that you watch it, Andrew, although I suppose that after that unfortunate interview with the Serious Fraud Office and the subsequent P45 you must have some time on your hands. Employers can be so unforgiving these days.

To bring a little finesse to proceedings

Swindon

Spoiler alert: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mornington_Crescent_(game)

Maud Of course I don't watch it. But there is one of those televising machines in the junior staff quarters (I now regret allowing it, but we all make mistakes) and word of what appears on it occasionally reaches me.

What on earth, however, is a "P45"? I fear you have made it up: it is not in the Dictionary and if it was real Dr Johnson would not have omitted it.

As for the young man from that Office which you demean yourself and us all by mentioning, I sent him packing with a flea in his ear. Of course, I told him to call in at the kitchen if he required sustenance; noblesse oblige and I had given firm instructions to the proprietors of the local hackney-carriage ventures that he was to be left to walk the seven miles there and back from Fowey.

Fowey- what has been happening during my absence on a matter than must remain unspoken about?

For six whole days?

I move before there is a Beeching closure to Tavistock

Come off it Saints - if the Bench had given you the option of a fine you would not have been AWOL. You really must overcome that little weakness of yours. Take up knitting instead. Or bathing in Golden Syrup. Or both simultaneously.

Haverfordwest and if you don't like it take two Fordwests.

Well I play the planned tourist line to Llareggub, as we have to being at the beginning of the next stage of the game.

Good grief. This game seems to be consumed by a lethargy, the like of which I haven't seen since the Rear Admiral was disqualified, during the heatwave of 1976, for playing a Deacon's Lateral while filling the waterbed from the standpipe. The dowager marchioness was most definitely not amused.

I feel then that it's my duty to pep things up by playing

Hanger Lane

That's the stuff to give the troops Maud; but be careful, if you play anther Central Line station within ten moves make sure the mustard is English, not that French rubbish.

Before I play the next and inevitable move, has anyone seen the Cathedral Organist since the transplant surgery? How did it go? Can she sit to her instrument yet?

Daventry

I haven't seen the organist for about three years myself. I fear that going back to the Midlands is not a good idea for a search party, as Bear Grylls survival skills may be needed. Since I lost my bag at a camp in Gilwell in the early 70s I cannot be trusted with such outward bound adventures.

So I think it should be back to the smoke as it were and to avoid the Central line, move to ^Ealing Common*

And upon discovering there is some issue with the lighting, down to Turnham Green

As you know, I am always eager to give our gallant troops whatever they need by way of sustenance and support.

Do we know much about Bear Grylls as an MCer? I suspect his play may be a little basic, but he'd have been a good bloke to have at the Nairobi play-offs in '72. After that incident with cousin Susannah, the game warden and the baked potato, we could have used Bear's knot-tying abilities and skills with a whittling knife. But I digress. I came in to remind you that the Victoria line is in munnings until Tuesday and so we're off to

Willesden Junction