Mornington Crescent....

[BratFarrarsPony]

Well as I won the last game fairly and squarely despite not being as quick as the old lags....I will start another game.

Gants Hill

Hmm, it is only fitting that to mark the legacy of Dr Beeching we should go to

Berkhamsted

Good Evening MC-ers! I'm delighted that you all observed the customary hiatus in honour of St Valentine, however i'm concerned that all players seem to still be absent. Quite how Bacchanalian your observances of the Saint's Day were to necessitate such a lengthy pause in the proceedings I cannot quite comprehend. My own absence is of course due to having to bail dear Mummy Pingu out (again) after her romantic evening with #9 (husband, not bus) went sadly awry and... well... lets just say that the entire Family Pingu are no longer welcome at The Ritz, The Savoy, The Dorchester, and about 90% of the general Mayfair vicinity.

With that in mind

Tottenham Court Road

The desk sergeant told me that Mummy P had gone a bit too far this time: Pingu, don't you ever learn? Do not let her have more than one jar of German mustard at a time especially when she is going to be out and about with her exes or any of them. And I don't think she's told you the whole story (but then does she ever?) because the romantic evening started with no. 9 on the no. 9 bus and there it would have stayed if some spoilsport hadn't complained about the noise of the kettledrums and the smell of boiled cabbage.

TCR just won't do: you and by association we need to move right away for a few moves. I play Hobson's Variation (and the Tipperary Improved Version) to Merthyr Tydfil where the antics of Mummy P look tame compared with the habits of the Baptist Minister with the unframed photograph of the Emperor Franz Josef and the Newfoundland dog.

Cymru am byth is all very well, but we need to get back to the metropolis. I had a chat with the Commissioner over dinner, and he's agreed to turn a blind eye to our return, as long as mummy Pingu agrees to leave the crate of Cif bathroom cleaner in Merthyr Tydfil and Andrew gives up on the Elvis-inspired rhinestone jumpsuits.

Gospel Oak

I think the Commissioner was wise in his ruling. I have often been concerned that the vowel shortage in the Principality leads to some strange decisions.

Sadly the efforts of Network Rail to complete the simple task of a few gantries and wires before the feast of St Valentine was beyond them, and so the rail replacement bus rule must be invoked to get us out of the current mess. With its aid I move to Leytonstone. If Mummy Pingu had settled in the mock Tudor houses not too far from there I am sure it would never have been necessary for so many divorces and husbands.

Oh come on Saints - would you deprive Mummy P of her harmless hobby?

I have made the sacrifice and the rhinestone jumpsuits are a thing of the past.

White City - and let me gently remind you that it is February and last year was leap year so throstlings are negative except on the Waterloo and City Line.

Glad to hear it, Andrew, although, to be frank, I'm not sure the magenta tartan taffeta number with plunging décolleté is much of an improvement, especially with the Norfolk jacket and Doc Martens. But each to their own.

Tooting Bec

Doc Martens? In Tooting? Sounds like something from the now defunct Tooting Popular Front, even after they tried to recruit someone from Balham, which was a terrible mistake. Magenta is not a colour one associates with the southern end of the Northern line with its 1920s tiling and large print station names.

A bit late for some shoe shopping unless you do so via the internet. So I will move the short journey to Colliers Wood for now.

Colliers bloody wouldn't, not if I had anything to do with it.

But if we must stay in timber country Poplar it is.

I will have you know, Maud, that the outfit of which you speak with such disdain won Equal Third Prize at my neighbour's grandson's Year Two Fashion and Pekinese Dog Show in 1998 and I treasure it!

I dare say you do, Andrew, I dare say you do.

Finchley

A move to Finchley? Which one? In parts of north London there seems to be this need to have at least two stations with parts of the same name, which was probably the North Eastern Railway's attempt to scupper any game of MC. Possibly someone who was the Beeching era equivalent of Peter Mandelson and was a bitter and twisted man who had lost a game in the 1930s.

So I play the incomplete names rule which means we are back to Poplar as the starting point for the next move. I am not sure where the most famous dog show is held now, but there is an exhibition centre not too far from Poplar. So it is off to Prince Regent DLR station to see what is being exhibited.

Maud is obviously still living in a cave not from London, Saints, and it is wrong to mock the afflicted.

Your last move only allows one way up, but in deference to our provincial competitors the Victoria will be that in Manchester.

How very dare you cast such vile aspersions, Andrew. I am very much from London, but the civilised side south, not the boondocks north. I suspect nobody has actually been to Finchley since the Leaderene represented it in the mother of Parliaments, but I thought it an amusing jeu d'esprit.

So, now, the epicentre of cultural sophistication

Brockley

The belief of Sourh Londoners that they are part of Western civilisation is one of those odd phenomena which save life from being dull, isn't it?

It's time for something special so let's go to Ryde

So you've got a ticket to Ryde, eh? Let's keep with the insular theme

Douglas

They don't come more insular than that. When it's noon in London it's 1936 on the Isle of Man.

I play the Rule of Stations Which Should Have Been.

Lerwick

Naughty, Andrew! Simply because I like the name (and it's easily accessible by trawler):

Stromness

I think the trawler should return to the mainland and so it is to Heysham that it should land.

Incidentally, as per the conversation abut south London, no-one actually lives there, they just survive or exist.

Yes, Saints, but don't mock, they can't help it.

Stranraer, I think.

I am sending this from the Countess's tea-party. That guinea-pig of hers is up to its old tricks. So is the Rural Dean, bless him!

I cannot imagine there are tea parties for more than a day or two at the Countess, generous host I understand her to be.

So it is off to start the long journey south and stop at Keighley.

It starts as a tea-party, but you know the Countess, Saints, and I had to stay around until the Chief Constable found his trousers and the dog got the Bishop out of his kennel and she was being her usual difficult self about it.

Let's take it slowly. Sheffield Hallam.

Now that Storm Doris has abated, let us continue to the place that was once represented by Oliver Cromwell- Huntingdon

A nice enough little town which overshadows Ramsey

Phooey!

Brixton

This game has reached that exalted stage where only the Grandest of the Grand Masters, la crème de la crème de la crème, are left standing. But the Greater Good calls and I will, therefore, throw a lifeline to the second echelon by making a play which will give the Best and the Brightest of them a chance if they are bold enough to take it.

Salisbury