Mornington Crescent rides again

[Andrewofgg]

Maida Vale. Just to make it difficult.

those customs officers can be VERY thorough. it was an eye watering experience which left me unable to walk in stilettos without discomfort for some weeks.
Living in the country as I do for most of the year, I am unfamiliar with these new fangled trams and their destinations. However I find myself residing in the Metropolis tonight for business purpose and am not a stone's throw from St James' park

Well dementedma you need to exercise a little more imagination next time you venture into the business of smuggling chocolate nougat bars.

Wrong city, right station; and from the station you meant we are transported on wings of song and the Tyne Bridge to Gateshead.

Hassocks

And I shall say no more

I shall quickly move through Gatwick Airport without any need to pass customs, as I remain on the train. I alight at Purley Oaks after a change of train. No sign of Mr Angry, that invention of Steve Wright, who used to be on the wireless in the afternoon. Time listening to his drivel would be better spent playing the game of games, of course.

After a day spent on the underground and the dubious delights of City Airport, I summon my last strength to play a feeble half Flitch to canning town

I am slowly and painfully recovering from the shock of learning that an aerodrome has been established at Gatewick. How absurd. Heston was sufficient for all the needs of London for such an establishment.

We need somewhere peaceful and quiet and will therefore march to March.

Quiet is hardly the word to describe March. Moribund, possibly.

Ely

Maud - after the business at Montevideo in '74 of the tin of Brasso, the Confederate flag, and the albino hamster, you know as well as I do that you dare not show your face in Ely. The arrest warrant may have been withdrawn but there are some long memories (and some former Home Guard weapons) still around. The Archdeacon and her husband use your picture for target practice.

For your own safety I will see you in ten. I will be driving the blue and green striped Maserati with the secret compartment and wearing a district jacket and revolving bow-tie. We will not be noticed while I smuggle to the safety of Merthyr Tydfil.

Well, thank you, dear heart, but I’ve noticed what time you were up this morning (another all-nighter in the club above the Neasden Kwik-Save, I’m guessing). Are you fit to drive?

Anyway, I’ll meet you on the corner in 5 minutes. I’ll be wearing my customary Givenchy shift, accessorised with diving helmet and gum boots. And thence to

Tower Hill

I make the shortest above ground move that I think is possible in the game of games and move to Tower Gateway DLR.

Sorry to have gone AWOL - I just hadn't the heart to tell the Archbishop that I couldn't babysit the pet chimp again. But I do wish the bloody animal would stop singing The Lost Chord to the tune of I've Got A Lovely Bunch Of Coconuts.

Ventnor - and Droppings are negative so yah boo shucks!

Did you stand Maud up again, Andrew? Though she should know better after the time you abandoned her at Blaenau Ffestiniog to go chasing after an errant flamingo.

On that note:

Porthmadoc

Tsk, tsk. If we don’t spend a greater proportion of our time in the metropolis, someone will inevitably invoke rule 493 (vii) (b) and then, even with droppings being negative, we’ll be in stubbing for a fortnight. So, without further ado, and for the sake of versatility

Victoria

There's nothing wrong with stubbing in a good cause and experience has taught me that some of the places we visit outside the metropolis are almost civilised - and in any event they won't get better without visits from people like us who can sow the good MC seed.

I propose a compromise. Manchester Victoria, and I am happy to say that there is nobody on Platform 12 except the usual woman with the chihuahua and the bag of barley sugars, and she's quite harmless as long as, well, you know, and we wouldn't, would we, unless Pingu forgets again!

There is usually no-one on platform 12 at Manchester Victoria most days. No-one on platforms 7, 8, 9,10 and 11 either. Unless in some mysterious novel written by someone in their local coffee shop.

So I play the Manchester Metrolink rule and move to Manchester Piccadilly

On the day of the Boat Race? There's imaginative and there's foolhardy!

Remember the story from Goodbye to All That: Meet me down in Piccadilly.

Barrow-in Furness and we will meet again in BST. We should never have let the railway companies inflict a single time on the whole country, should we?

Before supposed snow, or Easter 'improvement' works mean we are unable to move, or have to play the bus rule, I move a bit further south, to Wigan North Western. They do a nice pie in the pub by Wigan Pier.

In the light of the slow progress on this thread the Inner Committee of the Grand MC Council has met in secret session and has decided that

(1) Rule 1087(b)(viii) is suspended in its application to the East Coast Main Line until 31 April;

(2) Hoddings are negative; and

(3) The matter of the Grenadier Guardsman, the spiny anteater, and the eiderdown is not to be mentioned again.

At that point the meeting broke up; news arrived that MummyPingu had been at the old mother’s ruin again and unless we got there quickly was going to get married again to Number Seven - yes, that’s right, the former Jesuit with the strange taste in pets and much else - at Didsbury.

Alas, we got there too late and so the best we can do is throw biodegradable confetti as the happy couple depart for their honeymoon in

Bexhill

I understand that the cold weather has left the south of England at least for now. So a move to Lewes to sample the town's finest beer seems a good move.

Good news. Some arms have been twisted - a certain senior judge had to be reminded about the photos of the orang-utan and the box of Quality Street - and MummyPingu will be sorted out with a decree of nullity on Tuesday morning as soon as the courts are open. Some of may remember the same being done for Britney Spears, also a rather eccentric amateur Crescenter.

Lewes is pleasant enough especially when it leads on to Brighton.

Whence the natural (but, I hope, not obvious) progression is

Chelmsford

Two counties who have been the champions of cricket this century seems appropriate places to go to as the cricket season approaches. With I think the use of the heritage line rule in Kent, which was unexpected.

I do not know if I should be concerned that I have never been invited to the Inner Committee, even though I am a relative novice after only 22 years playing the game of games. I shall overlook this though.

I shall move to the rural tranquility of Ongar using the closed lines rule.

Maud you may occasionally be obvious - you know what and when I mean but my lips are sealed - but never your play.

Ongar has improved so much since Providence and London Transport closed its connection with that vulgar outcrop of the standard gauge known as the Central Line - my fellow Crescenters, it goes to Leytonstone - that I am tempted to linger.

'Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus,
Another thing to fall

as dear old Bill Shakespeare said the year he made it to the quarter-finals of the Warwickshire All-Comers Amateur event with a reverse fling to Appleby.

I think we have not really moved, so go from Ongar to North Weald.