Could Trainspotting be a new fetish for me? Like most things, a fetish has to start somewhere, making me suspect that yesterday’s activities may have had a tenuous link to having been restrained the evening before, strapped to an ice block.


In my previous blog, I described grumping my way up a bit of a tortuous hill having developed a sexagenarian pain in the foot. My life’s partner, Shan, always ready with some patent cure to prevent me becoming a complete pain in the arse, declared that the solution lay in cooling the injury down. I’d like to report that a small crowd of campers gathered to witness my ritual humiliation but it would be a lie.

Instead, I was strapped unceremoniously to a small plastic ice pack, more properly used in a miniature cool bag, using the strap that, in normal life, keeps Campy’s awning from blowing away. In order to complete the humiliation, the above photo was taken as evidence to be used for future blackmail. OK, so it was me who had been rabbiting on about getting a steam train from Corfe Castle to Swanage to meet The Queen in the morning. I believe this was to ensure that I wasn’t going to be able to get out of it when I was sober the next morning. A further bribe of fish and chips had induced me into this predicament in the first place.
All so that I could hobble my way down the rough-hewn byway to Corfe Castle to take up our assignation with steam and, unbeknownst to me, also with The Queen.

During one of those often tedious moments while waiting for a delayed train, serendipity took over when I confessed to a couple of charming steam train volunteers that I wished to take some photos of the steam locomotive to send to a friend. Expecting the normal knowing nudge and wink when using the “asking for a friend” explanation, I incurred genuine interest of the kind that turns bucket list tourism into genuine travellers’ experiences. I could easily have dug my hole a bit deeper when “confessing” that my friend was South African.
“Which part,” one of the volunteers asked. He was manning the Corfe Castle railway museum.
“Durban,” I replied. “East Coast.”
“He’s not part of the Umgeni Steam Railway, is he?”
This was too detailed for me. I’ll have to verify with Jeremy Hathorn (Jem) when we’re next in contact. I believe it to be true though.
Turns out this gentleman from Corfe Castle knew, and had traveled on, just about every steam railway in South Africa that had been extant in 1987 ... this last time he had visited the country. He’d also traversed many of the spectacular mountain road passes while on his railway quest (just like Jem, too). Apologising for gaps in his memory, he proceeded to reel off the names of all the passes between the Little and Great Karoo.
I also learned about the “Ficksburg line” and the last train that tried to traverse it in its neglected, dilapidated state. Beats Last Train to Clarksville any day. I was beginning to find out why people become trainspotters, many of whom lined the track between Corfe Castle and Swanage. There’s a visceral source of excitement when these iron beasts chug across spectacular countryside puffing steam from giant pistons and using it to toot a deafening whistle.
With all of my newfound excitement you may be justified in asking why I haven’t provided pukka illustrations ... I will, just as soon as I work out how to get them off my pukka camera while out in the bundu.

In the meantime, as soon as we arrived in Swanage we discovered that the iron roads had been central to the seaside town’s former glory. There must’ve once been a tram that skirted the bay, at least as far as the genteel pier. Swanage still has its attractions but the fine old buildings that cascade down the hill to the sea have been diluted by the more modern temples to fast food. As fish and chips may have delighted Victorian visitors to the seaside, perhaps while they rode the tram, it is possible that the older buildings remain behind some of the once-were-modern facades.
Covid-19 did bring a treble highlight to our brief sojourn in Swanage. We had to sit outside for our own interpretation of lockdown and spotted a brand new facade sporting fresh seating overlooking the fine bay. It was our first restaurant/bar/cafe meal since our tedious social distancing had begun.

A car drew up on the esplanade opposite and we were rewarded for our adventures by a wave from this fine lady smiling from the rear window of her chauffeur-driven Ford Fiesta.
Seemed apt somehow.

No trip to the seaside in England is complete without a walk on a pier and an ice cream. Swanage’s Wooden pier is sufficiently restrained to make it a peaceful haven and provide an opportunity to enter into dialogue with the local people fishing. Shan was particularly taken with a young woman’s minuscule fishing rod and asked her about it.
“It’s a Kayak fishing rod,” she responded, seemingly delighted that a fellow human being had taken an interest. My dear wife was delighted that she would have something to tell her sister, Kerry, about. Kerry is a world class fisherperson who has represented her country and lives in Hermanus in the Western Cape, a province of South Africa. Maybe it was ESP but Kerry phoned Shan and a typically raucous sisterly conversation took place between the three of them overheard by most of Swanage pier. I say three, because their 91-year-old Mum was there too and would, these days, rather be a sister.

And so it was we returned to the antique splendour of our steam railway. After our sumptuous lunch it was no disappointment that the buffet was closed. We’d learned a little more about how wonderful it is to have the time to stop and talk to people. The natural instinct seems to be that questions will not be welcome. How wrong an instinct this is. Show an interest and I’m prepared to wager the vast majority will be touched and delighted.

Shan tolerated my hobbling the mile back up to Campy, all revved up to complete this chapter by the time I went to bed yesterday evening.
I tolerated the interruption to despatch the “biggest hornet ever known to man, must be a super Vespa.”

Shan very seldom interrupts her teeth-cleaning for such trivia and so I’m completing these roaminations this afternoon from a completely different location. C’est la vie.

It is so peaceful now after yesterday’s excitement that it’s hard to imagine anything other than the lone Robin twittering away in the tree beside Campy.

Having endured unsilenced, high-revving two-stroke everything all Sunday as neighbours and allotment holders set about their autumn chores at home, we were relishing the prospect of peace in the sylvan delights of our wooded campsite near the South Coast of England.

“KABOOM 💥” a massive bang rent the air, at what seemed like dawn. Campy shuddered and assembled dogs began yapping. As if to provide the rhythm accompaniment to this awful symphony some petrol powered piece of  equipment burst into life close by.

Admittedly the equipment operator was showing the consideration of using a silenced 4-stroke piece of kit ... something that is mandatory in France but not here yet. Also, the second explosion that vibrated through our bones suggested the lawn mower driver was being doubly considerate under covering fire. Although this only became obvious a while later where the staccato of machine gun fire became audible. It was too much to hope that we were witnessing Jimi’s resurrection at the nearby Isle of Wight as these were the real deal and we realised that military manoeuvres are not uncommon with the firing ranges nearby.

Battle sounds were omnipresent throughout the day, providing an awful authenticity to our visit to Corfe Castle 

No wonder that bits have kept falling off this fabulous pile of rocks.

Bits started falling off me, too, although metaphorically rather than physically.

They felt physical, though, as the precipitous rough-hewn descent pounded away at the ball of my left foot.

During the castle visit, while moaning away and taking inconsequential snaps of its innards,

my observant wife was taking in the model village scene below.

I grumped my way back up the hill and requested leave to have an afternoon nap. 
“Will you be able to sleep with all the explosions?” Shan asked. They had continued throughout the day.
I was convinced I was able and was soon snoring, blissfully unaware that she’d taken herself off to investigate the possibilities of evening victuals. The first I knew about this was when she roused me with: “It’s nearly six o’ clock and I’ve had a bit of an adventure.”
”Tell me about it,” I replied groggily.
”You need to get up so I can tell you properly’,” Shan responded. She likes her dramatic effects.
The story goes that she was walking down the road when a fellow camper alerted her, entirely through eye movements, that there was a deer that had wandered into the camp to enjoy the plentiful acorns. The camper then tried to be helpful by handing the hungry beast some more of these delicacies 

This peaceful scene was promptly disrupted by the ungrateful  animal’s aberrant behaviour. First it attacked the original giver and then her partner, seen here with a similar gesture.
As can be seen from the lack of photographic evidence, Shan retreated to get help before it could attack her and the man in the picture had to be rescued by another man with a stick.
It is not clear whether the continuing loud explosions, that carried on until well after sunset, set the poor deer off.
We ended our evening with the thing that “had to be done”. 

Delicious battered cod avec chips and mushy peas, all ordered and delivered according to social distancing rules dictated by COVID-19 rules.

Oh and the pic on the banner of this series of blogs is a clumsy attempt to capture a kiss in a kissing gate. Evidence on my selfie ineptitude.

Lying on my back in Campy, gazing through the sky light I was astonished to see a bright, clear vista of a starry sky, the likes of which I’d normally only witnessed in places such as Calvinia in the South African Karoo.

Which was weird because a few hours earlier I’d been watching in awe as an intrepid cyclist climbed an incline on the Jurassic Way that was challenging for a person on foot. Not to mention the loose chalk and flint surface!

And then up pops a deer as if to say, “Oi, you taking my picture or what?

Kinda strange being in a campsite for the first time after lockdown ... this one more locked down than most with just about all facilities closed so the unpleasantness of chemical lavvies WILL be involved.

We got here despite duelling Satnavs, TomTom, Google and Shan’s paper map ensemble but I’m going have to do some homework to figure out how to prevent TomTom from taking us down the shortest route imaginable. We haven’t quite traversed a ploughed field yet but we did manage to terrify an old dear by attempting a postage stamp 75-point turn to extract ourselves from an impossibly narrow lane. I would’ve gone for it but my traveling companion has witnessed me removing bits from Campy’s exterior before and vetoed that suggestion.

​Also, WTF is Shan able to access Instagram from her iPhone while mine keeps stubbornly saying “NO INTERNET CONNECTION “. The wonders of technology not being helped, either, by Apple’s perverse insistence on only moving one’s cursor with “haptics” when simple back and forward keys would maker everyone’s life easier.

It’s all fab in theory but try posting to a blog when lying on your bed in a motorhome in a forest on the side of a hill.

It really is all lovely really. Really.

​hopefully more tomorrow once we’ve been out and about a bit. Love y’all.

​In the beginning, firewalls, and their stricter twins, De-Militarised Zones (DMZs), protected normal people from various forms of attack. What has happened to turn a relatively sensible idea on its head so that, nowadays, these devices exist to protect online vendors from their customers?

What are firewalls and DMZs - historical tableau

I'll explain. The very first firewalls probably came about to prevent human beings and their livestock from being burned to death. Fair enough you say, unless you're a firebug (hold this thought). Then some wise-guy came along and burned some fire-breaks. Smart person, playing the fire at its own game. If the breaks were wide enough (and didn't run out of control during the creation process), they provided a cost effective way of achieving the same effect as an expensive wall.

Of course,  someone's life partner was going to question the logic of this, probably centuries, if not millennia, ago:
"Are our lives a matter of cost benefit analysis? Is that all you think of me, Value for Money (VFM)?"
With one eye on keeping the peace and the other on doing penance the other partner says: "We'll do both. We'll have two fireproof walls with a firebreak in between. Then it will be impossible to burn us alive!" 
If it had been my own partner, the next question would have already been in the chamber: "But what if we were not being threatened by a forest fire? What if we were being attacked by baddies?"

And I would've had the perfect answer: "We'll surround our home with a deep trench and fill it with water. There will be stone walls on either side of the trench and we'll call it a moat."

Not so easily satisfied with the logic of this, my partner's armoury would never be depleted this easily: "But what if the baddies had trained seagulls who could fly over and drop exploding coconuts into our castle?"
"We'd shoot the seagulls with our bows and arrows and they'd fall into the moat. We'd call the wall/moat/arrow combo a DMZ."

"But what if the baddies could swim across our moat and we wouldn't notice them because we would be looking into the sky, aiming at the seagulls ... ?"

"I would already have finished you off with my sword and run off with the lesser danger, i.e. the baddies."
 
"Well that's not playing the game, I don't like you any more."

​Your customers have faith in you

You may remember that, in the second paragraph, I asked you to hold a thought : perhaps "you're a firebug"? Keep holding on.

By the way, your name is Henley and you are the proprietor of a much-loved High Street cycle shop where your customers come in in a steady stream to choose a bundle of your excellent bikes and accessories. One day a new customer comes through the door.
"I've been recommended to come here by one of your loyal fans. My name is Devon, by the way," the newbie greets you. "I must say I'm impressed. May I call you Henley?"
"Of course," you reply. You love welcoming people to the store and have dedicated staff who enjoy similar interactions.
"I say, Henley, this frame is really gorgeous," Devon exclaims. "Do you have any others like it?"
You beckon one of your assistants and explain that you are about to show Devon some other frames and would your colleague assemble some of the other bits your new customer will need to make up a complete bicycle. 
Devon picks out a frame and the required components to make up a dream machine and asks one last question:
"Would you be able to assemble it for me, Henley?"
"Of course," you reply. "It'll be ready the day after tomorrow and then we'll service it for free after you've ridden it for a while. Make some final adjustments."
Devon leaves your shop after shelling out a few thousand and returns at the appointed time two days later.

Avarice sets in

"Wow," Devon exclaims when clocking the new steed with an acquisitive grin before uttering: "Say, Henley, ever thought of upscaling your operation?"
"Not really," you reply, "my staff and family have everything we need. We enjoy our quality of life."
You glance over to one of your assistants who nods assent.
"Fair enough," Devon smiles, obviously dying to try the new velo.
"Don't think we've heard the last of Devon," the assistant mutters after our new customer has left. "That's one guy with an eye on owning a bike emporium."
How perceptive your staff member turned out to be. Devon doesn't give up. If anything, the zeal glows more brightly every day and there are many visits to the shop for new accessories like expensive clothing. Every objection you have to "upscaling your operation" is answered persuasively.
Devon has access to venture capital and the workings of a "Ponzi[1]" model together with all the business structures required.
Anxiety gnaws at your gut. You'll lose touch with your precious customers, many of them friends in the cycling community.
"Don't you think it's you that's being selfish, Dude," Devon is irritated. "What about your staff, Henley, don't they deserve a bigger pie." There are allusions to staff partnerships and share schemes.
"But what about our customers?" you demand.
"Don't be a baby, Henley," Devon exclaims, "they'll love the bigger range and the lower prices available from a virtual shop. Anyway you can always see them at that bike club of yours if you really want to."
"And the lower prices, how will we pay for those?"
"Offshore the whole operation. It'll be a natural DMZ between you and your customers. The call centre will be the outer firewall and an experienced outsourcer will provide an inner firewall between you and its operational staff.
"Now, come on, take a look at this sponsorship model. We can use venture capital to get a team up for le Tour[2]. That'll elevate you above your lycra-clad club mates, especially when we bring home the maillot jaune. You'll be too wealthy and important to talk to them then. Your new club will be business execs and fellow sponsors. The movers and shakers of world cycling."

The rot sets in

See if you can spot the firebug.
​
For a while everything seems to go as Devon said it would. You appear to have gained some respect, rather than lost it, even though you knew the TdF team and the maillot jaune were always pie in the sky. You were aware that teams are invited to the TdF - it generally takes many seasons to gain their confidence.

​Then venture capital starts to dry up and Devon is nowhere to be found. The team hasn't been paid the next instalment of the sponsorship and customers are giving VERY bad reviews to the outsourcing company.

You, Henley, are now in deep depression and decide to go out on a bike ride to try to blow away a few cobwebs. You foolishly follow one of your favourite routes. Foolishly because you are overtaken by a peloton from your old club.

"Hi guys," you wave hopefully.
"Who the hell are you?" one of them retorts.
"It's that Henley," someone you used to cycle with responds. "You know the one who had that brilliant high street bike shop some years back. And then Henley became too important and no longer associated with us. Worst of all, a few mates carried on buying from the multinational operation out of some misplaced loyalty. They were treated pretty badly."
With that, the peloton accelerates, leaving Henley in the dust, contemplating the unfairness of it all.

The final analysis

"But we have online customer surveys," you protest into thin air before the realisation dawns that all the surveys were designed with binary questions that only ask what your marketing team wishes to hear. Usually in order to justify the fee it pays to an external survey company to design and collate.

Clearly this story is somewhat allegorical, in that I haven't exactly witnessed each step in the yarn, but this kind of stuff is happening all over the place and has been for some time. They didn't have online operations in Ponzi's time but I feel sure there was some similar form of obfuscation.

I did say I'd name and shame one or two of the ones I've had the worst experiences with. Those who are completely uncontactable (and DELIBERATELY SO) when things go wrong and you need them most. Taking care to be mindful of the extra strictures that COVID-19 puts on most vendors, I have omitted a few candidates but here is my top 5 inexcusable stress-mongers
TomTom - The story is so long, I can only believe deliberately on the company's part, that I can't face recalling it again.
Hertz - as guilty as most car rental operations of taking your card up front and then making it almost impossible to rectify errors in their favour.
Lloyds Bank - For never being there when you most need them.
"Logistics" firms[3] - those who take advantage of the pandemic and are impossible to contact when things go wrong ... I'm still trying to figure out who the worst is from my own experience.
Oxfordshire County Council - masters of obfuscation when it comes to highway planning.

Coming soon: I'll follow up this blog when and/or if something is amusing or annoying enough for me to repeat
​
Endnotes

[1] ​ Pyramid selling
[2] ​ Tour de France (TdF)
[3] NB: there are some good ones

Mart liked to hold an audience ... more often than not it was by telling a joke. These jokes were renowned for being drawn out as he settled in chuckling to himself.

On one occasion a bunch of us assembled at the Wagonwheels Hotel in Florida Road, Durban. The agenda would have been to have a few Castle Lagers on the balcony to get us in the mood for some hot Saturday afternoon jazz. It may have been the John Drake Trio playing on that day. There were many aspirant Jazzists in the 70s and some were regulars at the Wagonwheels.

We were probably into the third round of Castles with the jazz imminent when Mart decided to tell one of his jokes to the assembled congregation around the table. The Wagonwheels had very heavy concrete circular tables: you know the type, with broken ceramic pieces set artfully into a top with a circumference of maybe a metre and some change. These were supported by a single central pedestal of immense mass.

Settling in for his joke and enjoying his rapt audience, Mart reclined in his plastic verandah chair and commenced the elaborate preamble to the punchline. I was there, Charles Phillips was there, maybe Packet and I'm pretty sure Andrew Hathorn. There were others.

We all gave Mart our 110% attention as his story rambled on. He was chuckling gently as his seating position became increasingly relaxed until he was almost prostrate in his plastic bucket seat with his chest jammed against the table top and his feet curled around the central pedestal.

Nearing the joke's finale, Mart was enjoying his audience and caught up in the moment. We had started to grin knowingly which spurred our hero on to string the story out just a little more,

Meanwhile, Charles was under the table gently tying Mart's laces together so that his feet were firmly conjoined.

The punchline was coming as Mart reached a pitch of animation but before the finale could emerge the rest of us stood up to a man:

"Time for jazz," Charles announced straight-faced as we headed into the hotel's interior for a session. All except Mart, who was wedged in a combination of chest, table top and firmly secured ankles around the pedestal.

"Guys, you haven't heard the punchline" he pleaded as we collapsed in the darkness of the Wagonwheels' interior ...

​Happy 70th Bewinlor xxx