The "I'm Such a Fecking Div" Thread

[hatler]

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I bet Network Rail (or whatever they were called at the time) were delighted!

[hatler]

No CCTV in those days. No-one noticed, or thought to bring it to anyone important's attention.

[Jurek]

I've just noticed a drawer (amongst my Dymo^TM labelled drawers) labelled "Switches. Reed" with a mercury filled tilt switch in it.
Enough mercury in it to probably fill a couple of thimbles.

ETA:

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

My bold. I'm impressed.
If memory serves, I had a school friend who went to work for London Transport (as it was then) on the tube and was told 'Step on the juice rail' on the basis that if you did that, there was less chance of tripping over it.
Can't see it myself.

[Tim Hall]

I've just noticed a drawer (amongst my Dymo^TM labelled drawers) labelled "Switches. Reed" with a mercury filled tilt switch in it.
Enough mercury in it to probably fill a couple of thimbles.

ETA:

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

My bold. I'm impressed.
If memory serves, I had a school friend who went to work for London Transport (as it was then) on the tube and was told 'Step on the juice rail' on the basis that if you did that, there was less chance of tripping over it.
Can't see it myself.

Training (see what I did there?) these days is don't tread on any rail.

Some years ago The Girl's school had an exchange visit from a school in Accra. The Ghanaian students went on a trip to London. While waiting at the station, one of them dropped a possession, wallet or some such, on to the track.  They calmly leapt down to retrieve it. Not so calm was the reaction of the host school teaching staff nor the station bods.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Suicide or terrorist, depending on the mood of the time.

[Jurek]

I've just noticed a drawer (amongst my Dymo^TM labelled drawers) labelled "Switches. Reed" with a mercury filled tilt switch in it.
Enough mercury in it to probably fill a couple of thimbles.

ETA:

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

My bold. I'm impressed.
If memory serves, I had a school friend who went to work for London Transport (as it was then) on the tube and was told 'Step on the juice rail' on the basis that if you did that, there was less chance of tripping over it.
Can't see it myself.

Training (see what I did there?) these days is don't tread on any rail.

Some years ago The Girl's school had an exchange visit from a school in Accra. The Ghanaian students went on a trip to London. While waiting at the station, one of them dropped a possession, wallet or some such, on to the track.  They calmly leapt down to retrieve it. Not so calm was the reaction of the host school teaching staff nor the station bods.

Remind me, when we've the time, to tell you about the occasion when I single-handedly managed to close down Bond Street Station.

[TheLurker]

Remind me, when we've the time, to tell you about the occasion when I single-handedly managed to close down Bond Street Station.

Well it looks like none of us are going anywhere soon... 

[ian]

I've just noticed a drawer (amongst my Dymo^TM labelled drawers) labelled "Switches. Reed" with a mercury filled tilt switch in it.
Enough mercury in it to probably fill a couple of thimbles.

ETA:

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

My bold. I'm impressed.
If memory serves, I had a school friend who went to work for London Transport (as it was then) on the tube and was told 'Step on the juice rail' on the basis that if you did that, there was less chance of tripping over it.
Can't see it myself.

Training (see what I did there?) these days is don't tread on any rail.

Some years ago The Girl's school had an exchange visit from a school in Accra. The Ghanaian students went on a trip to London. While waiting at the station, one of them dropped a possession, wallet or some such, on to the track.  They calmly leapt down to retrieve it. Not so calm was the reaction of the host school teaching staff nor the station bods.

Remind me, when we've the time, to tell you about the occasion when I single-handedly managed to close down Bond Street Station.

Pah. I kicked a nuclear reactor containment vessel and an entire US State ran out of electricity.

[Wowbagger]

@Jurek: Was it with a squirrel?

[Tim Hall]

I've just noticed a drawer (amongst my Dymo^TM labelled drawers) labelled "Switches. Reed" with a mercury filled tilt switch in it.
Enough mercury in it to probably fill a couple of thimbles.

ETA:

We had the marvellous 'Mad' Mike Smith.

His two most notable events were : -

i)  Jumping down from the platform at London Bridge and hopping onto the live 3rd rail to demo that electricity is only dangerous if you form part of a circuit

ii)  Driving the school minibus (complete with full load of pupils) into one of those downhill escape lanes to 'see what happens'. What happens is that the gravel comes up to the top of the front part of the bonnet.

My bold. I'm impressed.
If memory serves, I had a school friend who went to work for London Transport (as it was then) on the tube and was told 'Step on the juice rail' on the basis that if you did that, there was less chance of tripping over it.
Can't see it myself.

Training (see what I did there?) these days is don't tread on any rail.

Some years ago The Girl's school had an exchange visit from a school in Accra. The Ghanaian students went on a trip to London. While waiting at the station, one of them dropped a possession, wallet or some such, on to the track.  They calmly leapt down to retrieve it. Not so calm was the reaction of the host school teaching staff nor the station bods.

Remind me, when we've the time, to tell you about the occasion when I single-handedly managed to close down Bond Street Station.

Pah. I kicked a nuclear reactor containment vessel and an entire US State ran out of electricity.

YABJBIACMLTK

Bond and Leiter followed Petty Officer Fallon along the lower deck to the engine room and then to the engine-repair shop. On their way they passed through the reactor room. The reactor, the equivalent of a controlled atomic bomb, was an obscene knee-level bulge rising out of the thickly leaded deck. As they passed it, Leiter whispered to Bond, "Liquid sodium Submarine Intermediate Reactor Mark B.'' He grinned sourly and crossed himself.
Bond gave the thing a sideways kick with his shoe. "Steam-age stuff. Our Navy's got the Mark C.''

[jsabine]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

[Tim Hall]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

Almost.
Licence To Kill

[Jurek]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

Almost.
Licence To Kill

'Kin 'ell.

[jsabine]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

Almost.
Licence To Kill

Fair enough. Having decrypted BJB I really shouldn't have been sidetracked down the radioactive corridor.

[Tim Hall]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

Almost.
Licence To Kill

Fair enough. Having decrypted BJB I really shouldn't have been sidetracked down the radioactive corridor.

What's more worrying is that I last read Thunderball well over twenty years ago, yet ian's remark fired up a memory that allowed me to google "Thunderball steam age".

(edited to try to fix broken quoting)

[citoyen]

Of course, we all know that the world's primary source of mercury is Hg wells...

Very good!

[citoyen]

And I suspect the Millenials think that our generation are all safe and staid.  If only they knew.....

I was reminded yesterday that one of the main roads near me - a straight stretch of a few miles length - used to have what was known back in the day as a "chicken lane", ie a central third lane on a single carriageway, used for overtaking... in both directions.

What I want to know is, what fucking idiot ever imagined that could possibly be a good idea?

Must have been the late 80s before they finally got rid of it.

[ETA: officially classified as S3 roads - apparently they do still exist. And this page also reminded me of the Aston Expressway, which is classified as S7... one of the (many) reasons I never drive to Birmingham. https://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/index.php?title=Single_carriageway ]

[Cudzoziemiec]

I remember bits of the A4 being like that, near Hungerford IIRC. Or maybe it was Marlborough. Then they removed the third lane by simply hatching it. Those aren't busy sections of road so it actually worked ok.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

Ditto on parts of the A5 and other sizeable roads. I think there was a fashion amongst highway engineers until they looked at the crash statistics after that arrangement had been in place for a few years.

The resulting wide roads (after being converted back to two lanes) are actually pretty good to cycle on, due to decent lateral separation for drivers overtaking cyclists.

[rafletcher]

We still have a short - less than 300m - length of three-lane, on Tring Hill on the old A41. Mostly used by traffic going up the hill. The one I remember most was somewhere south of Basingstoke around 40 years ago on what is now the A33.

[Mr Larrington]

LTK? Lead Trimmed Knickers?

Almost.
Licence To Kill

Fair enough. Having decrypted BJB I really shouldn't have been sidetracked down the radioactive corridor.

What's more worrying is that I last read Thunderball well over twenty years ago, yet ian's remark fired up a memory that allowed me to google "Thunderball steam age".

(edited to try to fix broken quoting)

Interesting factoid ¹: The screenplay for Thunderball was co-written by the grandfather of former World's Fastest Mammal Sam Whittingham.

1: Subject to usual T&C

[ElyDave]

And I suspect the Millenials think that our generation are all safe and staid.  If only they knew.....

I was reminded yesterday that one of the main roads near me - a straight stretch of a few miles length - used to have what was known back in the day as a "chicken lane", ie a central third lane on a single carriageway, used for overtaking... in both directions.

What I want to know is, what fucking idiot ever imagined that could possibly be a good idea?

Must have been the late 80s before they finally got rid of it.

[ETA: officially classified as S3 roads - apparently they do still exist. And this page also reminded me of the Aston Expressway, which is classified as S7... one of the (many) reasons I never drive to Birmingham. https://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/wiki/index.php?title=Single_carriageway ]

LAst tiem I went on it the A17 was like that, not actually three lanes, but three lanes wide and people overtaking down the middle

[SteveC]

There's one section of the A303 near me which is supposed to be the last of those three lane roads to be built (according to local legend).
It was still three lane when I moved here 20 years ago, but after one particularly nasty incident, they changed it so that the middle lane is in one direction for about a mile or so, then swaps, with double whites the whole way.
My dad always used to refer to the lanes as nearside, offside and suicide.

[ElyDave]

There's one section of the A303 near me which is supposed to be the last of those three lane roads to be built (according to local legend).
It was still three lane when I moved here 20 years ago, but after one particularly nasty incident, they changed it so that the middle lane is in one direction for about a mile or so, then swaps, with double whites the whole way.
My dad always used to refer to the lanes as nearside, offside and suicide.

There are a couple of bits of that between the A14 and Market Bosworth, you get the extra lane on the uphills to go past the HGVs, you need to exercise great caution