Interested in historic TV & animation? Thunderbirds Wallace & Gromit Zippy & Bungle Jemimah, Hambel, Humpty, Big & little Ted Gordon the Gofer! Ever fancied reading the news? Ever wondered how they project Harry Potter in IMAX?
Ever wanted to appear with the Teletubbies? Or on Coronation Street? Ever wondered how they filmed The wrong Trousers? Or just want to chuckle at wierd and wonderful old tellys? (I think Jason King had the round white one in his groovy pad). I had one of those Philips V2000s! It looks huge now! The Bradford National Media Museum is a fascinating day out and it is free! Lots of stuff about photography too. As recommended by the Greys…
This got me to thinking about a Saturday job I had in my mid teens working at a Garage in Newcastle, cleaning out trade-in vans. My dad worked there and it was a Ford main dealer. There was a new product launch of a range of light trucks, known as the “A series”. To support this, seven huge boxes arrived, which when unpacked, were found to contain huge white polypropylene letters spelling “A series“. Once the sales Manager had gone home, however, they were re-arranged in the showroom window to spell “Arses“.
After five minutes or so and getting lots of car horn toots, we put them back. I wonder if anyone ever took a photo?
Six weeks since I cropped my locks. It just looks like a rather short haircut now at about 2cm all over, except the top front and temples where is a bit thinner (and had been for a while but the longer hair concealed it somewhat). It changed from a hedgehog look at about four weeks, where it started lying on the head rather than sticking out of it. It doesn’t appear to be any greyer than previously so I mustn’t have frightened it too much after the recent trauma.
I will be taking a blogging break during August, returning with a vengeance in September. In the meantime, I have lined up a number of top quality bloggers from Blogpower to guest here so that it does not become too much of a tumbleweed gulch.
We went to see the Greyhound racing last night. It was held at Kinsley Stadium, Kinsley being a small village between Wakefield and Doncaster, classed as being near Pontefract. It is a fairly small stadium, without Stands as such but holding 3000 spectators. There are two large buildings housing a Restaurant, Cafe, Bars and Tote windows. A large shed-like structure encloses the Bookies area and the outdoor tote office. There appears to be a lot of construction work in progress although it is too early to be able to work out what is coming.
The last time I went to the Dogs was in Slough back in the late 80’s. It was actually Saturday 21st March 1987, as it was their closing night. I enjoyed the evening with good company, although the races seemed to be rather short! Karen used to go to Belle-Vue Dogs as a St. Johns Ambulance First Aider and she much preferred the Dogs to stock cars or speedway.
The event is promoted as a great day for a family outing, although as it revolves around eating, drinking, smoking and betting, this is slightly questionable- they don’t even appear to have a Children’s menu. Despite this, however, David had a great time, particularly as he befriended a number of Grannies, offering them Chips and being offered prawns in return. Betting is the raison d’etre for most visitors. There are two approaches to this- Tote or Bookmakers. The Tote works on the basis of a lottery- all the money goes into a pot (after a cream-off, of course!) and is redistributed to the winners in proportion to the stakes and combinations. On this basis, the punter has no idea how much he will win until it is declared. This is known as Totaliser, or Parimutuel Gambling.
The Bookmaker, however, gives fixed odds at the time of the bet so the punter knows how much they might win if their dog comes in. It is fascinating to watch the bookies in action and how much they collaborate. The systems may be manual or high-tech but it is simple enough- you pay them, call your dog and get a ticket, with the odds being transcribed into the book.
Odds never got above 3:1 last night for the first six races and went down to 5:3, the other common variants being 2:1 and 5:2. The bookies didn’t put up the odds until a few minutes before the race so a small crowd of expectant punters (including me) hung around to find the best odds. Three of the Bookies had a minimum bet of £5 so I stuck to the Tote when I couldn’t read the form too well. Each race follows a time honoured ritual. The six dogs are brought out acros the oval sand filled track with individual handlers and are paraded whilst announced. The starting numbers are pre-ordained and the colours worn to reflect which trap they will go in. The dogs are then led down the course to the starting traps, mostly muzzled (and some stopping on the way for a call of nature). The course has two sets of starting traps, a regular (465m) race being a straight and a lap. The main trap box is to the left of the stand, the finishing line to the right. (For the longer 655m races, the second set of traps are used on the rar right of the oval). The dogs are loaded into the traps, the course official checks them then raises a signal paddle at which point a claxon sounds to acknowledge it and the dogs are under starters orders. The electic hare starts up from the mid point of the left hand bend and scoots past the traps as the doors fly open and the dogs give chase. The dogs whizz past in a blur and again down the home straight. Less than thirty seconds after the off, the winner crosses the line and it is all over. The dogs peter out on the opposite side of the course, the electric hare is covered (an Outside Swaffham McGee, apparently) and the lucky punters go to collect their winnings whilst the losers tear up their slips. Then it all repeats again fifteen minutes later for another twelve or so races, three times a week. Greyhound Racing has a devoted following and it is much cheaper to own a Greyhound than a Racehorse. However, the prizes for the owners are sub- £100 here so it is perhaps the Sport of Plumbers rather than the Sport of Kings. As animals are involved, there is inevitable contoversy about the well-being of the animals, although Kinsley stresses that it complies with all NGRC requirements and actively supports adoption of retired dogs.
Here is a race in full. It doesn’t take long! How did I do? Won two, lost four, made slightly more than the admission price but not enough to pay for David’s Sausage Roll & Chips.
The Dogs is unostentatiously working class, as is bingo. Some people get dressed up for a night out but many don’t and nobody cares. The place has the feel of a working mens club and is a bit shabby but I prefer the honest feel of the place to the fake chic of a Casino. I enjoy the odd flutter and don’t have any hangups about gambling- it is a mugs game, although some people seem to do better than others (& I’m not one of them, other than winning minor prizes in raffles). (Previous racing post here, (including a rude word!) and a bingo post here.) What generally puts me off is boredom- betting and playing bingo gets a bit tedious after a while.
The final Policing post from the West Yorkshire Police Ops Support open day is the CBRN team. CBRN stands for Chemical, Biological Radiological and Nuclear. This is the team that responds to incidents that could be terrorist related, or possibly industrial accidents causing hazards. Their main role is for initial assessment at unknown substance incidents in conjunction with partner agencies (undefined, but presumably the Armed Forces and Agencies like the National Radiological Protection Board which became part of the Health Protection Agency in 2005. The team demonstrated a range of their equipment for detection and protection, including protection suits and gas masks.
Despite all the interesting stuff with dogs, horses, hi-tech gear & choppers, this is a reminder that it is all for a serious purpose and often ties in with violent behaviour, really horrible incidents and sometimes death. The Police need to be able to handle most things thrown at them, expected or otherwise.
The centre at carr Gate had lots of other teams dealing with motorway patrols, logistical support, a VIPs, collision investigation, motorbikes and even a wildlife officer. It is a little village with several buildings sprawled across the site and it is rare that the Public would get an opportunity to go there. The site had been earmarked for a new Force Headquarters building a few years back but all of the likely Force merger plans (that came to nothing) scuppered that.
No doubt all 43 Police Forces in England and Wales have similar arrangements to a greater or lesser extent (some Forces share Helicopters, for example). I found it re-assuring- I didn’t feel that the facilities were ostentatious (far from it) or neglected, giving us good value from taxpayer money. If you need to do a job, best to do it properly.
