T is for Tricky Treats

I posted one of these a couple of years ago, but didn't see any last year, however, B&M managed to get another five out this year, although I ate the pumpkin without photographing it in close-up, soz!

 

Not as colourful as last time, but, like last time, I'd describe the flavours as 'tutti-frutti', yet, I did notice that they varied between the lollipops, and it would seem they are all supposed to taste different, nevertheless, there's no hint as to what the flavours are, or which lolly is which? Still in B&M, and worth looking out for instead of photographing all the piles of polymer, land-fill, shite!

 

As I entered the store, the couple ahead of me said "Oh, there's a spider on the floor" and we had a laugh about it, and as they wandered-off to look for whatever they were after, I though, it might need a good home, so rescued it from the detritus under the shelves! I think it had fallen-off one of those big polymer, land-fill, shite piles! There's a trend for 'spider's web' netting, pre-stapled with hundreds of spiders?

E is for Exhalenate! Exhalenate! You. Will. Exhalenate!

A bit of a Brucey Bonus, Getretro didn't have anything on display at the NEC which interested me, or wasn't in the older shots seen earlier (previous post), but they did have this floating on high;

 

It's a near-lifesize, inflatable/blow-up Dalek! How cool is that?

 

We may have seen this before, I might have shot it at the London Toy fair a few years ago? But it's not actually in Getretro's inventory any more, being instead their mascot, which they place on the roof-bars of their trade-stands. Wantone!

https://www.getretro.co.uk/

P is for Pet Shop Parade!

Not that close to the core subject here, but they ARE figural! Previously called Nose T' Tail Pet Supplies, I shot these in the window of Hook Pet Supplies a month or so ago, while taking my break one evening, and they're worth a post!

Cotton-balls and crochet, glued onto a wooden maquette/former, these may have been produced closer to home, and are in a different scale to the poultry below, most of which is life-size'ish.

 

These are all enamel-painted tin-plate, and probably from China, Vietnam or possibly the Philippines, but could just as equally be Indian, or even French (especially that last, filigree-pierced one), they like their cocks and hens there (no pun intended, it's their national symbol), and probably the sort of thing you'd go to a shop fitter's catalogue for, although, equally, TKMaxx can carry stuff like this in the homeware section?

 

This is closer to taxidermy, but the feathers are glued over a former, the eyes and beak plastic, and the wattle is red felt.

 

Just a bit of fun . . . I have seen giant - probably fibreglass - cows on the roof of a barn near Alton, and a large calf of similar construction in the yard of another farm nearby, which I keep meaning to shoot, if/when I do, they'll appear here too!

QAIMNS (R) is for Angels!

One of the more unusual things in my possession is this old kit bag, about twice the size of the one I was issued with in '84, but half the strength of material, being quite soft, compared to mine which is like a canvas belt material, only bags bigger!

 

The base is heavier though, to prevent wear on trains, mud-tracks and ferries! It's brown, I don't know if there's a colour code, but I think the Navy have always been white, ours were standard 'army green' and the RAF had theirs in the same blue as their best dress, so there maybe/may have been a code, with women's' forces or reserves in brown?

 

It's marked MK DALY - QAIMNSR - BEF, which is the name of the owner, the unit (Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service Reserve), these days you tend to put the 'R' in brackets, but back then they clearly didn't! And British Expeditionary Force, our troops in France.

A little non-arduous Googling quickly revealed some of her history, she seems to have served from at least 1916 sometime (one of some 10,000 women), probably earlier, with a war diary in the National Archive revealing;
 

"Recommendation for 1 months’ sick leave for Miss M. K. Daly, QAIMNSR, 1 General Hospital, suffering from neurasthenia."

A euphemism for what we later called shell-shock (see below), and now call PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), from Abbeville (the Somme) on the 15th October 1916, suggesting she had already seen more than most of our generation ever will, and most of it pretty bad.

However, they were made of sterner stock in Edwardian Britain, and the same diary's entry (I couldn't ascertain the name or sex of the author) for 15th June 1917 reveals;

"To Frevent (Frévent, about 18km NE of Abbeville, ed.), to 6 Stationary Hospital, arriving at 12.15 noon. Went round the hospital with Miss Daly, the A/Matron, and the CO, Lt. Col. Harding. All in excellent order – had been evacuating largely – about 350 cases in hospital at the time of the visit. Saw the new hut for officers suffering from shell shock – not yet in use, to be opened next week, which will greatly relieve the existing Officers’ Hospital, which was overcrowded on the day of my visit, owing to a large number of shell shock cases. 59 officers in hospital altogether. Had lunch in the Sisters’ Mess, most comfortable and well kept."

 

So, she had returned to work, and was helping officers recover from what she had herself suffered from a year earlier.

The third mention of her I could find was her gazetting in the King's birthday honours list for 1919, where the British Journal of Nursing reports on January 25th;

"The King has been pleased to award the Royal Red Cross, second class, to the following ladies in recognition of their valuable services : — . . . Miss M. K. Daly, Staff Nurse, Q.A.I. M. N. S. R. . . .  "

 

At no point was her Christian-name or middle-name revealed, there were at least two other Daly's, one seems to have spent her war in the hospitals at Colchester, the other gets a brief mention in Scotland (I think, it was 'in passing'?), and one wonders what happened to her, all three of them, or indeed, the many thousands who 'answered the call', after the war?

The Quims (as they were 'affectionately' known), would become the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps (QARANC), in 1949, commonly known as QA's. I briefly dated a QA after I'd left the Army, and once fell in love with a Captain, but she (along with two nurses, who were 'in on it') played a terrible trick on me and 'Snoz' Reed, which is another story for another day!

G is for Get Arff Moi Laaaand!

I saw this on the side of a house in the hamlet of Mapledurwell near Basingrad, earlier this evening, and there was still enough light for a decent picture, so I leapt out of the cab and took one!

He literally leaps out at you as you come round the corner of a tight little lane, but the way the building is angled, by the time you've registered him, he's gone, and you're driving up the road thinking "Did I just see that?"! Hackle and buttons say Grenadiers, and he's pretty-much life-size! And it must be the Devil's own task to keep the Virginia Creeper clear of him!

I is for Intellects - Vast and Cruel and Unsympathetic

I think we've seen some of this before, but while visiting Mr Morehead back in 2016, I shot it again properly, and it's been sat in Picasa ever since . . . there's still tons of it! Anyway, War of the Worlds, which was set, initially, on Horsell Common, not far from Woking, Woking seems to claim it as theirs, almost as hard as Mr. Andrew Windsor claims Woking as his alibi!

First landing capsule.

(beautiful brickwork)

A 'Glitering Machine'

Martain tripod

The valiant defenders

A Hawker Hunter

(Monday, 30 June 1958, RNAS Fulmar, Hall JHS, Lieutenant, RN

my uncle's coffin)

 

The microbes that made the difference.

 

The dedication plate.

V is for Vintage

This appeared in my feed at 5am, although it was posted yesterday evening, I used to ring Vintage Tyres daily when I worked briefly at Northhant's, so I'm sure the guys down there won't mind me spreading the publicity a little wider!

 

"We don’t know if the Daleks were to blame, but Doctor Who’s car had a flat tyre when it arrived at Beaulieu for a new exhibition at the Beaulieu, National Motor Museum.

The fabulously futuristic Whomobile was Jon Pertwee’s transport in two episodes of Doctor Who in the early 1970s. It was commissioned by Pertwee and built by custom car builder Peter Farries. It’s starring in an exhibition to mark 60 years of Doctor Who at the museum.

Underneath, the Whomobile is a three-wheeler powered by a Hillman Imp engine. Vintage Tyres replaced the less-than-futuristic 155/80R12 tyre enabling the car to travel through time and space all the way from the Vintage Tyres’ workshop to the front entrance of the museum.

OK, that’s only about 100 metres as the Tardis flies, but that’s not really the point, is it?"

F is for Follow-up - 'Street Furniture'

I should have posted this ages ago, and I've probably opened the file, or scrolled past/through it in Picasa dozens of times, but it is a fact that of the 7, 8, probably 900-odd folders in the long queue, I do have a tendency to faff, to procrastinate or to find some subconscious fault that keeps whatever it is, in the queue, rather than getting it on the Blog!

 

Anyway here it is, and it's not a follow-up to the dinosaurs the other day, but to whatever I posted last time, which was I think the previous summer's Fleet 'thing' posted late, and was spotted in the wild, the other side of the pond by Brian Berke. And at some personal risk to himself, as Hippo's kill more humans than any other animals, every year (except Man, of course), but this one looks pretty harmless!

Heehee! Isn't it brilliant! It's a plastic figure, guys & girls, if you collect Marx Disney or Cherilea Diddy Men, you can't get sniffy about a seven-foot hippo in a tutu! Very atmospheric photographs as well. If I had a tenth, nay, a hundredth of Elon Musk's money I'd have this stuff, and the dino's and the nutcrackers, and the giraffes all over my estate! Cheer Brian, sorry it took so long to post!

I is for Interesting Invertebrates or Insects

There were lots of Insects in Mr Attwood's parcel, so an unscheduled insect overview ensues now, another much ignored corner of the Small Scale World 'archive collection', there are lots in store, a few in the growing 'next overview' folder, and many downloads of sets to help ID them all one day for the A-Z pages, while there are good websites out there, for those who want to search for themselves, the STS Animal Wiki being the first place to start.

Spiders, this - like the cheetahs - was another one I had to re-shoot, as I found smaller spiders lurking under other things after I thought I'd found them all! A mix of the novelty/joke type and more realistic species identifiers, the stripped one on the left, for instance? But none are branded, with a smattering of CHINA marks, they will all need further research!

 

Big beetles; the khaki/dun and grey & white ones are from a set, while the two real biggies are probably (like the two big spiders) counter-top pick-me-ups, there is a consistency of marks/undersides within the contents of these five images, which suggest the majority of them are from two sets which should be easy'ish to ID one day.

 

Colony insects with a wingless ant facing-off against all his winged bred'rin! A couple of houseflies have snuck in under the 'wing' qualifier, but I'm not too sure on either of them, both larger than the usual novelty/joke flies, they have some bee/wasp qualities, and the red-eyed horror (a green-bottle, or green-arsed fly!) is more bee than fly!

 

Creepy, crawly critters (ooh, that would have been a better post title!), we have seen similar centi-milli-peades, but as we saw then, they all vary, and we may have seen the catapillar, or something similar, but I think most of these are new to stash?

 

With the exception of the little dragonfly, these all seem to be from the same set, with two issues of the devil's coachman and centi-milli-pede! The coachmen are both damaged, which makes them look more different!

 

Closing with scorpions, I've listened, all-night, to someone who's been stung by a scorpion, not an experience I ever want to repeat! The large damaged one (happily retained as 'first sample') seems to have always had two less legs, but scorpions do come in 6 and 8-leg (or 8 and 10-leg if counting front gloves) types.

The medium-sized one goes with the two medium-sized beetles in the second image, and the smallie goes with the chaps and chapesses in the previous image!

As always, many thanks to Jon for all these, they will be better sorted one day, and all have a place in the collection!

F is for Fleet Fell Flat!

Like Never Before!

This summer just past's hook for getting people up the High Street during the quiet month of August was very disappointing compared to previous years, and the reason seemed to be corporate laziness, relying on 'the Internet' to make the job easy?

Instead of a search for ten dinosaurs, ticking them off in your little guide-book/leaflet thing, as was the case in previous years, there were only three dinosaur models, some interactive crap, a post-box for a colouring competition (but no colouring sheets!) and a complete lack of interest in the task at hand, from Fleet BID, some retailer-funded marketing gimmick, like the old trade associations, or chamber's of commerce, but with money-grubbing Tory dogma written all over it!

You get the same problem everywhere now, we saw it here with the party covering the World's Apart - Horrible Histories figures a few years ago, young things, full of enthusiasm (and a still wet degree in marketing) on the phone, or in eMails, but with no knowledge or love of the product, losing interest and giving-up far too soon, because it’s not their product, it's not their problem and it's not their money . . .whack an invoice in, for services-rendered, and move on!

The annoyance was that everyone, including me, was still going to the council box-office to ask about the flyer, they said "We haven't got any this year, try the Library?", as it happens the library is next door, so off to them, they say "We've had loads of people asking, but we've been given no literature this year, and there's nothing on the website! But someone yesterday said there's something in the photographic shop?".

Then off to Kevin Wibbly (I think he's called, the only hint of 'community' I have - in this Stepford dormitory - is half-knowing the name of the owner of the photographic shop!) we go, where his assistant points out that yes, they do have an unhelpful flyer in the door-glass, but she knows nothing, and has been sending everyone who asks, up to the Library!

At this point, you can lose the will to live, but my life at the moment is the odd minutes of panic and a few hours of worry interspersed with a lot of spare-time, and this was that afternoon, where an answer would be found!

First thing to do was head on to the 'Glass Menagerie' as Mum's generation call it, our itty-bitty excuse for a mall, where there is usually one of the model dinosaurs/wild animals/nutcrackers situated, only to find that the station is unmanned, and there are no flyers, no colouring sheets and no model dinosaur, just an enlarged version of the window flyer!

So . . . off to the internet, ladies and gentlemen, off to get to the bottom of this phuqfest of ineptitude!

Opposite the Library, it was the Velociraptor which alerted me to the fact that this summers 'retail event' had started. It was a very good model, reflecting the very latest thinking on feathered dinosaurs, as is currently coming from the finds, out of the smooth sedimentary beds in the Gobi Desert.

Call Me Karen!

So, I found the Fleet BID Faceplant page, and the following exchange took place;

Me - So, I asked for the dinosaur map/leaflet at the Harlington Centre, they sent me to the Library, the Library had had dozens of enquiries but no promotional paperwork, then someone suggested Kevin Wibbly at the camera shop, his assistant has had to turn away six people today, and they got their poster late! Where are the dinosaurs, where is the map, where are the painting things, why do you need a QR-code reader (not everyone has a bloody i-phone) and what's going on? Get leaflets to the library! Get leaflets somewhere, anywhere, there are none with the picture post box in the shopping centre, nor is there a dinosaur? Get a grip . . . thank god it's gullible traders' money, not taxpayers!

Fleet Bid Spokesperson - There are four elements to this summer's activities which are all detailed on our website: [link] The colouring sheets can be downloaded from this webpage. The shopping centre have some and we will also be delivering some to cafes etc who have spare space to display them this afternoon.

There isn't a trail booklet as the Augmented Reality trail is QR-code based so does require a phone with the ability to scan a QR code. The ten locations are detailed on our website with a map and by scanning one of the locations this opens up the entire trail. The trail posters were delivered to businesses on 29th July.

There are 3 large selfie dinosaurs (at Pedal Heaven, by Sainsbury's and by [redacted to prevent publicity - tossers]) - again these are listed on the website. These were meant to have signs which explained the trail but unfortunately we only received the signs this morning.

There will be a dinosaur show on the weekend of 19th and 20th August with more details to be shared once we've finalised show timings.

Me - There were no colouring sheets in the precinct at 16:50 yesterday, but that aside, you have established a pattern over a half-dozen animal-dinosaur-nutcracker things, and now you've totally broken it in favour of the posh Miranda's of the Blue Triangle, at a time when money's tight for everyone, and you haven't kept the participating locations up to date . . . there are dozens of people, every day for at least a week, already, going to the Library, going to the Photo' shop wanting to know A) where are the ten dinosaurs (there are only three?), where are the maps (there isn't one?) and where are the colouring sheets?!! Not everyone has a printer, not everyone has a QR Code reader, you're supposed to be encouraging people to come to Fleet, not alienate them!

Fleet Bid Spokeperson - More colouring sheets are being dropped off this afternoon. We have chosen to do something different this year with four elements rather than just one. We have dinosaur shows happening on 19th and 20th August as well as the AR trail and 3 large dinosaurs for selfies. This information has been published and these locations have been kept up to date and published on our website since the end of July. All of this is available free of charge to people visiting Fleet. We are sorry if you feel that this is not what you would like to see, but we hope by doing more things that are free and incorporating the interactive AR element that families would enjoy something different and have more activity to keep people entertained over the summer holidays.

I can't remember if this was a 'Dippy' or a Bronty (I think it says Brontosuarus?), but it was a bit cartoony compared to the other two, and much smaller, in scale, maybe a baby! Also, I thought it was a bit pink and mammalian . . . Hippogriff!

Conclusion

Now, aside from the fact that I'm clearly turning into a grumpy-old-git in my dotage (a left-wing one, I hasten to add!), and allowing for the fact that my interaction did result in some quick updates to both the BID's and the Council's Faceplant pages, and hoping the colouring sheets were delivered (I wasn't after one!), I think you can see where the problems are, it's all-singing-all-dancing tech'y bollocks for people with the right kind of 'smart' 'phone, time to be where they need to be, at the times they need to be there, and therefore suffering under the twin burdens of spare leisure time and disposable wealth, i.e., the 'trophy wives' of the Blue Triangle and the larger town-houses of Elvetham!

The BID spokesperson sticking to the scrip and not really realising how they have broken a contract, established by repeat actions over several years, and somehow thinking that for five- or ten-year olds, three dinosaurs in plain site, is in some way equitable with ten you have to go search for, with a MAP!

Our civilisation is falling apart, through the thoughtlessness, selfishness and lack of imagination of the establishment, unquestioned and not countered by the complacency of the citizens. And it was clearly going-off half-cocked, with elements not in place, late, you have eight months to get ready and . . . ! Phuq!

 

By far the nicest of the three, ONLY three, was this rather fine Triceratops, with a metallic, rainbow-sheen on it, like oil on water!

 

All this saddens me, as how do you get people back to your retail hubs, when you water-down the very idea you have been establishing over the previous few years, to attract people? And no sign of a Christmas campaign yet?

 

And, good retailers of Fleet, if you are subscribing to BID, can I suggest that if you spend the money on Sainsbury's excellent generic four-packs of mince-pies instead, and offer one for every purchase over £5, you will probably have a better effect on your footfall, than BID's shenanigans is going to deliver in a month of Sundays!

 

I must check the Library for their seasonal toy exhibition, that can always be counted on! Underfunded, and mostly volunteer staffed, what would we do without them? And the Tories have closed 800+ in the last 14-years.

I is for Invertebrate Skeletons? It's Impossible!

The story 'de jour' this year, has been the growing realisation on Faceplant, and other [anti-]social media sites, that a lot of the skeletons on offer in the piles of polymer crap, being flogged off the back of what is supposed to be a thoughtful day of genuflection, for our own mortality and the memories of those who have gone before us, are actually completely bonkers, and I mean kecks-on-your-head and pencils-up-your-nose, shell-shocked bonkers! Not least because some pertain to be the internal skeletons of animals with exoskeletons, and others - the skeletons of things which normally have neither!

 

In my defence, I had already begun, over a month ago to shoot them in situ, when a post on 'The Darker Side of Science' alerted me to the bigger picture and the fact that I was not the only one, if not actually late to the party!

Shot first but seen third, this was in the big Farnborough Asda, under their George label, and as I had by this point seen the two below, had an idea for a short post, ergo: the shelfie was executed, and here's a spider skeleton, of course!

 

The one I'd seen first, Sainsbury's had these out quite early in September, so I'd walked past them dozens of times hoping the display might magic itself some bags of 'army-men' skeletons, zombies or the like, no such luck of course, but the ridiculous spider skeleton was tempting, at only three quid, but a bit big? Two-quid cheaper than Asda, it appears to be the same moulding!

 

And Morrisons also had these out before October I think, however they then ran-out after I'd stated collecting the shelfies and I found myself going back several times looking for the restocking, which, but the time it came, had led to me discovering their yellow-ticket scheme is better than Sainsbury's, with the result my freezer box is full of strawberries and raspberries at 29p a punnet! It's a larger design than the other two.

Amanda Bussell has come up with a  lovely psychological hack for accepting all these weird and wonderful creatures into your house, life, or wargames army! Just imagine they are the crazed output of a mad 'Dr. Moreau' type scientist! And yes, that is the skeleton of a boneless mollusk!

 

István Xpali found this larger, articulated spider 'skeleton' in his native Hungary, at 7000 Forints (about £15) it's at the expensive end of the cryptozoological spectrum!

 

The octopus again, all jelly in real life, and another large, articulated spider, from the price I'm guessing it's a lawn ornament around two or three feet long? It's also a particularly evil looking thing with all those dead eyes!

 

Meanwhile, Nicole Marie found this, err . . . it has to be said doesn't it? I have to write this shit down . . . a pumpkin skeleton!!!! In Jo-Ann Fabrics, an Ohio-based haberdasher's chain in the United States. It's a PUMPKIN . . . SKELETON! And there are smaller ones on the shelf below!

Suddenly this lobster, shot by a Toni Delany looks fecking sane and normal! Another internal skeleton for a creature better-known for its exoskeleton, almost easier to take than most of the others, because we know them to be large, hard'ish things?

 

And finishing this section of found stuff, is another huge outdoor display spider, this one about five-foot across, and owned by Dani Dennan. There is a good video on YouTube which looks at many of them here, and Clint's Reptiles (also on YouTube) does a yearly round-up of the whackier new-entrants to the genre, I was going to post another link, but most of his stuff is 'normal' so you're better off doing a search for "Halloween Invertebrate Skeletons".

Meanwhile, I hade made a purchase myself, not much safer ground, being equally, or more of a fantastical beast, but having grabbed the snake in Poundland or wherever it was, a few years ago, I couldn't resist another reptile!

Posed here with an unknown figure I think may be an interim-period Supreme, maybe? It was a fiver in Morrison's and with the snake, directs my Games Workshop army project - rather on hold, but a long-term gaol - toward a reptile mounted army, you can probably fit three or four old-school GW riders between the two sets of hips/shoulders!

Back to Asda for something else and saw these, which appeared quite late (last week) and were about Action Man/G I Joe size, which suggests a gag which could scar a child for life, coming down to breakfast and finding that the horrid little shelf-elf ate your doll in the night, and just left the bones still in the clothes!

 

While I was taking all the other shelfies I shot this rather fine, life-size rat, in Morrison's and you can see giant bats behind, with the same flimsy thread of elastic they had fifty years ago, when they tended to be joke-shop rack-toys over here, and Halloween was something other people did!