The Brampton Bugle

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

Thanks JPW. Even if you are me, it's still a complement coming from you. By the way, are you also Biggles?

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

Afraid so.

trampoline Gertie · Joined: 23 Jun 2007 Posts: 9 Location: Brampton

Are you me then too? It would explain a lot. Reality isn't what it used to be.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

No, I am not you, never was and never will be; but I do agree with you about the state of reality in this area (Chesterfield housing I mean, not the subconscious state of multiple personalities we are forced into by malicious attacks on our forum).

I blame the AGD, and the influx of Cockney infiltrates that have taken over the town. Not only have they put up the price of our little hovels, you can't walk the streets without being within 10 feet of a fort or fink.

C. Urmudgeon · Joined: 25 Jun 2007 Posts: 6

I remember when it was all fields, and local folk could "race their donkeys" in peace without the interference of pointless pansy southern paper shuffling pen pushers soiling the countryside with their bland housing estates and antisocial pronunciation.

AG bloody D - they should have been lined up and shot for building the AGD, then lined up and shot again for building its vile replacement. I don't know who, it's the principle that counts.

And don't talk to me about that bloody awful supposed sculpture (Isaiah) either, it's crap, ugly, and would be better used as hardcore; art my arse - they were robbed. It looked a lot better with a nose and mouth painted on it.

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

I remember when it was all dense forest and you could travel from Holymoorside to Staveley without setting foot on the ground. Then one day it was all cleared away and the hills were put up, big mistake, that's when all the Londoners came here to be first to climb up them and look down on the rest of us.

trampoline Gertie · Joined: 23 Jun 2007 Posts: 9 Location: Brampton

I can remember that, does that mean you're who I am?

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

Not necessarily, it could be you who is who I am. And remember, I am only a figment.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

What is it with this tramp-Pauline Gertie. First she wants to be JPW(Hmmm, I think not) Then she seems obsessed with H Splint. When I was alive I wanted to be Oscar Levant, or failing that Russ Conway.

Barney Bastard · Posted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 2:58 am Post subject: Re: Bah

I bit his finger off but it didn't stop him. Anybody want to buy an ark?

bonzo · Joined: 20 Feb 2007 Posts: 15 Location: Basket

I'd just like to say that I'm a figment of my own imagination, not anyone elses. I come from a litter of twelve - you can't teach me anything about identity. Times were hard when I was a pup, it was dog eat dog. Furthermore, it was me who actually bit off Russ Conway's finger.
_________________
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Support the Brampton Bugle
campaign against nun baiting.
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Fr. Grumptious O'Bastard · Joined: 27 Jun 2007 Posts: 2 Location: Brampton

He's right Barney, you merely ate it. Ah, happy days.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

Excuse me for interrupting this interesting and rather bizarre nostalgic reminiscing, but the Russ Conway I wanted to be when I was alive wasn’t the celebrated one finger-missing pianist, who regularly appeared on the Billy Cotton Band Show {with Alan Breeze}. He was Gladys Conway’s eldest son from Elm Street who had three sisters at Hollingwood Girls School.

The Famous Orb · Joined: 28 Jun 2007 Posts: 3 Location: Scarrot B

When I first crash- landed on Earth (Roswell 1947) I was greatly impressed by Larry Adler, but now I am retired and living in Heaton Court Brampton I spend my time listening to the shipping forecast and collecting leather washers.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

So that's where you are Orb, I've been looking for you for ages. I thought you said you'd lock up the flying saucer and meet me in Billy the Kids diner, Dexter, New Mexico. When you didnt show up I came to England and got a job at Staveley Works.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

I would just like to say that I was greatly surprised to read those last two postings regarding the Roswell incident. The more cynical faction of the forum readers will immediately jump to the conclusion that they are a deliberate attempt to ridicule the whole thing; especially as both the contributors are figments. But I say this- “this”.
No man is an island( except Barry that is) so watch this space for startling revelations.

C. Urmudgeon · Joined: 25 Jun 2007 Posts: 6

Final frontier my arse. Front bottom more like. I saw that alien from Roswell, it was that magician bloke from Yorkshire.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

To quote freely the words of the late Reggie Scrotter, (Brampton High Street) when he invited me to a free, all in, ‘nowt to pay, pork pie sampling extravaganza- "You may scoff."

admin · Posted: Tue Jul 10, 2007 4:27 am Post subject: Hmm

There is no mother-ship, it's not coming, ever. They never had any intention of coming back for us; this is it, and we are stuck with it.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

That's it then, so, what shall we talk about now?

admin · Posted: Tue Jul 10, 2007 11:35 pm Post subject: poo

The revelation of startlings perhaps? We don't get too many of those round here since the demise of quality pork pie manufacturing. When I was a lad, there was a pork butcher on every corner that didn't have a pub and everyone was significantly more startled on a regular basis. Anyway, why are you asking me? I'm just as much a figment as everyone else. Except Bonzo of course, who invented all of us while suffering from indigestion.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

What an interesting thought and very true. I was born startled, (it might have been the bombing) and ever since that moment, I have been in some degree of startlement right up to last night, when I changed to bewilderment.
When I was at Brim Boys, I was startled by Mr. Kelly the headmaster,( everyone was within a 5 mile radius) and then when I discovered Hollingwood girls school, breasts, (but that’s another story). When I worked at Markham’s, I was startled by thou’s, and how many millions there were in an inch, but I soon worked out that everyone else was. Looking back, we were happy then, no Nike trainers, drugs, computer games or texting to keep us happy, just a bottle of water, or Hop bitters if we were extra daring and a promise that our mam would give us a good hiding if were not back in the house before the street lamp came on.

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

Not many people know this, and I am not altogether convinced, but back in 1916, during the Great War, a well-known inventor and conscientious objector called William H. Throttle, from Derby Road, invented a machine for measuring startlement.
It was horse- drawn(although many draftsmen from Donkins helped with the design) steam driven and calibrated in inches, due to submarines. (You couldn’t get metric for love nor money in those days)
It had the added bonus of recording a score out of 10 for intensity; a 2 was quite normal for those days, what with the war and everything and a 5 was, well intense.
Anyone who registered a 5 was immediately sent to the trenches as they were made of the right stuff to face the Bosch. ( Some had to wash by hand in a stream.)
The highest ever state of startlement score was a high 6 and a quarter, recorded in 1923, long after the conflict and held by the Great Assendo, or Erne as his friends called him. He was an ex Royal Flying Coup Zeppelin spotter, but now that his services were no longer required, he became a freelance high altitude balloonist and exaggerator. I don’t know what happened to him but my granddad reckons he became a Liberal MP for North Sincs.

admin · Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2007 1:49 am Post subject: Re: flogging

It's funny you should mention Throttle's horse drawn steam driven startlement indicator, as my great aunt Cuthbert had one for years and never knew what it was until she was accidentally startled by a runaway tram. She won it at bingo shortly after the first world war. I used to play with it as a child, but the horses had been dead for some time by then.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

While reading about W H Throttle’s remarkable startling machine, I was suddenly reminded of another great man with local connections, George Stevenson, a man of vision who gave us the railways, and Stevenson’s Place, to mention just a few of his attributes.
Anyway, although I was reminded of him, this is not about him, it is about another local genius inventor called Ted Sporage, who lived and worked in Staveley, behind the Wizard. (For people who can’t remember Pan’s people, the Beatles or Sonky Sales, the Wizard was a benevolent savings club and a nickname for the old Scarrot’s Stores, a shop that sold everything from a tin tack to a steamroller, not somebody out of Harry Watsit)
Ted Sporage (that wasn’t his real name) invented a horse drawn, steam driven, one man; hand operated secret- measuring engine or ‘Secrometer’ as he affectionately called it. Coincidently this machine was covertly built during the First World War under cover (tarpaulin during the day, blackout by night) by Count Heinrich von Keapstum (Yes I thought that strange too) to check out secrets from secret agents who had inadvertently landed behind the wrong lines.
The highest ever-recorded secret was measured at 4.3, (a 6 in today’s money) which stood for several years until 1923, when a man called Harold Splint (remember him) broke all records and reached the dazzling heights of 9’3. (Off the scale nowadays) He told a convincing story into the hidden microphone, that he, had it on good authority that God wasn’t the all singing all dancing omnipresent creator of the universe (as stated by most of the clergy), but an acronym of a high powered company logo, wrongly attributed to God. He said it was all a mistake, and over the years vast amounts of adoration had been bestowed quite wrongly as it happens, on a huge benevolent organisation run by a nice man called Larry and based somewhere East of Spokane in Washington, nearly in Idaho USA.
Unfortunately, no one believed Harold Splint, (later made famous for his work with broken legs) especially the clergy, so the 9.3 remained an enigma, and the engine was never used again.

C. Urmudgeon · Joined: 25 Jun 2007 Posts: 6

Sonky? Pah. In Brampton (before it was invaded by posh folks and estate agents) we had Jimmy Gaunt's theoretical bicycle shop where you could get absolutely everything, and be reminded that it was cheaper than it was in Woolies in the 1920's. All gone now of course, you can't get a theoretical bicycle for love nor money. You can, however, now sit outside the pork butchers at the end of Heaton Street supping coffee on the pavement like a continental ponce. Personally I preferred the availability of respectable pork pies and cheap odd things. And don't talk to me about smoking in pubs, the last thing I want is to be able to smell the lavatories and taste the revolting muck they laughingly claim to be beer. And another thing, however grammatically wrong it may be to start a sentence with 'and'; why did they ever change the name of the George Stephenson Memorial Theatre? It's not as if we've had many people worth commemorating round here. There was Baden Powell of course, although I always thought 'Scouting for Boys' was a strange choice of title. Stephenson did invent the straight cucumber at Tapton though, and that deserves to be remembered alongside his other achievements. In my less than humble opinion, the admirable pointlessness of the development of the straight cucumber wasn't exceeded until they put a man on the moon.

I think I feel better now.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

I showed your article to my late granddad this morning, and although he was a Staveley man( from his lamp lens right down to his clogs), and a founder member of the 'Top of the Mount Freewheelers' he had to admit that hand- made Brampton bikes were better than any made in Staveley. He recalled the time when his late father bought a ‘Penny Farthing’ from Jimmy Gaunts, and the day he collected it with a borrowed horse and cart, Jimmy’s late granddad told him that not only was it a fine machine, hand built by craftsmen working at the limits of perfection due to threats of redundancy, but half the price of any tuppenny-ha’penny bike made in Staveley.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

I was talking to a very old gentleman on Walton Dam this morning and he told me that all his life he had had these funny feelings.
“What sort of funny feelings?” I enquired, suddenly taking an interest in him as I too am inflicted with the same malady.
He said that there was no pattern to them; they just sort of popped up from time to time depending on circumstances and things around him.
“What things?” I asked. “Give me an example.”
“Well,” he said. “The other night I had a dream about Sir Ranulph Fiennes OBE, and when I woke up, the fridge freezer had packed in and I found half a fish finger in the ice box.”
“That is strange,” I said, “can you give me another instance.”
“Yes, ( this is him speaking now) during the great war 1914- 1963) I was in the trenches up Norbriggs way, and a Jerry sniper had us pinned down for hours; couldn’t even go to the lav in case we got our arse shot off.”
“What did you do?” I asked, slightly intrigued by his predicament.
“I made a run for it, that’s what; he fired but missed and when I got back from the lav in the Coop, I said to my mate Sid, it’s no good worrying Sid, if the bullet’s got your name on it, you’ve had it.”
“I’ve heard that before,” I said, “Is that true?”
“Yes, but then I had this funny feeling; a sort of doom and gloom that seemed to engulf Sidney.”
“Oh dear,” I replied sensing an imminent death. “Was he killed?”
“Killed!” he said. “The bullet when straight thru’ his head and came out and stuck me, but it hit my mess tin which saved my life.”
“Wow!” I said, “Lucky for you, but not so for poor Sid.”
“That’s right, but when I looked at the bullet, although slightly squashed with the impact on Sid’s head, I found that not only did it have his name on it, it had his address and telephone number.”
I’m meeting him tomorrow at the same time.

The Famous Orb · Joined: 28 Jun 2007 Posts: 3 Location: Scarrot B

Is it my imagination or am I being paranoid, but whenever JPW decides to work on his book(s) and give the forum a rest, nobody else bothers to contribute. Not only that, judging from the numbers given clicking onto the site, nobody reads it until he starts up again. I might just be a figment myself, but I do have perceptions and I notice things.

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

I too am a figment, but I too have noticed this. I may have the ear of JPW, and perhaps lots of other bits, but nobody know what he's on with.

admin · Posted: Wed Aug 22, 2007 8:17 pm Post subject: Grunt

Apologies for the lamentable lack of whatever there's been a lack of of late, but Bugle Towers is currently beset by plague and pestilence of a hitherto unknown magnitude. We offer our sincere thanks to those stalwarts and bastions who have, single handedly in some cases, maintained the standards to which our esteemed readers are accustomed. We hope that normal service will be restored in the fullness of time at the appropriate juncture. Meanwhile, here is a little light music.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

Thanks 'min, I think you mean me, but how did you know I was a bastion? I thought only the close family knew my secret.Yes its out, I am half American, half Anglish and quarter Asprin. By the way I love the light music.

H Splint · Joined: 10 Jun 2007 Posts: 12

Light music, you’re lucky; all I can hear day and night are wind chimes, dingle, clinky, bloody dingle all the time. No mater where I am in the house, down in the cellar with the leopard or up in the round tower with Orb checking on asteroids, I am constantly bombarded with the most annoying sound in the world. (Next to Jamie Cullen’s attempts at playing jazz) The only way to stop the abundance of these abominations is to sell with them instructions that state- for best results, stick them up your arse.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

Here hear, I agree about the wind chimes, but I’ve got bigger problems than that.
I’ve got that great man himself, Reggie Hailstone and his complete marching saxophone band living in my attic, and I can’t hear myself think ‘cos of the noise. Day and night, sopranos, altos, tenors,( all with top F sharp) baritones, a C melody I think, and yesterday I heard an E flat sopranino, all improvising a full octave above James Last. Can anyone out there in Brampton land help? Even my late Grandma who lives next door in one of Hienrich Luitpold Himmler’s charity homes for the belligerent is acting funny. She is 103 years old, stone deaf and lives under the stairs in case of Zeppelins but even she has just started buying Larry Adler records to cut out the noise.

Little Jim · Joined: 27 Aug 2007 Posts: 5

I can help, although I helped before with the very same problem but due to heavy pruning on the old Brampton wall it alas got lost. Anyway, here it is again, take note all you readers in case it gets lost again.

My uncle Percy played lead Cor anglais in the Clay Cross, Cor anglais horse drawn formation display team, and my aunty Betty got rid of him with a cattle prod as she distracted him with a photo of Oscar Hammerstein humming .

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

When my mother was a little girl she told me a story about her late Aunt Hilda, who at that time, before the Liberal Democrats, lived in a big house up Walton way. She said that they were plagued by an annoying noise that emanated out of the servants quarters down in the mire, behind the holding cells for the clinically obese. The game keeper found that it was Jackson the footman, practising his trombone on his time off duty. (15mins a day except Christmas, when it was extended to 20 mins.)
Anyway, Aunt Hilda contacted- Trombones we get rid off are us, or something sounding similar, and they came round, did something humane with electricity, and the problem was solved.

JPW · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Walgrove area

My uncle Jim (Jim Jackson from Clay Cross or ‘Jabs’ to his friends) was the leading exponent of the muted E flat Cattle prod, in fact during the first Great War he toured all the major countries of Europe (except France) and stunned audiences everywhere he performed.

Dan Sprocket · Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 7

My great Uncle Sidney was a wizard on the coal fired steam driven harpsichord, but when they changed over to gas, it upset his embouchure and made him rancid.