Mad Hatters - The Humphrey Song

A spin off from the 1976 advertising campaign for Unigate milk, watch out there's a Humphrey about, you never saw a Humphrey only a line of red & white drinking straws.

In the afternoon on the commercial TV channel, there would be an announcement the the following commercials were part of the new advertising campaign for xxxxx, they would then show all the campaign commercials back to back, the Humphrey adverts were first shown as one of these.  

At the time of this campaign my girlfriend (later Wife) and me had just moved into our first house, money was very tight. that year the company I worked for made a massive loss, and as a consequence the stopped all overtime, at the time I was relying on some overtime to make ends meet, as I worked nights I decided to get a pert time job during the day, I ended up working as a lunchtime barman in a Truman's pub, at this time Truman's and Unigate were both owned by Grand Metropolitan Hotels, advertisements for the Humphry campaign were put up in the pub but they kept disappearing, the assistant manager, one of the barmaids was supposed to go out with the trainee manager, for some reason he did not turn up (he may have had to work if there was a staff shortage)  she went out with one of the patrons who was a milkman, after the one night stand she found out she was pregnant, for her the "I've been Humphried" had to totally different meaning, she took Umbridge at the posters and quietly removed them when no one was watching. 

 (1) The Mad Hatters The Humphrey Song 1976 - YouTube

A Quiet Time

With Septembers fishing trip being cancelled due to bad weather, the second trip cancelled this year, but the first one cancelled due to the weather, some years it has been 10 trips booked 8 cancelled due to weather, the next trip is from Brighton early in October.

My main email account seems to be playing up, I am getting emails that appear on my mobile phone bur for some reason don't appear on my laptop, a number of years ago before I had a mobile phone, I changed my computer while I was setting it up and transferring my email account I got a large number of 'New' historic emails, that for some reason had not been delivered.

The picture was taken about four years back is the Ashley Centre car park, Epsom, I had been in Epsom renewing my mobile phone, due to a problem with the handset I had to get it replaced, both times I parked in the Ashley Centre car park as the phone shop is in the Ashley Centre, though I dislike the car park and prefer the one at Hook Road ( the bays are larger), I had left the car park and was heading home I noticed a large plume a black smoke, I ignored it thinking it was builders burning some rubbish, but no it wasn't, a woman had steam and smoke belching out of her car, rather than stopping on the road she drove into the Ashley Centre car park and parked on the third floor (in the area I usually park in) and left her car to do some shopping, the car caught fire, the fire destroyed/seriously damaged 7 other cars and  damages the fabric of the car park, when the car park re-opened they had put in temporary roof supports from the second to seventh levels and closed off the main floors for parking, this cut the capacity down by at least 70%, parking now only available on the mezzanine floors and the annexes, it took about a year for the repair works to be completed, I wonder what her insurance company had to pay out, seven written off cars, repairs to the car park fabric and no doubt loss of income of 70% of the car park for a year, it was and still is a very busy car park.

The pictures below are from the Surrey Live website.

 

Valarie Singleton - Solomon's Centipede

 

Released 1969, both sides of this record were written by Peter Sarstedt.

 I was thinking about the continuity announcers on ITV Children's TV Wally Whyton and Muriel Young, Wally Whyton had a hit record as part of the Vipers Skiffle group and released a number of records under his own name, Muriel Young like Christopher Scott appeared as a narrator on a number of Meccano Story Records, they also had a number of different hand puppets over the years starting with Pussycat Willum, the flaw with Pussy Cat Willum was he didn't have a mouth so could not speak, this was rectified on the replacement Ollie Beak and later Fred Barker both spoke,  From memory I seem to remember another Children's continuity announcer on ITV, he was always in strange cloths and had a dark secret about the Dagenham Cocoa Rooms, I think his name was Reg, I always found him rather weird.

 

Valerie Singleton - 'Solomon's Centipede' (1969)

Valarie Singleton - Jimmy Giraffe

 

The 'B' side of Valerie Singletons 1969 release, her co presenter of Blue Peter at the time Christopher Scott also appeared on record, he narrated some of the Meccano series of stories, I was once offered the complete set of Meccano records but due to storage space constrains I declined the offer. 

Valerie Singleton Jimmy Giraffe B Side 1969

August Bank Holiday Boot Sale

 

Mondays Hook Road Arena's Boot Sale was much larger than they have been lately, filling most of the field as I arrived many of the sellers were still arriving, despite being much larger than in recent years there was less interesting items, it may be a sign of the times that there were many people selling cloths and household items, I brought very little, a set of magnifying glasses that look like they came from a Mad Max movie and four packets of cable clips ( 2 packs for 50p), I did miss out on some interesting records as I had passed the stall before they were put out, one person was showing me the records he had brought, I made a mental note of some of the titles and checked to see if I had them on the music drive, I had all of them, I spent less than £10 and was home by 09.30, one of the least amounts I have spent at a boot sale in a long time.

The fishing trip booked for next Monday has been cancelled due to high winds, It's the first trip we have lost to the weather this year, the other cancelled trip was due to Health & Safety, some years we have had most of the trips cancelled due to the weather, normally I would get the cancellation email just after I had completed the shopping and was on the escalator up to the car park. 

Emperor Napoleon XIV - I'm In Love With My Little Red Tricycle

This is one record I never owned, I was 14 when this record was released in 1966, my elder sister liked to buy records as birthday presents, so she could listen to them, she asked me what record I would like for my birthday I said I would like 'Emperor Napoleon XIV - I'm In Love With My Little Red Tricycle' she then said you can't have that record its all talking, I never did get the record, at that time I was not into pop music. 

 I'm in Love with My Little Red Tricycle

Car Troubles

 My car went for its annul service and MOT last Monday, when I went to Devon in July on the journey down my car started playing up on hills you could feel it start to lose power, then an audible warning and on the dash panel "Engine Malfunction - Seek Service" and go into "Limp Mode" on some of the longer hills it would do this 4 or 5 times, my thought was water in the fuel tank, many years ago I had the problem on my Lambrettta it always manifested itself going up hills, it was an easy repair, run it until the tank was almost empty then disconnect the carburettor and drain off the remaining half pint or so of fuel and dispose of, reconnect the carburettor, close the fuel valve and refill the tank. I looked up the problem on the Internet and it gave a number of causes such as, clogged fuel line, dirty injectors, clogged diesel particulate filter. About an hour after I dropped of the car, I got a text message about the problem they had connected the car to the diagnostic computer and it came up with 2 faults 'low fuel pressure from fuel filter' and 'Low fuel pressure at injectors' the problem was the fuel filter, I'm used to the fuel filter being a small clear plastic thing with a filter paper inside, the fuel filter in question was part of the engine management system and was about £150 for the replacement part, the car runs much better now seeming to have more power, I have not yet tested it on hills yet as there are no suitable ones locally, when I last went fishing at Brighton it was a least 30 miles before the problem appeared, I have a fishing trip booked from Gosport on September 1st so I will see how it behaves then.

I will be going to the Hook Road Boot Sake tomorrow, though the now have it on both Sunday & the Bank Holiday Monday they are not as good as they used to be.