Yourrrrrr’e listening to the Navvying Today programme and it’s one minute, 347 days and two millennia…
…after Christ’s birth. Allegedly. But more on that later. First, here’s some traffic.

There’s a problem just off the M40 near Warwick, where tourists on the Warwick Castle to Shakespeare’s Birthplace run are creating traffic jams as they stop to inspect an abandoned red Morris Minor Traveller, led to believe by it’s obvious agedness (and it’s less obvious knackered dynamo and burnt-out battery) that it did in fact belong to The Bard himself. Meanwhile, in Leek, Staffordshire, a number of stationary cars are boxed-in to the car park of Millward Hall for the weekend by an improbably well-parked green trailer. Back to Brian Redshirt in the studio.

Thank you. Now over to Froghall Basin on the Caldon Canal for a report on the restoration project there.

* * *

We’re here in our N-reg red radio minibus broadcasting live from the site of this fascinating historic transport interchange, beside the impressive Froghall lime kilns. We’re interviewing Rupert and Alison Smedley, who are co-ordinating efforts from their mobile canal restoration support unit, disguised for heritage planning reasons as a blue Morris Minor Traveller.

“Yes, having escaped putting most of London WRG and KESCRG up in our fleet of interesting narrowboats, we’ve been able to turn our attention to the basin, and in particular some major scrub-bashing of the almost park-like site beside it, chamber clearance of the lock out to the canal, and finishing off the restoration of one of the tramway sidings as a heritage feature.”

That’s great Alison, but what’s with the chappie in blue overalls wielding a chainsaw?

“Oh, that’s Tenko. He’s a whiz with it, isn’t he? You’ll only just manage to say the word ‘tree’ before he’s cut it down and sectioned it for firewood. We’ll pile it up over by the car park so that if it’s still there tomorrow, locals with unfeasibly large trailers can take it away.”

Thanks, Rupert, but how do you manage to feed this dedicated and hard-working group of impressively turned-out workers, and, er, the guy in the virtually non-existent shorts toting a digital camera?

“Well, with several Curver boxes of lunch, if it ever turns up.”

* * *

Welcome to the lunchtime cookery show, Ready, Steady, Cater!. Today star chefs Brian & Maureen, Ellie and helpers various will create a three-course Christmas-effect dinner complete with two kinds of soup, three kinds of meat, two puddings, cheese and biscuits, home-made red wine and beautifully decorated tables, using only this youth club kitchen, enormous and unwieldy green cooker and Transitful of ingredients. But first, here’s a quick and simple lunch recipe. You will need one huge pile of sandwich fillings, anything left over from brekky, some soup, several metal catering trays and a Peugeot 205…

* * *

Meanwhile, let’s see what’s going on in Carenza’s trench. Ooh, what’s that, Ed?

“It’s the bit of this old tramway siding that was left unrestored (ie. half-rotten) as part of the heritage feature being created. Thing is, the plan is to put rails down and display a typical wagon of the period to aid the public’s interpretation of the site. So we need to put a horizontal beam across the end of the siding in order to fit some buffers. And this vertical member here on the left is not suitable, as part of it has rotted away. If it’s anything like the one on the right, which has been replaced, it’ll be an old railway sleeper and come out, without a fight, to be replaced by this nice fresh one here.”

Several hours later…

“Well, having found that it is in fact square in section, goes down nearly half a metre below ground level and probably wouldn’t even come out with a Tirfor, we’ve decided to chop out the rotten bit (nice clean cut at the front with the Stihl saw, much hacking at the rest) and graft in a cut-down railway sleeper. This involves chopping out much of the pointing Mk2 did this morning.”

* * *

Welcome to Tube Idol, in which only the very pithiest attempts at dressing up as London Underground stations will go through to win a selection of unspecified prizes. We have some really talented people here, all of whom want their big break in public transport impersonation…

“The panel of judges, from the very height of the waterway recovery movement, have made their decision, having first turned to drink at the sight of Welsh Alan dressed as a fishnet-stockinged schoolgirl. Stars of the night have included the black tie and ballgown of Steve Davis and Ruth as Bond Street, Bob as both Royal Oak and (through use of his ever-present pocket blowtorch) Burnt Oak, Dr. Liz as Green Park, complete with joggers and a pond full of frogs, Richard Cool as Angel, with white wings both delicate and large, and Liz Wilson as Hatton Cross. Yes, it’s as simple as getting a hat and a cross in this game, but how will they all fare in Dr. Liz and Martin’s floor-sized, London WRG t-shirt based, Underground-style, pub map game? And who will survive the Tube Quiz, in which they will be asked to name the only station which contains none of the letters from the word ‘mackerel’?

* * *

Welcome to ‘Sunday Breakfast’ and to those of you who haven’t got much further than sitting up in your sleeping bags, staring blearily into space and wondering why Bob hasn’t brought the teapot and some mugs upstairs. And now, music video, featuring the Tim Lewis Prodigy with ‘Firestopper’, filmed on location at Froghall, and of course, in a London Underground tunnel.

* * *

Meanwhile, back in Carenza’s trench…

“Well, hours of digging has meant that it isn’t actually possible to tell the difference between Bob, MKP and Sleepy Dave, who are uniformly covered in black goo. Oh, no, tell a lie, that one’s MKP. Amazingly, you can still see the virtually non-existent shorts.”

Thanks Marcus. But what are you planning to do with the wood with which you have filled the entire back end of your Land Rover?

“Back to Rupert and Alison’s, methinks.”

The big story today is that the site looks really impressive now, “huge scrub clearance” seeming like an understatement and “an endless supply of really black goo” seeming even more like a living nightmare. Elanor and Eddie have started the kit-washing using pumped canal water whilst the pointing crew have finally sorted the three brick kits back into the appropriate bags. Anything else goes into the Really Useful Things Bag. Oh, and in other news, the Americans have finally found Saddam Hussein, alone in a hidey-hole in his hometown, and it only took 600 of them to take him.

* * *

It’s Sunday evening. You’re watching Restoration Songs of Praise…

• Thanks be to Rupert & Alison for sorting out an excellent accomm and recommending an equally ace pub for Friday night
• Thanks be to the catering team for yet another unbelievably wonderful Christmassy banquet
• Thanks be to people various for organising real ale, and, er, homebrewed “Surprise”
• Thanks be to Tenko for seeming to be cutting trees/stumps/railway sleepers in at least three places at any one time
• Thanks be to Bungle for going to bed early and thus discouraging Mk2 from starting a sing-song session
• Thanks be to all the volunteers who actually made site on Sunday and dug, chopped, burnt, bashed and pointed their way through hangovers to leave the site transformed.

Oh, and it was St. John’s Wood, by the way.

Mk2