I think Bushy House has enough ghost stories without adding composers to the mix!

It's a little on the high side, my post count, yes...I take that to mean that I enjoy spending time here talking to friends...the high post count is just a consequence of this...

barry's post count = 22 jumbo jets.

spoiled it now (22747), but

I had this really odd conversation with this woman at the bus stop at half 5 this morning

I would be surprised anyone else was at the bus stop TBH.

I've had to stand on the bus at that sort of hour of the morning before now...

I could believe you if it was a small single decker but not if it were a double decker or bendy.

It was a double decker (472 and 486 very good for crowds at that hour)...

This was a single decker (but then it usually is anyway)

You could be on a bus at 2 o'clock in the morning in London, and still find you have no seat...

You couldn't be on my bus in Leeds as it finishes at 11pm and doesn't start up again til 5 o'clock!

No night buses in Leeds, then...

Nght buses in London are...er...interesting

They're also very useful for going straight from King's Cross to my parents' house

Nght buses in London are...er...interesting a nightmare!!!

Well, you do get all sorts of people on them. Some of them are sober

That's true. There aren't too many but every so often there is someone sober on a night bus! You normally spot him easily as he is the only one not screaming or not asleep!

...or not singing something unrecognisable...

It's insanely foggy outside

When I was at school in Surrey buses were a real nightmare. They often did not come at the specified time and finished by about 7.15pm. Most routes only had 1 or 2 buses an hour.

So on the odd occassion I had to be at school in the evening I had to take a taxi home because inevitably I had 2 bags/ bag and instrument which made it impossible to cycle. Luckily I was able to take last bus to school on thise rare occassions.

What made it worse it that it took 2 buses to get home. I a glad the school ran a bus service that went less than 10 mins walk from my house.

At 5.3opm one wednesday I waited 40 minutes for a bus that never turned up, it was 35 minutes after the specifed time. I gave up on the bus and walked the 1 hour home. At least i saved ?1.80!

How can Robbie Williams win a Lifetime Achievement award at 35 years old?

Whenever I go to a bookshop I'm always surprised to see so many autobiographies written by people in their 20s or 30s!!!

So am I!...

I don't think the world is quite ready yet for 'Barry-Clari : my life with clarinets'

Surely it would just be "Barry-Clari:"

That would make a good read!!!!

You're right Claudia, it probably would just be that



you'd get a signed copy that you could sell on for...oooo...about 4 or 5 pence

You never know...it might be a bestseller! And as people tend to write about 10 autobiographies about themselves these days, yours could be followed by 'Barry-Clari : my life with cellos' then my flutes etc...

...and 'Barry-Clari, my life singing, including the karaoke moments, uncut'

ohh...this has got to be a DVD!!

Which would probably be filed in music shops under 'comedy'

*adds an entry to the list of things to do before she dies: witness a Barry-Clari live performance at a karaoke pub*

Oh, we'll make sure that wish is fulfilled sometime, missypiano

And temperature hasn't reached 0 yet.


That sounds like a lot of buses to me. We had two busses a day - one at 7:10 am which got met to the bus stop nearest school at around 8:45am, and one which left the stop nearest my school at 17:50 and got back to my village at around 19:30. These were the only two busses which served the local area.

Did you grow up in the middle of nowhere?

In my experience the worst bus service I encountered was the No 64 Croydon - New Addington (We lived in Selsdon at the time) . I think it was supposed to be a regular 15 min service, but there were frequently 3 or 4 in convoy coming up Farley Rd , then you wouldnt see another for an hour.
I expect Cyrilla might tell us if this is still the case.

I think that buying "Mass Effect 2" is really not going to help me allocate extra piano practice time... It's awesome, though! ooops!

I agree, but as you said, does nothing for the piano skills

Hot tip of the day. Do not use cotton buds to clean trumpet mouthpieces. They snap off and get stuck! Just spent half an hour with various forks, screwdrivers etc to remove one Not that I'm heading off for my big trumpet gig in 10 mins, eek!!

I spent a small fortune upgrading my PC a few months back to play the latest games, but piano sort of got in the way and the only game I've played lately is Mahjohng that comes with Windows 7... ooops!

Must exercise some restraint though, ME2 looks like it could chew up dozens of hours..

'Twas ever thus, f#m...and still is!!

The bus route with the worst record is the 65. It goes betwen Kingston and Ealing Broadway. Luckily I only rely on it once a week.

I love that 65 bus. It's far better for getting from Richmond to Kingston than the 371 is

Doesn't the 371 go via most of South West London to get from A to B though?

Basically, yes.

What is the point in having a bus service that goes an appallingly long way round to get anywhere? I must be missing something...

Maybe people live in the area where it goes round and they don't want to get 3 buses to go somewhere

...I think I'll stick to music, not public transport planning

In the town where I work, they have express bus routes during the peak hour - they usually still go on the same roundabout route, they just don't stop very often. A couple of years ago (when they put a tram line in) they re-organised the bus numbers:

N° 23 went from the tram stop to A not via the station.
N° 34 went from the tram stop to B via the station

N° 23 express went to A via the station

And the bus drivers of 23 and 23 express got irate because passengers kept asking if they were going to A or B and if they stopped at the station or not

In the end they changed the number of the 23 express and called it something completely different.

I think I've decided what I'd like to do during the school summer holidays...

Get on lots of buses?