Published at 09:34, Thursday, 24 December 2009

AFTER months of planning, the loft of Hextol Towers has been relieved of all its flotsam and jetsam.

It’s all in preparation for the arrival of the men who are going to re-insulate it, having deemed the present random heaps of fluffy yellow fibreglass barely adequate for Barbie’s Bungalow.

More than 30 years’ worth of oddities had accumulated in the roof space, all surplus to requirements, but somehow too good to throw away.

We came across things we had forgotten we owned, and even more that we never knew we had.

There was the incredibly gaudy 1973 stair carpet, and the family tent, an eight-berth contraption which never went up the same way twice, perhaps because we always seemed to have too many of one type of aluminium pole, and not enough of another.

We therefore improvised with assorted lengths of copper piping, which created the sort of interesting shape the tent designer can only have dreamed about.

As well as a pair of skis and a surf board, there were a pair of crutches and a sports bag which contained several sections of Scalextric track, and one car, of extremely doubtful provenance.

I believe it may have been part of the one my brother and I shared in the 1960s, and then cannibalised, using bits of Dinky toys, and possibly his Trionic cat’s whisker radio apparatus.

It had oversized slick tyres, which we used to lick, to create a satisfying amount of wheelspin, and the little metal pick-ups were augmented with generous tufts of Brillo pad to set more power coursing through that little engine.

We used to use books to create Indianapolis 500 style banking, but the souped up cars always shot off the end, and almost into the next room.

Another prime find was suitcase crammed with sections of model railway track, carriages and most of a locomotive.

I was never much of a one for train sets – there were only so many times you could watch a little black tank engine going round and round an oblong track.

Bestial bro and I used to set up barricades of logs, and plastic cowboys and Indians, for the train to crash into, but even that palled after a while.

Electronic genius that he was, my brother did carry out certain adjustments to the transformer, which sent the train hurtling along as though Casey Jones was in the cab, but also produced plumes of acrid smoke from the control box.

He also once managed by some miracle of electronic wizardry to have two trains hurtling towards each other on the same track, producing some top notch railway disasters, but it was all a little one dimensional.

I also had a solemn school friend, a cherubic child with hair so blond his scalp shone pinkly through.

He lived in a rambling mansion on the outskirts of town, and was into model trains in a big way.

He once announced that the entire top floor of his house was given over to a monster railway lay-out.

My lack of belief was palpable, so one night, he insisted I came to his house to see for myself.

My memory may be playing me false, but I seem to recall that a uniformed, bewigged flunkey opened the door, and eyed me haughtily.

He bade me stand on a six square of carpet, while he announced in a stentorian bellow: “Master Pelham, there’s a person of the lower orders asking to see you.

“Should I have him removed?”

As I only knew him by his surname, I had no idea my chum had such a posh name, and was quite taken aback.

Thankfully, The Kid with Pink Hair came trip-trapping down the staircase, and waving away the flunkey, bade me join him.

We tramped along several miles of corridors, passing silent relatives and some slightly more animated suits of armour.

Then we entered a veritable Clapham Junction of gleaming rails, orderly stations and what seemed like dozens of locos, pulling carriages, toting freight and emitting plumes of smoke.

I was gobsmacked, and noted the gleam of pride suffusing young Pelham’s delicate features.

Then, from the depths of an armchair at the far end of the room, came a bull-like roar, as a red-faced man with a white walrus moustache bawled: “Get out of here, fool; I told you never to come in here.”

“Yes, dad,” he said meekly, and sadly closed the door.

Published by http://www.hexhamcourant.co.uk