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Richard Griffin

@squarewheels.org.uk
185 followers 41 following 170 posts

Husband, train driver/instructor, novice baker, cyclist, musician, geek, parkrunner. www.squarewheels.org.uk

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Reposted by Richard Griffin
Gavin Lingiah 🧬⚖️ @gav1nx.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Andy Burnham: We shall improve society a little bit. Conservatives:
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daily bunnies 🐇✨ @dailybunnies.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Close-up of a brown bunny’s nose, whiskers, and mouth.
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Brexit Bin 🇪🇺 🇬🇧 🇩🇪 @brexitbin.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Probably one of the greatest speeches on kindness and intelligence ever given! 👏👏👏 [SOUND ON 🔊]
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 21/09/2026
More so if you’re the driver! (except in my halcyon days of nonchalantly pulling off my “Park Lane – Grosvenor Sq – Berkeley Sq – Piccadilly – Sloane Sq – Holbein Place” unauthorised diversion, in 2004 in various 40-foot coaches (mostly Volvo B10Ms tho) on the Oxford - London X90 service (RIP).)
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 17/09/2026
www.maptap.gg September 17 94🏆 99🎯 96🔥 100🎯 97🔥 Final score: 976 (OK, that was a bit flukey in places!)
maptap.gg
🎯MapTap Daily Geography Game
Play MapTap - the daily geography game! Find 5 world locations on a 3D globe with historical stories. Free browser-based daily game for geography lovers.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 06/09/2026
My shredder was running more slowly than usual. I see its motor sparks quite a lot, and presume this is because the motor’s brushes are worn out. But where to obtain brushes measuring 5.4 x 3.9 mm (prob about 10mm long when new)?
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Gaby Hinsliff @gabyhinsliff.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
I’ve been a bit quiet on here lately, and this was why www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Losing a parent is a bewildering, lonely experience. Here are the things I wish I had known before | Gaby Hinsliff
There’ll be exhaustion, love tinged with occasional rage, even moments of black humour. But my mum would want me to tell you: don’t be afraid, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 05/09/2026
Awesome bike-ride! I'm sorry you're struggling mentally. I still cling to the notion that I'm a cyclist, but the last time I rode anything like that sort of distance was in 2019. Keep doing what you do. :)
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Elle Cordova @ellecordova.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Rough Draft vs Final Draft
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 03/09/2026
Nature herself proving that "Hexagons are the Bestagons" :)
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 02/09/2026
Welcome to Harrow! (Exit from station car park, Station Rd) @harrowonline.org
Behind some buildings a row of bins has rubbish overflowing and piled on top of them and spilling out into the roadway
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 31/08/2026
Yesterday I was sorting through my teetering reading-pile. Much of it is magazines, incl from my employer and from Cycling UK. It's telling that both backlogs start at June 2020 — a physical manifestation of insufficient headspace / mental wellness / or time since then to do much reading.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 27/08/2026
It’s ok to not be ok. Sounds like you are going through it at the moment. You do almost infinitely more exercise than me though which is probably helping!
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 26/08/2026
Earlies never seem to get any easier!
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 25/08/2026
No indeed, and Shanklin overrun is off a missing bridge into the road!
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Hastings Diesels Ltd @hastingsdiesels.co.uk · 25/08/2026
👀 New railtour alert! 📅 Saturday 19 September 2026: HDL ‘Megawatt Valley Venturer’ railtour to Nottingham, and the High Marnham Test Track near Tuxford. For details and bookings, please visit our website: www.hastingsdiesels.co.uk/tuxford
Screenshot of fare table, which also exists as a more accessible HTML table at the web-link given in the same Bluesky posting.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 23/08/2026
Ah yes, and do they have any terminus protection do you know?
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 23/08/2026
Something odd happening at Heathrow, a whole slew of consecutive missed approaches (well, at least 3 just now plus others a few mins ago) to runway 27-L. And now the landings are diverted to 27-R.
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The Museum of English Rural Life (MERL) @themerl.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Museums pro tip: Want to know if there's a bat flying around your galleries? Simply listen to all the visitors saying "there is a bat flying around the galleries."
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Terence Eden @edent.tel · 14/08/2026
I know you all hate the emergency alert about disposable barbeques. But yesterday I watched a man at our hotel breakfast set fire to a toaster by trying to toast a croissant - despite multiple signs telling him not to. Today he tried again. So, you know, calibrate for the average person.
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Mark Pack @markpackuk.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Bluesky yesterday and tomorrow - why are so many people so stupid? Bluesky today - why does the government have to send an alert to people telling them not to be stupid?
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Paul Whitewick @paulwhitewick.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Well...now its in the media I can share that this was indeed my sister that drew the... erm... bin in the sky. Legend!
Bin shape draw on flight radar
Two pilots in a plane.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 12/08/2026
I would be minded to do that too... though one shouldn't have to burn a day's A/L just to fix an awful roster (that is presumably written by people who don't work shifts)!
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 12/08/2026
Hope so... and glad the Sundays business is sorted out.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 12/08/2026
(With apologies to the memory of Senior Fire Officer Colin Townsley... ...whose surname I now see I conflated with that of Barry Townley-Freeman who was the flight engineer on board BA009 in June 1982 / G-BDXH / The Jakarta Incident / volcanic ash from Mt Galunggung)
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 12/08/2026
Hmmm, yeah but that's horrendous really — you've evidently managed it pretty well — but I couldn't cope with a roster that did that!
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Count Binface @countbinface.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
Wow. Just wow.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 11/08/2026
I'd made it clear I wasn't departing until he did, and I'd said "that's a minute you've delayed us, there's the [OPO] alarm going off." And once we departed I found myself saying, "Maybe just don't bloody smoke on the Tube!" [RIP SFO Townley-Freeman and the 30 passengers at King's X in 1987]
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 11/08/2026
If you were on a Met Line train earlier at 22:00ish that was on its way to Chesham, yes that was me who allowed 90 seconds' delay to accrue while a smoker was persuadedto step back out onto the platform... ..and to stub out the lit cigarette that he'd flicked out of my doors as they closed.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 08/08/2026
An unusual situation which amused me – to have closed all three of my Apple Watch activity rings by 1 minute past noon! (By exceeding 500 kCal of activity, 30 mins of exercise, and to have stood up & moved around during each of 12 hours.) How did I do it? Night-shift then parkrun! 🤭😂
Screenshot from my Apple Watch at one minute past noon, showing that I had already closed all three Activity Rings.
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Kat Knight @katkni.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
As someone wading through this right now with our parents’ house, a small but heartfelt plea to consider hugely decluttering your home if/when you have the ability to do that and ideally long before your offspring have to do it instead (when they are weighed down by extra things like grief).
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Joe Brown @joebrownlondon.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
#OnThisDay 179 years ago one of the most elegant station buildings in the country opened at Huddersfield, Grade I listed and designed by James Pigott Pritchett. Described by Sir John Betjeman as "the most splendid in England"... hard to disagree. Tim Green buff.ly/h3ND83I
Front elevantion of Huddersfield station: using the neo-classical style, the station is well known in architectural circles for its classical-style facade, with a portico of the Corinthian order, consisting of six columns in width and two in depth. In the square in front are fountains and a statue of Huddersfield-born Harold Wilson.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 19/07/2026
Carl Richards writes: “Risk is what’s left over when you think you’ve thought of everything.”
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 19/07/2026
“The most important part of every plan is planning on your plan not going according to plan.” — Morgan Housel
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Annette Gordon-Reed @agordonreed.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
Don’t know who to credit for this. But it is how I feel.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 13/07/2026
So that’s 40 minutes between trains that have an advertised 7.5-minute service interval. And, obviously, the Tube Status is “Good Service”. And even as an employee there’s literally nobody I can even mention this to, far less anyone who would listen let alone do anything about it.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 13/07/2026
Yet again the Tube Status proves to be utterly meaningless. I just missed an Uxbridge train from Harrow at about 10:09. The next one came at 10:30ish but then curtailed at Ruislip. The one behind that curtailed at Rayners. I’m now on a Picc. I can see the next UXB left Harrow at 10:50.
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 08/07/2026
At terminus stations (back in the old days of loco-hauled trains), the arriving train's loco would be uncoupled. When the train departed, the light engine would then follow the train out. 2 trains in 1 section. I never thought about this at the time, but what signalling arrangements were used?
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 08/07/2026
So I do have childhood memories of Liverpool Street, and particularly of how platforms 9 & 10 went much further south than all the others... which I recall being useful one day when we *just* caught the Cambridge train but only because it went from p9 which you could access freely (not via a gate).
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 08/07/2026
Here's a 1985 video tour I found of Liverpool Street mainline station. I grew up in Cambridge, for which "the Liverpool Street Line" was *the quick* way to London in those days (i.e. before the OHLE came north from Bishops Stortford and Royston to King's Lynn). www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrJn...
youtube.com
A walk round Liverpool Street (BR) station, 1985
YouTube video by Nick Mitchell
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David Benedict @eggsbened.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
“I am the most verbally and physically attacked public figure or politician of modern times.” The disgraceful Nigel Farage. Remembering Labour MP Jo Cox, born 1974, murdered 2016.
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Bylines Network @bylinesnetwork.co.uk · 27/06/2026
As Britain swelters through another heatwave, few people will have heard that ministers have quietly dropped plans for solar carports. Cars cooler in summer. Shelter from the rain in winter. Clean electricity all year round. A missed opportunity? @eastangliabylines.co.uk
eastangliabylines.co.uk
As Britain bakes, ministers quietly park plans for solar carports
Ministers have quietly shelved plans that could have transformed Britain's biggest car parks into shaded power stations
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Dr Susan Greaney @suegreaney.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
Petition against the job losses here: c.org/ddjtYXzdQQ
change.org
Sign the Petition
Stop Redundancies at the University of Exeter
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 26/06/2026
This is literally why I have this feeling of dread from about April onwards...
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 23/06/2026
😁 (That's supposed to be the crying emoji but the tears boiled before they could form drops)
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 23/06/2026
I did, but the water evaporated as its depth lessened towards the top of the glass when I tipped it.
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Paul Taylor @pavtal.bsky.social · 21/06/2026
Our @hastingsdiesels.co.uk English Riviera trip was a success! See some fantastic footage here.. www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KjU...
youtube.com
Rare Hastings DEMU at Dawlish Sea Wall
YouTube video by Coast Cams
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alexvonwitzleben.bsky.social @alexvonwitzleben.bsky.social · 06/06/2026
"France passed a single law and instantly unlocked 11 gigawatts of #solarenergy — without using new land. In 2023, France's government mandated solar canopies over all car parks larger than 80 spaces. The scale was enormous: There are 400,000 parking areas across France #ActOnClimate #Renewables
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Richard Griffin @squarewheels.org.uk · 06/06/2026
Glad you can enjoy this! Slightly disappointingly, I found these much nicer than the newer Eurostar trains.
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Peter Walker @peterwalker99.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
Keir Starmer's response to Nigel Farage at PMQs just now was probably the most powerful and eloquent I have seen him in the Commons. The full answer is worth reading.
“A grieving family have asked us not to respond in the way that the leader of Reform has responded. They've asked us not to. They have lost their son in the most appalling circumstance. They make a simple plea of us as human beings to please not exploit that. That is their plea to us. 
“We all need to reflect on those words of Henry's father. My response, and the response of others to be fair, has been focused on the lessons to be learned so we can deliver justice. “His response has been to appeal for rage – rage. That's his response to a father who has lost his son and asked for that not to happen.
“Exploiting this tragedy to create grievance and division would be wrong in any circumstances, but to do it when the family are expressly saying please don't is unforgivable. It shows exactly who he is.”
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