82,387
edits
No balloons: Difference between revisions
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
no edit summary
Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) No edit summary |
Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) No edit summary |
||
| Line 3: | Line 3: | ||
{{Quote|'''NO BALLOONS.''' <br>Balloons are not permitted on these station premises. <br><small>Please speak to a member of station staff for further information. </small><br> | {{Quote|'''NO BALLOONS.''' <br>Balloons are not permitted on these station premises. <br><small>Please speak to a member of station staff for further information. </small><br> | ||
:::Network Rail: ''Working for you''.}} | :::Network Rail: ''Working for you''.}} | ||
Now there are many things you can imagine the proprietor of a | Now there are many things you can imagine that the proprietor of a rail terminus might not like brought onto its premises. Some its health & safety team might feel strongly about: Snakes, for example. Crocodiles. Explosives. Undomesticated grazing livestock. | ||
Then there are those which might upset tenants and concession-holders: a rickshaw coffee vendor who cycles in and sets up on the platform concourse. | |||
Then there are assorted articles which, while posing no immediate danger to life, limb or the profitability of stall-holders, could be disruptive enough to the orderly functioning of the station to exclude: megaphones. The playing of cricket. Madrigal groups. Boomerangs. Stink-bombs. | |||
Yet nowhere in the grounds of Liverpool Lime Street will you be cautioned to so much as restrain your alligator. Guerrilla coffee vendors, have, as far as station signage goes, free run of the place. Choral societies, cricketers and those with loud-hailers may carry on their activities —at least, we suppose, until asked to stop by station staff. | |||
But should a young nipper skip across the platform with a balloon-dog he was awarded at a party, he risks immediate censure.<ref>Though the sign does not go so far as to say what form that censure will take. Will he be arrested? Marched to a cashpoint and ordered to pay an on-the-spot fine?</ref> Nor is it clear whether the prohibition covers only inflated balloons, or would a packet of yet-to-be-blown-up balloons also be barred? The [[JC]] did not wait around long enough to find out. The local urchins around the station, all clutching their traditional R&B 45s, earned from rough trade with itinerant American seamen, looked nervously on. They did not seem minded to run the gamut. | |||
Somehow, in Liverpool the humble balloon has earned its own special category of turpitude. What can have happened? Was the fat controller one day plagued by balloons, flipped out and decided to get his own back? Has it helped? | |||
===Signs=== | |||
The [[JC]] doesn’t like the sorts of signs that warn you, or forbid you, or tell you what you can or cannot do. They emanate from the same [[passive aggressive]] instinct as the [[This is an auto-generated email|email sent from an unmonitored account]] — they’re a cheap shot at someone who can’t hit back — and more to the point they are a failure in [[design]]: if you don’t people to walk on your grass, stick up a fence, or ''pave'' the damn thing, or create some obstacle — do with life ''code'' what you are trying to do with ''bossiness''. | The [[JC]] doesn’t like the sorts of signs that warn you, or forbid you, or tell you what you can or cannot do. They emanate from the same [[passive aggressive]] instinct as the [[This is an auto-generated email|email sent from an unmonitored account]] — they’re a cheap shot at someone who can’t hit back — and more to the point they are a failure in [[design]]: if you don’t people to walk on your grass, stick up a fence, or ''pave'' the damn thing, or create some obstacle — do with life ''code'' what you are trying to do with ''bossiness''. | ||