Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles – The Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society

6 May 2024

End of World is NOT yet nigh

posted in: Country poles, Foreign ones, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, Photos |

At the time of writing, and as far as I know, Mr Putin’s plutonium tipped armageddon is NOT presently on its way to mither my little backwater in west Wales. They would surely have said something on radio four if it were. So at 4:12 pm on bank holiday Monday I can safely put the title to this post. Trouble is I’m not sure of the timescale they’re talking about when they say “nigh”.. If nigh is the four minutes of the eponymous warning from the 1970s then I should still be ok for another cup of tea. But if “nigh” refers to any quantity of time greater than 4 minutes, then yes, I suspect the end is, in fact, nigh. In mathematics this might be written as End=t>4.

What’s he blathering on about I hear both you and me saying? What I’m trying to say are two things. That (a) all is well with the world if I can find the time (in a hectic life) to post some telegraph pole photos and (b) If nigh was indeed imminent, then here are some telegraph poles to fill your remaining four minutes.

Back to Ireland again. Yes, I know, my fantasy job as globe-trotting espionater often takes me over there with time off between top secret missions to spot poles and also interesting railway station paraphernalia. Herewith: Can’t quite remember where this hairily ivied pole was but then we stopped at Roscrea Station, Co. Tipperary for a good nerdle. Then on to Birr, Co. Offaly for those interesting petrol pumps and finally, a bookshop in Thurles (pronounced Turlies) where I found that intriguing book. Who cares what it says inside it, it’s got poles on the front.

One regret was that whilst in Roscrea, I didn’t take a photo of “Breens Footwear” shop. Google streetview will give you an idea of how it was in 2019. Let’s just say the last five years have not been kind to it.

24 Apr 2023

Messing with my mind

posted in: Art, Country poles, fabled poles, Found Poles, Gorgeousness, New Poles, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, Oddities |

I’ve been playing with ChatGPT lately – the world-changing artificial intelligence that we, as a society, haven’t fully worked out what to do with yet. I won’t tell you how, but it is a real boon in one of my day jobs. I won’t be telling the people I work for either. Anyway, very recently, I was introduced to ChatGPT’s elder, more artistic sister. Her name is DALL-E. We’ve become very close. Close enough that Mrs TPAS is asking me what’s going on. I think up something and DALL-E draws it for me. Just like that. Here’s a couple of pictures she did for me of Godzilla in a wedding gown (Bridezilla). Mrs TPAS already knows about this side of me by the way.

Godzilla in a wedding dress as drawn by DALL-E Artificial Intelligence

Godzilla wearing a wedding veil as drawn by DALL-E Artificial Intelligence.

So, obviously, being the supreme commander of The Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society I wanted to know how DALL-E might draw a telegraph pole. So I asked her for “a photo realistic telegraph pole with 6 arms on a lonely road in Wales”. Below is what she came up with. It really flips my mind. I can almost feel the fuggy intelligence behind it all trying to please me. The landscapes and the poles are real enough, yet completely alien at the same time. Eerie even. I love them. What’s also clear is that DALL-E, like most people, doesn’t discern between a telephone pole and a power pole. Mwynhewch! as we say on lonely roads in Wales.
(click an image to enlarge)

12 Apr 2022

Abrasion, Ursine Situpons and Reg, not from Mombassa

posted in: Art, Country poles, Gorgeousness, Literature, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, Submissions, Telegraph Poles |

The Bond index is used as a measure of the relative abrasivity of different rock materials. It is not this index that I have been measuring my relative roughness against this week, however. Since Tuesday last, I have been as under-the-weather as Tomasz Schafernaker’s hat. A viral type lurgy that refuses to test positive as covid – which would give me full there-there-there benefits – but instead just makes me thoroughly fed up. Yesterday I peaked at 3.6 on the Bears Arse index. For reference a score of 1.0 on this scale might cover a heavily hungover Sunday morning i.e. as rough as a bear’s arse. My score of 3.6 bears’ arses is really unwell and I think ought to involve cards, Lucozade and the children surrounding my bedside asking me to sign things. Quickly.

So it was with this glumness that I sought spiritual embrocation which, as always, led me back to my TPAS inbox. Here an email from Chris O’Doherty, aka Reg Mombassa, bristling with quirky telegraph pole related art and poetry did much to bring my roughness score back below three bears’ bottoms. Still poorly mind you.

Reg Mombassa is an Australian based artist and musician who you may better know from his band “Mental as Anything” or “Dog Trumpet“. And his pop artwork oozes out of the Ozzie cultural landscape like Warholian*¹ wallpaper. Reg clearly has a thing about telegraph poles, and we have permission to reproduce the images you see here. Ditto the poem (The Telegraph Pole) that he sent in via Joel Schuberg.

You can get drawn into websites like reg-mombassa.com whether for the music, the art, the laconic wit or for the feeling of “so that’s where I know that from” and frankly, it’s what the internet was made for. This has been the only thing to break me away from my cat-videos in a long while. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Reg Mombassa:

A quirky power pole pen and ink art by Reg Mombassa. — Tree of Man by Reg Mombassa

“Tree of Man” is an etching edition is part of the The British Museum’s permanent art collection. by Reg Mombassa — Tree of Man by Reg Mombassa

The second image above entitled “Tree of Man” is an etching edition and is part of the The British Museum’s permanent art collection. Reg’s website is set up to disallow any kind of cut and paste. Clever, but to read Reg’s latest poemn (as promised above) entitled “The Telegraph Pole” you’ll have to click the title there.

*¹. First time I’ve ever used the term Warholian. I hope Reg isn’t offended by the comparison. Sorry if you are Reg, but I so wanted to use the word Warholian*².

*² Now 3 times

23 Mar 2022

Cold war turns hot. In Denbighshire

posted in: Big Poles, Country poles, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, Villainous behaviour, Vintage |

Finding the mood to conjure up some whimsical guffery – as is my wont and forte – has been difficult of late. Given the rather nasty goings-on in the area north of the Black Sea. I’ve doom-scrolled the news posts until I can’t sleep any more and refreshed the headlines on my browser to a standstill. All the time hoping for some cessation of hostilities.. I’ve seen the film “Threads” for goodness’ sake. And a (much) younger me – a mere lance corporal*¹ – was once responsible for patrolling a tiny stretch of our side of the rusting iron curtain as the cold war simmered and seethed between the two Germanys.

This talk of hostility brings me to this photograph of a fine, wide, four armed vintage pole just south of Ruthin in N. Wales This pole, you may remember, was one of those discussed in our fabulously famous film “Telegraph Poles on the B5105“. Mrs TPAS was camerawoman that day and after we’d finished filming this particular pole we walked back up the lane opposite to our car. Therein we were accosted by an irate lady who lived along said thoroughfare and considered our car’s position as a violation of her right to exist as a human being. My wife – practised in these things – did all the arguing for our team: that we were on a public right of way; that we were parked in a layby; that we were 300 yards beyond the end of her garden and jurisdiction. Mrs Angry was having none of it and harangued to the point of amusement for some ten minutes or more. I was carrying the camera at the time and had sneakily pressed the record button as her first salvos of red-faced vitriol rained in upon us. A ceasefire was only called when the husband of the house called his wife off us and we (mentally) signed a peace accord to the extent that we would never film there again. My ears ring to this very day.

I still have the ten minutes of footage if Mr Spielberg/Coppola/Tarantino might like to dramatise the whole conflagration.

A wide, four armed telegraph pole with 18 insulators stands tall amongst the trees on the side of the B5105 in Denbighshire. Two cars passing below.

*¹ Should, by rights, have held the rank of Captain only I filled in the wrong form at the recruitment office.

27 Mar 2021

New Zealand P.O. Marital Aids

posted in: Engineers, Hardware, History, Maintenance, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, Oddities, Stuff for Sale, Vintage |

Low productivity levels among telegraph pole linesmen was causing serious concern among New Zealand P.O. bosses as the 1960s came to a close. Research led them to believe this was because of unhappy home lives and if they could somehow spice up marital harmony then this trend could be reversed.

A short-lived experiment ensued in which 120 pairs of No. 1 S&M kits were handed to linesmen across three districts: Rotorua, Auckland and Christchurch. They failed however to provide explicit instructions as to their intended use and the baffled pole engineers took them home to humour their bosses.

However by the end of the six month trial period productivity had actually increased in these key areas. Dramatically so in the case of Rotorua. It turns out that the enterprising linesmen had discovered that these fierce looking devices could be attached to their legs and thus enabled them to climb poles way quicker than they ever could using a ladder. Whilst the love lives of the workers hadn’t changed, their speed up a telegraph pole had accelerated four-fold.

Embarrassed bosses back-tracked and reported that this had been their intention all along and that “leg irons” should thenceforth be issued as standard to the workforce.

The set you see below was bought by Judy Pittman at a car-swap meet in Nelson, S. Island. She was delighted to learn the history of them from me but intimated she would be keen to sell them to any of our readers were interested in adding these fascinating love-aids to their paraphernalia collections. She would be happy to post to the UK but reports that postage would cost £36. If anybody is interested, do drop me a line to martin@telegraphpoleappreciationsociety.org and I will pass on your details.

Photo shows the teeth of a telegraph pole linesman's leg iron. Used for climbing poles

Part of aluminium leg iron - used by linesmen to climb telegraph pole and trees etc.

9 Dec 2020

Mr. November

posted in: Literature, Nothing to do with Telegraph Poles, The Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society |

My career has now pinnacled and there’s little left for me to achieve in life. I’ve made it. Spangled celebrity invitations must surely follow. I think I’ll do the “Get me out of here” thing first – it’s only up the road.

I came perilously close to serious heights when The Sun did a piece about our esteemed society for a recent Saturday edition. Embarrassed by the terrible photo though and corny write-up I never broadcast this further than the foot of our stairs. And buying up all copies nationwide proved a larger task than ever I imagined.

BBC Somerset followed. That was nice, I suppose – they got it, at least, and didn’t try to score any cheap points. But then Talk Radio came on for an interview – and I found myself little more than the punctuation between the presenter’s portentous pontifications. I felt somewhat violated afterwards. So when Channel 4 came knocking for a daytime chat show, I had to decline.

I’ve seen the documentaries: Diego Maradonna never had a moment to himself and Princess Diana even had a scuba paparazzi around the U bend in her toilet. I don’t want any of that thank you very much. And neither does Mrs TPAS.

So, it’s rather fortuitous that presently we’re all forced to hide our faces behind masks enabling me to hang on to my utter Z list nonentification once the new year’s Dull Men’s Club Calendar hits the shops. For you see, dear reader, I and, more specifically, T.P.A.S. are the face of November 2021. Do you know who I am?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dull-Mens-Club-calendar-2021/dp/0578809281

P.S. I’ve deliberately blurred the text in the hope it’ll encourage you to buy one to see what it says about me and the other eleven fascinatingly dull people on there. Plus you can use it to check if it’s still Sunday or not.