Wednesday morning and ‘Jinty’ 47276 slowly propels a rake of 16 ton mineral wagons under the aggregate loading screen. It’s a slow old process, but needs must and all that.
Grey suited, hard hatted aggregate inspectors and part-time conspiracy theorists, Billy Nut and Tony Job, are discussing the need for all the aggregate and where does it all go.
Billy is convinced that the crushed yellow stone is ground up in to a powder and put in to cheddar cheese as colouring and to add that crunch to vintage cheddar.
Toby Job’s theory is that the finely ground stone is dumped in to the upper atmosphere for the rain to bring down “it’s a ploy you know, set up by car wash industry to boost trade, especially with those who own a black car”.
And so he continues “Colour film manufacturers are also behind it, because all that yellow dust makes for more spectacular sunsets, and is good for colour film sales. If ever you go to a camera club, 94% of all photographs in the weekly competition are sunsets, with only the remaining 6% being taken up with flower closeups”.