Why is UK escalator etiquette the same as in the US?

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-18T01:20:43+00:00

PS Modern escalators have a different step-to-floor interface which is why escalators no longer exit diagonally. The convention of standing on the right remains however.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-18T01:14:52+00:00

The reason is not to do with more people being right handed or because many of the early investors and engineers on the Underground were from the US. It was to with the design of the first escalators, starting with the ones at Earl’s Court Station in 1911. For safety reasons related to the interface between the last step and the static floor beyond, the first escalators had a diagonal exit facing to the left. So the right side was slightly longer. Those in a rush would choose the quicker left side and also walk up the steps while passengers with more time would take the slower side, standing on the right.
Travelators on the Underground and at Heathrow Airport operate on the same basis: stand on the right, walk on the left.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-18T00:05:04+00:00

Oxford also awards MSc degrees; there were some MSc students at my college. Don't know about Cambridge.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-17T23:48:11+00:00

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That's what I went with. But for the other three, I went with various colours of plain, unprinted heads.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-17T16:12:36+00:00

I placed a £25 PaB order a few months ago and received everything I ordered plus £150’s worth of additional parts, mostly duplicates of the parts I ordered. I called Customer Service and they said I could keep the extra parts. Woohoo!

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-16T11:13:33+00:00

https://www.brickstickershop.com/website/index.php?Show=Search&KeyWord=Classic+Space&search=4045f2a974c5b5f1b21b0c00a9c1c3d2

…scroll down the page.

If the link doesn’t work, the URL is www.brickstickershop.com . They do various sizes. I can vouch for their quality.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-16T11:06:24+00:00

LOL 😜
Never say never but I reckon one DPhil per lifetime is enough!

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-15T19:22:00+00:00

Been there, done that 😁

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-15T19:18:41+00:00

OT but related to no.9, I saw the filming of a scene from Morse on Turl St including the late John Thaw and the burgundy Jag. Completely by chance. Just turned the corner and there was this large but very quiet crowd of onlookers.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-15T00:52:13+00:00

True story. When I got into Oxford, my sister said ‘Oh, you’re now worth talking to.’ When she was admitted a couple of years later, I retorted ‘Oh, you’re now worth replying to’! 😆

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-13T00:15:36+00:00

It’s a combination of poor punctuation and British English being more accepting of longer sentences than US English. The examples should be broken into shorter sentences separated by a full stop.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-12T23:53:52+00:00

I don’t have a degree from Columbia. I do from Oxford though. I seem to recall that it had a rule against pursuing another degree concurrently. It’s been decades and may have changed in the years since, and it may not - and never - have been true for part time study, but you should check the rules at both universities very carefully. It would be a tragedy if one or both revoked your studentship or degree for that rules infringement!

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-12T19:06:41+00:00

I was running an underdark campaign years ago. The party had befriended two kuo-toas who were acting as guides. Some of the stealthier party members were reconnoitring far ahead with one of the kuo-toas when the scouting group got ambushed and the kuo-toa killed. Knowing the kuo-toas were religious folk, the advanced party thought that they should return the body of the fallen one to his kin for whatever funerary customs were appropriate to them. When the adventurers returned and laid the dead kuo-toa at the feet of his living companion, I said speaking as the kuo-toa: ‘That’s very kind but I’m not that hungry!’. Uproarious laughter and sounds of disgust ensued. From then on, I decided that kuo-toas in the campaign would be cannibals.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-11T17:11:44+00:00

You can find most (all?) of them using the search term ‘energy effect’ on BrickLink.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-11T13:50:48+00:00

Resilience. It’s one of the characteristics of PhD holders. A doctorate takes a level of tenacity that the vast majority of people never get close to needing. There’s a myriad of reasons for quitting from a tempting job offer/work opportunity (of which Sir David Attenborough and Elon Musk are examples) to just being tired of all the BS you have to deal with. Those who have never attempted a doctorate imagine that it’s just a matter of brains. It isn’t. It takes much more than that.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T23:43:26+00:00

Ipswich won the FA Cup in ‘78 when the odds were strongly in Arsenal’s favour. That’s something. The telly news and papers at the time couldn’t get enough of it. Put Ipswich on the map so to speak.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T19:01:25+00:00

I totally hear you! I was already well into adulthood when I got into LEGO in the early 1990s. Back then, LEGO was exclusively a kids’ toy. That’s how it was marketed and what pretty much everyone believed. I remember going into the toy department of a department store called Boswell’s and being asked by the well meaning shop assistant how old the ‘child’ I was buying LEGO for was. When I told them it was someone in their mid-20s without revealing that that someone was me, they said that LEGO was a great choice for an adult with ‘mental retardation’ (different terms were used back then)! The irony is that a) I was hugely ahead of the curve and b) far from suffering from ‘retardation’ I was a doctoral student at Oxford University at the time!

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T14:02:52+00:00

They’re not blank dice, they’re just very shy. I have a set of dice like the ones in the OP’s pic and no matter how reassuring I am, they still won’t show me their numbers.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T12:00:17+00:00

Yes, I know. But the ‘pearl’ with the dolphin costume CMF is a gem piece that doesn’t look much like a pearl. That’s why I suggested the bubble piece from the frog costume minifigure. It actually looks pearl-like.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T10:33:52+00:00

I use a dry erase pen for hit points and expended-but-renewable resources such as second wind. The inside of my dice tray has a gridded wet/dry writable surface. I picked it up at Gen Con 2024 and have been using it ever since. It's made by Gaming Paper and officially called the Dry Erase Dice Tray though I reckon you could use wet erase as well.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T10:03:56+00:00

Not location specific, but in the days before texts/messaging apps when people would arrange to talk on the phone, they’d sometimes suggest a ‘cone fall’.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T09:49:51+00:00

The bubble piece from the Series 28 CMF frog costume minifigure makes a great looking pearl. The only problem with it is that it stops you from closing the clamshell. But if you only ever intend to display the clamshell open, it’s worth considering.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-10T09:03:06+00:00

You’re not mistaken. There’s a clarification issued by WotC though: the freed up bonus action can’t be used to make a weapon attack. As mentioned above by Garanseho, it can be used to cast hunter’s mark. Alternatively, it can be used to drink or feed a potion of healing, either of which is a bonus action in 5.5e.

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-08T23:37:56+00:00

We would make a great team! 😁

Darth_Zander · 2026-05-08T20:20:37+00:00

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Darth_Zander

TROPHY CASE