Great Western Coffee Shop

Nicknames for trains .... we've come across the Nodding Donkeys, the Doodlebugs and the Coffin Nails ... just seen a reference to "Cucumbers".  Anyone else heard that one?

GWR green IETs?

Just had to google this, slightly unlikely results:

Especially any vinyl wrapped ones! (Is there a barcode which can be read which gives you the leasing cost?)

There's an old bus known as a cucumber in Poland. It wasn't green nor especially cucumber shaped.
https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jelcz_043

I haven't head the name used for a train but it makes more sense (for colour and pointy ends) than the bus.

Are you sure that this isn't what you saw ??

https://www.wikihow.com/Train-Cucumbers

I've referred to X73500s as bananas, but they have other names (in French, obviously) that include cucumbers, sausages, shells/bullets, blue whales (liveries vary), and (very Frenchly) suppositories...
(https://p1.storage.canalblog.com/11/07/1127999/88230350_p.jpg)
(Image from http://transportrail.canalblog.com/pages/x73500---digne-successeur-de-l-x2800/27614277.html)

Don't forget Network Rails 'Flying Banana'

I'm warming even more to BNM's idea-


The five car units could become "half cucumbers"

And if GWR would take the idea on, perhaps they could replace the rather dull and worthy names they are using with names like - "The Cornish Cucumber", "The Cardiff Cucumber" and the "Cotswold Cucumber" ;D

Would that make short-formed but busy services "cucumber sandwiches"?

Courgettes??

from what we read in this forum, perhaps "Squashes" maybe more appropriate!

They are fairly straight cucumbers. Does this mean they'll be allowed through the Tunnel?

My name for them is “Better than 142, 143, 150 and 153”

I've also heard that GWR's 2+4 HST GTi is commonly called a 'Chalet' rather than the completely innappropriate 'Castle' nomenclature. I am sure this doesn't need an explanation, but [apparently], if a 2+8 is a 'full house', then a 2+4 is a 'half house', aka 'chalet'.

Where does a cucumber stop and a gherkin start?

When it gets in a pickle!

When it originates in the West Indies and is of the variety Cucumis anguria rather than the garden cucumber Cucumis sativus.

(I looked it up, I ain't no Monty Don. Alan Titchmarsh wants decking.)

Depends - how big's your jar?

All this cucumber chat reminded me to get some of this year's cucumber crop started. The variety I prefer (Marketmore) actually grow to a size between a gherkin and a cucumber. Not sure if this contributes much to the discussion but it might highlight the complexities of cucumber definition!  ???

Interesting. I was always under the impression that the word gherkin is one of only two words* in English derived from Polish, in this case from ogórek, that being the Polish for cucumber (itself derived from a Greek word meaning melon... I guess the melons are smaller further north, or maybe it's the cucumbers that are bigger further south). Ogórek refers to all types, species and genera of cucumber, whether fresh or pickled. The connection with buses (see upthread) remains unclear to me.

*The other is spruce (the tree, not the cleanliness).

So - 9 car IET - cucumber. Short-formed 5 vice 9 - gherkin. Green TGV - cornichon?

If you find a green TGV, the bigger gauge means (especially if it's two-storey) it should be a courge - i.e. what a courgette is a baby one of.

Nope - that'll be a marrow!

Better late than never ...

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/cucumbercourgette.jpg)

A 2x 5, and a 1x 9 with the newer vinyl wrap.