We all know Thomas the Tank Engine – the slightly alarming human faced locomotive who lives on the island of Sodor with a lots of other fleshy-boilered rolling stock. There’s a heritage railway just down the road from my work which has Thomas weekends where they put faces on their locos and steam up and down the line from Tunbridge Wells to Eridge with carriages full of excitable kids and long suffering parents.

To us Brits, Thomas is synonymous with Ringo Starr, who has been narrating the kid’s animated TV show for 20 years or so. There are several generations of people now who are quite surprised to find he was once a drummer in some band or other.

In America, the same TV shows are shown, but they’ve been revoiced by George Carlin! I’m going to have to find this on YouTube – I’m having trouble imagining this.