Acorn Orange
I'm a member of the National Trust - they're the ones with the brown roadsigns that have an Acorn, not a Potato Waffle. My girlfriend and her family are quite interested in that sort of thing, and as such I've been to many stately homes and grand old houses over the past couple of years. I enjoy them a lot more than I thought I would (Dunster Castle near Minehead is my favourite, as they let you hold shotguns and play snooker), but all the dining rooms, sculleries, landscaped gardens, and bedrooms where royalty once* slept all merge into one after a while. As such, I cannot remember exactly where this story took place.

We were at a National Trust property somewhere in England, and we were at the outer part of the grounds (where they tend to put the cafe and toilets). It was late-ish in the day, and we wanted to see if the last tour of the house had left, so I went up to ask the NT volunteer by the cafe (pretty stereotypical middle-class female retiree). As I walked up behind her she was talking to another group who I heard ask the same question, so I just started listening to the volunteer as she found out the information. She raised her walkie-talkie and barked:
"ACORN BLUE, THIS IS ACORN ORANGE, DO YOU READ? OVER!"
Silence, then a similarly well spoken man fizzed back over the radio:
"ACORN ORANGE, THIS IS ACORN BLUE, LAST TOUR LEFT AT 1400, OVER!"
"UNDERSTOOD ACORN BLUE, OVER AND OUT!"
It was fortunate that I'd not been in direct conversation with Acorn Orange at this time, as my reaction to these clearly heavily drilled yet completely unnecessary callsigns would probably have resulted in a court martial and a stint in a lovingly restored and historically accurate prison.

We went AWOL from the NT platoon and walked around the house on our own in the end. It had beds and tables and paintings and stuff.

*And I actually mean once. I've walked around an exhibition inside a room that had Mary Queen of Scots in it for approximately 15 hours.
(Dowbocop, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 0:46, 10 replies)

orange penis
( 2 Can Chunder Word to your mums, I came to prod bums, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 1:11, closed)

Callsigns...
... are a legal requirement for a radio licence.

Good radio procedure is a good habit to get into, because while it may sound a bit silly when you're just talking about tours leaving it will seriously improve your communications when you're dealing with an emergency.

The last thing you want when you're trying to evacuate a building full of random public when it's on fire is this sort of thing:

"Hey Sharon, can you hear me?"
"Who is it? Is that you? Who is it?"
<protracted silence as someone sits on their microphone, jamming all the radios>
"Can you hear me?"
"Yeah, can you hear me?"
"No, can you hear me?"

We get this shit all the time.
(gordonjcp, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 9:15, closed)

Unlikely to be radios requiring a licence
Most walkie-talkie users are not radio amateurs or anything like that, which is why the drones in places like Go Outdoors and similar sprawling stores are issued with hand held radios.
( Snappyuk gets BIGGER with free sample., Tue 29 Jan 2013, 11:37, closed)

If they're in the UK...
... they either need a licence, or they can use the cheapy crappy £12.99-in-Argos PMR446 gear.

Just about all the National Trust stuff uses licensed radios. If the OP tells me which NT site it is, I'll look them up and tell you.
(gordonjcp, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 15:21, closed)

Very true
although the differing voice procedure between organisations can be confusing - personally, I'd have ripped the piss out of the OP's reported "over and out"...
( wynoh kills threads by his mere presence, Thu 31 Jan 2013, 18:02, closed)

Reminds me of a marshall I heard at a SciFi convention
This spod in a fluoro jacket was bustling along shouting into his radio "Put out an APB on Harlan Ellison!"

I bet he's waited his whole life to be able to say "APB" on a radio.

Yes, I know, I once went to a SciFi convention. Let the derision begin. It'll be worth it, though, because I got to enjoy the sight of a room full of Americans listening to Ken Livingstone's vision of a socialist future without access to their guns...
(moon monkey is busy making memories worth repressing, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 10:28, closed)

Unless you were forced to go to said convention
I say wear your nerd badge with pride.
( Bats, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 10:55, closed)

Oh, I do.
I was just aware that I was providing fuel for the desperate foam-flecked ranting that the trolls use as a substitute for a personality.
(moon monkey is busy making memories worth repressing, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 11:23, closed)

15 hours...
That's a long time to walk round an exhibition. Were you locked in overnight?
( e.m.m.y. foxtrot uniform charlie kilo india tango, Tue 29 Jan 2013, 10:36, closed)

I don't mind the volunteers who hang out in rooms of a stately home answering direct questions
it seems in my experience that a lot of them eavesdrop and then wade into a conversation (between ourselves, and the Mrs is a top art history graduate who rarely needs to check her background information) when you didn't ask them anything. It's not a fucking competition.

Last time out I asked a few questions of a volunteer and was told 'we don't really know' by which I take it, she didn't know. I'm an engineer, I'm possibly expected not to know. If you don't know then why are you standing about as a 'font of all knowledge'?
( Rotating Wobbly Hat That's not a banana. THIS is a banana., Tue 29 Jan 2013, 19:39, closed)