Thursday 14 January: In a war against Covid, it’s mad to halt successful vaccination campaigns

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
Intelligent, polite, good-humoured debate is welcome, whether on or off topic. Differing opinions are encouraged, but rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated. Posts which – in the opinion of the moderators – make this a less than cordial environment, are likely to be removed, without prior warning.  Persistent offenders will be banned.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/01/14/lettersin-war-against-covid-mad-halt-successful-vaccination/

1,000 thoughts on “Thursday 14 January: In a war against Covid, it’s mad to halt successful vaccination campaigns”

        1. Bloody cold, but not by your standards. Sleet expected mid-morning & lasting all day. Nasty E. wind.

          1. I like wool sweaters… they help against the cold, as long as you can keep the wind out!

          2. I don’t. As I posted the other day, I have to be very careful with wool next to my skin, having been forced to wear woollen underwear when I was a kid. So I tend to go for synthetic cardigans, etc.

          3. Locally, sweaters are often available with a fleece inside collar. Second Son wears those, as he doesn’t get on with wool scratching his skin.

          4. Cotton, silk or cashmere next to the skin for first layer. Woollen layer next for warmth. Waterproof layer on outside. Three layers is all you need for comfort, warmth, sweat-wicking and weather-proofing.

          9. Dr. Daughter could have only been 3 or so when we stopped for a meal somewhere. When the waiter offered us the Kids Menu she piped up, “Oh! Do you serve baby goats here?”

          13. I was never talked down to by my parents as a kid. Once, when a stranger wanted to point out a certain animal to me, she said, “Look at the gee-gee.”
            My father turned round to me & said, “She means a horse, Peddy.”

          14. I always talked to the boys as if they were adults. Made adjustments for age, but not of the ‘gee gee’ variety.

  4. It appears that us tin foil hatters were all right again about people having immunity from covid once you have had it, how long has it taken the experts to catch up?

      1. I was listening to Times Radio in the tub this morning and this was announced as a new report out.
        Haven’t got any video of me in the bath.

    3. BBC radio 4 also reported this bleeding obvious fact but added the usual – we don’t know how long the immunity will last etc., and you will still need to keep to the rules and take the vaccine- The experts are more scared than us for some reason.

  5. Alan Rusbridger’s curious Russia Today appearance. 13 January 2021.

    RT is the Kremlin’s state-controlled TV network. It has a history of downplaying stories that paint Russia in a bad light. It also has a habit of reporting with relish stories that make western countries look bad. In 2019, RT was fined £200,000 by Ofcom after an investigation found that the channel had failed to preserve due impartiality in seven news and current affairs programmes. According to David Remnick, editor of the New Yorker: ‘RT is darkly, nastily brilliant, so much more sophisticated than Soviet propaganda.’

    Morning everyone. RT is the Kremlin’s state-controlled TV network in the same sense that the BBC is Westminster’s TV network, with the exception that it is not funded by money extorted from its viewers under criminal sanction. Impartiality is of course in the eye of the beholder but the Russian Channel, so far as I can detect, has no Cultural Marxist agenda. There are no black presenters or gay weather men. Its ads, and it’s worth watching just for this, do not look as if they were made in Uganda. It is certainly more truthful than the BBC and though one might say what isn’t, it lacks what Hollywood calls production values i.e. it’s done on the cheap. To be more sophisticated than Soviet Propaganda is no compliment, women repairing tractors was never eye candy! Enjoy it while you may; it will shortly be removed from view at Mr Biden’s and Mr Johnson’s pleasure!

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/alan-rusbridger-s-curious-russia-today-appearance

    1. I’ve noticed that RT has more or less been reporting the election fraud and now the Capitol house with the same narrative as our MSM
      It still give a more balance view though in most cases and cover stories that our media doesn’t want us to know

      1. Morning Bob. It has to make some concessions to the Liberal consensus or, as previous experience has shown, it will be sanctioned by Ofcom!

  6. ‘Life in Hull is the same as in Iraq’ says refugee who wants council house after fleeing war-torn Middle East. 14 January 2021.

    Intesar Hassan, 55, was sent to East Yorkshire with her children by the UN in 2012 as she fled war in Iraq and Syria.

    Since arriving in the city, the mother says she has been left mostly bed bound and reliant on a wheelchair, after enduring squalor at her home and having to wash in her kitchen sink.

    The mother-of-four says her life in Hull is in fact ‘hell’, adding: ‘When I think about Iraq and Hull, they are the same to me.

    BELOW THE LINE

    What The Heck…, In My Garage, United Kingdom, about 10 hours ago,

    It is probably a bit too late to comment on this story, but it has made me so very angry. I am 61 years old and my mother left me in care of the council and went to Australia when I was seven. I was brought up in children’s homes and foster homes, which due to no fault of mine, but due to their total inadequacies, left me at the mercy of the state. When I was kicked out of the last home that I was in, at the age of seventeen and a half, there was no state help whatsoever. I tried to get some help from the local authority and they said they could not help me, unless I was 60 years old with a pension. This was in 1978. I managed to get a job and had to live in the most disgusting conditions, paying two thirds of my wages to live in the most awful conditions, in the smallest box room in the house of people that were claiming benefits, so I could bolster their living conditions. This story STINKS!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9141915/Life-Hull-Iraq-says-refugee-wants-council-house-fleeing-Middle-East.html#comments

    1. I’ve been to Hull, if not to Iraq. If it’s that bad (it wasn’t), do please return to Iraq.

  7. Forgiveness

    Toward the end of the Sunday service, the Minister asked, “How many of you have forgiven your enemies?” 80% held up their hands.

    The Minister then repeated his question… All responded this time, except one man, an avid golfer named Walter Barnes, who attended church only when the weather was bad.

    “Mr. Barnes, it’s obviously not a good morning for golf. It’s good to see you here today. Are you not willing to forgive your enemies?”

    “I don’t have any,” he replied gruffly.

    “Mr. Barnes, that is very unusual. How old are you?”

    “Ninety-eight,” he replied. The congregation stood up and clapped their hands.

    “Oh, Mr. Barnes, would you please come down in front & tell us all how a person can live ninety-eight years and not have an enemy in the world?”

    The old golfer tottered down the aisle, stopped in front of the pulpit, turned around, faced the congregation, and said simply. “I out-lived the bastards.”

    1. “I do not have to forgive my enemies, I have had them all shot.” — Ramón Maria Narváez (1800-68), Spanish general and political leader. Said on his deathbed, when asked by a priest if he forgave his enemies.

  9. Good morning from a dark ages Saxon Queen with sharpened axe and longbow.
    Its chilly and dull and we are supposedly going to get sleet / snow today, not a huge fan of snow but with lockdown i don’t suppose it’d cause too many hassles.

  10. Good morning, all. Dark and wet day so far. Rain promised all morning – so handy when going to the market (prolly for the last time as BPAPM proposes to close markets and lock us in our bedrooms).

    Will look in later – assuming NoTTL hasn’t been cancelled.

    2. ‘Morning, Minty, so, what’s new. Still not getting ‘New Comment’ banners. They appeared briefly but now, no more.

      Off to refresh – again!

      1. Morning Nan. I’ve had them all this morning. Log in! Sorry we cannot post your comment! No notifications. I think I might have upset someone!

  12. From the BBC
    Pre-departure Covid-19 testing will now be required for everyone travelling to England from 04:00 GMT on Monday.
    The rules had been due to come into force on Friday, but the government said people needed time “to prepare”.
    This is baloney of course.

    Yet, in reality, those businesses and individuals who import and export goods, including posting a parcel as well as shipping pallets, were given six hours “to prepare” prior to new post-Brexit rules coming in.
    Delays and confusion at the borders are the result of last minute “deals” that should either have been concluded months ago or abandoned to a”no deal” position that would have resulted in no delays as there would have been no immediate changes under the WTO protocols.

    Personally, I’d have said that the government should have focussed on helping our businesses rather than continuing to make it easy for virus-laden visitors to enter our country without any health checks, as has been the case since the pandemic started a year ago. (That is now a whole year that the UK borders have been wide open to anyone with any disease to wander in for any reason.)

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55656589

    1. ‘Morning, Horace, like you, I suggest that this requirement is about a year late – always assuming that the tests are accurate and don’t give an inordinate number of false positives.

  13. Brilliant sunshine yesterday morning. The roads dried out for the first time for many weeks. This morning they are covered in snow under a leaden sky. It’s the weather that made the British what we were*.

    *Note use of past tense

    1. Hmm, your roads may have dried out – our 3 mile, single track road to the main road is reported as flooded, with what looks like a flowing river so, to go for my INR at the Surgery (a 6 mile journey) I shall have to use a longer, narrower road.

      “I’m going out now, I may be sometime.”

  14. Part of the Sun’s report today about bad weather in UK is picture of ‘a practically deserted and dull Blackpool Seafront’. It put me right as had expected – nearly half-way through January – it would be teeming with visitors.

    1. But instead, sadly it’s teeming with rain.
      Yesterday as I walked passed with my labrador at our local recreation area the police arrived in a van and about a dozen young lads climbed over the high fences of the astroturf football pitches and ran off. Exercise they hadn’t predicted. Cops didn’t even get out of the van. …..well it was raining.

      1. I really must get my reading glasses sorted: Presidential ‘prick’ worked seamlessly….

        Edited to sort a typo – I blame my reading glasses!!!

      1. Except that it will mean that he cannot stand again in 2024, if the ‘Rats get it through.

        1. He’d be 78. I agree that no longer seems to be a problem, but a younger candidate with Trump’s drive and political philosophy but not the braggadocio would be better.

          2. Indeed. When he appeared I was staggered he actually managed to get the nomination, let alone the Presidency. Had it been almost anyone other than Clinton up against him I still doubt he could have done it.

    2. Even though he stops being POTUS in a week or so.
      Eejits. The hatred is blinding them.

        1. Because they know that they cheated and he stands a good chance of getting back into power.

          1. I think they assume nobody will get into power without their approval. If they really did cheat, they know now that they can get away with it.

            The Republican party might well split and the Democrats will consolidate their base.
            It’s heading towards a very nasty endgame.

          6. I know nothing about America and have never been there. I did sail around the BVI but decided not to visit the US even though I had a visa. Anyway, we sailed to within a mile of St Thomas (in the American Virgin Isles) and then tacked and sailed back towards Tortola.

            However, I have tried to remain objective but the bias of the MSM coupled with the raw hatred directed at Trump by the Democrats is making me more and more sure that the election was stolen.

    3. He missed the opportunity, he should have deployed the national guard and locked up the opposition. That might have flagged up the dems true support and what they are actually up to. Treason by any other various forms.

        1. I don’t like him as a person but I’m rather hoping he’ll turn it all on its head. If only for the sake of organised sanity. Which is now basically missing in the world of politics.

          1. American politics was clearly broken when the choice was between Trump and Clinton.
            Biden’s selection then showed it was FUBAR.

            Had Covid not appeared I suspect Trump would have smashed Biden out of the ball park.

    4. In other news, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) announced on Wednesday night she will introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on January 21, 2021 over his abuse of power.

      Rep. Greene told Greg Kelly, “We cannot have a President of the United States that is willing to abuse the power of the office of the presidency and be easily bought off by foreign government, Chinese energy companies, Ukrainian energy companies. So on January 21st I will be filing articles of impeachment on Joe Biden.”

      And for millions of Americans it will be the first time they’ve ever heard about Joe and Hunter Biden and their deals with China or Ukraine!

  17. Good morning all.
    It’s peeing it down outside and the yard thermometer is a tiny bit below 0°C, with snow supposedly on the way.
    Looks like being one of those days when staying in bed seems the better option.

    1. The weather this week isn’t doing my “Walk 1,000 miles” challenge any good – I do have good enough kit but setting out in heavy rain isn’t much fun!
      Edit: after a brief flirtation with proper snow, the weather has now opted for the snow equivalent of drizzle – snizzle? Snozzle?

    2. Morning all.
      It’s a bit warmer 4 degs down south Bob. But chucking it down with rain.
      Even doggo refuses to go out side.

    3. Morning Bob – Snowing since before 7 this morning up here. Another day in the house I expect.

      1. I’ve just taken the DT her tea & Weetabix up and told her she might want to stay in bed today!

  18. The impeachment of freedom of speech. Spiked. 14 January 2021.

    In such a moment of hysteria – and we really have reached hysteria now – it can be difficult to call for calm and reflection. But that is what we must do before things go too far. The truth is that this impeachment of Trump is deeply problematic. It is an indictment not just of a president who has done many gravely questionable things in recent weeks, but also of freedom of speech; of the right of everyone – whether president or plebeian – to express him or herself plainly and passionately. Trump is essentially on trial for making heated political comments, for pushing an ideological line – that the 2020 election was ‘fraudulent’ – that many people find offensive. If he is found guilty, he will be found guilty of expressing himself in a way that the political elite considers problematic. Everyone needs to stop, breathe, and consider the impact this would have on the already frail culture of freedom.

    Freedom of Speech. Democracy and Freedom itself are all being extinguished in the West. There is already very little difference between it and China. Soon there will be none!

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/01/13/the-impeachment-of-freedom-of-speech/

    1. The people from the “Propaganda you can trust” organisation the B@stard B@stard C**ts, claimed on the Radio 3 Eight o’clock News that President Trump, is the first US President to be Impeached twice. . I seem to recall he hasn’t been impeached once….

      1. Impeachment is the accusation of wrong-doing, akin to a person being charged with an offence. The Senate will then determine whether or not he is guilty.

    2. The people from the “Propaganda you can trust” organisation the B@stard B@stard C**ts, claimed on the Radio 3 Eight o’clock News that President Trump, is the first US President to be Impeached twice. . I seem to recall he hasn’t been impeached once….

  19. Morning all

    SIR – I had already heard that our surgery had been told to pause their vaccination operation before I read yesterday’s front page report of GPs being forced to slow down and having promised vaccine deliveries cancelled.

    It is sad that politicians and bureaucrats descend by default to the lowest common denominator.

    Our rulers are ready to inflict harm on Britain’s citizens and economy by lockdowns because we are on a “war footing”, so why delay vaccination campaigns that are going well?

    It is a relief that politicians have not arranged for the virus to be spread evenly across the country so that all have an equal chance of getting it.

    Andrew Lukas

    Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucesterhire

    SIR – Diverting deliveries of doses from places giving hundreds of jabs a day to allow other regions to catch up is one of the finest examples of socialism that I have seen.

    Nick Jones

    Cardiff

    SIR – You report that drug companies insist supply is not a problem and ministers insist that supply is the limiting factor.

    We need an agreed programme that all stakeholders have bought into. At the current rate, we will not meet the Government’s target.

    Glenn Warren

    Shenfield, Essex

  20. Morning again

    SIR – Allegra Stratton, the PM’s press secretary, is quoted as saying that “there was currently little demand for vaccines late at night”. Where did she get that information?

    Every single person I speak to, old and young, has asked why they are not doing it round the clock. My husband and I are 70 and would happily get up at 3am if we could get the vaccine.

    Jeannie Harvey

    Chislehurst, Kent

    SIR – My wife has just received a letter of invitation for the Covid vaccine. I haven’t.

    We are both over 80, live at the same address and have the same surname. Doesn’t it occur to the NHS that elderly couples would prefer to travel together to one vaccination centre rather than two centres at different times?

    Whatever system is used to select which people are sent these letters seems little more sophisticated than pulling names out of a hat.

    Derek Morton

    Woodford, Cheshire

    SIR – Surely GPs are the last people who should be doing the jabs. There is an army of retired doctors and nurses offering their services, along with pharmacists. It takes a maximum of 
15 minutes to train a novice to give an intramuscular injection.

    Dr Chris Keast (Letters, January 13) asks patients with minor ailments not to contact their GP at this busy vaccination time, but as a retired consultant physician I know all too well that an ailment perceived minor by a patient may prove anything but.

    Hugh Simpson

    Bradfield, Berkshire

  21. Buying Chinese

    SIR – I agree with Ryan Bond (Letters, January 13) that one way consumers could “punish” China’s recent actions would be to stop buying its goods. However, that might not be as easy as it sounds.

    When I bought a pair of apparently British Muck boots from a website emblazoned with Union flags, I then received a pair of boots labelled “Made in China”.

    My wife’s Christmas present last year was a pair of Nikon binoculars. Nikon is, of course, a well-known Japanese company – yet the binoculars had also been made in China.

    David Vincent

    Cranbrook, Kent

    SIR – I recently moved my account from First Direct, a division of the Chinese-owned HSBC.

    Fiona Wild

    Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

  22. Unfamiliar feathers

    SIR – Regarding the proposed parakeet cull (Letters, January 13), it’s all a question of familiarity.

    When we stayed with a cousin in Australia, we were thrilled to be woken each morning by the sound of kookaburras in her garden – but she would gladly have shot them.

    On the other hand, she loved to hear our native birds singing in our garden, while I am barely aware of them. I would happily shoot the pigeons, though.

    Jill Smith

    Stalbridge, Dorset

    1. Our good friends in Victoria live on the edge of the Dandenong ranges. Twice daily they have hundreds of sulphur crested cockatoos (an ancient flight path) settle in tree tops around their garden and squawk very loudly.
      And Bruce once had a pet magpie (much larger than ours) and also a very noisy bird.
      Hoppy use to join him when he sat on his veranda for ‘a coldie’ jump on to his knee for a share of his packet of nuts. Take that as you wish 😉

      1. Ancient flightpaths = another source for “The Songlines”?

        Remembering a different Bruce, who would have been 80 last year.

      2. I know the area well, Eddy, and Good morning.

        When we lived in ‘The Basin’ we thought it would be nice to have a bird-feeding table. Duly built and erected only to have 20-30 Cockatoos sitting, squawking and pecking at the fence rails, if the food was all gone. Destructive little Bs!

          2. Amazingly close to our Good friends in Old Belgrave road.
            Are you still there now ?

            They have been talking about moving up to Olinda for years, they have a three part share in large holiday home on Phillip island, they have to sell that first. One of the reasons i do the UK national lottery I want to buy it.

          3. ‘Fraid not, Eddy, visa ran out in 2010 and returned to UK via Sweden – 2 months, France – 1 year and Spain – 5 years but divorce led me back to my daughter in Tasmania and a heart attack brought me back to UK in 2017. Then I met Best Beloved on t’internet and we now live together just outside Ipswich in Suffolk.

          4. After 4 years and when we came in 1980 for Christmas we had spent 6 months living in Gladstone QLD. while we ere home her for three months my uncles’ building business was in trouble as his partner had had a heart attack and I went into London to help him out. Not for the first time he offered me the opportunity to take over his company. We literally tossed a coin on whether we stayed in the UK or not. I went back to sell everything we had scattered between states. And we moved in with the In Laws in Hertfordshire. We came back absolutely broke. I was working helping out on a loft conversion job in Enfield when uncle’s business partners managed to partly return to work. But because his son was also ‘in his own’ building business, he wanted him to be involved. My uncle disliked his son intensely. They couldn’t reach an amicable agreement although with his wife involved my uncle had more leverage than his partner. So he folded the company. I was left high and dry Bert his partner had another heat attack and then died. I had to fend for my self which wasn’t difficult I soon had plenty of local work on building projects most less than half an hour from the in-laws house. But i yearned to return to Oz. Alas my wife is an only child and her father became ill, we had a another son and…..
            But having been back there three times since, i think we would have enjoyed living near Perth we loved it. We were hoping to return to Oz this year, we will have to wait and see.

          6. Take a look on Google earth at 26 Hunter Road Christies Beach SA After a year or so 100 Richards Drive Morphet Vale SA, we moved to Hunter Road.
            And then we bought a 4×4 and a 16 x 8ft caravan and travelled.

      3. Their “magpies” will happily attack humans during the breeding season. One sees warning signs in many neighbourhoods.

        1. I know, I was once attacked by a Maggie at Myponga beach SA, all I was doing was walking to the rocks to sit and go fishing.
          Better than that, a bloody Emu tried to knock me off my motor bike. It ran off as I kicked out and took a head long dive over the fence.
          Something that remains in my memory years later.
          As has the scary moment when again on the dirt bike, I had no option but to run over a 6ft brown snake. Chopped it in half. I was fortunate its top half did fly up at me.
          A dangerous place the outback. 😉

          1. Don’t forget the feral bees (the warning sign on an outback dunny will stay fresh in my memory).

          2. The inch ants the hornets as big as you thumb and all the stuff in the se below the surface. I had a mate Trevor who was in charge of birds and retiles at Adelaide zoo. I once helped him catch and bag up some death adders. He needed them for the reptile house.

    2. I think the thing about the parakeets is not so much familiarity or otherwise as the havoc they wreak on the native species.

  23. Lawless in lockdown

    SIR – The theory of some police forces and the Secretary of State for Health that laws are now made by ministerial announcement, rather than under parliamentary authority, is worrying.

    Matt Hancock and several senior police officers keep suggesting that exercising other than locally is a criminal offence. Yet the current coronavirus regulations say nothing about where we may or may not exercise. I suppose the police simply don’t bother to read the regulations.

    Mr Hancock’s belief that it is fine to pretend they do contain such a provision amounts to an attack on the rule of law, which would until recently have been unthinkable in someone claiming to be a Conservative.

    Charles Utley

    London SW18

    1. SIR – I am 82 and need a walker when I go out. Weather permitting, I try to get out each day. After about 45 minutes’ walking there is a bench. I sit on it to rest and also do my neck exercises.

      Passers-by say hello; some days that is the only time I speak to anyone.

      I then tackle a hill on my way home. If I didn’t rest on the bench, I wouldn’t manage the second half of my walk.

      Janet Ostle

      Belper, Derbyshire

      SIR – What Lord Sumption says about coronavirus regulations (Comment, January 13) rings very true to my experience with building regulations.

      Rules in any section could be printed on half a sheet of paper. However, each section includes pages of guidance and examples, which inspectors then treat as mandatory.

      Charles Radcliffe

      Penrith, Cumbria

      1. Good morning everybody, grey day with mist and drizzle.
        What exactly is a “walker”? For my generation it refers to a platonic escort at a party or social function. In any case, Ms Ostle might try to obtain a rollator, which would obviate her need to rest on a public bench and risk a confrontation with the Derbyshire Democrats.

        1. If she wished to rest on her rollator, tim, she would have to find a wall or some other support to back it onto. That is recommended procedure for the equipment. The brakes aren’t reliable. I know this because MOH has one.

  24. SIR – While in no way condoning what happened in Washington on January 6, let’s not forget seeing Nancy Pelosi tearing up her copy of the State of the Union address last February, just after President Trump had given it.

    What message did that send to the country – let alone her wish, ever since his election, to impeach Mr Trump? Even now, she is not calming the situation by calling for the destruction of everything he has done, good or bad.

    Let’s not lose the good with the bad. Mr Trump has been his own worst enemy and should have gone with some dignity.

    Sidney Sands

    London N12

    1. “Finding Your Roots” – The Nancy Pelosi reveal. 14 January 2021.

      Last night’s principal guest was Nancy d’Alesandro Pelosi. Wow! I have never met her and have never paid much attention to her as a personality, but all you had to do was watch her “mug” for the camera and “sculpt” her answers to create her desired narrative to understand that this woman is carrying a lot of psychological baggage and has done so for a very long time.

      Her paternal grandparents were immigrants from a mountain village in Abbruzzo. Her father, Thomas d’Alesandro, was born in Baltimore (photo above). He comes across in the Nancy construct as a political version of the De Niro character in “Raging Bull,” no beatings but lots of bullying and domination by “the Don.”

      This guy was determined to keep his family “in line,” especially Nancy and her mother, another Nancy. Any effort on the part of the mother to establish a separate identity was squelched by the father. The mother created a cosmetics business that had nation wide custom. The father made his wife close it. The mother bought investment real estate. The father made her sell it. These women, the two Nancys, were his, his possessions, and they were not allowed to have anything like a life of their own.

      Trump seems to be for her an avatar of her father. He is a domineering man who recalls for her the frustrations of her childhood and adolescence. The childish, mocking acts of revolt, the tearing up of a copy of his state of the Union Address for all the world to see, the tunnel-vision focus on revenge before all else, these are all symptoms of an irrational obsession.

      https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2021/01/finding-your-roots-the-nancy-pelosi-reveal.html

    3. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) said this during the impeachment hearings: “I just don’t know why there aren’t more uprisings all over the country and maybe there will be.”

      The Dems were outraged until they found out that he was quoting Pelosi word for word!

    4. So the Capitol had inadequate security, nearly twenty years after 9/11 and nearly 80 years after Pearl Harbour.

      And now the Democrats want to have a militarised Inauguration, with thousands of young white males bearing arms and wearing camouflage fatigues.
      Sounds like Belarus, or a banana republic.

      2. The name was a deliberate choice. It suggests someone whiling away his time in God’s waiting room.

    2. That reminds me a bit of a YouTube video I watched on baking Eccles cakes. The baker wrote:

      Eccles Cakes how to Recipe Demonstration in the Bakery

      Recipe : Puff Pastry 4 in Square
      Make your own or Frozen from a shop.

      4 ozs Currents
      4 ozs Sultanas
      2 ozs buttler
      2 ozs castor sugar

      Mix all together until fruit is fully covered, then put the filling in the center of the puff , fold to cover the mix, then roll out with a rolling pin or flatten with a block, tray up and rest for an hour, then wash with water or egg whites, then drop the top into sugar, then bake at 400 f for around 15 mins until golden brown.

      Well done Bakers, You have now baked with the Crazy Baker.

      I posted a reply:

      I’m a bit confused about the ingredients. The recipe states “4 ozs currents”. Would that be direct currents or alternating currents? It also asks for “2 ozs buttler”. Will a gentleman’s valet do? As for the “2 ozs castor sugar”, I only have caster sugar! 🤣

      The baker responded, my mickey-taking whooshing over his head:

      Hi mate recipe is under the video in the description laters 👍

  32. 328478+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    To my way of thinking this whole issue is on a daily basis being pushed by ALL media channels far to hard, turn on a radio and first words will, 10/1 contain virus.

    I am asking if you could mass jab the Nation in a day that I take it would prove , beyond doubt to be a successful vaccination campaign granted, but how about the contents of the actual vaccine, have they been tested over time to be acceptable to the herd as a success, that is very hard to see on account it is not there.

    This “war” setting is IMO governance speak when I am seeing peoples in the main acting in a normal manner against a government trying their best to create
    a “war setting”
    It is coming across to me as being stampede the herd then prod on a daily basis to keep them arolling until ALL are
    branded ( jabbed) and brown envelopes honoured.

    “war against Covid, it’s mad to halt successful vaccination campaigns”

        1. The hysteria is unbelievable – or, rather – was unbelievable.
          Again, as we cleared up small dog’s toys, we caught the start of ITN at 10.00 pm; talk about ranting. With a different backdrop, it could have been a Nuremberg rally.

          1. One of the worse thing about it is they have a batch of people including many ‘experts’ hiding in cupboards, seemingly under their stairs and continually use them to incite further despair.

  34. Bluss it was cold at the market. A ghost market. Just four stalls and saw four other people. Dreadful for the traders. A couple of dozen people in Morrisons..

    Am putting CH back on – and drawing up a kitten to warm my hands – which are devoid of all feeling.

      1. I thought the construction made it clear that it was my hands. “A kitten” = singular; “my hands” = plural – hence “are devoid…”

        Do keep up.

  35. I read that if a person fails to turn up for a vaccine appointment….

    That instead of using the dose on the next patient it will be binned at a cost of around £40.

    That suggests the doses might contain ingredients tailored to the individual rather than uniformly across the board.

    1. 328478+ up ticks,
      Morning H,
      Was it with you on breitbart we discussed the sugar on the big rock candy mountain.

      1. Morning Ogga..

        Don’t remember that one unless you are talking about Sugar in Gib as we seemed to have been there around the same time.

        1. 328478+ up ticks,
          H,
          The very same, didn’t have time to say goodby on breitbart, kicked off for truthsaying.

          1. The same truth that has now become reality….

            Good to see you are alive and still kicking.

    2. Yes. This is what I have thought. Batches for the elderly, separate batches for the health professionals….. I wonder why??

      1. Batches for Prime Ministers that cure a bad case of covid in three days…

        One batch for the lefties who have already been brainwashed and a stronger dose for those with right leaning thoughts.

        1. I was thinking more in terms of a batch for the elderly, well, those over 75, giving them a couple more years life then that’s it – long enough for it not to be associated with ‘the vaccine’ and how does one prove it is nothing but natural old-age? In view of government’s recent past attitude and treatment of the old in care homes this would not surprise me.

  36. I posted this below the line on the Spectator, but they’ve already moved on from Trump and Biden and gone on to presidential dogs, so I doubt anyone will read my comment. Here it is anyway:

    “‘In Our Time’ this morning had a fascinating discussion on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel ‘The Great Gatsby’.

    What Melvyn Bragg and his panel of experts missed, but I picked up on, was that this 1925 novel was a remarkable satire of the Trump presidency. Listen to the BBC podcast, and then consider casting Trump as Gatsby, Daisy as America itself, Tom Buchanan as the patrician old guard of the GOP, and the vulgar Myrtle as American virtue, its religiosity and its tawdry and spiritually bankrupt puritanism today expressed by woke Democrats. All set in a glittering party that is founded on such rotten values, it can only end badly.”

    2. And as Nick Carraway, the narrator, says to Gatsby:

      “You’re worth the whole damned bunch put together.”

  38. 328478+ up ticks,
    Borrowed from Carney on twitter,

    It’s surprising really who’d have thought cases of a seasonal respritory illness would increase during the winter months. Still a mask that’s as effective of catching fog with a fishing net will save us all.

  39. From the radio earlier. “Loads of callers saying heavy snow is starting to cause traffic problems” A few minutes later . . .”We have had a message that people with an appointment to have the vaccine should still attend”. Do they really want old people to go out in heavy falling snow, possibly slipping and breaking bones, to get a jab? The sheer desperation the authorities are showing to stick needles in every single one of us is suspicious.

    1. 328487+ up ticks,
      Morning W,
      Yes that is what is required, if not after being asked tomorrow will bring compulsory.

      1. Either that or perhaps he’s just been stabbed in the back by his VP nominee? Either way, some say it’s only a question of time.

  41. Civil unrest leading to chaos…

    The very words attributed to the NWO agenda. The planets of doom are perfectly aligned with the impeachment of Trump and the 70 million Patriots who voted for him. Many of the Patriots are former service people and part of the military family which means that if Antifa and BLM thugs turn up when the Patriots are standing peacefully…

    Which side will the regular troops take?

    And if all the DEM voters were to turn up….they only have a few days to dig many of them out of their graves in cemeteries across the country.

  42. After another trip to the supermarket, am I alone in thinking that front-line workers in supermarkets, transport, building, teachers, police, (even) footballers, should have all been placed as a top priority to receive the vaccine rather than 80+ year olds largely sheltering indoors. Certainly it would have allowed a quicker return to normal and would have more rapidly given the virus landing sites. The older groups could well have started receiving the vaccine later – say in February/March.

    2. Definitely NOT footballers ……how about recovery vehicle drivers (of which I am one – and 80 in a couple of months). My jab is booked for next week

        1. I think I was more stunned by the fact that sweet FA is still working at the age of 80 rather than him winning a Jab berwoky….!

          1. It is continuing to work that keeps him fit and alert. He is sharper than most on this forum, and I’m not just saying that because he is a mate.

    3. No, you are not alone, but…
      Logical, planned and careful consideration followed by prompt action – have you seen any of that from our government in this pandemic? We have seen hasty decisions that have not been thought through. We have seen panic. We have not seen good crisis management.

  43. 328478+up ticks,
    Past time in the case of amazon for the meek to re-inherit the market place,

    Rustled from twitter,
    PeterSweden
    @PeterSweden7

    8h
    Let this sink in.

    Apple, Google and Amazon COLLUDED to get a rival tech start-up Parler kicked offline.

    These are monopolies co-ordinating to get rid of competition.

    Isn’t this highly illegal?

      1. 328478+ up ticks,
        HP,
        Following the same script even down to “making their bones” could very well end up with the peoples taking to the mattresses.

    1. Hello Horace,

      I could not see any picture on your post. I’ve noticed that with this new laptop there are often posts with large gaps? Do you know what it might be in the setting-up? (I be technophobe, so I knoe nothing).

      2. Um, no. Others are getting it, so I cannot help. You are dealing with a techno idiot who has a phone with a dial..

    2. My first thought on watching this was “What actual effort have you put into getting your business ready for Brexit?” – by the sound of it – not a lot.

      1. Have you had sight of the government handbook of “How to Complete New Export Forms for EU”?
        No, neither have I.

    3. So vote for the fishwife and get Jockland back in the EU then instead of whingeing on here!

      1. Bites tongue, and merely reiterates, “Have you had sight of the government handbook of “How to Complete New Export Forms for EU”?
        No, neither have I.

      1. There isn’t a market for it. Most fish sold in the U.K is cod and haddock. Cornish fishermen up until now sold 80% of their Lobster catch to Europe.

        Unlike all across Europe where they have fish markets in virtually every town we have hardly any. Brits don’t buy it.

        1. Morning Phil, most people I know used to eat a lot of fish before it became too expensive. The answer is to sell it here, there’s a market for it. The price would be reasonable as there’s no tariffs or overseas transport costs. I never eat fish because of the price preferring home grown chicken, beef and pork.

          1. Good afternoon.

            I find it strange that the fish appears in French and Spanish markets being sold cheaper than it would be here. Volume of sales i suppose.

      2. I think that they get better prices. Lobsters, langoustines and scallops from here are the best in the world and highly prized by top restaurants. Also exports of cod, haddock, and even mackerel by bigger companies to Franc and Spain.
        The people of the UK do not eat fish. Compare a supermarket fish counter with the meat counter.
        I also suspect the the fish sold in the UK is not the top quality, except perhaps in some London shops and, of course, London restaurants. I have struggled to buy good haddock, that is, fish that were not as thin as paper.

        1. Perhaps there’s not such a big market here because the fishermen have priced themselves out of it by finding they can get more money exporting it. We can still get fish straight off the boat but it’s still expensive, I can also get local scallops at a reasonable price

          1. Yes, there are various inter-connected factors. There is no sign the government supporting a campaign to eat more fish, or offering grants to people to open fishmongers on the High Streets. Or bakers, or greengrocers, or butchers, or florists, or grocers…
            the government has basically said,”We have signed a trade agreement that comes into force in six hours. If you want to know what to do, read the agreement, look up our website – if you can work out which one – and just get on with as we have washed our hands of you.”

  45. A friend’s follow-up comment on the sex and insurance post:

    “Excellent but I think they have forgotten Group Sex – Third Party”

    2. Have a look at this – copied from my friend Ian’s email:

      On the rigging of voting machines connected to the Internet there is now not just a smoking gun but a whistleblower who admits firing the gun! The scandal is surfacing in Italy where the Government of Giuseppe Conte is facing a no confidence vote. There is an affidavit which claims an employee of the Leonardo Group (Defence Contractors) was involved in the US vote changing fraud. Conte presides over a coalition of the anti EU Five Star movement and the europhile left wing Democratic Party – having previously led a coalition of two anti EU parties (Five Star and the Northern League).

      I quote here from the Affidavit of the lawyer of the man who admits manipulating US voter data in favour of Biden and uploading via satellite and Frankfurt back to voting machines in the US:

      VOTE SWITCHING ADMITTED

      The lawyer Professor Alfio D’Urso provides the affidavit in which ARTURO D’ELIA an employee in the IT Department at Leonardo SpA (having been charged with technology/data manipulation and implanting viruses in Leonardo’s computers) states in sworn testimony that he:

      “under instruction and direction of US persons working from the US Embassy in Rome, undertook the operation to switch data for the US elections of 3rd November 2020 from significant margin of victory for Donald Trump to Joe Biden in a number of States where Joe Biden was losing the votes totals”

      The affidavit says that he was

      “working in the Pescara facility of Leonardo and used military grade cyber warfare encryption capabilities to transmit switched votes to Frankfurt.

      the Defendant swears that the data in some cases may have been switched to represent more than total voters registered.”

      D’Elia stated that he had secured the backup of the original data and data switched upon instruction to provide evidence in Court. He fears for his safety. Here is the sworn affidavit:

      https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RQMxmbW8ujZmfTUl2D1jXWS996ZgmoHo/view

      CIA, MI6 AND US STATE DEPARTMENT

      One of the sources of this information about this scandal is Bradley Johnson a former CIA Chief of Station. He asserts (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7EWzxtwhCI&feature=youtu.be) that Italy was involved in the US Democrat party-promoted “2016 Russian interference” hoax. A Call by Trump to the government of Italy had ended with the sacking of 4 Italian Intelligence operatives.

      Johnson asserts that US voting machines (specifically vote counting) were illegally connected to the Internet and voting results data passed through a server in Frankfurt, Germany. Because such a flow of data does not leave specific tracks to follow, this new admission of the source of the manipulation in Italy is the first really hard evidence of vote fraud.

      According to Johnson the fraud was co-ordinated by a State Department individual through the US embassy in Rome, supported by the British MI6, the CIA and of course the Leonardo Group itself. The coordinated shut down of the count in 5 critical swing states on election night became necessary because Trump was getting a vast numbers of votes. (the highest ever for any sitting President seeking a second term). A new analog to change votes became necessary and was sent back up thru the military satellite run by Leonardo back down to counting machines in the USA. The overnight blip of Biden support seen in voting figures was the result. Johnson claims British MI6 techs who were present in Rome were tracked by Italian Intel (they had not followed the protocol of announcing their presence to the local authorities).

      All this is devastating for the unbelievably incompetent Boris Johnson who has, in the face of massive vote fraud evidence, asserted that the US Presidential elections were fair!!!

      A second source for the Italian scandal is Maria Zack (of Nations in Action) interviewed on America Can We Talk:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBGiHZfOheI&ab_channel=AmericaCanWeTalk%3F

      She has ensured that the evidence has been passed to senior Congressmen and the Governor of Georgia. It is a measure of the corporatist fascist putsch in the USA that so many witnesses have been intimidated and fear for their lives. This is no democratic environment – it is an electoral and media war against democracy. In the case of the USA there is specific legislation to counter and pursue it where foreign actors are involved (as is the case here). China is a prime case for investigation as is Venezuela and now Italy.

      FOREIGN INTERFERENCE LAW AND SANCTIONS

      In September 2018 President Trump issued an Executive Order to counter the:

      “the ability of persons located, in whole or in substantial part, outside the United States to interfere in or undermine public confidence in United States elections, including through the unauthorized accessing of election and campaign infrastructure or the covert distribution of propaganda and disinformation, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.

      Any property or interests of those found to have interfered in those ways:

      “are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in”

      https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-imposing-certain-sanctions-event-foreign-interference-united-states-election/

      One thing is crystal clear – any politician, judge or Administration which does not pursue these many sources of clear evidence of vote rigging are admitting they are conspirators with the vote riggers and the enemy of Democracy.

      Even the communist educated (in East Germany) China-friendly Angela Merkel has attacked those corporations which have taken down the Parler site and the social media accounts of Donald Trump and his leading allies. Although that is the least any real Democrat should do – Boris Johnson must follow her example!

      http://freenations.net/us-vote-rigging-by-italian-whistleblower-affidavit-sworn-cyber-warfare-encryption-switched-votes-on-us-instructions%ef%bb%bf/?utm_source=Freenations+News&utm_campaign=361dffe91c-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fcb667887d-361dffe91c-123048263

      1. Anyone powerful enough to put the fraud in place is certainly powerful enough to eliminate any whistleblower.

      2. Ouch HOT stuff HL I wonder what the video was of that was removed, the three agents i guess.

      3. The link to the Google Drive above produces the following result:-

        ‘Google Drive
        We’re sorry. You can’t access this item because it is in violation of our Terms of Service.
        Find out more about this topic at the Google Drive Help Center.’

        I wonder why a sworn affidavit violates their Terms of Service…?

    3. It simply shows you the power of the MSM by not investigating these serious allegations. I wasn’t aware of the extent of the alleged fraud.

  47. Is any follower (fan) of wendyball able to find photographs of Brashford “celebrating” a goal by hugging and kissing his team-mates?

    I’d love to have something on that sanctimonious leftard.

          1. Thank you.

            Were I to be on twotter (et al) I’d post something about his anti-social behaviour.

    2. What bothers me more than all the stupid hugging and kissing is the fact that footballers are still going down on one knee at the start of every match.

    1. 328478+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      But the ovis in many respects are led to believe that he is a far right racist Og, whats to do ?

      Get the bloody stencils out ,is what.

        1. 328478+ up ticks,
          Afternoon HL,
          Their answer will be he stole it, hope your typing lisp can be mastered.

      1. They need £42000 a year for a family of four? Isn’t that about what our benefits pay our illegals for coming here – and doing nothing?

    3. Quite, “You no longer have the best of both worlds, and people can’t rely on speaking only English to get by.”

      Dearie,dearie me.

          1. Det er virkelig godt at se dig igen, Lass. Håber du har det godt. Vi begyndte at blive lidt bekymrede for dig. 😘

    4. Apparently, they’re only allowed 90 days in their second home!! I have my tiny violin…

      1. That’s how our Bill T used to do it – three months in France and three in Norfolk, alternating.

    5. The Remainers are all about themselves, how Brexit would affect them. No thought for the historical process. Selfish, the lot of them.

    6. And by such means the Spanish Authorities cut the throats of small businesses in the areas frequented by the Ex-pats.

  50. Just back from Cromford after a walk down for the paper & a bit of shopping.
    After dithering over raining or sleeting, there was a brief pause before light sleet began with it becoming heavier and moving toward “not quite snow”.
    Now it’s light to moderate sleet bordering on VERY WET snow.

    I’ve already got the woodcrates etc filled, so i’ll not be doing much outside today.

  51. 328478+ up ticks,
    May one ask, how is the governance overseeing invasion on the Dover bridgehead ratcheting up today, any clicks yet ?

    Wonder which politico is going to be the author of the book.

    “The part we played in successfully bringing down a decent nation via collusion in the polling booth”.

    1. So many people in a plastic pub that only sells keg beer and lager. Just two imitation beer engines (hand pumps) there just for show!

      I avoid these places like the plague.

    3. Hello BoB,

      You’re good at techno stuff –

      This is a new laptop and I can’t see the content of your email (picture I presume). Do you have an idea of what needs to be done – I’m rather backward on the IT stuff.

      1. Hi HL

        Have any of your circle access to a 4 year old

        One should be issued on loan for a week, whenever you get a new bit of electronic equipment

      2. Sorry, my access is usually fairly trouble free, so I don’t have to sort out problems like that!
        All I can suggest is try a different browser. I’m on Chrome with Edge as a backup.

    4. 328478+ up ticks,
      Afternoon Bob,
      Totally agree, but that will not be forthcoming under lab/lib/con ongoing, with
      intermittent breaks for pressure relief,and making regular lock-downs more acceptable to party first members.

  53. Just to confirm that ‘Dr Dominic Barker’ did have two almost identical letters ‘published’ in the Telegraph, yesterday and on 10th Jan. This person may well exist, but as yet my Google serach of him is coming up short, especially on practicing doctors (presumably he is a medical doctor, but they might not be). A Dominic Barker does work as an assistant at the HoP.

    Something here sounds VERY fishy here, especially given his Orange Man Bad letter.

    1. According to his LinkedIn profile, Dominic Barker the Parliamentary Assistant has a PhD in History.

      1. If it is the same person (I didn’t want to log in to Linked In as it tells the other person that you’ve viewed their profile), odd how they live in Devon and work at Westminster. I wonder who he works for? The other question is why was the letter printed twice and three days apart, and with slight changes each time. Very suspicious to me.

      2. Our erstwhile PM, Gordon Brown has a PhD in history.

        His thesis is titled “The Labour Party and Political Change in Scotland 1918–29”

        This must be the most useless subject ever chosen by anyone to gain a PhD!

    2. There has been a spate of people with non-medical doctorates writing to the papers and posting on social media about Covid. they really should stop using the rather misleading ‘Dr’ title when doing so.

      1. Non-medics with Ph.D are correctly referred to as “Dr”; it’s the medics who get “Dr” as courtesy title.

          3. The prefix Dr is not at all misleading in any context. It is the belief that all doctors are medics which is at fault. It tells you that the person using it has a doctorate; just as the prefix Prof tells you that the person holds, or has held, a professorial chair, or the letters MA or BSc tell you that the person has a degree in Arts or Sciences (though I can’t remember when I last used the letters to which I’m entitled).

            As Paul says, most medics don’t have doctorates. They are, in the main, Bachelors of Medicine and Surgery, they will not even have written an honours thesis, let alone a doctoral thesis. Of course quite a number do go on to further study and theirs is an applied science where work in the field means as much as, or more than, paper qualifications in many cases. But “Dr” is an honorary title for most of them.

            Remember that many people who hold doctorates do so in sciences which mean that their opinions on SARS-CoV-2, vaccines etc are as valid as those of any medic… or more so. A doctor of virology or immunology is undoubtedly in a far better position to pontificate than the average GP whose time is spent keeping up with the job in hand. Whatever the doctorate it is perfectly proper to use the prefix, to suggest that people shouldn’t is rather belittling and not very polite.

          4. I disagree. If used when writing about a topic unrelated to topic studied it is misleading because rightly or wrongly, people associate the term with medicine.

          5. That is not the fault of the holder of the Doctorate, but of the people mis-associating the term with medicine.

          6. Why not just write “ignorant people associate the term with medicine only” – which would be the truth.

            Anyone with either education or intelligence knows otherwise.

            The suggestion that people should not use the designations they have worked for and earned remains belittling, impolite and simply wrong.

      1. HL I cant find your earlier post on the US election fraud, the accompanying videos had already been removed, has it all been removed ? I was hoping to send it around the world. To the many disbelievers.

        1. On the rigging of voting machines connected to the Internet there is now not just a smoking gun but a whistleblower who admits firing the gun! The scandal is surfacing in Italy where the Government of Giuseppe Conte is facing a no confidence vote. There is an affidavit which claims an employee of the Leonardo Group (Defence Contractors) was involved in the US vote changing fraud. Conte presides over a coalition of the anti EU Five Star movement and the europhile left wing Democratic Party – having previously led a coalition of two anti EU parties (Five Star and the Northern League).

          I quote here from the Affidavit of the lawyer of the man who admits manipulating US voter data in favour of Biden and uploading via satellite and Frankfurt back to voting machines in the US:

          VOTE SWITCHING ADMITTED

          The lawyer Professor Alfio D’Urso provides the affidavit in which ARTURO D’ELIA an employee in the IT Department at Leonardo SpA (having been charged with technology/data manipulation and implanting viruses in Leonardo’s computers) states in sworn testimony that he:

          “under instruction and direction of US persons working from the US Embassy in Rome, undertook the operation to switch data for the US elections of 3rd November 2020 from significant margin of victory for Donald Trump to Joe Biden in a number of States where Joe Biden was losing the votes totals”

          The affidavit says that he was

          “working in the Pescara facility of Leonardo and used military grade cyber warfare encryption capabilities to transmit switched votes to Frankfurt.

          the Defendant swears that the data in some cases may have been switched to represent more than total voters registered.”

          D’Elia stated that he had secured the backup of the original data and data switched upon instruction to provide evidence in Court. He fears for his safety. Here is the sworn affidavit:

          https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RQMxmbW8ujZmfTUl2D1jXWS996ZgmoHo/view

          CIA, MI6 AND US STATE DEPARTMENT

          One of the sources of this information about this scandal is Bradley Johnson a former CIA Chief of Station. He asserts (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7EWzxtwhCI&feature=youtu.be) that Italy was involved in the US Democrat party-promoted “2016 Russian interference” hoax. A Call by Trump to the government of Italy had ended with the sacking of 4 Italian Intelligence operatives.

          Johnson asserts that US voting machines (specifically vote counting) were illegally connected to the Internet and voting results data passed through a server in Frankfurt, Germany. Because such a flow of data does not leave specific tracks to follow, this new admission of the source of the manipulation in Italy is the first really hard evidence of vote fraud.

          According to Johnson the fraud was co-ordinated by a State Department individual through the US embassy in Rome, supported by the British MI6, the CIA and of course the Leonardo Group itself. The coordinated shut down of the count in 5 critical swing states on election night became necessary because Trump was getting a vast numbers of votes. (the highest ever for any sitting President seeking a second term). A new analog to change votes became necessary and was sent back up thru the military satellite run by Leonardo back down to counting machines in the USA. The overnight blip of Biden support seen in voting figures was the result. Johnson claims British MI6 techs who were present in Rome were tracked by Italian Intel (they had not followed the protocol of announcing their presence to the local authorities).

          All this is devastating for the unbelievably incompetent Boris Johnson who has, in the face of massive vote fraud evidence, asserted that the US Presidential elections were fair!!!

          A second source for the Italian scandal is Maria Zack (of Nations in Action) interviewed on America Can We Talk:

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBGiHZfOheI&ab_channel=AmericaCanWeTalk%3F

          She has ensured that the evidence has been passed to senior Congressmen and the Governor of Georgia. It is a measure of the corporatist fascist putsch in the USA that so many witnesses have been intimidated and fear for their lives. This is no democratic environment – it is an electoral and media war against democracy. In the case of the USA there is specific legislation to counter and pursue it where foreign actors are involved (as is the case here). China is a prime case for investigation as is Venezuela and now Italy.

          FOREIGN INTERFERENCE LAW AND SANCTIONS

          In September 2018 President Trump issued an Executive Order to counter the:

          “the ability of persons located, in whole or in substantial part, outside the United States to interfere in or undermine public confidence in United States elections, including through the unauthorized accessing of election and campaign infrastructure or the covert distribution of propaganda and disinformation, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.

          Any property or interests of those found to have interfered in those ways:

          “are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in”

          https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-imposing-certain-sanctions-event-foreign-interference-united-states-election/

          One thing is crystal clear – any politician, judge or Administration which does not pursue these many sources of clear evidence of vote rigging are admitting they are conspirators with the vote riggers and the enemy of Democracy.

          Even the communist educated (in East Germany) China-friendly Angela Merkel has attacked those corporations which have taken down the Parler site and the social media accounts of Donald Trump and his leading allies. Although that is the least any real Democrat should do – Boris Johnson must follow her example!

          http://freenations.net/us-vote-rigging-by-italian-whistleblower-affidavit-sworn-cyber-warfare-encryption-switched-votes-on-us-instructions%ef%bb%bf/?utm_source=Freenations+News&utm_campaign=361dffe91c-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fcb667887d-361dffe91c-123048263

          1. No wonder Trump is refusing to pay Giuliani. If dear Rudy did not raise this issue, he wasn’t earning his keep. There again, OANN isn’t headlining it either.

          1. I manged to get another one and sent it to all i know. The world and his dog needs to see all this. As some one pointed out Pelosi is of Italian decent and she may well have had help from the mafiosi i wouldn’t put it past her.. Nice to ‘see you’.

      1. They certainly would if I’d used ‘castor’ sugar (whatever that is). Unfortunately I only had caster sugar (so-called because it is fine enough to be used in a sugar caster) in the pantry.

        3. I’m still struggling with sour dough it always flops and flattens when i take it out of the banneton. But it tastes great, especially toasted aka weaponised.

          1. I love sourdough, outside in the sun, with a glass of red wine and a bowl of minced chillies in oil to dip the bread in.

          2. A bowl of olives in oil. Dip the bread in the oil and eat the olives along with.

            Chillies, like black coffee or strong tea, do not agree with delicate digestive system.

          3. I tend to make a pain de campagne more often than sourdough. It’s like a halfway house: still wonderful flavour but with a lot less hassle.

          5. Mine is somewhat similar, Eddy. You first make a starter with 50g strong white bread flour and 50g rye flour (you can use, instead, wholemeal wheat flour, spelt flour or any other flour of your choice. I like a wholemeal/spelt mix)). Add 1g dried yeast and 100g water. Mix into a paste and leave, covered with clingfilm in a warm place for 48 hours.

            Two days later mix 535g strong white bread flour with 8g salt, 6g dried yeast, 280g water ,and the starter. Mix by hand, or in a food mixer, until combined and you achieve a smooth elastic dough. Place it into a bowl and cover with clingfilm (I use a shower cap) and leave it in a warm place for 2 hours for the initial rise.

            Knock back, divide and shape into two balls of dough. Place on a baking sheet, cover and leave to prove for 1 hour. Heat the oven to 225ºC. Place a tray in the bottom of the oven and fill with boiling water. Slash the top of the loaves then place them in the oven and bake for 25 minutes.

        1. Noooooooooooo all my own hand work. Four plain white four seeded whole meal one experimental rye and whole meal and the crumpets.

          3. https://thecooktwit.co.uk/2013/12/14/crumpets-a-recipe-by-paul-hollywood/comment-page-1/#:~:text=%20Crumpets%20%E2%80%93%20A%20Recipe%20by%20Paul%20Hollywood,thoroughly%20grease%20the%20inside%20of%20at…%20More%20
            I have it in a book, but i think this is it. Hollywood. You will need some crumpet rings try and get non stick.
            What i do is cook (only half fill the rings or they’ll try and climb out) them first in a lightly oiled heavy base metal pan four at a time and then as they start to loose their glossiness, finish them off under a pre heated grill, not only do they come of the rings more easily they can be eaten straight away. If you let them cool you can put them in a plastic bag and they will keep in the fridge for a few days. And just pop them in the toaster. Great with, love it or hate it,…. Marmite.
            In his recipe he turns them over in the pan, much better to put them under the grill as above.

      5. A bog standard loaf maker writes: Wow – well done. Glad that you have booze close at hand to “help” you bake…!!

      6. Wonderful display Eddy well done. We bought all the ingredients to make a FOADMAP loaf for our son, now following a gluten free diet due to IBS, and it came out like a house brick! So disappointing. When we told him we’d tried it he said apparently that was fairly usual so we shan’t bother again. It was enough of a hassle to buy the ingredients separately. He can buy a Warburton loaf that’s good for him.

        3. Why i persevered was, most home baking contains only around 5 ingredients commercially made bread can contain up to 14.

        1. I bag it in tie up freezer bags and chest freeze it. On our micro wave we have a bread defrost setting. Set it to the weight of the loaf add a few more grams and it comes out as if it’s not long been out of the oven and lasts for days.

        1. Not much is kept in the kitchen rack it’s there to reach room temperature. Bread all goes in the freezer as soon as it’;s cold. and comes out of defrost as it came out of the oven.

  55. This is now getting to me.
    While driving around, I was playing a bog standard classic compilation. Swan Lake came on and I teared up. I want to go to theatre, ballet, opera, restaurants, pubs, exhibitions, concerts ……
    I want to spend money – any spare that I have – on pleasure, not sodding food and warm clothing.

    1. We belong to a small, local Music society – normally we have six high quality concerts in the season from October to March. The final one of last season was cancelled last March. A tentative programme was arranged, starting 24th January – I don’t think that will go ahead now.

      We normally go to the theatre in Cheltenham a couple of time a year to see the English Touring Opera – nothing now since 2019.

      Our life has become a cultural desert.

      I also miss lunch with friends, and generally going out and doing things. We had no hedgehog events in 2020 – normally we’re out at local fetes every weekend from spring onwards. Nothing booked for this year yet. No talks or school visits.

      No table tennis – apart from a few Saturday practices in October.

      This is just existing – not living.

      1. As Alf’s friend says, there is more to living than not dying.

        We would normally be gearing up for our Bowls season with open days to arrange and matches against other clubs and also competitions internal and external – all highly dubious now. We played for a few weeks last July to September but socially distanced if you please. Considering the rinks are between 4.3-5.8 metres wide utterly laughable. (Bloody annoying is what I mean!).

        We are just existing at the moment and I can’t see it improving any time soon. The vaccines, which were supposed to be our saviour, were right from the start accompanied by hints that normality wasn’t going to be a given.

        1. by the time we get back to normal we will have forgotten what normal was like.
          How long will it be before the birthday friend blows out the candles on their cake before we dare to eat the cake?

        2. There was an article in my local rag promising harsher lockdown was not for “today or tomorrow” – Saturday, then, was my cynical thought.

      2. This is why the younger generation are flouting the rules/diktats. Keeping them under house arrest is never going to work for long. That is why we are seeing more powers being given to the Police. Eventually it will be the armed forces. Probably French.

        1. Is the younger generation flouting the rules Phizzee? Not where we live. Not at universities cos they’re all closed, schools are closed. Hardly see children out and about except with parents and don’t see teenagers, they’re still in bed or studying for exams that may or may not happen.

          We seldom know where we’ve caught a cold from, same coronavirus as Covid19, and it’s the same with this virus. I wish they would remove all restrictions and let life return to normalcy. But I fear that there is a far more sinister agenda behind it all.

          1. Police reports keep saying they are breaking up house party. Four friends got fine £200 each for going to a drive through McDonalds.

            I think there is something sinister too. I feel like we are frogs in a pot. How to boil a frog. Slowly so it doesn’t jump out.

          4. My teleporter is broken. 🙁

            I have an extensive film library. Last night i watched Enchanted April. Took me away for a while.

          5. Absolutely right. Green agenda, decent jobs obliterated, education trashed, there’s so much more being deliberately downgraded. We will all be asked to, what do I mean asked – made to cough up more tax one way or another to “make up” for expenditure on Covid. It’s like a nightmare. And we can do sod all about it. Lambs to the slaughter.

          8. The effect on two of my granddaughters is appalling. One is having her university time totally bu88ered – not even an apology or a refund. The other is in her A level years and is going stir crazy; Zoom lessons are not the same. She is coming up for 17 and has always enjoyed her social life.
            This is just so damaging.
            The trouble is, many scientists are on the autistic spectrum, and pursue their goals of perfection because they are unable to understand the normal human need for social interaction.

          9. My twenty-something neighbour, whom I see occasionally when he’s out for a run (the gyms are closed) while I’m walking my dog is fed up and ready to flout the rules at the earliest opportunity. I can’t say I blame him at all.

      3. Absolutely right. Without wishing to sound pretentious, it’s the cultural side – plus not seeing the more paranoid friends and relatives – that’s getting to me.
        We are just existing.

        1. Even going to the supermarket checkout a smile is missed because they cannot see ours through the masks.

    2. I miss all that too. Take up a hobby you haven’t tried before as a distraction. Stay focused. Don’t let it get to you because that is the slippery slope.

          2. Thanks to walking my dog, I often meet my neighbours out walking their dog (or in today’s case, in town when I made a failed – I forgot they close early – trip to the bank).

          3. It’s good to have a dog to get you out of the house. I just can’t be bothered to go for a walk when it’s so grey and miserable. I will go to Morrisons this afternoon – my highlight of the week!

        2. That other forum I was talking about ealier has been useful as ‘people to talk to’ but seems to now be going into full TDS mode – at least one very vocal minority. I think it’s because so many people are shut indoors and going stir crazy. I’m ‘lucky’ as I’m used to living on my own and finding things to do by myself.

          The main things I haven’t done or as much over the last year is a) go the cinema (only twice) and b) no holiday (too expensive for my usual hanut that significantly jacked up prices plus everyone couldn’t go abroad, so no availability). I’m glad I now have a bicycle, to use when the weather improves. I just have to take it easy as I’m no spring chicken (but not old).

      1. When i am in the mood i put one out on the dining room table in one of those jigsaw holders. You can roll them up to keep it safe. I do a few tiles as i pass by. Couldn’t sit there for hours. Dolly likes jigsaws too. She eats the odd tile i have dropped on the floor.

        1. I have one of those (only not the roll-up kind). My dog has destroyed a few pieces if I’ve been careless enough to drop them.

    4. One of the reasons why I asked for loads of film and TV DVDs and boxsets for my birthday and Christmas this year. At least I can watch my fave stuff. Very little new and more importantly, good, entertainment will be on this year. The only new film I’m looking forward to is Top Gun: Maverick. I took out a free trial subs to Amazon Prime just before Christmas just to binge watch The Expanse all the way through.

      Try your best to keep yourself occupied – it is difficult. Maybe do a house top to bottom early spring clean? Intersperced with your fave TV shows and films.

      1. I’m about to start on another needlepoint – probably a bargello to complement the one I’ve finished.
        I want a social life. I want to have people round for meals, do silly but fun things like picky stuff using FA’s little forks. Just silly fun stuff.
        Even something as anodyne as shopping has become a bothersome chore.
        Everything takes 2 to 3 times as long and has become a marathon rather than a sprint. A visit to the post office is now something to be carefully planned and dressed for as it involves standing in the cold for half an hour.
        I realise these could be described as first world problems, but all the joy and spontaneity has been sucked out of life.
        Life in post war London wasn’t a laugh a minute, but at least people weren’t suffering from rampant paranoia and treating each other like plague bacilli.

        1. Do you have a ‘support bubble’? Whilst this, at present, can only be one person from a single person household (as I am with my parents), you technically can change who that support bubble is (though only between single person households) IF you leave a gap of (I’m not entirely sure) two weeks between the change and that new person reasonably self-isolates (doesn’t see anyone apart from visiting the grocery shop, but can exercise outside).

          A long way from ideal, but it might work if the other people don’t get visitors themselves – including district nurses, etc etc. I know what you mean about the Post Office, as I had to endure a long wait outside in the freezing cold the week before Christmas just to retax my car – given problems with the post/email, I didn’t want to take a chance doing mine online/over the phone. Luckily I own a nice thick ski coat and gloves – not that I’ve ever gone skiing. 🙂

          What I do to keep warm if I know I’ll have to wait outside a long time is long for a nice long brisk walk beforehand, which warms me up nicely, though I do have to keep waggling my fingers otherwise (poor circulation in my hands and feet – possibly due to slightly low blood pressure) they don’t warm up. I also live in a smallish town and must have walked every road 10 times+ by now; woodland/trails are too muddy and the country lanes/other roads in/out of town are dangerous at the best of times, more in poor weather/winter poor light.

          I do like it when it snows – but it does seldomly where I am, was hoping today, but it’s now just going to rain/sleet. I like driving on snow, especially now that my car has all season tyres which have never been used on snow.

          1. We have sensible friends and family who aren’t spooked by this nonsense. However, that still means the spontaneity and fun has gone out of life.

          2. It has, and with it went the energy and enthusiasm to be arsed about things.
            We feel the same. No fun to be had (at least we can go and eat out, (but no social mixing or alcohol). No energy to do other stuff.
            One advantage is that we’re not spending too much, so the bank account isn’t suffering, and we’re lucky enough to be in full-time emplyment.
            One thing I do that eases things a bit is that, recogniding others are similarly affected, is to try to give them a boost – we gave our cleaning lady ( Polish) a bottle of her favourite prosecco, making her face light up. That was worth the £12 it cost! A bit of informal training using Teams was good for me, too!

          3. I agree; I’ve just given my cleaner an early birthday present of something she needed. She is a Treasure and well worth the cost.

          4. I quite agree. Two neighbours of mine, one who’s about the same age as my parents, the other a bit younger, are going for walks together, but I think their enthusiasm is beginning to wane, and they’ve only been doing this for the last month or two.

          5. Andy, I have retaxed my car over the phone for a few years now. Only problem is NOT to try and key the numbers in too quickly. Leave a second between each firm press, No trip in the cold, no waiting. I write the relevant credit card numbers large and clear on paper ( destroyed afterwards ) so I can see them without trying to struggle to see those tiny numbers. Fully automated ( no people) – MOT and Insurance are checked electronically. I’m actually retaxing mine Friday ( so it will be on next month’s credit card bill ).

          6. No – its not the problem in doing it online/over the phone at all – its that mine is due on 31 Dec, which means if there’s an error or the postal or email confrmation doesn’t arrive (bearing in mind I can’t re-tax it too early), there’s no-one to contact to check because it’s the Christmas shutdown. They won’t be back (even in normal times) until after my previous tax expires.
            If my car tax (VED) was due in any other month, then I would do this online or over the phone. I just can’t take the risk, especially as my car’s annual MOT and service is always due the week after, which it MUST be taxed for.

    5. Make sure you have the very best food and wine at home for a start. Buy wine for the same price you would pay in a restaurant and live a little. I live to eat, not the other way round.

      1. That is what I am doing – partly to make sure that MB is well fed which improves general well being.
        Today I treated him (us) to calve’s liver.

  57. Food parcel shame of greedy few is hard to stomach, says LEO McKINSTRY D/E
    Marcus Rashford: UK businesses helping to provide free meals
    It is a noble spirit embodied in the heroism of medical professionals, the dedication of key workers and the service of community volunteers. But that altruism is not universal. For some parts of corporate Britain, the emergency has served as an opportunity for exploitation at the expense of the taxpayer. Rather than meeting the needs of the most vulnerable, a few rip-off merchants have cynically taken advantage of the crisis to line their own pockets. While others strive to give their best, they do their grasping worst.

    Rashford’s over food parcels meant to feed youngsters for 10 days

    National free school voucher scheme – how to get a school meal voucher
    The incidence of greed has been highlighted this week in the bitter storm over the quality of food parcels provided during the lockdown to hard-pressed families who would normally receive free meals when schools are open. In some distressing cases, the contents have proved totally inadequate, despite generous funding from the Government.

    That was the experience of one disabled mother, who anonymously posted photographs online of the meagre offering she had received.

    Inside her parcel, which was meant to supply £30- worth of food to last 10 school days, all she found were two carrots, two jacket potatoes, a tin of baked beans, two loaves of bread, several slices of processed cheese, a tomato and a few other small items. As she explained on Twitter, she felt “very sad” as she unpacked the delivery.

    “Where has the rest of the food gone?” she asked herself, believing that the whole lot could have been bought from her local supermarket for £5

    Her complaint rightly provoked outrage. Yesterday the Education Secretary Gavin Williamson said that he was “absolutely disgusted”. Just as indignant was the footballer Marcus Rashford, who has built a formidable reputation during the pandemic as a food poverty campaigner. “Children deserve better than this,” he said.

    One of the reasons the controversy struck such a chord with the public is that this sorry case is not an isolated incident. As the row escalated, a host of other aggrieved parents came forward to recount how badly they had been let down.

    At a time of unprecedented strain for thousands of families, hardships have been deepened by a woefully shoddy service.

    The package that sparked the row was supplied by the catering firm Chartwells, which is part of the international conglomerate Compass. The global giant is certainly wealthy and experienced enough to offer far better. According to its latest annual report, even in the pandemic Compass enjoyed revenues last year of £20billion, with an “underlying profit” of £561million.

    Chartwells has made an apology, adding that standards had slipped because it had been required to provide thousands of parcels “at extremely short notice.” Whether the insufficiency was due to incompetence bred of pressure or, more reprehensibly, an eagerness to maximise corporate profits from the public purse, the affair has exposed some glaring hypocrisies within Compass.

    In its annual report, the company grandly boasts its “social purpose” is to “provide health food and nutrition” while “supporting local communities”. Similarly Charlie Brown, the head of Chartwells, claims that “he loves helping to make people’s day better by providing our great food and services.”
    Tell that to the disabled mother. What makes the saga all the more nauseating is that Chartwells’ sister company provides parcels full of delicious food to private schools while it is “palming the vulnerable off with measly, stingy ration boxes”, to quote the eloquent words of food campaigner Jack Monroe.

    1. It would be better to give people vouchers – to buy proper food. But isn’t Child Benefit intended to pay for children’s food and necessities?

        2. And takeaways and cigarettes (for the parents). Why oh why did CB not stop at two children….?

          2. We all get on the wrong side of the line for something. I had a state retirement age (SPA) of 60 not so many years ago. Now it is 66.

            Although I don’t object, as it was fair to equalise SPA, I really object to thousands of women age between 60 and 65/6 being made redundant while opportunists from Africa, sent over here are put into hotels, fed, watered etc. with help from the French (who does Pritti think she is kidding giving money to the French to stop them – doesn’t she know that the French are cowards and cheats?)

          5. At least I was on the right side for that one. I got my RP at 60, though it’s still paid at the lower rate.

          6. A couple of years ago, pension age here went from 67 to 70.
            Somebody has to pay for the useless imports.

      2. To be fair, the children would get lunch at school if they were allowed to go, so that’s five extra meals to provide per child per week on top of the parents’ usual budget.

      3. I suspect that many of those wouldn’t know what to do with proper food. Child benefit is for things like Sky, booze and ciggies (one of my former teaching colleagues told me that was what hers was for).

        1. When I was aJobCentre adviser that’s what they all used it for. Then on benefit day they all drew their money out and lost it on the bus, or having spent it on food for the freezer, the freezer broke down.

    2. Compass – say no more, they took over the in-house catering in the large national firm I worked for back in the early 2000s,Staff Tuped, ( and consequently Tupped you might say) prices shot up, quality plummeted and within a year all canteens were closed never to reappear.

      1. A bit like KPMG and internal IT departments?

        Outsourcing to consultants is only outsourcing in relation to the employees of the company concerned, who are often made redundant . As far as the consultant/advisor or whatever they label themselves as, it’s in-sourcing to them.

    1. And I am reasonably sure that the UK is still on the EU hook if there is a full blown banking crisis.

          1. Indeed and that, I’ll bet, is still hidden somewhere in the small print, perhaps under “obligations”

    3. This is what happens when things are done for political reasons,( United States of Europe) rather than sound economic reasons. It is bound to fail in the end, that the ignorant remainers would never accept. Thank God we have left.
      The only thing you can thank Gordon Brown for is that he stopped Blair taking us into the Euro.

      1. Problem is, the economies were so divergent. Maybe the Central European economies could have stood the Euro, but the Mediterranean ones clearly weren’t suited.

      2. To be fair William Hague, before deciding to become a complete imbecile, wanted to ‘save the pound’ and Sir James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party stirred things up a bit.

    4. Look, this is how it works.

      The poor nations of Europe buy German goods. In turn, Germany gives them money – washed through the EU – to buy those goods. That’s how it works. That’s why it doesn’t work. However that is precisely why none of them will ever change it.

  60. RE the failed asylum seeker who killed three, now got a whole life sentence. As he is a FAILED asylum seeker I assume his family are NOT already here. . but . . as he is now here jailed for life ( supposedly ) will his family use the HRA to get into the UK to “visit” him – and instantly claim asylum – thereby achieving his original aim of getting them ALL here to be freeloaders on our taxes?

    1. 328478+ up ticks,
      Afternoon W,
      So whats the problem ? that is what an lab/lib/con vote is for isn’t it ?

    1. Sentenced to 6, out in 3. He now knows he is here and looked after for at least three years ( time off for good behaviour ). As for calling him a “Portsmouth man” we ALL know why. But the authorities keep thinking that blanket denial will make it all acceptable.
      Yet another who will have done it deliberately, knowing that on release he will be able to claim he’ll be persecuted for the crime if sent home, so allowed to stay ( after WE have paid for his lawyer of course ). I would bet a £million if I had it that he will NEVER be deported and his family will arrive hands out and laughing, very well rewarded from our taxes for the rest of their lives – -for his criminality. They should ALL be deported no matter WHAT they claim they’ll face.

    2. I remember once was it a Swedish police officer rattling off the criminal for that day – 90% of the names were foreign.

      Do our police keep records on the ethnicity of criminals or did the Left deem that racist as most crime was commited by inner city black kids knifing one another and organised crime eastern european gimmigrants ?

  62. D11squus is telling me that im logged out when making comments, clearly its the Saxon Queen ghost writing, hmm . The husband and I’ve just had a nice jacket potato with beans and Cheddar cheese. Getting fed up with soup. Hopefully the weekly ocado shop on Friday will contain some other things to have for lunch. We have been very please with ocado apart from one occasion it send out strawberry ice-cream instead of frozen peas. Mind you it does spoil the spontaneous part of life .

    1. I’m having problem posting; it keeps telling me to check my Internet connection and I have to click on the ‘Post as’ button several times before it condescends to accept it. Oddly enough, I had jacket potato with Cheddar (and a salad) for lunch, too. I fancied a change from soup as well. Great minds think alike, Aethelfled – or maybe, fools seldom differ 🙂

    1. You are only supposed to be that stupid if you are 25yo, blonde and beautiful. In what way, Miriam, do you imagine you are qualified?

      2. The young lady who delivers my post in the morning is stunning. She looks like a young Farrah Fawcett Majors. She gives a beaming smile. I wonder if she knows quite what an effect she has on men. And yes, she is blonde.

        1. She’s a woman. Women know the effect they have.
          Then there’s the stretch-that-juts-the-boobs and hair-fluff-with-hands move, usually seen in the office.
          (mumble)

          1. The woman who cuts my hair is gorgeous. Long blonde hair. A few month ago she asked my age and I told her. I was gobsmacked when she said she was 42. As I had noticed she had had ( reasonable size) implants I wasn’t sure if she meant her age or her new bust size.

          2. I earned many bonus points in a similar situation, when I was visibly gobsmacked that she was that old, and said so. She was delighted!

          3. Same here. My jaw dropped when she told me her age. I said I couldn’t believe it – genuinely meant it – and then I realised how many years she had actually cut my hair.

          4. You told me you were Just 18
            On the telephone
            I thought that you meant 18 years
            Not just 18 stone,
            Big Fat Mama

            [Benny Hill: Transistor Radio}

          7. Casting Benny Hill and Irene Handl in a major film just goes to show the paucity of acting talent available at the time.

          9. Years ago an instructor at the gym reappeared after a long vacation with similar enhancements. After a lot of uttering among the ranks, I lost the draw and was the one delegated to mention the change.

            My innocent You look different, is that a new haircut? was reasonably graciously received.

        2. The face, the smile, the intelligence, the humour and the personality are what wins me.

      1. “I think it’s a residue of the Civil War which was a long time ago.”

        Oh? And would that be the Civil War that was started by the Democratic party in order to continue and perpetuate their lucrative slave trade?

    4. She was on GMB this morning, being unpleasant about Boris and Trump (I’m sure they both think highly of this self-opinionated lefty luvvy too) and bemoaning the fact that she is going to have to leave her home in Tuscany because ‘of this Brexit thing.’

      What a very unpleasant, arrogant woman she appeared to be.

        1. That was my thought too. The interview immediately moved on to whether she would be getting vaccinated on her return to the UK, a prospect she seemed remarkably enthusiastic about.
          Perhaps the tardy roll out of the vaccine in her beloved EU is one of its few downsides?

          1. I can’t help hoping that her enthusiasm for it is rewarded with experiencing the full range of side effects!

      2. She could always apply for residency – oh, wait a minute; she wants to have her cake and eat it.

    5. She must be one of the least attractive women one is ever likely to see. I suppose she could be used as a cure for anyone with an excess of libido.

      1. I have quite a soft spot for her.

        Simply because I could never develop a ‘hard spot’ for her!

    6. She lives in Australia now,………….. apparently enjoying Bush Tucker
      I’ll get me didggery don’t.

    7. Funny how she thinks it’s the Right who’ve taken over. She really does need to look in the mirror occassionally. Look at the oppression of free speech. The assault on liberties. The offensive tax rates. The scale and extent of the civil service. The problem isn’t the right. It never is. It’s her lot.

    4. We are blessed to be a nation of sanctuary! Similar treatment to the demo outside a Cardiff police station after Mo (who could do no wrong) was released and died shortly after. Its all a lot of sweetmeats, I tell ye.

      1. Remember the Kindertransport? I knew two guys who came to the UK that way, both Professors, and both without family, who didn’t escape.
        That, doing the right thing, makes me proud to be British.

        1. I don’t think the enrichment rocking up in rubber boats is anywhere near the quality of those on the Kindertransport, Ol. Neither will they be as grateful as those earlier incomers.

  65. 328478+ up ticks,

    Lockdown ‘Removing Hope’ from Britons, ‘Nonsensical’ Interventions ‘Infantilising’ People, Says Senior Tory

    5 minutes post statement he was awarded a DCM.

    A DCM is equivalent to Don’t Come Monday.

  72. Brazilian Covid variant may infect people who have recovered from virus. 14 january 2021.

    The Brazilian coronavirus variant may infect people who have already recovered from Covid, scientists said as they called for urgent investigations into whether the new mutation can escape previous immunity.

    Britain is preparing to ban travel to Brazil over concerns about importing the new variant. The move follows a huge rise in cases in Manaus, a city that had been believed to be close to herd immunity from the first wave.

    I’m not a doctor let alone an epidemiologist but I have the uneasy feeling we are screwed here. This thing is mutating faster than any Flu or Common Cold equivalent. Don’t get your hopes up about going on holiday this year!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/01/14/brazilian-covid-variant-may-infect-people-have-recovered-virus/

          1. My main function in life – God knows why they call me Eeyore…{:¬))

            Gus and Pickles are 120% fit and well, thank you. They brushed off the vet’s request for two days of quietness and solitude by hurling themselves round the house, fighting and climbing. They are also discovering how to dismantle the utility room units…

      2. 328478+ up ticks,
        W,
        The lab/lib/con coalition wartime type broadcast regarding re-set,
        Dover calling , Dover calling.

      3. I don’t think they are banning travellers FROM anywhere, just people travelling TO Brazil.

    2. Yo minty

      Holiday 2021 in UK

      A shopping trip, using your “One Day Out A Year” COVID passport of course

    3. This is a message for the long-suffering public, along the lines of “don’t think existing antibodies or T-cell immunity is going to save you. You are deffo going to have the vaccine. Annually.” Confusion is the name of the game in order to obscure the truth of the matter. Do not fall for it.

      1. So what’s the point of the vaccine in that case as the idea behind vaccinating people is to fire up their T-cells to prepare to fight it? Might as well just keep on practising social distancing (six feet apart) and washing your hands assiduously, then get on with your life.

        1. The point of vaccination is profit for the pharmaceuticals (one must ask oneself for whose benefit actually are these dodgy, incompletely tested vaccines) and doing Gates’s bidding in producing a vaccine that, er, satisfies his need for control of the human population (and gives him far greater profit than his software organisation) as he is allegedly funding/investing in all these firms that are producing the vaccines in the West. He who pays the piper calls the tune. The point of promoting the vaccine is pay-off for Whitty, Vallance, Hancock, Johnson and no doubt others in government and SAGE. (Don’t you just love the acronyms – NICE, SAGE and others when they are anything but. How they must be laughing their socks off at us.) I think we are being expected to be perpetually vaccinated, at least on an annual basis. All this at the moment seems to be very much in the nature of an experiment, a largely untested vaccine, certainly not tested on on the over 55s and ageing immune systems, nor on people with illnesses and the corresponding drugs they have to take for those illnesses. This is absolutely contrary to the Nurember Code of Ethics, the first of which states that testing must be volunteered, fully informed and non-coerced. Sadly it seems that our elderly are expendable, you have only to look at the way government behaved towards our elderly in the nhs wards by tipping them out into the care homes where they infected the elderly already resident there.

          1. On that front, you are absolutely right; I wasn’t clear enough. I meant what’s the point MEDICALLY of giving people who’ve had the virus the vaccine? 🙂

    4. “Britain is preparing to ban travel to Brazil over concerns about importing the new variant.”
      I think a travel ban from Brazil might make me feel safer, Minty.

    5. This could last for years! New variant from … Russia, Czechoslovakia, Rumania, Italy and the rest of the EU, Switzerland, all the Middle Eastern countries etc. Etc. By the time we’ve had a “new strain from every other country in the world we’ll be back to the first one with another new strain!

    8. Isn’t that like ordinary ‘flu? It’s why sometimes the ‘flu jab doesn’t work – they’ve chosen the wrong mutation. Still, never pass up an opportunity to spread doom, gloom and fear …

    9. It’s an RNA virus. RNA viruses mutate a lot faster than DNA viruses. As long as the mutations don’t occur in the area the vaccine targets then the vaccines should stay effective.
      The likelihood is that we’ll need a new vaccine every few years. It’s problematic to make a long-lasting vaccine against RNA viruses.

  74. Bad omen? Tower of London raven missing, feared dead. 14 January 2021.

    One of the ravens at the Tower of London is feared to have died, in a potentially gloomy omen for Britain. It means that the tower is close to having fewer than six ravens, a level that would spell doom for the kingdom, according to legend.

    Ravenmaster Christopher Skaife confirmed that one of the birds, Merlina, known as the queen of the tower’s unkindness of ravens, is presumed dead after being missing for weeks.

    I would have thought they would all have been long gone by now!

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jan/14/tower-of-london-raven-missing-feared-dead

      1. Captive-raised ravens can imitate people as well as parrots can. In the wild, ravens have a life expectancy of around 10-15 years; in captivity they can live more than 40 years.

        Raven – Yellowstone Wildlife Sanctuarywww.yellowstonewildlifesanctuary.org › raven

        1. I suspect that with all the protections with which they have now been provided wild ravens will start to live rather longer. Their numbers have certainly increased drastically in this area, which is not beneficial to lambs. They seem to take delight in pecking out both eyes of the lamb which is struggling to its feet whilst its mother gives birth to its twin. Blind lambs do not thrive, even with artificial feeding.

    4. You’d have thought they’d have had some spares, wouldn’t you? It’s almost as though they want the UK to be doomed …

        1. I also like “In our time”, usually well balanced debate and explanations.
          When they do it well, the Beeb can do it very well.
          Too few and far apart unfortunately.

          1. Agreed – that programme has not fallen into the dumbing-down, woke, diversity trap. I expect it will when Melvyn packs it in.

    2. I keep a spreadsheet of the figures, with comparisons with other causes of death.
      In Norway, so far, compared with 2018 influenza deaths, COVID is A THIRD as deadly. And I don’t recall any fuss 3 years ago.
      Noticeably more people committed suicide in 2018 than have died of COVID.
      What bollox it all is.

  76. D1ssqùs either tells to keep logging in or it let’s me post when supposedly logged out, hmm.
    I think the Saxon Queen shall make husband and herself a pot of tea and eat some nice dark fruitcake. A very dark windy, wet and miserable day today .

    1. It’s been happening to me all this afternoon. Disqus acting up again – seems to be occurring more frequently.

        1. What’s on the menu tonight?
          I’m having a wild mushroom omelette with a slice of black pudding, followed by bread & butter pudding.

          1. That sounds delicious, wild mushrooms are lovely in an omelette, especially with a spot of parmesian cheese , I love omelettes, had one the other day.
            Tonight we are having Linguine Al Gamberi ( thin spaghetti with prawns ) .
            It also contains curry powder, white wine, chicken stock, egg yolks and parmesian
            cheese. Got it from my little ‘ Pasta Italian Style Book ” they are all small and quite
            simple books, Sainsbury did a series of them in the 80s .
            I ve got the cooking with fish, meat, as well as recipes from different countries,
            I’ve lots of cookery books from famous chefs but use those little ones daily .

          2. I shall fry the mushrooms with thyme leaves & finally flame them with a little brandy before placing them in the omelette.

          5. In the end, I skipped the omelette: too much caviar starter, so I settled for some really good Camembert & the pudding.

          6. I remember those books; 99p each. I still have some of them. The recipes are good and clearly written.

        1. Catterick is snowed off 🙁 I expect the bad weather will make its way down here in the near future.

          1. I would have thought that Catterick would be ready for poor weather.

            Strange, in southern Ontario the weather is really mild for January. Above zero is a rarity but it has been there for several days. The realist doesn’t expect it to last.

          2. The snow balls up in the horses’ feet, so it becomes like trying to run with a tennis ball strapped under your foot. Not recommended when travelling at 30mph!

  78. Received an SMS message from my NHS surgery at 13:18 hrs today inviting me to make an appointment for a COVID-19 jab via embeded url or phone.

    Unfortunately my smart phone does not link to SMS urls to avoid phishing and the contact phone is always busy.

    Tried typing in url on desktop computer and after being required to login for the first time on an American Synnova heathcare website found that all the slots at two local entres were greyed out as unavailable until March 2021 and June 2022 respectively after which the interface hung up.

    1. They are certainly making life very uncomfortable for many people .

      I think they assume far too much . They forget who they are dealing with . Techie expertise has gone beyond a joke .

  79. It is clear that the vaccination campaign is making people feel more secure, safe and confident.
    The UK government paid Big Pharma around £200 million pounds as a non-returnable deposit* at the early stage of Big Pharma’s attempt to make a vaccine. That is, before there was vaccine, the government gave away £200m of our money whether or not there was ever going to be a vaccine produced.

    Now that they have made a vaccine we do not know if it works. If it works we do not know how long for. We do not know if it as any effect at all. We do not know if it does harm in the long term.
    The government raised our expectations and told us that vaccination was the answer to lockdown. So the public started to look towards a vaccine with hope and longing.

    Even though the multi-million pound vaccine is useless the government is rolling it out because it makes people feel better, and because they do not wish to admit to squandering yet more billions of public money.

    This charade should remind everyone of the time when they introduced airport security. X-rays, scanning, searches and so on. The Home Secretary of the time said quite clearly that none of that made people any safer. It just made them feel safer. That was why it was done. Just psychological mind games, then and now.

    Would it not be nice if the governments of the UK stopped perpetrating these frauds?

    *Edit. The exact words of Professor Barry Schoub, a virologist and the chief advisor to the South African government in respect of Covid-18. He said that the economy of South Africa could not afford to make the required pre-payment of 2.4 billion Rand, unlike the UK.

      1. The only thing that might need changing is the first sentence of Horace’s third paragraph:
        Even though the multi-million pound vaccine is useless as yet fully proven……

      2. Practice. I could say that as they appear to know nothing about what the vaccine will do in the way of prevention, amelioration, or suppression that adds up to nothing. (Zilch + nil + zero = 0). It may be a leap but a small one. The pattern is there.

        If you went a into a shop and asked for a tin of red paint and the salesperson presented you with an unmarked tin and said, “It may not be red, and it may not be paint. It’s £5.” would you buy it?

      3. Whilst paragraph one is simply a falsehood. No “non-returnable deposit” was paid. The government made an investment into the research and has access to the vaccine at far below the market price which would normally be payable.

    2. You’re mistaking the public for intelligent and self aware individuals. They aren’t. Far too many are thick, the rest are blinkered., the few remaining who will see both sides are rare.

    3. “Our money”, “Public money”.

      No. No it’s not. It’s freshly created electronic credit, not recycled taxes, not borrowings, it’s created. Taxes don’t fund services, the government does. Taxes ensure demand for pounds, alter our behaviour and take away some of our purchasing power given to us by government spending.

      The vaccines aren’t useless, they seem to work. It is worrying that they haven’t had the usual level of testing though.

        1. Like it or not that’s the way governments actually work.
          If we paid no tax at all could we have all the services we have now? The truthful answer to that is yes we could if politicians agree to release that amount of cash into the economy. The trade-off for having no taxation would be a barter economy with people working for FOTM currencies, much higher inflation, and no ability to guide behaviour via financial means.
          The big question is are we taxing in the best way to lead to a healthy economy. The current answer to that is no, far from it.

  80. Interested to learn of any elderly who have a fall on the day or day after having a Covid Jab. I know of two. The latest a complete stranger 84 who yesterday had his jab and suffered a fall and today when we found him had fallen a second time but in the street. Fortunately it wasn’t too ccold at 8.0c and the ambulance arrived half an hour after the 999 call. (We were told it might take an hour to arrive…)

    1. The father of one of my friends had his jab yesterday. Today he was complaining of feeling unwell; his arm swollen and he was aching in every joint. His next jab isn’t until April, so what happened to the distance between jabs?

      1. Dear Conway,

        I’m too cowardly too. So sorry if it’s got to that (hoping you were exaggerating for effect). Should it help, I could email you my latest painting- first horse portrait – and you could laugh and tell me what I did wrong (horse heads are SO weird up close!).

        Best wishes,

        AshesThanDust

        1. Thank you. I am not actually suicidal (although the thought has briefly crossed my mind, only to be dismissed, when days are really bad). I have been there in the past and tried it; not to be recommended 🙁

  83. Although ‘scientists’ think that COVID is spread by the nose and mouth,
    it is mostly spread by ar$$holes

  84. Some sad news received earlier to today. The passing of a great teacher:

    “Thank you for letting us know that Tony Harding has sadly passed away. I have very fond memories of being taught A Level English Literature by Tony. He was a great teacher who introduced us, amongst others, to the poet Gerrard Manley Hopkins. I will never forget Tony’s emphatic delivery of the Poem ‘Felix Randal’ especially the final line in his resounding tones which I can still hear to this day

    Soft at first:

    “Felix Randal the farrier, O is he dead then? my duty all ended,
    Who have watched his mould of man, big-boned and hardy-handsome
    Pining, pining, till time when reason rambled in it, and some
    Fatal four disorders, fleshed there, all contended? ”

    and then ringing out:

    “How far from then forethought of, all thy more boisterous years,
    When thou at the random grim forge, powerful amidst peers,
    Didst fettle for the great grey drayhorse his bright and battering sandal!”

    Fifty years ago to this very month I sat the Mock A level Eng.Lit paper set by Tony. Tony read out the results of the exam in reverse order. I’ve no idea who was more stunned, Tony or me as he announced that I had scored top marks!

    If you get the opportunity would you kindly pass on my sincere condolences to his family.

    1. I have the amazing good fortune to be married to such a teacher.

      When the MR ended her last post in the UK, dozens of former pupils turned up for her leaving. It was very moving.

      1. Funnily enough a girl who came on one of our courses was a great friend of your MR’s at Norwich High School For Girls. She was a very jolly girl whose sister also came to us and her mother, called Griselda, had some very amusing telephone chats with Caroline. Carolyn will know of whom I am talking.

      2. Funnily enough a girl who came on one of our courses was a great friend of your MR’s at Norwich High School For Girls. She was a very jolly girl whose sister also came to us and her mother, called Griselda, had some very amusing telephone chats with Caroline. Carolyn will know of whom I am talking.

        1. I don’t remember Blundell’s ever playing cricket against Haberdashers’ Aske’s (where they must have taught the apostrophe as well as they taught sprung rhythm) but today a chap from my alma mater took five wickets for England in the test match.

          1. I don’t think so. However, the school can count such diverse personalities as Lord Soper, Steve Harley (Cockney Rebel) and Richard Michael Hills (17 January 1926 – 6 June 1996) and Sidney Green (24 January 1928 – 15 March 1999),[1] informally known as Sid Green and Dick Hills, were a British partnership of television comedy writers, at their highest profile during the 1960s.

            They both attended Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham Boys’ Grammar School in south-east London. They were both school captains, Hills in 1943 and Green in 1945. Richard returned to the school as a teacher of English, Latin and French. They co-wrote a number of radio scripts whilst Hills was still employed there, and then became writers of Dave King’s TV show.

  85. That’s me for this cold, wet horrible day. Back to my book – I am re-reading C P Snow – once very popular, now never heard of.

    I hope the weather is better tomorrow.

    BBC Radio 3 is playing the last movement of a Brahms quartet – which we heard, twice, in Cap d’Ail in 2010 played by a pick-up group of young musicians. Wonderful they were. When they finished, the went upstairs in a lift – and they were still playing while the lift rose.

    A demain

    4. It shows he has a sense of humour or his advisors are as thick as two short planks stuck together.

      Lammy-nation

  87. As public health experts around the world issue warnings about new mutant strains of SARS-CoV-2, it appears a new variant has been isolated in Ohio, likely originating from somewhere in the Midwest.

    One of these variants, dubbed the “Columbus strain,” has three gene mutations that haven’t previously been seen in other SARS-CoV-2 strains – the virus that causes COVID-19, according to a statement from The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. These mutations occur in the so-called spike protein of the virus, which enables the virus to bind to human cells more quickly.

    This strain quickly became the dominant COVID strain variant in Columbus over a three-week period between late December 2020 and early January, according to the researchers, who hope to post their findings soon on the pre-print database bioRxiv.

  88. ‘Evening, all.

    I feeI I should make one final post, firstly to thank all you kind NoTTLers for your supportive comments of yesterday, and secondly to make clear that my reason for quitting the forum is not the spiteful, bitter old bana-bhuidseach, JenniferSP’s persistent downvoting of a growing number of people, rather it is because of the deleting of my comments by richardl – (Dick by name, dickhead by nature).

    His deleting my criticism of JenniferSP yesterday is just the latest of several of my posts that he has deleted, the others having nothing to do with JenniferSP. It seems to have become something of a personal “vendetta”. As I’ve posted before, he’s quite unfit to be a moderator, he’s too partisan and he takes excessive delight in wielding his petty powers, much like an over-officious traffic warden – I’m sure we all know the type.

    So there it is, I will not post where my comments are subject to deletion at the whim of a tw@ like him.

    Thank you all again.

    3. I will miss you , your erudition, your no nonsense comments, and your wicked humour , grand as it is NOTTL will be diminished by your departure. As my Great-grandmother from East Queensferry never used to say “Slàinte Mhath”

    6. Don’t let a flappy head cancel you !

      Answer with your Unwinese humour. They will never get it !

    7. My mood was lifted immediately, when I saw your avatar, thinking you had had second thoughts.
      And then you deflated it, you VOB, you.

      };-O.

    10. You will be much missed. I really hope you change your mind and come back to see us soon. Love to you and your family and keep well.

    11. Mods should not be banning regular contributors nor deleting their posts. I may have used intemperate language occasionally and can take the punishment of the odd deletion.

      A couple of trolls have made persistent personal attacks on my character and achievements and would continue to do so if I invite them, which I have no intention of doing. I blank them without blocking which seems to cut off their oxygen supply.

      We take each other on trust without having any real idea of whom we can really trust. This is a lesson well learnt.

      In the past I have simply taken a few weeks leave and returned refreshed. I hope sincerely that you do the same. The place will be diminished by your absence.

        1. I recall Richard Tracey, a great commenter on here, was described as a ‘Dirty Old Man’ and Duncan as a ‘Vicious Old Bastard’.

          Miserable old sod does not cut it for me by comparison.

          1. I’ve enjoyed spontaneous human combustion, where complaints have been sent to both Mods on duty, and even the big boss.

          2. On a serious technical point, and to divert the conversation, on the subject of spontaneous combustion I first read about it in Melville’s Moby Dick.

            A few years later I was a student at the University of Sheffield and attended a lecture given by the Chief Fire Officer for South Yorkshire. He showed some horrific post fire scenes and the more squeamish left the lecture theatre.

            One scene showed the torso of an old guy, seated in his armchair, but with a hole in the floor through which his legs had dropped to the floor below. The walls of the room were covered in streaky brown fat deposits.

            The Fire Officer explained that the chap did not ‘spontaneously combust’ but that he fell asleep and dropped his lighted cigarette. A fire took hold and his clothing acted as a gauze meaning that he slow burned throughout the night.

            Melville was still a great American writer.

          3. I’ve seen that one.

            Horrific, but a better explanation than people suddenly becoming a bonfire of their vanities.

            There is a lot of combustible material in the body that, given half a chance , will burn very nicely.

        1. I am a West countryman and from Bath (which is considered posh) but I retain my accent and was swearing in the infant school, having listened to my father, a Welshman, who liked his Woodbines and IPA and swore like a Trooper. Several years in India and Burma probably taught him a few new swear words including some in Urdu and Hindi.

          We have an affinity with folk from your part of the country. Say it the way it is with no pansying beating about the bush.

        2. I am a West countryman and from Bath (which is considered posh) but I retain my accent and was swearing in the infant school, having listened to my father, a Welshman, who liked his Woodbines and IPA and swore like a Trooper. Several years in India and Burma probably taught him a few new swear words including some in Urdu and Hindi.

          We have an affinity with folk from your part of the country. Say it the way it is with no pansying beating about the bush.

      1. Hopefully not.
        Like ’em or hate ’em they are all volunteers and good luck and thanks to them all.

    13. I – for one – will miss your humorous insights with Gaelic inserts, Duncan.
      Haste ye back …

    16. Your pleasure. Two comments deleted that all.

      I have never deleted any posts because of content, as long as they do not conflict with the basic rules about personal attacks, they stay.

      1. That’s simply not true – unless you count insulting your favourite jigaboo, Baroque O’ Banana, as a “personal attack”.

          2. Just hang on in there DM tell jsp to eff off, she’s horrible.
            I have 3 blocked, its the equivalent of shutting the door in their faces.
            Have a word ‘off pist’ with Geoff regarding the Canadian. They’re quite a few hours behind the (at least 5) uk so imho, it’s not really suitable for him to be a ‘woke monitor’. I’m not sure how one becomes a monitor anyway. But I’m glad yer back on board Jimmy 😉

        2. What on earth are you talking about.

          There is a lot of childish name calling on here, anyone in the public sphere who is left of Trump is open to ridicule. Not a very adult way to behave but I am not aware of any comments being deleted for that reason.

          I have asked Jennifer to stop her unconventional way of disagreeing with other peoples comments, it’s not something that can be enforced.

          No one has banned you, as an ex para you should be able to provide sensible input.

          1. “…… but I am not aware of any comments being deleted for that reason.”

            Suffering from selective memory loss, eh?

            And BTW, I never said that I’d been banned. As for providing sensible input, I like to think that I do and my upvotes would suggest other NoTTLers share my view.

            At least, if you’ve managed to persuade that foolish cailleach to stop annoying everybody with her downvotes, somehing has been achieved.

          2. Listen here sunbeam,
            I do not go round deleting posts in the cavalier manner that you imply.
            If you have had more than one or two posts deleted, some other person with mod privileges is doing it and staying mighty quiet about it.

            Now, it’s time to turn a new leaf and move forward in a civil manner.

    17. Well Duncan Mac I bid ye fare well as I slurp my Whisky Mac. Aye, and lots o’ Hoots Mon etc.

      PS How’s my Gaelic coming along?

          1. F1!

            Guys I need some help here with my homework. I confess I’m having a few problems with the phrase Duncan’s posted above and I’m honour bound not to use google translate. Can any of you suggest what it means after a while I’ll take a stab at the one I think is most likely…?

            PS Duncan ain’t allowed to partake as he set the question.

          3. Thanks Grizz but that doesn’t help. It just looks like you rearranged the letters and added a few more….

          5. Regrettably your reply also came through as a message on my phone and it doesn’t have one of these

          6. Thanks Grizz but that doesn’t help. It just looks like you rearranged the letters and added a few more….

          9. Well Duncan you’ll be relieved to know you won’t be needing to send me that case of whisky after all. In trying to be helpful Grizz’s reply also appeared as a message on my phone but without the spoiler. In all honesty I can’t claim to have deciphered the phrase on my own. And although I’ve mastered the art of Whisky (Veteran of a Speyside Whisky Festival), I’m unlikely to be proficient in your Lingua Franca so to speak.

    18. I’ll miss you. I might not often agree with you, but you are one of the more insightful posters on here.

      1. Thanks, T, I appreciate the compliment, the more so since, as you say, you don’t often agree with me.

        1. We don’t all get along, we don’t all agree on everything. If we did there’d be little room for real discussion. I like to think that I can keep it polite most of the time when I disagree. I also like to think I can keep an open mind. Almost every day I learn something new simply by coming here. It could be an old song i haven’t heard before, a film I haven’t seen, a book I haven’t read or even something more educational. I feel richer for partaking here in discussion.

  89. Not good. From the DT:

    “More than 1,000 jobs have been lost at Gatwick airport after Norwegian culled long-haul services in its latest bid to survive.

    The budget airline, which had been Gatwick’s third-biggest carrier before the pandemic, will now focus on short-haul flights to European destinations.

    1. In Dublin’s fair city
      Where the girls are so pretty
      I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone
      As she wheeled her wheel-barrow
      Through streets broad and narrow
      Crying, “Cockles and mussels, alive, alive, oh!”

  91. The Saxon Queen shall venture into the kitchen and at least start cooking dinner.
    Tomorrow she’ll be up at dawn walking through the mists and listening to owls .
    The ground will be sodden so she ‘ll wear her Hunter Wellington boots and long green
    waxed coat, it’ll keep her dry .

  92. Evening, all. What “successful” vaccination campaigns – unless they mean making people feel safer, whether the jab works or not?

  93. Utterly off topic, but for “Pointless” watchers.

    This evening was a classic example of arrogant stupidity.
    Two women were leading 1-0 in a best of three competition.
    They knew four other answers out of five, but being “we’re going to rub your noses in your ignorance” against the other couple they answered the same question. They were wrong too. The other couple went on to win.

    In reality, if you think the other people are wrong, why not answer one you are certain of?

    If they really are wrong, they lose. If they are right, you lose anyway.

    Stupid bitches.

      2. It’s a “wash over” quiz show, that happens to start at wine o’clock here, just as the wood-burner is getting the room up to a comfortable temperature and while supper is cooking.

        1. The Chase is much more entertaining at that hour. And it comes with breaks for glass replenishment!

          1. My son likes The Chase, I prefer Pointless, and of course I’m not as old as decrepit as you,
            };-O
            I can fill my glass between rounds.

          2. That’s you off the truffle list. Of course if you keep the winebox next to the telly you don’t have to miss a single moment of Pointless. ;@)

          6. I like the idea of pointless, you know knowing the correct answers that the people surveyed didn’t but I find it hard to warm to Alexander Armstrong and being a BBC show the prizes barely pay for your cab to the studio.

          7. It might seem that way, but as a programme, working on 5 shows and 50 weeks, including celebrity ones, they give away in excess of a quarter of a million pounds.

            I think AA is one of the better “all round” presenters, inoffensive and with a lot more talent than most of the others.

          8. Beat the chasers just ran for a week. They gave out more than a quarter of a million in six or seven shows. I can remember a celebrity team winning 100k for charity. And Bradley is a far better host than Alexander even if he is a damn gooner 🙂

          14. Have you seen Michael Macintyre “The wheel” if that isn’t fixed I don’t know what is. Well, I must qualify that…..Pointless must be the best example of how to rigg a TV programme.
            Who are the ‘100 people’ ???

          15. I wonder that at times too.

            Some scores, for what I would have thought must be almost primary school level knowledge are surprisingly low.

          16. But strange that the presenter always knows the answers……..and personally i can’t stand that large chap with the huge head.

          17. I’ve only fairly recently started watching, but similar questions pop up and they’ve obviously been doing it for years.

          19. I don’t watch ITV. My mum never watched anything else: I think that made me rebel against ITV’s innate vacuousness (and incessantly crass adverts).

          20. I only watch live TV at work. They too stingy to pay a whole £9 a month to have netflix. At home I mostly watch movies or bingeworthy shows. I recently watched the first two seasons of ‘A Discovery of Witches’. That was really good but I need wait a year for the final season (I think, it’s based on a trilogy of books).

      1. It’s certainly standardised.

        I’m always staggered by how few people know the answers to so many subjects; and then my ego gets thoroughly punctured because I can never name celebrities, or any other popular cultural icons.

    3. I always chuckle when seeing the variant show, ‘Pointless Celebrities’ in my TV guide. A very apt description of the people taking part, especially as many of them make the ordinary citizens look intelligent.

    4. Should it be titled ‘Pointed’, I could be tempted to try it; I never watch pointless programmes …

  94. How do you know you’ve got the new Covid variant coming out of Brazil?

    All your pubic hair falls out.

    1. The new Covid variant is not the only thing to emanate from Brazil. Charley’s Aunt also comes from there (where the nuts come from).

  97. 328478+ up ticks,
    Just musing,
    The politico’s know, and they know we know they know that the mask is in reality a breaking in tool of submission as being a partial burka and accepting such into society with maybe a bent knee or two would not go amiss.

    The governance party’s via parliament & the parliamentary
    canteen are up for new overseers being introduced as shown by the oath taking instruction manual, perused / used
    plus the canteen halal inclusive menu.

    Ps
    With reinforcements arriving daily via Dover.

        1. A fortnight, now. Tomorrow afternoon will be half way. I very nearly caved in yesterday, but I told myself I’d started so I’ll finish 🙂

          1. I’m only two weeks into my 20-week abstinence. I’ve not drunk alcohol until May for three years on the trot now.

          2. Three years on the trot? You must be used to it by now 🙂 This is the first time I’ve ever done dry January (usually I have too many social engagements to give up alcohol in that month). I have occasionally managed dry February, albeit not in a leap year 🙂

          3. I’ve never been a big boozer, Conners. When I were nobbut a lad, I used to hang about with mates who all liked to get rat-arsed at every available opportunity. I tried once or twice to keep up with them but I never had the capacity (or the heart) for it.

            On one occasion I forced myself to keep up with them and I passed out! When I’m not on the wagon, these days, my alcohol consumption is limited to a glass of decent scotch on a Friday night and possibly a gin or a cognac on a Saturday night. I don’t even drink much beer nowadays since it is prone to bring on an attack of gout. [I’m also a long way from a decent pub selling excellent cask-conditioned bitter on tap!]

          6. I like Bordeaux. The father of one of the friends I stay with in Normandy is a wine merchant. They (and I when I stay with them) drink the good stuff!

          9. Mr Grizzle

            Your actions fit the profile of being an alcoholic ie an

            inner compulsion to drink at certain times

          10. Funny you say that, Mr Effort.

            It must be summat else since I’m as dry as a Pom’s bath mat.

          11. Two years ago i gave it up for 12 weeks it didn’t make an ounce of difference on the scales or on the waistline,… so i gave up.

          13. And it works well for me. Eschewing the calorific value of alcohol (i.e. converted sugar) helps me lose weight very efficiently. I think it varies between people since we all have a different metabolism.

          14. For more than 20 years, from the age of 35 to 56, I abstained from alcohol for at least 6 months of each year. I feel my abstinence has already been paid in full.

          15. Yo Conway

            We move house tomorrow

            I shall watch the Spitfires and Hurricane practice their defence of UK, over the North Sea

            We were tempted to buy a house in Coningsby, however

          16. I envy you, OLT and hope the move goes well. For my next (it will be my third) Spitfire flight I intend to go to Goodwood (the Boultbee Spitfire) and fly over Glorious Goodwood when the racing is on. It is looking increasingly likely that, apart from watching it on TV, that’s going to be the closest I shall get to spectating 🙁 That said one of “my” (ie I have shares in it) horses has won at Chelmsford. The drop back to 7f seems to have worked the oracle. I’ll watch it on the Internet. Even owners aren’t allowed at the races (not that I would have gone to Chelmsford – probably my least favourite flat track – even if they had been).

      2. I have submitted to Covid rules

        Dryanuary is too much

        Especially when it is just for us serfs, not the PTB

    3. I was born mad.
      I’ve lived a life of madness.
      I’ll die mad.
      And I’ll be a fucking mad ghost!

    4. With my family history it’ll be madness, heart, cancer and then maybe alcoholism. Covid will have to get in the queue.

    11. “Cigarettes, whiskey and wild, wild women …”

      Gave up cigarettes, pipe and cigars in 1998 …

      Nowadays, I much prefer Wine*, Women and Song …

      *including Prosecco, dry sherry, vintage port and Cognac – but not all at the same time !

  100. I just saw my laptop clock change from 1939, 1940, 1941, 1942, 1943, 1944 to 1945, and thought what a bunch of wimps we all are.

          3. Coffin lids do not have pintoles. The mediaeval doors in my house do. I suppose the door to the dark crypt might have creaked on its pintoles, rusty as they would be.

            I think the idea was that you could lift off the doors and take them with you when you moved. The accounts from the Tudor period at Hampton Court Palace support this supposition.

    2. Interesting comment , MM

      Will you expand a little ..

      My view is the UK has lost its muscle , no more can do will do, and we are buckling under new ideas like wokeism, common purpose / politically correct stuff which emanates from dare I suggest educationalists.. Our colleges and institutions have been taken over , and that sort of nonsense started in the sixties .

      1. We’ve lost the backbone to stand up to (and smash out of existence) the Leftist twats who are destroying the world.

      2. I suppose I was just thinking that the population of Britain during 1939-1945 underwent privations and dangers of perhaps several magnitudes greater than we are now experiencing. We’ve got a bit soft.

      3. The movement to the left, as you say, has been like a 5th column, undermining our national identity.

        1. Exactly ..

          They are equivalent to the Brown shirts and concientious objectors , these people are denying their history and heritage , almost like a personality problem .. needing to identify with harsh regimes , they cannot sit comfortably in the class system , oh I dunno, I am probably spouting a lot of rubbish, but that is how I see things.

      4. colleges and institutions took over, ex military no longer involved. There’s your swing to the woke left, no other reason needed.

        1. Judging by what I see of the Air Force (the only contact I have with the current military), wokeism is rife there, too.

    3. My clock showed 1347, 1348, 1349, 1350, 1351, 1665, 1666 (it’s a strange clock), 1918, 1919 … and wimps were thin on the ground then (They were certainly thin).

      1. Now they didn’t need PCR and LF tests, just a bunch of buboes needed to confirm a ‘case’.

        1. The evidence for buboes in the Black Death is very thin, they are only actually mentioned a couple of times in contemporary documents. Then there is the problem of rate of spread, which is far, far faster than Bubonic Plague has ever achieved in other outbreaks.. It not at all unlikely that the Black Death was in fact an Ebola like disease.

          1. Zaire ebolavirus is, as is clear from the name, a virus.

            It is pretty well document that the Black Death was caused by Yersinia pestis which is a bacterium.

          2. Pretty well documented, and pretty well refuted. Like a criminal trial, where one fact that the defence/prosecution cannot explain overturns their entire argument, other outbreaks of Yersinia pestis travelled at about 8 miles per day, the Black Death travelled 30 to 100 times faster than that, which requires a far faster infection mechanism than rats, insects and bites. No Yersinia pestis DNA has ever been recovered from Black Death remains, and if one case were found it would mean little. Yersinia pestis was a frequent visitor.

            The fact is, we don’t really know, and there is nothing to indicate that we ever will know.

          3. No Yersinia pestis DNA has ever been recovered from Black Death remains , and if one case were found it would mean little.

            Covering your arse are you. Read Mola’s link and you will find that it has, indeed, been found. It may have been argued against, it has certainly not been effectively refuted at all.

          4. So evidence of a bacterium which is known to have been endemic around the Mediterranean was found in a Marseille plague pit, and this proves something? Given that is the only evidence, the weakness of it suggests weakness in the argument. Given that you are so certain (actually you are always certain, you don’t do doubt, so not a scientist) how do you explain the rate travel. What mechanism do you suggest, what is documented that supports that mechanism. Unless you can show that, or show that the rate of travel has been wrongly calculated, the argument for Yersinia pestis is dead. Science is not a vote, it is a contest of facts.

            BTW, in tha adu

          5. I haven’t stated any certainty (try reading my comments instead of deciding that they say something I didn’t write) – probably because I am a scientist. I’ve simply put your argument back to you.

            On the other hand by saying with such clamour that something has been refuted you are declaring a very unscientific certainty.

            Don’t bother to argue further. You are condemned by your own keyboard – as I am not.

          6. We haven’t had an argument, all you have done is insist that your textbook is right. For an argument, you would have had to refute. You have not. And your certainty (in all your posts) betrays that you are no scientist.

          7. On the contrary. Your alleged refutation has no more standing than the old theories which I have expressed without a word of certainty.

            The certainty, and the accusations are all yours. You betray yourself (repeatedly) whilst trying to condemn. Instead you condemn yourself. As before.

          8. “As far as most people are concerned, the Black Death was bubonic plague, Yersinia pestis, a flea-borne bacterial disease of rodents that jumped to humans. But two epidemiologists from Liverpool University say we’ve got it all wrong. In Biology of Plagues, a book released earlier this year, they effectively demolish the bubonic plague theory. “If you look at how the Black Death spread,” says Susan Scott, one of the authors, “one of the least likely diseases to have caused it is bubonic plague.” If Scott and co-author Christopher Duncan are right, the world would do well to listen.”
            https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg17223184-000-did-bubonic-plague-really-cause-the-black-death/#:~:text=Victorian%20scientists%20dubbed%20it%20the,ve%20got%20it%20all%20wrong.
            Well, epidemiologists’ theories are always worth ploughing through I guess. I say, look to your armpits and crotch!

          9. The rate of spread argument has been around for some years. If you ask “Why are you sure it was Yersinia pestis” the answer is always because of the reports of buboes. That would be fair enough if they were common, but there were hardly any. Fiction is full of them, textbooks talk about them, but contemporary mentions are only a couple, and they may have been “It’s plague, there must be buboes”.

            Epidemiologists with a sound grounding in maths are OK. Professors at Imperial College who are Physicists I am less willing to pay attention to.

          10. “If you ask “Why are you sure it was Yersinia pestis” ”
            We discuss many things at my local, that hasn’t come up yet, but maybe soon, if they open again.

    4. So you stopped at 1959? Missed the 60s, and the 70s. Oh heavens the girls were well dressed in the 80s, you missed that? You need a drink as consolation.

    5. I like it when mine changes to 17:01. My mind drifts off to better times seen from the bridge of a famous ship of the 23rd/24th Century.

  102. I see Langer is following the Australian Cricket Book of Sportsmanship – When caught cheating, lie. If nobody believes you, lie harder.

    They’ll probably lap it up in the Oz, but no one else will believe a word of it. “Smithy always does that!”. So he’s been cheating like that for years? Not surprising. I would have thought it was not good to boast about past deceits, but that’s Langer for you.

    1. You might be surprised, but real Australians are ashamed of what he’s doing, and not just because he was caught.

      1. Langer always goes for spin when there’s trouble. He’s even less reliable that St. Tone the Bliar. He just can’t do an honest response, it’s not in his nature to be truthful.

      2. I understand your affection for Australia and I am not suggesting that other than a small minority of Australians like it, but their cricket press will accept it, and that is what Langer cares about. Not “How did I do”, rather “How do I look”.

        1. I must have rewatched that last hour of Ben Stokes magical innings (and last stand with Jack Leach) against the Aussies from the 2019 Ashes tour many times over the past year. Always lifts my spirits. I should rewatch my DVD box set of the 2005 Ashes. I remember Ricky Ponting being rather put out on several occasions. As he was in 2009.

          1. I remember the distinctive markings on Jack Leach’s bat. I checked and it was a Somerset bat maker.

            Hitherto I thought most bats are now made in India but using English Cricket Bat Willow, planted for this market on several farms around me in the Stour Valley.

  103. 15th April 1912, the Titanic Sank…. between 1503 and 1517 people died… terrible tragedy. We still talk about it…..
    Yesterday, 1564 people died of Covid 19 in the UK.

    We don’t know what todays figures are .. perhaps we are being prepared for an even bigger shock.

      1. That is a better and more reliable measure than what a doctor puts on the Death Certificate. They need something that is constant over time and not affected by publicity and fashionable views. Then you can get into philosophical arguments, if a man has a terminal heart condition, gets Covid and dies, what killed him? Etc. A standard procedural measure is needed, and all measures will have defects.

        1. Even if it isn’t precise, the trend (the important bit) will be pretty accurate, as you will be measuring consistently.

      2. Those who die of accidental death are not counted, even if they did test positive less than 28 days ago.

    2. My guess is that they found a whole lot of numbers got lost over Christmas/New Year and,
      1. They won’t declare it until they’re sure it’s solid.
      2. They’ll declare it late so it it isn’t front and centre this evening.
      I say that because if there is a problem with lost data, it’s what I would do.

    3. My guess is that they found a whole lot of numbers got lost over Christmas/New Year and,
      1. They won’t declare it until they’re sure it’s solid.
      2. They’ll declare it late so it it isn’t front and centre this evening.
      I say that because if there is a problem with lost data, it’s what I would do.

    5. Now that Tombola (bingo to you landlubbers) cannot be played, the drums and
      numbers have been utiiised by hospitas to generate the Covid Count.

      You watch, when the drums have been returned to Mecca etc, the Covid count will be right down

      The above is an example of NHS Statistics

      1. I used to run Tombola stalls when I was fund-raising. It’s completely different from Bingo. On a Tombola stall, the prizes are numbered and to win one you have to draw the correct, ie matching, number. With Bingo you have to complete a line or the whole card by having the numbers the caller picks.

  104. I’m very concerned about the elderly lady next door.
    In November she had a fall, an ambulance turned up, her car was moved off the drive,
    the ambulance was on the drive instead, she was in hospital and returned home.

    I just looked out the window of the house because I saw bright lights, an ambulance was on the road ( not her drive , and I saw a stretcher being placed in the ambulance, I saw a white blanket covering the lady but I felt like it was wrong to look out the window for too long,
    I didn’t see her face , or sitting up, but I wasn’t looking for too long. I don’t know what’s happened.

    1. Be a nosy neighbour and see if she needs help.

      One day it could be you that needs a helping hand and wonders why no one noticed the fuss.

      What I object to is sightseers with their cameras standing and watching, a non intrusive offer of help is very different.

          1. That’s a very good point, there were other cars on the road, as there were in November
            when she had a fall and broke her hip. She lives on her own, last time it was either her daughters or neices car there, we don’t know them but know she has relatives. Maybe she contacted them and its not as bad as I was thinking .

          2. She may have a contact alarm that she wears around her neck. It works over the phone to a call centre. The ambulance guys would get the keys from a nominated neighbour.

  105. PS.. if the lady next door had another fall why was she on a stretcher instead of being wheeled on a chair and why wasn’t the ambulance on her drive like it was last time.
    I briefly looked as it seemed rude and only saw the stretcher and a blanket, I wasn’t wearing my glasses and didn’t see much but it felt strange.

    1. hopefully they were wheeling an empty stretcher back to the ambulance.

      If only you had rushed out to check on her.

      2. It is difficult to do that in these covid times. The elderly lady may have seen that as another threat to her well-being.

    2. Depending on injuries sustained in any fall, she may not be able to sit in a chair.

      Different ambulance drivers can park in different places so that’s not anything to worry about.

      1. She went into hospital in November due to a hip injury ( for a few days) lives on her own.
        I’d not have known if she was on a stretcher or in a chair last time as the ambulance was right up next to her door . Poor lady.

        1. I think a broken hip would be a stretcher case, and if there is any doubt that she might have damaged it again then they will nearly surely have kept her lying flat.

          Keep an eye out for family coming round – to turn off water at this time of year if nothing else – and pop out to ask them how she is. Family members very seldom take offence at kind enquiries from neighbours.

          1. She’s fractured her hip a few times, assuming its that, of which recently happened in November again. I’ve no idea how she has been coping in that house on her own . Ill keep a look out as you say to see if her family turn up .

    3. Stretcher sounds serious , hip injury , head injury .

      Do you know her name .. you could make some enquiries if you know her name .. She might have pets, a budgie . etc.

      1. Yes we know her full name, she has no pets. The ambulance has only just left her house 30 minutes after the neighbour being placed in the ambulance, not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. The last time she was in hospital a month ago it was a hip injury , but the ambulance was on her drive, this time it was on the road.

        1. With my last heart ‘episode’, MOH insisted on calling the ambulance. I had previous form from a big attack 6 years earlier, but was sure this was not a heart attack. Anyway they insisted on stretchering me to the ambulance and giving me an ECG. Took about 30 minutes to get an all clear, and then they let me walk back to the house. Your neighbour might have had something similar but with a less clear prognosis and would have been taken in to play it safe.

          1. I’m sorry to hear about your heart attacks, that must have been horrendous.
            As you say, ambulances don’t move off straight away .

          2. That’s right, they’ll often do a few tests onboard where their equipment is connected online to high tech diagnostics. It was only after the big ‘attack’ that I realised I’d had 5 or 6 smaller ones in the previous 10 years. Blokes aren’t very good at ‘being ill’.

          3. they have different procedures here, before moving you they do a quick ecg with a portable machine and if that is not clear, hang on for dear life the ambulance is flat out to the regional heart centre.

            They wouldn’t tell my wife how fast they had been driving, but by the time I caught up she had received two stents and was on the way to ICU for the night

          4. My night of the ‘big one’ no tests in the ambulance, just whoosh. White as a ghost and looking like death.

          5. Nothing quite tests your heart like watching the ambulance spin its wheels on the way out of the driveway.

            With that many stents, are you OK now?

          6. In rude health (touch wood).They all went in at the same time. The Indian cardiologist who popped ’em in (I told him please please do it without opening me up), kept saying “I knew I should have done a bypass, Mr Max. Get me another 4mmx 30mm quickly!”

          8. We’ve all had ups and downs, Belle, I’m less worried these days that I don’t have to get on choppers for trips to rigs and vessels. Your hubby probably misses it, not me. I’m fine thanks, Belle, you guys look after yourselves, I’ve got 8 stents looking after me.

          9. Eight? That must be up near a world record.

            None of those stents for me, they just cut out the broken arteries, moved a few things around and stitched me back up.

            Apparently an artery that they moved means that I will never be able to breast feed, as a seventy year old male that is not a concern.

          10. “Apparently an artery that they moved means that I will never be able to breast feed, as a seventy year old male that is not a concern.”
            Has it affected your lips?

          12. He misses flying , but he is glad he is out of it , his flying pals pals are also retired , but he doesn’t miss the CAA checks , the health examinations and all that palavar.. He will be 75 this year and has had various health scares , but he tries hard to keep himself active and irritating!

        2. I expect she is in safe hands now, you will worry, and of course with this Covid thing you probably would have been waved away by the medics .. social distance and all that .

          Relax now , and I am certain you will know more tomorrow .

          We do our best you know, but these are strange times , now you must try to relax .

  107. Just seen the latest video from Dave Cullen on his Computing Forever (really now just news and politics) channel – away from YouTube. He comments on the West German film ‘The Hamburg Syndrome’ from 1979. Well, shall we say it has a LOT of similarities with the pandemic world of today. I wonder if Klaus Schwab and his WEF/WHO buddies got any ideas from this.

    https://www.bitchute.com/video/EJC5js8vpLrj/

    As the platform is a P2P one, it does take a longer time to load/start than You Tube. This video is only 12 mins long. Well worth a watch.

    2. I’ve just been watching an iPlayer re-run of the old BBC series about MI5, Spooks , (I missed it the first time around). Yes, it’s a lot of hokum but it is weird how they talk about (and worry about) a lot of what is now happening for real in the world

      In fact it is spooky [forgive the pun] how events in the series are now being mirrored in reality, especially the theme of a “new world order”.

      2. Spooks is pretty good for a BBC spy drama. Of course much of it requires suspension of belief especially things like cracking advanced encryptions in milliseconds with the tap of a few keys from Malcolm, but if you can get past that it’s very enjoyable.

    1. Trump appears to be striking a more conciliatory note in his latest speech. The Democrats should reciprocate, as what is needed now in the USA is a healing process to bring people together. Pelosi seems to be on a personal mission to destroy Trump rather than adopting a position which is better for the nation. She strikes me as being vindictive.

      2. I will vote for that and unfortunately have to agree with you about Pelosi, all that I see her doing is play politics. Maybe she is focused on Trump today but if he is out of the way, any republican will do.

        With the amount they spend on getting elected, there must be some mighty big IOUs out there, they are not going to reform.

        1. Actually I don’t think so, she is worse than that. Just totally focused on destroying Republicans.

  110. A frog goes into a bank and approaches the teller. He can see from her nameplate that her name is Patty Whack.
    “Miss Whack, I’d like to get a $30,000 loan to take a holiday.”

    Patty looks at the frog in disbelief and asks his name. The frog says his name is Kermit Jagger, his dad is Mick Jagger, and that it’s okay, he knows the bank manager.

    Patty explains that he will need to secure the loan with some collateral.
    The frog says, “Sure. I have this,” and produces a tiny porcelain elephant, about an inch tall, bright pink and perfectly formed.

    Very confused, Patty explains that she’ll have to consult with the bank manager and disappears into a back office.

    She finds the manager and says, “There’s a frog called Kermit Jagger out there who claims to know you and wants to borrow $30,000, and he wants to use this as collateral.” She holds up the tiny pink elephant. “I mean, what in the world is this?”

    The bank manager looks back at her and says, “It’s a knickknack, Patty Whack. Give the frog a loan. His old man’s a Rolling Stone.”

  111. Goodnight, all. I’m off to listen to some opera – I occasionally miss my dose of Kultcha.

      1. They are used to squatting over holes in the ground ..
        How can they understand how to use modern amenities. It is like that woman living in Hull whose home was wrecked by her neglect .

  114. Nicola Sturgeon’s husband Peter Murrell faces a suspension call after his new Alex Salmond inquiry evidence

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