Thursday 13 July: Gardeners deserve better than class warfare waged by Thames Water

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 we prefer 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.

519 thoughts on “Thursday 13 July: Gardeners deserve better than class warfare waged by Thames Water”

  1. Good morrow, Gentlefolks, today’s story

    Take This Job And Shove It
    For Your Eyes Only
    High Priority
    Reply Requested When Convenient

    When you have had one of those real TAKE THIS JOB AND SHOVE IT days, try this.

    On your way home after work, stop at your pharmacy and go to the section where they have thermometers. You will need to purchase a rectal thermometer made by Q-Tip.

    Be very sure that you get this brand. When you get home, lock your doors, draw the curtains, and disconnect the phone so that you will not be disturbed during your therapy.

    Change to very comfortable clothing, such as a sweat suit and lie down on your bed. Open the package containing the thermometer and remove the thermometer and carefully place it on the bedside table so that it will not become chipped or broken.

    Take the written material that accompanies the thermometer and as you read it you will notice in small print the statement that *every rectal thermometer made by Q-Tip is PERSONALLY tested.

    Now close your eyes and say out loud five times, “I am so glad that I do not work in quality control at the Q-Tip Company.” “

    1. Good to read your morning funnies again, Sir Jasper. I have struggled with this perishing iMac to catch up but I did enjoy your “How to wash your cat” post. It was hilarious!

  2. Bizarrely, the only way I can get to this page is via the link Geoff posted on Wednesday’s page – this page doesn’t show when you open Disqus, but since I’m writing on it, it obviously exists.
    Weird.
    Morning, all Y’all.

  4. Good morning, chums. after 10 days my iMac was certified as “sorted” so I collected it yesterday. Within minutes I brought it home and plugged it in, only to discover the “disconnected” and “connected” messages were still appearing at around one minute intervals. Aargh!!! (Ah, well, life is a series of plan Bs!)

    1. Morning Elsie, which iMac have you? I had a lovely 24″ intel one for over a decade. I bought the 27 intel just before the M1 came out! I like Apple hardware, but I’m leaning toward a generic PC next time as they’ve made huge strides in noise reduction and build layout.

      Although I feel for you in the repair side. Having to go to the ruddy shop is a pain in the backside.

    2. I know nothing about iMac. Is your problem an issue with your broadband or wifi cutting out, have you something else to check that against. Whatever, must be infuriating for you.

    3. This could happen if you have a neighbour whose wifi channel is on the same one as yours. The channel can be changed by accessing the wifi hub on your router.

      1. Thanks, Rusty, but I am a technophobe and don’t understand how to do that.

  5. Morning folks

    Try not to choke on your Cornflakes….

    Here’s how the Beeb sees it:

    “The cornerstones of BBC News are trust, impartiality, reliability. Huw Edwards was all of those things.”

    2. We trust them to lie to us, that can be relied upon. Impartial? You’re joking? The problem with the BBC, much like the guardian is that it lies by omission. The state does this as well by proclaiming how great – for example – windmills are. It espouses the amount of energy generated for their operating costs… and deliberately excludes subsidy, rigged pricing (that we pay) and all the costs of building and dumping them, let alone decomissioning.

      It is this deception that is only uncovered by the critical websites – which google refuses to list so you can’t easily research the cost, nor does the BBC ever challenge the lie.

    3. They are all at it.
      Our Canadian cbc just got caught telling whoppers about the conservative leader before the latest election in Alberta. They conti ued with the allegations that she interfered with the justice department right through the election period. Only after an independent inquiry have they now admitted that their story wax made up.

      To qoute them – CBC your trusted news source.,

  6. 374403+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    There cannot be a criminally nuttier nation on this planet brought about through the polling booth and a multitude of fools
    consent , putting party before Country via the polling stations.

    We are IMHO witnessing the flagship of RESET, you’ll want for nothing, you’ll need nothing all catered for,
    health / welfare / resettlement, in camp.

    The indigenous herd outside working the fields, earning the financial needs required for such an establishment to exist.

    Dt,
    Pictured: Inside Britain’s new large-scale asylum camp
    First migrants arrive at RAF Wethersfield base in Essex, which will house 1,700 single male asylum seekers by autumn.

    If it looks walks and talks like a stand by army, ir is A BLOODY STAND BY ARMY, awaiting the call from the tower.

    1. 374403+ up ticks,

      O2O,

      Dt,

      Spending millions on fancy hotel rooms for migrants shows we have failed on immigration
      The gap between the Westminster elite’s attitude to illegal migration and the experience of normal people is now a terrifying chasm

      What is more terrifying is the fact that “normal people” aided & abetted this odious state of the Nation via the polling booth, and their love of party before Country.

      ALL innocents are now suffering the evil consequences.

      1. We didnt want them here. No one wants them here – even those squealing ‘wefugees welcome’ don’t want them living with them. I continually find it funny that Sunak bleats ‘My priorities are those of the British people.’ Bolloix it is. If they were he could get repealing endless unwanted laws that prevent us simply kicking the wasters out – literally. He doens’t want to repeal them. heck, I doubt it has ever been offered.

    2. If Google is anywhere near correct then the combined number of illegals who crossed the Channel in 2019, 2020, 2021 & 2022 is around 84,000. This year the number currently stands at around 12,000. The British Army, including reservists, stands at 112,000. Parity in numbers isn’t far away as the vast majority making the crossing are young men.

          1. The problem isn’t the ISIS fellows here, it’s the deliberate,willful desperation the state goes to to avoid monitoring and removing them.

    2. He’s clearly ill. He’s not even pretending to be a woman. Oh, I see. His chum filmed it as if it were ‘cruel’ to him where really it’s something to celebrate.

    3. He’s clearly ill. He’s not even pretending to be a woman. Oh, I see. His chum filmed it as if it were ‘cruel’ to him where really it’s something to celebrate.

    4. Good. That was disgraceful. But it’s not the first time that transwomen have called for violence against women, or have physically attacked women, and got away with it.

  9. Shoplifting gangs target Waitrose. 13 July 2023.

    Waitrose has said organised gangs of shoplifters are targeting its supermarkets, amid fears products are being stolen specifically to be resold.

    The supermarket reported “rising numbers of shoplifting offences” in its stores, saying incidents were often orchestrated by organised gangs.

    Lucy Brown, director of security for the John Lewis Partnership, told the BBC: “Some are one-off offenders but the majority are shoplifting on a regular basis, switching across all retailers.”

    TOP COMMENT BELOW THE LINE.

    Wounded Taxpayer.

    Hardly surprising that shoplifting is on the increase. My understanding is that the police don’t regard theft of anything worth less than £200 as being a crime. They just completely ignore it. Petty theft has effectively become legalised.

    If you want to attract the attention of the police, try saying that a man who likes wearing frocks isn’t a real woman.

    Unlike WT my surprise is that it is not much worse. This can only be due to the residual respect that the older and indigenous population still retain for Law and Order. As the numbers of incomers rise it will deteriorate further. Now would be good time to reinforce the doors and windows and perhaps buy a knife proof vest for shopping trips!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/07/12/shoplifting-gangs-targeting-stores-waitrose/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    1. How long before the Supermarkets migrate to 100% on-line shopping only? I can see the delivery drivers being kitted up like the chaps who drive armoured trucks for Securicor!

      1. Morning Stephen. I thought that they might eventually shut down the open plan layout and install security doors and perhaps as you say online orders and authorised pick ups.

        1. I remember passing through Liverpool on my way from Lime Street station to Aintree for the Grand National and seeing off licences with iron grills around the drinks and people having to point/ask for what they wanted and it not passed to them before it was paid for. Counter service.

          1. You don’t find a shop on that route now that isn’t shuttered except the chippies, Chinkies and laundromats

          2. Like the old Systembolaget in Sweden, and Vinmonopolet in Norway. Counter service only, in a bleak hall, surrounded by old posters asking you if you are alcoholic.

    2. I’ve gone in thrice asking when they might have Jus Rol pastry in stock and each time it’s been ‘the next time’.

      1. That would elicit a complaint to customer services if they treated me that way.

  10. Good morning, all. Bright with thin high cloud in N Essex.

    Yesterday I put up Esther McVey asking minister Will Quince MP a question re the WHO and the IHRs.

    Richard Tice, Reform leader, has responded to McVey’s tweet by questioning the answer the minister gave. Who is correct, the minister or Richard Tice? The people deserve the truth not lies or obfuscation from the politicians of all stripes.

    https://twitter.com/TiceRichard/status/1679067766039490560

    3. Rule 1. Politicians lie. Rule 2. See rule 1. Rule 3. By the time the lie is uncovered, it is too late. 4. When challenged they say ‘ah, it’s not that they have power over us, it’s that we have to obey their dictat in every way. That’s different, so I didn’t lie.

    4. Esther McVey’s question must be put repeatedly to each and every government minister starting with Sunak. If we are going to be betrayed then one minister should not be made a scapegoat. It must be clear before any agreement is signed that every single member of the government is complicit in all lies on the questions of the WHO’s powers.

      I remember voting in 1975 for Britain to stay in the Common Market. I voted as I did because Mr Heath, the then leader of the Opposition and the pro membership faction, assured us that there were no political implications or questions about sovereignty. The Common Market for which many of us foolishly voted was not what the mendacious Mr Heath and his scurrilous party told us it was. We were betrayed by Conservative politicians as well as Labour and Lib/Dem ones who have continued to betray us ever since.

      .

      1. I fell for that lie from Heath & Co. I started questioning that decision when I saw the local apple orchards my mother had worked in for decades being grubbed out. Now, a few miles from that area, a large new orchard has sprung up and a local farm shop recently has planted a small orchard with cherries and pears.
        To top it all a few vineyards have been planted. Not all bad news.

      2. It was when the EEC became the EU that the rot really set in.
        But, of course, that was always the plan – European Coal and Steel Community – EEC – EU – United States of Europe.

      3. It was when the EEC became the EU that the rot really set in.
        But, of course, that was always the plan – European Coal and Steel Community – EEC – EU – United States of Europe.

      4. Mrs T had been Conservative leader for four months at the time of the 1975 referendum and was for staying in. Heath’s lies preceded the 1970 GE. The manifesto stated:

        These policies will strengthen Britain so that we can negotiate with the European Community confident in the knowledge that we can stand on our own if the price is too high.

        Our sole commitment is to negotiate; no more, no less. As the negotiations proceed we will report regularly through Parliament to the country.

        Speaking on TV in January 1973 upon Britain’s entry into the EEC, he said: “There are some in this country who fear that in going into Europe we shall in some way sacrifice independence and sovereignty. These fears, I need hardly say, are completely unjustified.”

  11. Good morning, all. Cloudy. Rain “tomorrow” (very Alice in Wonderland)….

  13. SIR – As the owner of a fifth-generation sausage-making business, I suspect Robert Barlow’s disappointment with British sausages today (Letters, July 11) may be to do with the quality rather than the quantity of meat.

    Premium pork sausages contain more rather than less meat – mostly above 70 per cent, with some even claiming 97 per cent. But meat content is not the only yardstick by which a premium sausage should be judged. The quality is crucial, together with the other ingredients, including rusk (or bread) and seasoning.

    British pork is second to none but has increased in price by about 40 per cent in a year. Manufacturers have also been affected by higher wages and energy costs, and inevitably these will lead to higher prices.

    Together with retailers we have tried to absorb the costs, but if the consumer will not accept reasonable price rises, some manufacturers will be tempted to seek cheaper and potentially lower-quality meat, to the detriment of the Great British banger.

    Grant Powter
    Newmarket, Suffolk

    SIR – I am reminded of what my father said about wartime rationing: “There were three kinds of bread: brown bread, National Bread and sausages.”

    Peter Winney
    Bath, Somerset

    SIR — If Robert Barlow (Letters, July 11) is so dissatisfied with the sausages he buys, why doesn’t he make his own?

    Since moving to Sweden if I want a British-style banger I simply mince some belly pork, season it with salt, pepper and sage,
    add a controlled amount of breadcrumbs and water, then choose whether to stuff the sausage meat in skins or not.

    In one much-loved recipe I add tomato passata to make a Midlands’ favourite: pork and tomato.The result is a delicious food product
    of a far higher quality than you can buy at any butchers or supermarket.

    A. Grizzly B.
    Skåne, Sweden (unpublished.)

    1. Good morning, Grizzly

      Have you a good recipe for gluten-free sausages?

      Caroline has coeliac disease and therefore has to be careful not to eat sausages with breadcrumbs in them unless the breadcrumbs come from gluten-free bread.

      1. Good morning, Rastus. Indeed I have. Many German sausages (and Polish ones) do not add any bread to them.

        Mince some good quality belly pork and then add: 2% of the weight of the meat in salt; 0·2% of the weight of the meat in pepper (black or white) and 0·2% of the weight of the meat in sage (fresh or dried). Mix well together in your hands until all is combined. Then either stuff this mixture into skins or simply form into discs (“patties”). Place them between sheets of greaseproof paper and freeze until required.

        An alternative seasoning (and very delicious) is this:

        Make a basic seasoning mix by combining 46g salt, 9g white pepper, 6g ground nutmeg, 6g ground mace, 6g ground coriander seeds, 6g dried parsley. For every 500g of meat add 18g of this seasoning mix [i.e. 1,000g meat = 36g seasoning; 1,500g = 54g etc …].

        You don’t need to add any breadcrumbs but they do soak up water and fat and give a much more pleasant mouth-feel. They have a purpose and are not simply used as a ‘filler’. If you can source some gluten-free breadcrumbs then add those at a proportion of 70g (plus 150g cold water) to each 500g of meat. 1,000g meat requires 135g breadcrumbs to 300g cold water, and so on.

        I hope Caroline tries this and reports back anon.

        1. SWMBO & Firstborn have a very similar recipe as your top one, Grizz, but they add a stage in the middle.
          After mixing all the ingredients thoroughly, fry a sample or two (about teaspoon bowl sized) and taste. Adjust the ingredients accordingly – we tend to like it quite heavily salted and peppered, but you can go too far.
          The results knock shop-bought sausages into a cocked hat – the mass-produced type are best eaten with HP sauce, to disguise the lack of flavour. The home-made ones are best on their own, or lightly lubricated with fried egg yolk.

          1. Thanks, Paul. The basic recipe is very versatile and adaptable. If you add a lot more sage you get a Lincolnshire-type sausage; if you add a lot more black pepper you get a Cumberland-type sausage. Once you have the basic palette only your imagination stops you from experimenting.

            Last week I made a Bratwurst sausage meat. It was quite OK on its own but it made utterly terrible Scotch eggs!

          2. Since Bratwurst is German, you should have made German eggs… tsk! tsk!
            But the “real” sausages, made with home-reared pork and following the recipe, are the best I ever ate. Difficult to not eat the whole lot in one go …

        2. Many thanks.

          I have passed this on to Caroline and I have no doubt she will get back to you.

          We have students with us at the moment so she is struggling continuously with the fact that many of them seem to know less about French grammar than I had to know for Common Entrance.

      2. Good morning, Rastus. Indeed I have. Many German sausages (and Polish ones) do not add any bread to them.

        Mince some good quality belly pork and then add: 2% of the weight of the meat in salt; 0·2% of the weight of the meat in pepper (black or white) and 0·2% of the weight of the meat in sage (fresh or dried). Mix well together in your hands until all is combined. Then either stuff this mixture into skins or simply form into discs (“patties”). Place them between sheets of greaseproof paper and freeze until required.

        An alternative seasoning (and very delicious) is this:

        Make a basic seasoning mix by combining 46g salt, 9g white pepper, 6g ground nutmeg, 6g ground mace, 6g ground coriander seeds, 6g dried parsley. For every 500g of meat add 18g of this seasoning mix [i.e. 1,000g meat = 36g seasoning; 1,500g = 54g etc …].

        You don’t need to add any breadcrumbs but they do soak up water and fat and give a much more pleasant mouth-feel. They have a purpose and are not simply used as a ‘filler’. If you can source some gluten-free breadcrumbs then add those at a proportion of 70g (plus 150g cold water) to each 500g of meat. 1,000g meat requires 135g breadcrumbs to 300g cold water, and so on.

        I hope Caroline tries this and reports back anon.

      1. Indeed he is; however, I have sampled both Powter’s and Musk’s Newmarket sausages and although they are OK, they tend to be a tad too heavy on the nutmeg and mace for my palate.

  15. SIR – If plant-based food is such an attractive proposition for vegetarians and vegans (report, July 12), why do manufacturers insist on using meat or dairy-based names for their product?

    You are unlikely to see a butcher disguising pork chops as bean curd anytime soon – so please, come up with your own names and descriptors for products that are made from plants, and leave sausages, mince, milk and cheeses alone.

    Graeme Brierley
    Sutton Bridge, Lincolnshire

    I enjoy a natural, nutritious and delicious carnivorous lifestyle which provides me with all the nutriments, health and vitamins I require. As a direct result I am also physically fit and mentally alert. I am completely persuaded (and clear evidence is presented daily) that vegans are not only lacking in proper nutrition; their choice of lifestyle is directly responsible for their clearly-evident mental illness, imbecility, susceptibility to disease and physical frailty.

    1. I asked vegetablists why they wanted their quron stuff shaped like bacon and sausages and the response was ‘well, sometimes you want to think youre eating a sausage. Which struck me as a bit odd. After all, if you want to pretend you’re eating sausage, why not just eat sausage?

      1. Sometimes I like to pretend to make love, but it’s been many years since I’ve found anyone I find remotely attractive that wishes to share that experience with me.

      2. Perhaps they still want to play hunt the sausage and find there is something missing. Straight women who convert to lesbianism probably understand the problem.

    2. What they wish to eat is their business. Just stop deluding themselves that it’s saving the planet.

      1. What they wish to eat is their business. Just stop telling normal people that our diet is bad for us.

        1. Indeed, the warm glow of self righteousness! (Let him who is without sin etc.)

          1. I don’t subscribe to biblical bollox, Joey.

            I simply describe how my natural (time-honoured) choice of a personal diet is nourishing and healthy. If others wish to follow suit that is their personal choice. Those who wish to continue eating food proven to be poisonous to the system, well, that is their look out.

          3. Low-fat and processed foods are certainly culpable. No so much low-carb, which is sensible, healthy and nutritious. High-carb foods are demonstrably bad for you.

          4. The low-carb fizzy drinks, without which one is not allowed outside, cannot be doing good with all the hideous sweeteners in them.

          5. The low-carb fizzy drinks, without which one is not allowed outside, cannot be doing good with all the hideous sweeteners in them.

        2. My local vegan café has a sign in the window campaigning for the end of the meat industry. It’s never about what they want to eat, it’s about spite against other people’s choices.

          My local butcher doesn’t have any signs calling for the end of the soy bean industry, funnily enough.

    3. I’ve heard that many farm animals eat plant based foods. And someone wants to wipe them out because they fart and belch.

  16. SIR – If plant-based food is such an attractive proposition for vegetarians and vegans (report, July 12), why do manufacturers insist on using meat or dairy-based names for their product?

    You are unlikely to see a butcher disguising pork chops as bean curd anytime soon – so please, come up with your own names and descriptors for products that are made from plants, and leave sausages, mince, milk and cheeses alone.

    Graeme Brierley
    Sutton Bridge, Lincolnshire

    I enjoy a natural, nutritious and delicious carnivorous lifestyle which provides me with all the nutriments, health and vitamins I require. As a direct result I am also physically fit and mentally alert. I am completely persuaded (and clear evidence is presented daily) that vegans are not only lacking in proper nutrition; their choice of lifestyle is directly responsible for their clearly-evident mental illness, imbecility, susceptibility to disease and physical frailty.

    2. Truth is determined by what you want to find. Once you’ve decided what you want to find,it’s easy to find evidence that supports your world view. vis the 97% of scientists agree that man creates climate change.

  18. Good day all,

    Light cloud above McPhee Towers this morning, sunny periods forecast with a chance of a light shower. Wind remains Sou’-West, 14℃ rising to 19℃ so another day below the long-term average for July since 1990, this time by 3.5℃.

    Rather than add to the day’s huwman interest story, I thought I’d highlight this one:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/07/12/raf-bureaucracy-struggle-to-retain-staff-harvey-smyth/

    Not much has changed in the RAF I knew in the 1970s and 80s then. It’s taken their airships an awful long time to get around to addressing the Service’s real problem – shitty little jobs given to intelligent and expensively trained men, and these days women, who are then assessed for promotion on their performance in them. As soon as the 12-year-long oil-crisis generated hiatus in airline recruitment came to an end around 1987 pilots departed in droves for better-paid jobs with virtually guaranteed promotion to salary levels they wouldn’t see in the RAF unless they were to become Air Marshalls which few would. Nothing has changed.

    And this is now overlaid by wokery.

  19. Good morning.
    Apparently those two towering intellects Biden and Sunak have been doing their best to push Ukraine into NATO, and thus precipitate world war 3….at this point, I do not see that the UK is going to escape scot free from our position at the other end of the axis of evil…

    In other clown world news, how many different ways can you say “idiot?” Criminal stupidity is not even funny any more.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3b1e3156a7912516a4217da366239095289af5c7a8932a79164bf2b89a3cd033.jpg

    Hope the feckers get prosecuted for damaging the road!

    Slightly more positive news from the Netherlands….another very pro WEF politician, Sigrid Kaag, as decided to quit. So there is real hope that Klaus’s “penetration” of the Netherlands government might be limited to the royal family now!

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d92c4d4093bf9c1ebf2e39397161b1337fd0e2c988a92b0cbf60d2cf08b59305.jpg

    1. I don’t really understand what Scwabb gets them all. Why do they listen to him? His communist ideology has failed every single time it has been tried. The nation state is paramount, trading with other nations in a free, unfettered market capital economy.

      Enforced sociaism, protectionism, high welfare open borders nonsense is never going to work. It just creates poverty and, because it is always the bill payer who loses out, the imbalance just gets worse every single day.

      1. They get an invitation to mix with billionaires at the WEF, and they are the kind of people who lap it up.

      1. He should be forced to clean out the slurry from Dutch dairy farms.

        Hercules cleaned the Augean Stables by diverting the flow of a river but Rutte should be made to do the job by hand and not have any access to dykes to help him.

        1. I have the feeling that would win the democratic vote in the Netherlands right now!

      2. He should be forced to clean out the slurry from Dutch dairy farms.

        Hercules cleaned the Augean Stables by diverting the flow of a river but Rutte should me made to do the job by hand and not have any access to dykes to help him.

  20. On a GBN piece about Huw Edwards, a vaguely familiar man, possibly an old news reader, was pointing out that the words ‘my lovely’ spoken by an older man would be taken in a completely different way by an older lady than a young ‘easily offended’ woman.
    While true, that scenario is a world away from an older man paying vast sums to a teenager/young adult for questionable photos.

    2. I call most people I know ‘dear’. It’s got me into trouble before as someone misinterpreted it.

      1. A perfectly acceptable term to people you know.
        Most of the staff at the care home where my Mum stayed for her last couple of years regularly addressed residents as ‘my dear, darling, lovey etc.’
        They treated the residents like their own families, and it all contributed to a lovely, homely atmosphere.
        Mind you, I have started only giving my title and 1st initial when filling forms/speaking to customer services etc. I strongly object to being addressed by my first name by anonymous strangers. To them, I am Mrs A, not Ann. Emails then get sent beginning, ‘Hi Mrs ,’

  21. On a GBN piece about Huw Edwards, a vaguely familiar man, possibly an old news reader, was pointing out that the words ‘my lovely’ spoken by an older man would be taken in a completely different way by an older lady than a young ‘easily offended’ woman.
    While true, that scenario is a world away from an older man paying vast sums to a teenager/young adult for questionable photos.

  22. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/07/13/rishi-sunak-starmer-hunt-latest-public-sector-pay-review/

    Hunt has no plan for growth. He thinks that more tax, more waste, more debt and fiddling creates growth. It does the exact opposite. Is he stupid? I don’t think so, therefore he must know he is lying. If he believes his twaddle then he needs to be kept away from the finances of a tuck shop, let alone the nation.

    There is one way to create wealth – only one: Cut taxes, shred the state.

    1. Yep. Privatise the NHS, halve welfare (abolish it for migrants), get the state out of education. Sack half the civil servants ( the non-indigenous). That should do for starters

      1. Cut the amount of mps, abolish the Lords and try and make the majority of the public happy.

        1. Bonuses only for having created wealth/results above that expected of the job, not just for turning up.

          1. I bet they are claiming extra expenses for the higher mortgage payments for the second homes they are claiming are necessary.

          2. As far as I can make out Obs they produce nothing else but hot air.
            It’s time to make serious lasting improvements and changes.

    2. Yep. Privatise the NHS, halve welfare (abolish it for migrants), get the state out of education. Sack half the civil servants ( the non-indigenous). That should do for starters

  23. Worms emerging from woodwork.

    Beeboid “staff” are coming out and reporting having received “inappropriate” messages from the late Welsh newsreader.

    Funny they never mentioned it before.

        1. Saved up to be brought out at the right time, and strung across around 7 days of incredibly boring dominance of the mainstream media.
          Trivialities like the gold-backed BRICS currency, the NATO summit, Andrew Bridgen’s questions about the WHO regulations and the Bank of England chief telling peasants to suck up higher mortgage costs because they’re for the greater good can safely be ignored of course.

    2. I thought that they were all trying to make out that he could escape without censure if what he had done was not illegal. They then said that if it is not illegal it is also not inappropriate; and so if it follows that it is not inappropriate it is appropriate to get teenaged people to send you pornographic photos of themselves.

    1. There’s about 8 separate articles about his playing career and his Cape Town education. But not one mention of how and why he died so young.
      Same age as our youngest son.

    2. Good morning Capt. MacPhee, and everyone.
      Tragically, there is a shadow of a hint that the rugby player may have died by his own hand. Please do not fall into the morass of anti-vaccination opinions; undoubtedly there were flaws in the decisions which resulted in the mass vaccination programme, but adults should be prepared to take responsibility for their own health.

      1. Should the adults who “should be prepared to take responsibility for their own health” include all those who were effectively forced to be vaccinated under a storm of government propaganda, supported by the media, with the threat of removal from normal life. Denied access to work, some sacked, denied access to travel, to seeing relatives (including those in ill health), to normal social activities? There is a responsibility on the government and healthcare professionals to enable ‘informed consent’. Did that happen?
        Please do not fall into the morass of those who supported this pernicious assault on our freedoms and way of life.

      2. “undoubtedly there were flaws in the decisions which resulted in the mass vaccination programme, but adults should be prepared to take responsibility for their own health”.

        Extraordinary comment. Pfizer knew their product would damage and kill people. That’s why they wanted immunity from prosecution and their data buried for 75 years. I suggest you do some research. You could start here:

        https://www.ukcolumn.org/video/what-did-pfizer-know-a-shot-in-the-dark

  25. Morning all 🙂😊
    High cloud but brite-ish take out the e and it describes our weather. Now a different Hue.
    I’m not sure what sort of warfare is being waged by Thames Water they are not our Water company.

  26. Penny finally dropped.

    All this malarkey about “plant based diets” means eating effing vegetables!!

    3. I think it still counts if you eat a piece of beef derived from an animal that ate plants?

    4. I think it still counts if you eat a piece of beef derived from an animal that ate plants?

  27. Boy, 15, denies stabbing maths teacher at school.

    A 15-year-old boy has denied stabbing a maths teacher in a school corridor.

    The teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, admitted possession of a “bladed article” but denied a charge of attempting to wound with intent. Jamie Sansom, 27, was stabbed in a corridor at Tewkesbury Academy in Gloucestershire on Monday.

    His alleged attacker was charged on Tuesday night and appearing at Cheltenham Magistrates Court yesterday, he was remanded in youth detention until July 21 when he will re-appear for a pre-trial hearing.

    The court was told that the trial in the youth court should be held before Sept 6 this year.

    In a sensible world run by intelligent people, airport-style archway metal detectors would be used in schools to screen all schoolchildren on their arrival at school. Those who activated the alarm would be taken to a room and bodily searched (strip-searched if necessary). Any found carrying anything offensive would be handcuffed and taken to the police station.

    All mobile phones would be confiscated at the school gates and kept in a locked safe until the end of the school day.

    Silly me: I’m forgetting. We don’t live in a sensible world run by intelligent people!

    1. What a state the world has come to when children need screened security-wise when entering school, Grizz.
      And – I would expect that every pupil would come to school with something that will ping, just to enjoy the delays and disruption caused! Imagine, the whole school (600+ pupils) arrested…
      In any case,, the UK authorities are so effing useless, it would never work. The magic doorways would be broken, too sensitive, folk would complain it’s racist to arrest a black kid with a blade – you know how it goes.

      1. I know, Paul and I agree with you. However, how do you stop schoolchildren entering school with weapons of offence, coupled with a determination to use them to attempt to kill teachers?

        1. Indeed. Soon, it will be firearms, a la USA.
          :-((
          The trick, if anyone knows how to do it, would be to make the failure of the detector test shameful, rather than a mark of pride for the miscreant.

      2. I think of that every time I walk Spartie past local schools.
        In the past few years, they have all expended serious money on the type of fencing that once only surrounded prisons.
        The locked gates have coded sentry systems.
        In my youth (in exactly the same area) any still standing walls were of brick and had surrounded the garden of the original buildings – large Victorian domestic properties – and any gates had long since disappeared.

    2. Any found carrying anything offensive would be handcuffed and taken to the police station. And flogged.

      2. I agree, Bill, and the flogging of 15 – 30 year-olds, should carried out in public, preferably on a Saturday afternoon before the Wendyball and on the bared buttocks.

        The shame would deter others from such acts.

          2. That was accepted by the public on the basis of what has turned out to be a lie – that people who would have been hanged would get life (meaning the whole of their life). Now, if they come from a protected religion they get a slap on the wrist and some counselling. A few years in clink if they are very unlucky.

    3. Well versed and educated to tell barefaced lies as well.
      I expect his parents might recognise the ‘bladed article’ that’s been missing from the kitchen drawer for a few weeks.
      Does a lawnmower qualify as a bladed article ?

  28. RFK Jr clarifies his views on climate change. He believes that the planet is warming (spoiler: it was up til the nineties, not recently), but he believes that the lizard elite (he doesn’t actually use that term) are using it for their own ends in order to impose dictatorship, and he doesn’t agree with that.
    Twitt video, sorry.
    https://twitter.com/RobertKennedyJr/status/1679287184254287873

    1. That blows his chances of being elected. Can you imagine the tree hugger greenies voting for him?

      Rather a decrepit old man

      1. He might get a lot of middle ground voters though. There is a wing of the greenies that has woken up to the communism part, and doesn’t like it.

  29. Can’t argue with Martin Daubney’s assessment of the current state of the UK.

    It’s going to take a man or woman with a strong will linked to an equally strong vision to get us out of this mess. Basically, the current political class is redundant as it no longer functions as an extension of the people’s will.

    https://twitter.com/MartinDaubney/status/1679369404289523714

    Edit: Just read some comments on this thread. Either the trolls are busy or there are many people who see the invaders as needy people. What, I wonder, will change these idiots’ minds?

    1. And not one of these creeps in politics will even attempt to explain how and why they are determined to turn our country into an absolute lawless shit hole.

      1. Of course they won’t even attempt to explain…because they know that what they say would be totally unacceptable.

        1. If that’s the case HL it proves without any shadow of doubt they are not fit for office. Crooks and liars.

    2. Good morning KK

      Funny that we are accommodating a mud hut culture who squat over holes in the ground , who pray to Allah 5 times a day, who are generally non productive skill wise, who have torn up their ID’s and passports and who regard European girls and boys as sex aids to satisfy their priapic urges .

      They are a culture who rise to an angry mob in minutes and are argumentative and disruptive and loud ..

      We cannot trust the Lords or the Commons to sort the migrant act out

          1. But Tom, as the Major in Fawlty Towers would explain, they’re not wogs, they’re n*ggers :-))

  30. Aryna Sabalenka pleads with crowd to stop booing – but Wimbledon won’t step in. 13 July 2023.

    Aryna Sabalenka has urged crowds to stop booing Russian and Belarusian players, but Wimbledon has refused to follow other authorities in telling spectators to stay quiet.

    Sabalenka is on a collision course with Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina in the Wimbledon final on Saturday if both players win their respective semi-finals.

    She said she hoped reception from the crowd at Wimbledon will improve after the Women’s Tennis Association addressed the Ukraine handshake “misunderstanding” which saw fellow Belarusian, Victoria Azarenka, heckled on Sunday.

    I haven’t watched any tennis so far and I certainly haven’t seen any of these “booing” incidents. The first thing that occurs to my ever suspicious mind is that they might be orchestrated. The tennis equivalent of 77 Brigade tutoring the peasants. I definitely wouldn’t put it past them! The British State is now so morally corrupt that anything is possible. In support of this it seems somehow un-British to pick on individuals for the actions of their governments.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/tennis/2023/07/12/aryna-sabalenka-wimbledon-crowd-booing-belarussian-russian/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    1. There was a time that politics was kept out of sport, and for very good reasons. I think tennis players in particular represent themselves rather that their nationality.

    2. If nothing else, why can’t the umpire demand ‘silence on court’ as used to happen years ago. That would include booing – a sound that once would have been unthinkable at Wimbledon.

      1. Morning Mum. The Wimbledon authorities didn’t wish to invite the Russians anyway. They were compelled to do so. They are just venting their spite by refusing to protect them from this intimidation.

        1. Ah, so that’s what they are playing at, fools. It’s a very immature and unprofessional way to respond to rude, poor behaviour, whatever their ‘reasons.’

  31. The Ministry of Defence (MOD) will be conducting an event at Lulworth Camp on 13 and 14 of July 2023, the timings will be weather dependent but are likely to be between 0800 and 1400 on both days. The event will be largely conducted within the MOD’s Lulworth Range area but will include fast jet and large transport aircraft along a number of helicopters that will need to fly outside of the ranges both over land and the sea. Local residents may see a brief increase in military activity, notably low flying aircraft, during the 2-day period, some of which will be unusual for the Lulworth and surrounding area.

    Well, we have been warned , and I wonder if there are other exercises taking part in other parts of the UK?

    1. 374403+ up ticks,

      Morning TB,

      Are you thinking what i’m thinking are the political twisted tw@ts triggering the RESET coup, is the foreign ogre about to rise from its hotel bed ?

      Is the table being set in the parliament canteen
      for a halal feast of victory ?

    2. I will watch for anything out of our local RCAF base. Not that Canada has much left to fly but we might see the Lancaster buzzing around.

      1. Down’chew mean NAAFI Break?
        Do they still get a Sally Army or WRVS tea van pull up on the ranges?

        2. In Verden, we had the Toc H wagon came round the barracks every weekday morning.

    4. We’ve had a joint services exercise, mainly marine landings, in our loch over the last couple of weeks

  32. 374403+ up ticks,

    There is no sense of unity in opposition to what these manipulating political overseeing bastards want to do next,
    just criminally dumb acceptance for, in many cases,” the good of the party”.

    Save the railway ticket office
    The best way of ensuring trains remain accessible is to have someone at stations who can answer questions.

    Also applies to the British Nation.

    Save the United Kingdom,

    The best way of ensuring democracy remains accessible in the HOC is to have someone who can answer questions with a very high degree of honesty, for this the lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled immigration importers / paedophile umbrella coalition must be eliminated.

    You don’t need trains within the 15 minute network.

  33. Here’s to a fun morning. I have to deliver an unfed, uncoffeed boss to hospital by 6AM.

    Shall we just say that she is not in a state for compromise and warmth. Kid gloves and cattle prods might be in order.

    2. Just talk about the weather ….. should be on safe grounds. Hope it goes/went well.

  35. Good Moaning.
    Who would believe that reading a Daily Wail ‘where are they now?’ article about the Grange Hill stars could be so poignant?
    But they are the same age as our sons, so the two are rather interlinked. Looking at them now, I can picture the teenage Allans of the early 1980s. So different from the ultra-sensible middle aged chaps trying to keep recalcitrant parents on the straight and narrow.
    Just off to exploit impoverished grandson’s desire to earn money by deep cleaning the Noddy car.

  36. We’ve just watched our granddaughter receive her BS Sport Science (Hons) Degree live on YouTube from the university.
    Very proud grandparents.

        1. A very proud moment indeed. Hope your granddaughter finds her ideal job, so much competition to get through.

        2. Congratulations to her and to your family. Will you be having a celebratory lunch/dinner?

          1. We’re all going to our daughters on Sunday for a late lunch. Our 2 children, 3 grandchildren and their partners. Should be a splendiferous occasion. Thank you for your congratulations I’ll pass them on.

      1. So very proud of her. Her first year in scamdemic isolation she knows how to overcome adversity.

      1. She has a place at St Mary’s Teddington for sports management. She wants to be involved in events as she was a volunteer at the Commonwealth Games and received accolades for her hard work. She will do well and has plenty of contact.

          2. My middle lad went the Loughborough route, SMT was right up there then, so I’m pleased it’s still as good (if not better)

          3. Granddaughter was based in hotel at Loughborough when she volunteered for the Commonwealth Games handing out England kit to athletes. 15 hour days at times but she loved it. She was thinking of teaching but that experience opened her mind to all different routes she could take.

  37. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1d9eb109cf6f1b425f7298f033073bff58dc05f2e87cb90c1cc0d427eb907412.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/076ba1689f15b3d9c7c6e0b4336fbfac3a533c0497bb835a4fc8023ffb333ac3.png

    BTL

    Mitterrand proposed shutting all private schools; the teachers had a mass demonstration in Paris and told him that if private schools were closed they would all leave the teaching profession.

    As this would completely swamp the state system and render it completely ineffective Mitterrand had no option but to relent.

    In France the state has a bizarre idea: that is that if you pay for something then it should not be taken away from you by the state! So as everybody has paid for state education (and state medical care) with their taxes they do not lose their entitlement and so private schools receive the same amount per child as the state spends on educating each child. When our two children were in private primary schools their schools were so well run that we were not expected to pay any school fees at all.

    1. Mitterand and Macron are both devoid of principle. And Mitterand was a gangster (note JP Bérégovois suicide at the Elysée from two shots to the back of the head, allegedly ).
      But he was very intelligent and pragmatic.
      Very much unlike Macron le Médiocre

    3. I still say that there is a certain “chavvy” charm about her and after a couple of pints at the Brompton Stomp “Grab a Grannie Night” a definite possibility!

  38. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1d9eb109cf6f1b425f7298f033073bff58dc05f2e87cb90c1cc0d427eb907412.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/076ba1689f15b3d9c7c6e0b4336fbfac3a533c0497bb835a4fc8023ffb333ac3.png

    BTL

    Mitterrand proposed shutting all private schools; the teachers had a mass demonstration in Paris and told him that if private schools were closed they would all leave the teaching profession.

    As this would completely swamp the state system and render it completely ineffective Mitterrand had no option but to relent.

    In France the state has a bizarre idea: that is that if you pay for something then it should not be taken away from you by the state! So as everybody has paid for state education (and state medical care) with their taxes they do not lose their entitlement and so private schools receive the same amount per child as the state spends on educating each child. When our two children were in private primary schools their schools were so well run that we were not expected to pay any school fees at all.

  39. ‘Morning All

    Huwge Medley……

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5e9dca283efec8000679022867ac9a52428f90490c303b9e6e66cdf368f75813.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4e02520c4f5ca32d0d385be607bd4834cb268ee5f0098f516dc5fd6593e1c6e3.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/857366bfd00bdbb64df480528fe04bf30a2552d3d1d1a11fca3fc1771b058e1b.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4cd52d3ab2008e38c181af73c1d7332f84137ae34342744fba726843c3b382b1.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1edcc957d7d18c9af2cfd3b1886dc5dfaedca2f43e29afdfea96fc366dcb2598.gif

    1. There are many forms of mental health conditions

      Anxiety

      Depression

      Schizophrenia

      Bipolar

      Getting Caught.

  40. Regular Medley

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/958d32dfe04c31ceed34793dd3b7ba560da759e1d9bf0671f6180882e44715de.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/428ecaf458b6bd974cd4a5830e724198d7c62e89663fee44313c8fe9541c101f.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/60ca415baaa879e218db882c454bbc9873b0fdbca931b8bda232faa4dac722b9.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5423a9d6af9f8bd6d3345df92a9e60aa7a2cc2f72606f3cd6f1aa7c79308e9ee.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7ee4dd6489355dfab768e0da6af465088c27ada5f2519d034d0f28f980f88dad.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0adeb59706cca706d8842887b70f93c77a3651c517cc6db0fa763dea4e431aee.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ed373b2e1a32e3ff18443ec2fc98d8776540428986ef61ffa809035bdc74feac.gif

  41. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b93bddf7aaac1b3bac197caef45b4e9032b9b216f6f4ac846171c15e2760eeaf.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9f61342251bad8183f8868f1c89e15e25cf5fa658f65bc4a71f8039eb56ec832.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b595834760d89be5db3ae41ecbc6ba00f113fa4888cbed2ef43d3088047fbd0e.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3e7c77008f144123c814a5becab81eb2f46f9596c2470e6fee9fb1ce8ae276ec.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/aa503ff3a35f69df1b3a3f2a0e92f3e0b431cd34d7cfa5048a4873e526c79f66.jpg

  47. We’re having a heat wave,
    A tropical heat wave,
    The temperature’s rising,
    It isn’t surprising    … Irving Berlin 1933.

    The BBC News is onto it! It’s replaced Huw. I wonder if Irving knew back then that there was no such thing as a heat wave? They didn’t really begin until Global Warming!

    1. She certainly can can can!

      But can she do what Philip Larkin said began in 1963 between the end of the “Chatterley” ban. And the Beatles’ first LP.

  48. I really despair of the people who produce the schedules for delivery drivers – they apparently haven’t heard of maps and pick a random order! I have reached this conclusion from the fact that quite often the tracking apps show the van 5 minutes from us, yet the forecast delivery time might be 2 hours 10 minutes, and having got so close the van then moves away again!

      1. Unnecessary cost in wasted driver time and diesel, too. More could be delivered in a day were the rounds sorted out properly. The van could even be loaded in the right order so the driver didn’t have to thrash around in the back to find the package, saving further time.
        Not too difficult to program, either.

        1. They should give the drivers regular routes. Our postie knows who lives where in our village – handy given so many properties with similar names.

          1. All along the Upper Thames all the houses have the same name: ‘No Mooring’

          2. I went canvassing with a lass who had lived abroad for many years.
            She was surprised that so many people on one housing estate shared the surname ‘Friedland’.

          5. You have never been involved in logistics have you.Leave people too long on the same routes it will end up involving the police.

          6. What a ridiculous statement. You do not know me. You do not know what I have done in my life. If you’ve got a point to make then make it without being derogatory.

          7. I know you have never been involved as those that are not always make your point. I do not have to know only what you say.

          8. So you repeat your false assertion based on no evidence.
            I’ll draw stumps here Mr Norfolk. I tend to keep away from people like you online.

      2. It probably is [should be] software generated, but looking at the result the software could well have been written by Prog Ferguson!!

          2. Nobody can read a map these days! I force my children to look up our destination on a map when I am driving – they complain like anything!

          3. I dislike satnavs, I use a map in conjunction with a satnav. I like to know where I’m going, and where everything is in relation to everywhere else. Satnavs are handy for getting one through Paris and Rouen though, for example.

      3. I thought that routing was computer generated. One of their claims over here is that they avoid drivers needing to make left turns.

        A friend’s son does deliveries for one of the big companies, his delivery van has a GPS that tracks the route he takes, too many deviations and he is reprimanded.

        It might save a few teaspoons of diesel in city driving but if the same logic is applied on rural routes, things may not work out too well,

    2. Its the black art of ” Logistics”. I used to route things all over Europe and that was even more interesting.

  49. Can India be decoupled from Russia? 13 July 2023.

    Getting the world’s biggest democracy back among the good guys is a very big ask.

    TOP COMMENT BELOW THE LINE.

    Bobby Moore.

    Why on earth would India trust the Americans? Come to that, why would anyone trust the Americans. The CIA are up to their elbows destabalising democracies all around the world…supposedly to protect Western interests, which is a load of cobblers. America are interested in enriching themselves at other peoples expense. Which is exactly what they are doing through their proxy war in Ukraine…they are now doing very nicely out of the huge boost to their oil and gas exports picking up the slack they have created through the Russian sanctions, and are managing to effect the transfer of hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars into the bank accounts of their arms manufacturers…whose senior management operate a revolving door employment policy with the Pentagon and the White House…massive salaries, share options and pensions all round…and all this after they managed to extort trillions of tax payer dollars for their big Pharma companies during the Covid pantomime. The next big scam is net zero with the massive tax payer funded subsidies being channeled into the coffers of the ‘green energy industrial complex’.

    Did anyone vote for any of this?

    Mr Moore is substantially correct though he forgot to mention the destruction of the Baltic Pipeline which has enriched the United States enormously and was an act of staggering treachery against a supposed ally

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/07/12/india-russia-relations-oil-china-strong-against-west-allies/

    2. “Getting the world’s biggest democracy back among the good guys is a very big ask.”
      I read that and thought it was about the US elections!

    3. Perhaps the US should offer India a special Relationship. After all even thought it achieves nothing, every other country appears to claim that they are number one friends with the US .

    4. Perhaps the US should offer India a special Relationship. After all even thought it achieves nothing, every other country appears to claim that they are number one friends with the US .

  50. The Daily Mail has produced the following headline:

    “SARAH VINE: A courageous wife, an icon’s reputation in tatters… and a nation in shock”

    Am I the only person who looks at that in disgust and sees only overpaid leeches on the licence fee, years long dishonesty and cover-ups of shabby, seedy, exploitative behaviour, and a nation led by the nose to an orgy of titillation and faux moral outrage?

    Faux because many are still funding the BBC and its loose morals. I am not in shock because, although I had actually heard of this newsreader, he isn’t the cuddly, friendly extra member of my family which is how we are supposed to regard television presenters.

    1. Ahem

      Nicked

      He used is power and influence to groom a young lad and paid him
      for sexually explicit photographs which he used to fund a serious drug
      problem and has arguably made an extremely negative impact on this young
      man’s health and wellbeing. When his sexual perversions are exposed he
      has the temerity to play the ‘mental health card’.

      To all those
      degenerates defending this man ask yourself this question – How would
      you feel if that was your son who was being used to fulfil a 61 year old
      man’s sexual perversions? You all need to a take a long hard look in
      the mirror at yourself.

      1. That’s what I meant by “shabby, seedy, exploitative behaviour” – I just mean that I don’t expect anything better from the BBC, so I am not shocked, neither is anyone’s reputation in tatters, because I just assume they are all like that anyway!

      2. Have you read the book, Catch 22.. have you seen the film ?

        Coined by American author Joseph Heller in 1961 in his novel Catch-22, in which the main character feigns madness in order to avoid dangerous combat !

        1. Heller originally titled the manuscript ‘Catch-18’ but his publisher (who died this week) didn’t think it was ‘catchy’ enough. The publisher came up with ‘Catch-22’ in a dream and told Heller it was a far more saleable title.

      3. I suspect this is a case where both sides are pretty odious.
        I think the parents were hoping for a financial bonanza.

    2. Sarah Vine had an odious husband in Michael Gove just as Philip Schofield and Huw Edwards had wives with odious husbands.

      1. Huw Edwards’ wife is a producer for the BBC though – she’s one of them.

      1. Huw Edwards has an unpleasant top upper lip, which seems to curl up with contempt, sneer almost .

        I am really not surprised by his downfall, and bang goes his knight hood I hope .

    4. I had always assumed that being a perv was a required trait for its ‘stars’.
      That and being a champagne socialist.

      1. The latter = deffo. The former? Well, I think they more into, “Just look at ME – how lucky you are” preening.

        1. I think they’ve got exponentially worse in the last twenty years. Since Blair, everything’s rotted.

      2. Graham Norton is safe. He never tried to hide anything. And wasn’t stupid enough to take advantage of gophers.

  52. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/791a9356e922c1bee138c2dd08fae5e80a5ed9cb10222c725aafb1b834dc9797.png
    Ben Lawrence : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/theatre/what-to-see/why-shakespeare-isnt-funny/

    BTL

    Actually some of Shakespeare’s humour is only accessible to people who are more perceptive and more intelligent than the writer of this piece.
    Ben Lawrence should get out of journalism and take Rosalind’s advice and sell at once for he is not for all markets!

    4. If Shakespeare is re-written then it is no longer Shakespeare. It’s ‘ignorant anonymous onanism’.

  53. A small but interesting victory (at least for now)

    Protesters are claiming victory after a siege ended at a top hotel due to take in more than 200 asylum seekers.

    The four-star Stradey Park Hotel in Llanelli, South Wales, which allegedly

    sacked its staff after gaining the Home Office contract, has been

    surrounded by demonstrators who blocked off the two main entrances,

    trapping six security workers inside.

    Police met with the

    protesters to ask them to give the guards – all ex-military – safe

    passage away from the hotel. They agreed and the security workers left

    peacefully as the mob chanted ‘Cheerio, cheerio cheerio.’

    https://twitter.com/StanVoWales/status/1679209333689577502
    I suspect it would be “unwise” to sneak the gimmegrants in after the protests disperse
    the Welsh have fiery form dealing with those they consider invaders

    2. They had a bunch of invaders at Penally Camp near Tenby over 3 years ago. I think the local people have demonstrated several times since.
      This has to stop its outrageous.
      The government and Whitehall are habitual liars and robbing the British people to pay for all their disgusting behaviour.

    1. I’m sure one of the technical wizards would know, but would it be possible to create an almighty power surge to destroy such communications? (tactical atmospheric nuclear air burst for example)

      1. You’ve mentioned it – an electro-magnetic pulse although I believe some military equipment has built-in protection

        1. I wonder why they don’t or would it take out too many of their own communications?

          1. I guess that’s possible but it would only be line of site disruption in my view and it can be shielded from

  55. 374403+up ticks,

    Dt,
    Forget Parliamentary ping-pong: migration is about to trigger massive social unrest.

    The real challenge will come not from the House of Lords, but from the just-about-managing – and they won’t be championing liberalism
    Short term gain long term pain as mandatory diversity dictates
    the overall picture eventually will show ALL in poverty, with no one there to assist any other.

    1. Cue squeals of ‘Far Right!’ from the media and ignoring that they’re just normal people sick of their country being used as a toilet – by the state AND the welfare shoppers.

  56. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/02241de717ef13f8708848361c05cc8bf04c074fa207bc5880724734a0a6e820.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a72053acd26f9e4f5b8d4d84f4ef5d7f455607897ac48c7a5d6d19e09ccbe404.jpg Where’s Maggie.

    I know you hate barbecues but I’m wondering if I would be able to convert you if you saw what I’m going to cook on Saturday. Today I have made a Chinese-style marinade of red bean curd, oyster sauce, hoi-sin sauce, dry sherry, honey, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, fresh ginger, fresh garlic and fresh chilli pepper. I have placed it into a sealable bag with some meaty pork belly spare ribs. They have been vacuum-sealed and on Saturday I shall cook them (still in the bags) in a sous vide bath for a few hours at a constant 65ºC.

    I shall then remove them from the bag, transfer them to the top grate of my BBQ smoker, and then gently smoke them for an hour-or-so until coloured and cooked. They will be nowhere near the hot coals and cherry logs since they will be separated from them by a water bath, which adds steam to the smoke and prevents them from burning. I am persuaded that this would make you think differently about barbecuing.

    I shall photograph them after smoking on Saturday.

    2. Afternoon Grizz. Is that what you do with bodies after you’ve waylaid them in the Midwinter twilight?

    3. Impressive my son. But that ain’t the type of barbie that Maggie was alluding to.

      And to be honest you are just finishing it with a light smoke. Not a char grill.

  58. Police call off search for missing boy, 2, after five days. 13 July 2023.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2751263161474ded4b6ed95f99947b42bbf534386a3607e4108b3ce46fa3616c.jpg

    French police have called off a search for a two-year-old boy who went missing from a remote village in the Alps five days ago.

    The boy, Emile, was last seen walking down the street from his grandparents’ home in Le Haut Vernet on Saturday afternoon.

    What to say!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/07/13/police-stop-search-for-boy-2-after-five-days-french-alps/

      1. Not many – I know these villages. Strangers are rare and noted by the locals.

    2. The DT is slightly misleading. Only the local “search” has been stopped. They have spent 4 days doing an inch-by-inch search over nearly 100 hectares.

      One theory now is that the child was abducted. Another theory is that the family may be involved (though, as staunch Catholics, they wouldn’t be, would they??)

      This happened in a tiny village with a handful of residents. Everyone has been interviewed and asked to account for their movements.
      A local car was found with blood on its front. Theory of child run over and “disposed of” discounted when analysis showed it was animal blood.

      All ghastly for the parents – and grandparents with whom he was staying.

      All very mysterious.

      2. For anyone following the William Tyrell case in Australia, they now think the adopted mum was involved in covering up his death (which could have been an accident). You just wonder, if this is the case, why she didn’t just tell the truth.

        1. They’re so thick they don’t seem to understand the government is dedicated to giving them what they want. I think they should experience it first. They want to live in the Dark Ages, let them. In fact, force them.

          When they decide they quite like running water remind them this is what they wanted.

  62. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/85e6160c4f760fd0582289cda657cf2d272b4721ecf150a0cdf8cb1b9e5c3155.png
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2023/07/13/prince-andrew-feels-lonely-without-parents/

    BTL

    We all admired Queen Elizabeth II and we all think her judgement was good – and certainly much better than the judgement of her eldest son, Charles III. This makes me wonder why she clearly preferred her second son to her first and why many members of the royal family certainly prefer Andrew to his nephew, Harry, and his father. I think that the Media has treated Andrew very harshly – he has not been found guilty of anything and he is certainly wise not to allow himself to be traduced in a kangaroo court in the USA.

    1. Andrew was the designated scapegoat in the Epstein affair, with a touch of buffoonery that would make people take the whole thing not very seriously. Very clever, really.

      Diana liked him, but then she married Charles, so her judgment must be held to be a little suspect.
      I once heard an anecdote about Andrew going out of his way to be nice to a group of workers.

      1. Diana would certainly have been happier with Andrew than she was with Charles. She would have had far more fun in her marriage and she might even have managed to remain faithful to him.

    2. Missing his parents? About time he grew up.

      Missing someone to pay his legal fees more like.

      1. Losing parents always hits the family favourite hardest. They don’t go through the growing up phase the same way as the rest of us.

        1. I can accept that but it is not as if his parents died young ! They lived far longer than actuarial figures show for the majority.

    3. Andrew may not be the brightest or most polished of the princes, but the Yanks have certainly set him up over the Epstein affair.
      Sadly, PA is impressed by blingy wealth and a dodgy businessman used him as a respectability shield.

  63. Article in the DT.
    I know nothing about Greg Smith, but he sounds like a good ‘un.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/07/13/hs2-has-become-a-nightmare-it-is-time-britain-woke-up/

    HS2 has become a nightmare. It is time Britain woke up

    We must not delay putting a stop to this vanity project. Government simply cannot afford to waste tens of billions of taxpayer money on it

    Greg Smith13 July 2023 • 2:05pm

    “Mark Thurston’s departure from HS2 Ltd is more than just a staffing change. It is symbolic of absolute failure. Of course those of us who have opposed HS2 since it was a twinkle in Lord Adonis’ eye under the last Labour Government foresaw the inevitable bleeding of taxpayers’ money at a rate of knots, coupled with the serious human misery and environmental destruction construction would bring.

    The project remains wrong. Possibly the most iconic manifestation of an era of “government by shiny thing”. Projections on its final cost vary wildly, but analysis by Lord Berkeley shows how it could end up well over £165 billion, if future phases north of Birmingham ever happen. Let’s not forget the current iteration of HS2 goes absolutely nowhere useful. No Euston. No Birmingham New Street. But from a glorified bus shelter in West London to an inconvenient location in Birmingham. The time anyone saves from “high speed” travel will be more than eaten into getting to the respective city centres. People will question why they didn’t just use the West Coast Main Line or Chiltern Line in the first place.

    The fact that not one private sector investor was willing to risk a penny piece on this project gives us all the clues we need. I’ve argued in the House of Commons that all infrastructure projects like this should be subjected to a private sector viability test. If no one in the market will touch it, then it isn’t worth doing.

    Turning back to the departure of Mr Thurston. He is reported as citing rising costs and political pressure among his reasons for going. I’ve always tried to play the project and not the man – and in many respects he was never ever going to win. Construction projects like this always balloon and you can count on the fingers of one hand the number of state projects that come in on budget.

    But the merry go round at all levels of seniority within HS2 Ltd and their contractors paint a sorry picture of a project in total disarray. From my constituency perspective it is impossible to fully convey the frustration at raising issues, being told we will hear back, then receiving non-answers coming back just before a staffing shuffle, meaning we have to start all over again.

    When the Transport Select Committee visited my constituency to see the devastation for themselves, the distance between theory and reality could not have been more clearly manifested than my simple question to Mr Thurston asking when he last visited and spoke to representatives in Buckinghamshire communities directly impacted by the build, and he openly admitted it had been a long time.

    Of course, the case against HS2 isn’t just about money. It is about people. Livelihoods. Quality of life. Living with a major construction project is miserable. It is dire.

    Housing developments are bad enough, but they’re largely done in a couple of years and solve an obvious problem. HS2 will be with my constituents for decades. The endless road closures adding miles to the school run or to get to the GP. Closure of footpaths and bridleways, stripping away the very reason many chose to live in the countryside.

    Businesses like the school bus operator are facing thousands of pounds a week in additional costs from diversions and damage to vehicles from the state of our roads after tens of thousands of construction vehicles have made them resemble the surface of the Moon. The Prince of Wales pub in Steeple Claydon was taken to the edge of bankruptcy as multiple roads in and out of the village were closed, costing over £65,000 in turnover last year. No compensation offered, nor even hinted at. Not even any sympathy.

    The project, with its endless layers of twisted and tangled bureaucracy, has failed my constituents. Failed to address, and in most cases even acknowledge, these very real problems that impact real people, none of whom asked for the destruction it has wrought on their everyday lives. Proponents of HS2 would call my arguments “Nimby”. If they saw what it was like to live with it, they would see that opposing HS2 is entirely rational: why wouldn’t I prioritise people over a project that will bring little or no gain?

    HS2 was flawed to start with, but its culture and attitude all happened under Mr Thurston’s watch. It is right he has gone. But rather than just replace him with someone, possibly worse, a report from Lord Berkeley earlier this year identified we could get the loss down to £8 billion if we cancelled this monster now. That’s still a huge chunk of cash, but we must not fall prey to the sunk cost fallacy. It is time to put hands up to the mistake, take the hit, rather than waste another £150 or maybe £200 billion in the years to come, at a time when we simply cannot afford it. ”

    Greg Smith is Member of Parliament for Buckingham.

    1. Probably everyone who lives along the corridor affected by HS2 construction can agree with this article.

    2. The final cost of HS2, wherever it goes, will be over half a trillion. Why? Because no bugger does anything.

      It’s a giant EU enforced white elephant. The key bit is EU enforced – that’s why they won’t cancel it.

      Edited as made a typo!

      1. Since you picked up on some grammar elsewhere, I’m going to point out your spelling of ‘wherever’. Appalling. ;@)

        1. Rightly so! I am by no means accurate!

          I’ll say that this is a the better versions. My tremors are playing up something rotten and I’ve made so many typos it’s laughable.

      2. This is what most people don’t understand – that it’s part of an EU Europe-wide plan.

    3. Greg Smith is the very able replacement for John Bercow in the Buckingham constituency and would be my MP if we hadn’t moved to France in 2010.

          1. CGT is a tax charged if you sell, give away, exchange or otherwise dispose of an asset and make a profit or ‘gain’. It is not the amount of money you receive for the asset but the gain you make that is taxed.

          2. Gosh – you ARE well informed (sarc…!!)

            I think you’ll find that HK was having a leg-pull – though that prolly means something else in Fareham…{:¬))

          4. Capital losses can also be registered (within 4 years) but can be then carried forward indefinately, to be used against gains. Can be useful if you have sold any doggs, especially as the CGT allowance drops from £6k to £3k next year.

          5. Whoosh!

            I know only too well what CGT is Phil, I was joking about it with BT.

          7. Took me three days to calculate how much we had spent on the renovation and extention. Fortunately, we had kept every single scrap of paper. Submitted the figures (and my calculation). Revenue accepted without any questions.

            Fortunately, we had owned the property for so long that French CGT did not arise….

    4. Greg Smith is the very able replacement for John Bercow in the Buckingham constituency and would be my MP if we hadn’t moved to France in 2010.

    5. The money isn’t being wasted by government. It’s being transferred from the public purse into the accounts of their family and friends.

      1. Don’t worry when it’s eventually finished they’ll dig a large trench alongside and lay a large diameter water pipe to bring water from Wales / Lake District to London…..

      2. Don’t worry when it’s eventually finished they’ll dig a large trench alongside and lay a large diameter water pipe to bring water from Wales / Lake District to London…..

  64. Public sector pay offers.
    Let’s shit on the armed forces, as usual.
    The pay increases are as follows:
    Police: 7 per cent
    NHS: 6 per cent
    Junior doctors: 6 per cent
    Prison officers: 7 per cent
    Armed Forces: 5 per cent
    Teachers: 6.5 per cent
    Most will be rejected I’m sure.

    1. Then people will leave and work somewhere else.
      Don’t like the pay & conditions – put yourself out on the market and get a better job – or work for yourself.

    3. How many of the above are likely to face enemy fire? Eh
      The toms,crabs and wetfeet, that’s who.

      1. A few, very few medics might, but only if they volunteered, conscription is so passé

    1. Can’t be Sunak. The trousers aren’t short enough. Got the sleeves right though. Looks lifesize too!

  66. From the DT

    France will soon begin paying people to have their clothes and shoes repaired instead of throwing them away in a push to reduce waste.

    From
    October, the French will be able to claim a “repair bonus” worth up to
    €25 (£21) for clothing alterations and shoe repairs as part of a government mission to divert textiles from landfills and fight fast fashion.

    The
    initiative aims to reduce the 700,000 tonnes of clothes thrown away by
    French people each year, two-thirds of which is sent to landfill,
    Bérangère Couillard, the secretary of state, in charge of ecology,said
    during a visit to a hub for responsible fashion in Paris on Tuesday.

    “From
    October, consumers will be able to be supported in the repair of their
    clothes and shoes,” she said, calling on “all sewing workshops and
    shoemakers to join the system”.

    Under the new scheme, consumers
    will save up to €25 for repairing leather soles and €7 for heel repairs.
    Alterations to fix a torn sleeve will be set at around €7 and fixing a
    zip up to €15.

    Anti-waste

    The
    plan is the latest phase of the government’s anti-waste, circular
    economy legislation passed in 2020 and will draw from a €154 million
    fund over the 2023-2028 period.

    The subsidies, which will be
    applied directly to the price of repairs, will only be applicable for
    tailors and shoe repair shops that sign up to the government program via
    Refashion, a textile eco-group that will steer the project.

    “The
    goal is to support those who do the repairs,” Ms Couillard said,
    referring to sewing workshops, but also the brands which offer repair
    services.

    But Jeremie Liotet, a tailor at Retouches Paris in the
    French capital’s 2nd arrondissement, was doubtful whether such a scheme
    would make a noticeable impact for both his industry and the
    environment.

    “It might help, but I’m not sure it will really change the lives of tailors,” he told The Telegraph.

    For
    years, tailors have been fighting an uphill battle against fast-fashion
    brands, Mr Liotet said, pointing out that consumers are less likely to
    pay €10 to repair a torn shirt when they can buy a new one for €4.99.

    “We
    really need to rethink the entire clothing industry. The current
    industry is based on free market capitalism, putting out a million
    pieces of clothing for sale in the world…I think it’s just a government
    announcement more than a deep desire to change things.”

    According
    to figures from Refashion, 3.3 billion articles of clothing, shoes and
    household linens flooded the market in France last year, 500,000 more
    than in 2021.

    Customisation

    Mr
    Liotet said the environment was not the main concern of many of his
    clients, with more of his business coming from requests to customise
    clothes to make a fashion statement, rather than spare the landfills.

    During
    the visit, Ms Couillard singled out Chinese fast-fashion giant Shein
    for being “destructive for our planet, for the human conditions of the
    countries that host their production and also destructive for the
    textile sector, which may not recover.”

    The bonus for repairing
    clothes and shoes is based on a similar scheme launched last winter,
    offering between €10 to €45 in discounts – or about 20 per cent of the
    total repair bill – for repairing household electronic items no longer
    under warranty. This includes everything from refrigerators and washing
    machines, to toasters, hair dryers, digital cameras and laptop
    computers.

          5. She did tell me he has film star looks like Errol Flynn. I think she was smitten.

          7. Ooh, you dreadful gossip, you! I said nothing about Errol Flynn!! 🤣🤣

          10. I told this young lady she had film star looks – She said “Who, Marylin Monroe?” “No” I said “Lassie!”

    3. I’ve a pair of hiking shoes where the lace loop has gone. Replacing them would cost £40. Repairing the damage £80.

      Market capital works. The problems come when devices are engineered poorly and wear out before their expected lifespan is up. In addition, the weight of taxation, legislation, red tape and such nonsense means that profits are only made when there’s a high production run. That precludes keeping spare parts for failed consumer equipment. As for keeping spares for computers – in 3 years the interface won’t be around, let alone repairable..

    4. Nice little earner – rip you fave blouse then take it in for repair.
      Raid charity clothes banks and rip them all up 😄

    5. Words fail me. It used to be standard practice to have shoes resoled and reheeled. Mind you, then the fashion for moulded soles came in and they were impossible to repair.

      1. Yes, I’ve had to bin a lovely pair of sandals I bought in Italy several years ago for that very reason; the moulded soles just disintegrated.

  67. Birdie Three today.

    Wordle 754 3/6
    ⬜⬜🟨🟨🟩
    ⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Well done. Bogey five for me.

      Wordle 754 5/6

      🟨⬜⬜🟨⬜
      ⬜🟨🟨🟨⬜
      ⬜🟨🟨🟨⬜
      🟨🟩🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Par here.

      Wordle 754 4/6

      🟨🟨⬜⬜🟩
      ⬜⬜🟨🟨🟩
      ⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. Par for me
      Wordle 754 4/6

      ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟩
      ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
      ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  68. Where has the summer gone?
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/features/66177220

    A few wet days and the summer’s over. ..

    TBF, this is not the worst BBC piece on the subject because it’s less certain and definitive, a bit more suggestion than assertion as is usually the case (although you know which way it’s leaning).

    And a bit of water in some fields during March isn’t unusual.

    2. The Schools are about to break up for the summer holidays guaranteeing wet weather for at least 5 out of the next 6 weeks!

      1. Add to which, on 27 July part of the roof will be re-tiled. So rain is guaranteed.

      2. I remember lots of sunny school summer holidays as a child. Or is it just a fabricated memory?

      3. The weather, however, will be warm, dry and sunny for the first two weeks in September, when everybody has gone back.

  69. A bang-your-head-on-the-desk moment.

    UK approach to China spy threat inadequate, ISC report warns

    The report by Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee said China has penetrated “every sector” of the UK’s economy. It accuses the government of failing to recognise the issues involved.

    The prime minister said he was “keenly aware” there was more to do. The government had taken measures to prevent interference by reducing Britain’s reliance on Chinese technology, but he wanted to have “open” and “constructive” relations with China.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66189243

  71. Here is an Alasdair Macleod essay on the new gold-backed international exchange currency, and its likely impact.
    https://www.goldmoney.com/research/the-bell-tolls-for-fiat

    It’s long, but the title sums up his conclusion…
    He doesn’t go into the politics of how this economically bumpy period is likely to be hijacked by those seeking to establish authoritarian control structures in the west. But he does think that the development of this currency is further forward than the western establishment seems to think.

    1. A sudden turn of events occurred when the western alliance imposed sanctions against Russia following her attack on Ukraine. They set off a train of actions that has unified Asia and many of its supplier nations into a rebellion against American hegemony, stoked up by Putin and led by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council. And since the western alliance turned its back on fossil fuels, the low-cost producers throughout Asia have banded together representing nearly half global oil output, and a third of natural gas. As a cartel, OPEC is now just an appendix to the Asian mega-energy producers.

      The new cartel is dominated by President Putin, whose degree from Leningrad University was in energy economics and well qualified to be energy ringmaster. Not only has he demonstrated an understanding of the importance of controlling global energy supplies, but he also has a clear understanding of the importance of monetary gold.

      I don’t think we are going to see that on the BBC in the near future!

      1. Yes, it does rather put our lot into perspective, whose main qualifications are brown-nosing to Schwab and his masters, marrying rich women and getting on a the hopelessly old-fashioned Ox/bridge universities.

    2. A sudden turn of events occurred when the western alliance imposed sanctions against Russia following her attack on Ukraine. They set off a train of actions that has unified Asia and many of its supplier nations into a rebellion against American hegemony, stoked up by Putin and led by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council. And since the western alliance turned its back on fossil fuels, the low-cost producers throughout Asia have banded together representing nearly half global oil output, and a third of natural gas. As a cartel, OPEC is now just an appendix to the Asian mega-energy producers.

      The new cartel is dominated by President Putin, whose degree from Leningrad University was in energy economics and well qualified to be energy ringmaster. Not only has he demonstrated an understanding of the importance of controlling global energy supplies, but he also has a clear understanding of the importance of monetary gold.

      I don’t think we are going to see that on the BBC in the near future!

  72. That’s me for this day of three halves. AGA played up; brill AGA chap came and solved problem. Sultry and chilly (odd combo) weather this morning. Useful rain this arvo. And – in between – a line of washing done AND ironed and put away…

    Less good news – my only older cousin – 89 years old – grand-daughter, daughter, wife, mother and grandmother of South Devon farmers – a woman I have adored for 80 years – has, stupidly, had a small heart attack. Said to be on the mend. If only Plymouth wasn’t so far away…

    No market today – so to see Nurse (again – yawns….) first thing. Am thinking of going down the honey route. (There was an article in The Grimes today about the healing properties of Oxymel – honey + vinegar). Can’t be worse than endless (after TEN weeks) plasters. Then a trip round Morrisons. What a hectic life we lead.

    So have a spiffing evening.

    A demain.

    1. Meanwhile if reports are to be believed President Z is going to have a Spiving evening….

  73. News tells me that the Merkin cluster bombs are already in Ukraine, but haven’t been used yet.
    It wasn’t all that long ago that the world was all against cluster munitions, due to the leftovers after they have been used and taht need cleaned up before they blow small children and animals to buggeration. But hey, when the US demands, they get.

    1. This whole war, cluster bombs being used on both sides, is profoundly depressing!

        1. The prospect of escalation – tactical nuclear weapons – will lead to WWIII.

          1. I’m sure that once the radiation levels drop a bit and the mutant human war of the post-apocalyptic era ends in mutual destruction, the planet will be much better off.

    3. This sounds as though surviving a Merkin attack will be a close shave. ☺️

    1. That’s so upsetting. Are they going to exhume Harry Corbett, or did his ashes go up the chimney?

    2. Oh dear. That really made me laugh. Two glasses of red wine, you see. Oh, and one on the floor. It covered a surprised new puppy who burst into tears. Thank heavens for Vanish. One can scarcely see it now….. the stains, which went everywhere, not the puppy….. who after his initial astonishment thought my endeavours with kitchen roll and squirty stuff was a great fun new game, the likes of which he’d never seen before.

        1. Ah, too late…. it was a possibility… we did chew it over – some friends in France had a Papillon by the name of Enzo. He has been named Rico, as in Abricot, for his apricot colouring. We tried Sandy, but that really didn’t seem to work somehow. He stayed all of three hours in his crate last night (whimper, whimper, whimper, s i l e n c e , whimper, whimper… you get the picture). At 4.00 am Charles went downstairs and returned with this tiny thing (2 kgs) in his arms who immediately settled down on the bed as though that was where he had been spending all his nights for the eleven weeks of his life and we all had a peaceful sleep thereafter. Guess where he is sleeping tonight….

        1. He was drenched! Whimper, whimper, whimper…! So we towelled him down and attempted to mop up the rest on the floor with kitchen roll, which he thought was a great game, we couldn’t stop giggling. Meanwhile, across the table, a steady stream was descending floorwards as yet unseen by ourselves….

          1. You’d have thought he’d have got more pleasure by licking himself clean

          7. Our Oscar was whimpering when we picked him up after dental work at the vets. The full GA left him very unhappy and he’s only now coming back to normal. Me and the missus were very teary eyed on the way home. I sat in the back cradling him.

          9. And costly, Conway! It’s the most awful thing not to be able to explain to an animal that you’re doing the best for them – despite what they think!

          11. It certainly is when the vet is the dentist! A general anaesthetic set me back nearly £600 when Oscar had to be knocked out to have his feet examined. I got them to do other things while he was under! Oscar is convinced I am out to cause him maximum discomfort. I suspect it’s because of his experience with his previous family.

          12. It used to be, and then 16 years ago I started at a new dentist 5 miles away. A Polish lady dentist and a Cornish lady hygienist, over the years, made me not be scared over the 6 monthly visit that turned into annual visits. Unfortunately, the practice has moved to Plymouth and I’m out of date with my check up.

          13. Oh how we suffer for our pets. GAs knock them for six, Poppie was always woozie and bit doolally afterwards. I hope Oscar is returned to normal after a good night’s sleep but sometimes it can take another day. Hopefully his teeth are gleaming now!

  76. Evening, all. Started off dry, then it rained and finally the wind got up. Not bad for a day that was supposed to be sunny!

      1. Justin Rowlatt waving his arms around again as he tells us we’re all going to fry.

  77. I’m not sure I should show compassion toward people with mental health problems any more as it seems to me that people with these problem blow up kids in concert venues, explode bombs on tube trains and buses, prostitute school kids with drug addictions, and decapitate soldiers who are merely walking down the road.

    I know one thing, next time the black dog comes asniffing I’ll keep my trap shut because I don’t want to be associated with those loonies.

    1. The anachronistic element of being mental is that one is unaware of being mental and there is no objective test capable of interpreting the condition. A diagnosis can only be made by a psychiatric consultant who must rely entirely upon hearsay evidence from third parties about the behavioral patterns of a patient.

      The best that may be achieved are observational changes in behavioural patterns by a spouse with long term accustomisation of living with the patient. This means that it could well be one’s spouse who has more control over the likelihood of an individual of being committed to a lunatic asylum rather than the heavenly body itself:

      https://www.healthline.com/health/full-moon-effects#takeaway

    1. Limitless ‘white’ hydrogen under our feet may soon shatter all energy assumptions
      There’s a real possibility that vast reserves of this clean fuel can be extracted at competitive costs

      …and who’s going to foot the bill? 🤔

    2. WTF is white hydrogen, apart from being racist, of course?
      Doesn’t matter anyway, as the BTL comment is correct – if it looks like benefiting us, they will ban it.

      1. White hydrogen is controllable and relatively safe, black hydrogen is volatile, dangerous and explodes if slightly provoked?

  79. Slightly off topic.
    With apologies to all the Nottlers struggling to see their appropriate physicians.
    Re NHS, envy of the world, and the pay rises offered and strikes threatened.
    For comparison:

    French medical care.

    This was nothing special, just some regular organised tests and a six monthly check up.
    My doctor writes the prescription for the next tests when I report to discuss the current results.
    They do these automatically where we are.
    Two blood tests were needed.

    When the six months was up I ventured into the vampires nest, appointment arranged to suit me, tests done, results in my email by the lunchtime.
    Online appointment to arrange to see my GP, lots of choice for times.
    See doctor, who has all the results on line and would have phoned me to arrange an appointment had she not noted I was already booked in.
    Happy with all the results but wants me to see a specialist, just in case as one figure has moved up unexpectedly
    .
    Letter of referral, new prescriptions and guide note in my inbox before I even got back from her surgery today.

    Online appointment with the specialist at my local hospital arranged for early October. If it was regarded as urgent I could have had an appointment at his base hospital almost immediately.

    The strangest thing of all is that the locals think the service isn’t up to scratch, not as good as they were used to!

    Ho Hum…

      1. The French don’t seem to keep banging on about theirs being the envy of the world, so presumably not.

  80. Last night the bar didn’t have any helicopter flavoured crisps so I had to make do with plane

  81. With apologies to Blackadder:

    Zelenskyy: Now, I’ve compiled a list of those with security clearance for our ultra- secret offensive, have you got it Zaluzhnyi ?
    Zaluzhnyi: Yes sir.
    Zelenskyy: Read it please.
    Zaluzhnyi: It’s top security sir, I think that’s all the Captain needs to know.
    Zelenskyy: Nonsense! Let’s hear the list in full!
    Very well sir. “List of personnel cleared for mission Get Putin, as dictated by President Zelenskyy:
    You and me, Zaluzhnyi , obviously. All Western newspaper editors, all Western newspaper editors’ wives, their wives friends, their families, their families’ servants, their families’ servants’ tennis partners, and some chap I bumped into the mess the other day called Bernard.”

  82. Currently watching the new Lucy Worsley gameshow on puzzles. Ye Gods, this one and the previous one have at least one transgender contestant, with the rest being active LGBTQI+ fans.

  83. Message for Poppiesmum:

    I’ve found the perfect name for your new companion – Pinto, a very small pint. Also a strong little pony able to carry your joys and sorrows.

        4. “Easy, ‘Rico!”

          I bet no one can remember which TV series of the 1960s that became a catchphrase from.

    2. Thank you, sj! I will run it past him. Nice name, I like names beginning with ‘P’, they are easy to say.

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