Sunday 28 February: Why can’t historic homes reopen when non-essential shops do?

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/02/28/letters-cant-historic-homes-reopen-non-essential-shops-do/

761 thoughts on “Sunday 28 February: Why can’t historic homes reopen when non-essential shops do?”

    1. Morning to you, here it is 08:00 Zulu time, you ought to see the tribes of them gathering around the local estates!

    3. Era Check

      2021 AD

      or to globalists

      2021 CE

      (and they have also meddled with the Greenwich Meridian calling it the Prime Meridian)

      (I sailed across the Atlantic in a 30 foot boat using a sextant to find my way – would I have made it if my boat had been 9 metres long using the PM?)

      2. Reminds me of the Irishman who attempted to cross the Atlantic on a plank – he failed, when he got to the other side he found it was 3ft short

      3. I shall carry on using BC and AD. Common Era indeed! The only common thing is the brains of the corrupt and decadent who seek to destroy Christian culture in the West.

    4. Good morning Angie and all Nottlers.

      So why is it not CUT instead of UCT (Co-ordinated Universal Time). Is it coz we Brits may be a bit naughty with the word? Slightly misty here this morning. Heating wonderful. We had a boiler service 2 weeks ago and were informed that it was past it’s use by date, leaking and rusty inside, so needed a new one. Had 3 quotes very quickly and settled on a company who explained why the heating wasn’t getting downstairs very well. The house had been extended in 1991 and pipes just added on rather than properly adjusted to cover a bigger area. It was fitted 5 days later and has made such a difference. We come into the kitchen/breakfast area, “L” shaped room and it’s actually warm! Happy days. That’s a couple of grand gone. And well worth it.

      And now of course we have slightly warmer weather 😃😃😃.

      1. Morning vw,

        It’s good you found an installer who notiiced the mismatch between your boiker and rads.
        Some would just have replaced the boiler to get a quick commission on the basis that they couldn’t get the spare parts.

      3. Through the winter, I found it was always freezing in my bedroom even if the heating in the house were on. I dont like to sleep in a warm room but this was getting ridiculous.

        I eventually decided to investigate and found that there was about an inch and a half gap open around the window where an ivy trunk had forced it’s way through.
        I’m lucky I have caught it before any serious damage has been done.

  2. A More Perfect Union? 28 February 2021.

    There is much to say about the issue of the function of government that is implied by the deliberate reinterpretation today of the words “a more perfect union” in the preamble to the US Constitution.

    In the minds of the framers there was no doubt at all that what was meant was the “perfection” i.e., the completion of the organization of a government for the original states and any that might be formed later.

    What was NOT intended was the expression of a desire or intention to seek the creation of an earthly paradise, a utopia, constructed by humans who held the belief that mankind is endlessly malleable and that it is the function of government to control and direct that malleability toward anyone’s idea of what a perfect society ought to be.

    Today at the CPAC convention Senator Mike Lee of Utah reminded us all clearly of the essential difference between these two visions of the purpose of government. Lee told us that we should always be skeptical of people who believe that government exists to shape us, mold us and control us in pursuit of utopian goals. Such people may or may not be genuine believers in their stated goals. Some of them merely seek money and power and a good life for themselves in a US version of the Soviet nomenklatura. Others, like AOC are deluded but dangerous naifs. Some are the tools of disappointed and deeply cynical opportunists like HC. Some are anarchist street thugs reminiscent of the brawling Brown Shirts of the SA.

    They all want the same thing. They want to own us. They want to tell us what we can say or write. They want to destroy our history, our shared memory of who we are, who we were and how much we struggled to make this country what it has been. They want to tell us who we are just as the Soviet Union and the CPUSSR wanted to create Soviet Man.

    Those of the globalist elites who actually believe in their goals, think it only right that average Americans should live poorer so that people in other parts of the world can live better in a world-wide socialist state.

    Well, to hell with that! Pat Lang.

    Morning everyone. The view from the States!

    https://turcopolier.com/a-more-perfect-union/

    1. Here’s another view from the States in support of clear, rational thinking rather than following the globalist elites’ deliberate destructive ideas. De Santis is getting a lot of press lately for what he is achieving in Florida. Johnson and his sidekick Hancock took the ruinous globalist path and we are paying for those globalists’ lackeys’ actions.

      https://twitter.com/hughosmond/status/1365775543535337482

      February but a beautiful Springlike day and pictures and reports of thousands upon thousands of people visiting the coast, parks etc.Oppression still reigns in parts of London, it would seem.

      https://twitter.com/berniespofforth/status/1365674364616781830

      https://twitter.com/tomhfh/status/1365725210876530693

      An early Spring and a good Easter will enable the people to get out and about and enjoy themselves and start to put the tyranny to bed. However, expect a reaction from the tyrants e.g. variant ‘X’, spike in infections etc. They will fight to the bitter end; they have invested too much of their personal beliefs to give in without an attempted backlash. However, I expect, parked somewhere is a ‘Boris Bus’ with Sage’s number on it and that evil group will be thrown under said ‘Bus’ as the situation unravels. Nobody should have any sympathy for those tools of oppression and the likes of Johnson, Hancock, Gove etc must suffer too if there is any justice in life.

      1. Tom Harwood quite rightly being blasted for being an utter hypocrite, under that tweet.
        He’s fully a fully paid up supporter of lockdown, but is “shocked” that officious policemen are storming up to people in the street and demanding to know what they are doing there.

        3. Haven’t seen much of him before and didn’t realise he’s a lockdown supporter. I’ll have to expand my horizons and Twitter feeds. There is another video, again from London, of a small group being harassed for queueing for a coffee and one of the group being roughly handled by the police. Police obviously ‘on message’ with the government oppressors but seriously ‘off message’ with the public.

        4. Sadly Tom has gone all ‘establishment’ of late, possibly influenced by him scribbling for the Telegraph as well as working for Guido Fawkes (which, IMHO is far less of a ‘free thinker and troubler-maker than they used to be). Note also that he’s recently accepted a new job over at Brillo’s GB News.

          To me, that change of attitude from Tom doesn’t bode well for the indpendence of the TV channel’s journalism. And at the moment, we REALLY could do with some proper jorunalists around who aren’t afraid to ask awkward questions and not accept being fobbed off.

    2. Independence in the third world should bring self-sufficiency. If you are independent you should pay for yourself and not expect to be subsidised by others.

      Same goes for Scotland.

      1. Brilliant speech and orator. We have no equivalent over here more’s the pity. Thanks for posting. Such clear diction and fluency.

  5. Morning all

    SIR – While I agree with Peter Woods (“Help for hospitality”, Letters, February 21), a substantial decrease in alcohol duty will not be enough.

    Advertisement

    On Wednesday there is an opportunity for the Chancellor to redress a harmful imbalance that has been allowed to develop over many years, especially for wet-led pubs. A significant rise in the duty imposed on supermarket alcohol sales would be prudent – and he could use one to fund the other.

    Think of it as a long-term “drink out to help out” initiative to save many of our wonderful pubs from oblivion.

    Dr Andy K Wilkinson

    Ely, Cambridgeshire

  6. SIR – We were relieved to see the Government’s measured roadmap this week. The resumption of normal business activity at historic houses – from tourism and hospitality to weddings – depends on public confidence that the unlocking is cautious and justified.

    We urge the Government to keep the reopening of indoor heritage attractions under close review. Historic houses have demonstrated their ability to manage access and risks. Yet they will only be able to open from May 17 at the earliest, while non-essential retail can reopen from April 12. Allowing these places to open at the same time as shops would safeguard the 34,000 full-time equivalent jobs that independent historic houses support; promote wellbeing; help generate the income needed to pay for vital conservation work; and stimulate the local economy.

    We have also asked for clarity on when safe, distanced wedding show-rounds will be allowed. Enabling historic houses to take bookings for future events will help them catch up on the estimated £260 million of income lost over the last year, which in turn will help safeguard jobs in the hospitality industry and the physical fabric of these very special places. The situation remains precarious for independent heritage.

    Martha Lytton-Cobbold

    Knebworth House

    President, Historic Houses

    The Earl and Countess of Carnarvon

    Highclere Castle

    The Earl of Harewood

  7. Morning again

    Moving beyond the Blairite view of university

    SIR – Lord Young of Graffham is spot on (“We will never fix universities until we admit that too many people go to them”, Comment, February 21).

    Tony Blair’s target of 50 per cent of school leavers going to university was complete madness – yet over 20 years have passed and nothing has been done to repair the system. How many more millions of young people are going to fall victim to the gross misselling of a “university education”?

    John Baron

    Caterham, Surrey

    SIR – Robert Halfon (Comment, February 21) makes valid points about “rebooting our education system”.

    However, as chair of the Education Select Committee, he should have a better understanding of why teacher recruitment is low in disadvantaged areas. Over two decades of teaching, I have seen two common denominators: low aspiration among pupils, combined with poor discipline and an unsupportive senior leadership team that serves to undermine the teacher in the classroom. It is little wonder that young teachers become disillusioned.

    Paul Farrow

    Lincoln

    2. The fact that young people have been lured into debt by politicians is a complete disgrace.

      I can accept the concept of student loans – what is unacceptable is that it is almost impossible for many people to ever pay them off.

      Student loans should be interest free as they are in many more civilised countries than Britain – that students are lumbered with loans at over 20 times the BoE base rate is evil usury.

      Repayment of loans when students start earning should be a charge against income tax; employers should be allowed to repay their employees’ loans as a charge against their business tax; those in jobs such as teaching and medicine in the state sectors should have their loans paid off after 8 – 10 years to encourage them to stay in their jobs.

      I went to university, Caroline went to university – our parents paid all our tuition fees and living expenses so we started our professional lives not one penny piece in debt. We paid for both Christo and Henry so that they too could start their professional lives with no monstrous debt hanging over their heads. Of course they worked during university holidays just as we did when we were young. For example working on an oil rig in the North Sea as a roustabout during one summer university holiday probably taught me almost as much as UEA did!

  8. Reposted from late last night

    Sunday 28th February, 2021

    Jeremy Morfey

    A Very Happy Birthday

    and

    Very More Enjoyable and Musical Returns

    With best wishes from

    Caroline and Rastus.

        1. Thank you, RCT, I will do my best. Late lunch with our son and family this afternoon, I’m cooking the beef and gravy.

    4. Thanks to all, and to the card where the performers at least have Alma’s ears.

      Rewarded with one of my sweetest dreams – I was with a nice young woman holding her hand, and she didn’t pull it away when I kissed it. That sort of thing doesn’t normally happen to a grumpy old scroat of 65!

      Only a year to go to my state pension.

      1. Happy birthday, let’s hope Rishi doesn’t confiscate it and you get many years benefit from it.

        1. I’ve fallen out with Carl Philip von Maldeghem, artistic director of Salzburger Landestheater, when he stated that the whole point of putting on Alma’s ‘Cinderella’, which is in jeans just to spite her, and set on the deck of a 1930s cruise liner “It is important for us to show a contemporary work by a young woman in the men’s bastion of opera”. They even have the National Trust mentality in Salzburg. Is nothing sacred?

          Actually the thinking of the opera was more mature, with more insight into the human condition, when she first put it on at the age of ten, rather than the grand revisions she made to please the Salzburg trendies at sixteen. I plead with Alma to leave her beautiful childhood work alone, and produce something new to reflect her mature period. I’d love to put on ‘Cinderella’ myself, but I would take a scholarly approach, taking the best from all the versions, rather than Alma’s latest bigging-up the orchestration, and then cutting out the good bits because of social distancing. And I’d put Cinderella in a dress.

          What I am looking forward to though is getting back singing with the choirs. One of them has already planned the programme for the Three Choirs Festival concert with my favourites we all know well – Elgar’s Bavarian Highlands, Sumsion’s ‘In Exile’, and Maxim’s Lullabies for the Girls. These three are very special to me. The Bavarian Highlands was the last thing I did with Donald Hunt before he died. ‘In Exile’ was dedicated to Donald, and was composed by the bridge, since Herbert Sumsion knew both Elgar and Donald well. Then the Lullabies to the Girls is one of the most delightful works of Donald’s successor Piers Maxim, who has four daughters and composed one for each of them, reflecting their characters.

          2. Good morning again.

            I found a video on the internet of you singing Berlioz’s The Shepherds Farewell

            I wonder you ever came across the man who was married to my sister, Mary? John Rowlands Pritchard used to be in a group which performed Gregorian Chant?

      6. Happy Birthday, Jeremy! How nice it is on a non-rainy Sunday! (It is foggy here but there is a hint of sun around.)

  9. Even in the playground, I was told my skin was too dark: it’s time to face up to colourism. 28 February 2021.

    If 2020 was the year the world decided it was time for a proper conversation about racism, then 2021 is definitely the year we need to face up to colourism. Colourism is discrimination against dark-skinned people. It comes from within the community as well as without, and is an issue across many races, including mine.

    Growing up in south London in the early 90s, I found colourism played a far bigger role in my life than racism. Brixton was so full of “diversity” (before it was a buzzword) that my six-year-old self would definitely have said that most people in the UK were black.

    Colourism!? Grizz is right! God help us all!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/27/time-to-face-up-to-colourism-candice-brathwaite

    2. India has been ahead of this game for ages – an extract from the NYT:-

      “Colorism, the bias against people of darker skin tones, has vexed India for a long time. It is partly a product of colonial prejudices, and it has been exacerbated by caste, regional differences and Bollywood, the nation’s film industry, which has long promoted lighter-skinned heroes”

      even here they try to apportion some of the blame on “colonial prejudices” , I believe the caste system existed long before colonisation.

          1. I do take academic papers on this subject with a large pinch of salt, as they tend to be there to prove left wing theories rather than uncover the truth.
            For example, on the first page, it makes the colossal and unwarranted generalisation that white people see black people as slaves and that is why they think white skin is better than black skin.
            Despite the eighteenth century trade, there is no history of seeing black people as slaves and slaves as black people in Britain. This is simply false.

          2. Fairy nuff – I’m guessing the author of this particular paper is of Indian heritage and is definitely based in Bangalore and may be more than a little biased.

      2. So has Japan. Japan was never involved in the slave trade in Africa and had no African immigrants. Japan might therefore be seen as homogeneous. Yet it was not. There was a clear caste system. The lower orders worked in fields, near naked, and were burned very dark by the sun. Ladies of the upper classes never exposed their skin to sunlight and were very pale. This paleness was highly prized as a sign of high rank and wealth. This was the case even before Europeans arrived.

    3. I thought Fifty Shades of Grey was just the title of the book but now I appear to be suffering from ‘Colourism’. Well we all seem to be well and truly bu@@ered.

    5. What a ghastly mentality where people store up grievances from the playground, and are then encourage to expand on these grievances, and to have laws to make them feel validated and smooth away the hurt.

      What happened to growing up?

      We will never cure this problem as long as so many people in the UK are dependent upon money printed by the government.

    6. I had a birthday greeting this morning from my old Filipina girlfriend, whom I fell out with after she spent the money I sent her for her trip to England 12 years ago. She’s 40 in a week’s time.

      I had one or two things to say about the colourism in her country. She has the most wonderful suntan that a girl from Essex would spend a fortune approximating from the bottle before going on the beach. I called it her best brown dress. The problem I had with it was this skin whitener she insisted on using on her face, which is a staple item on the supermarket shelves next to the rice. Why on earth would she want a pallid maggot skin like mine when hers is already so fabulous?

        1. With that stuff on, she’s a pickled corpse. Luckily, her womanliness was obvious when in her best dress, and this was fortunately in the days when women didn’t have penises.

    1. On its way out, more like. They could let all the lunatics vote too….oh, sorry, they already do.

      Morning Ogga

      1. 329765+ up ticks,
        Afternoon A,
        I do believe that has changed a tad.
        The governance overseers have erased the “no” for many of the new guests, straight from en suite to welfare, labour being viewed
        as being only for fools & horses.

  11. Good morning and a very happy birthday to Jeremy Morley. Also, if he happens to be reading this site, a happy birthday to Peddytheviking (whose birthday is technically February the 29th). I hope both of them have a really happy time today.

      2. I was all ready to make the post at midnight just between February 28th and March 1st.

        And I was also going to make reference to the apprenticeship to a pirate which stayed in force until his 21st birthday when he was 84!

      2. I wrote “a happy birthday to Peddytheviking (whose birthday is technically February the 29th)” and I think I my post is abundantly clear, Sos.

        2. Not to me it isn’t.

          Unless you know that he has an “official birthday” as well as a real one and/or that “Ped” is also Ptv.

          1. You are right – my apologies. Now I shall have to email Peddy a second time to explain why I wished him a happy birthday! Aaarghh!

      3. Sos, I read your post as Peddy, hence I thought you were suggesting that the “two leapers” were Jeremy and Peddy.

    2. Stone the crows! But it’s Sunday, the editorial team were late stirring and so not in time to prevent this sort of dangerous rubbish from being published. Comments are not enabled, so some office junior had their wits about them and prevented inappropriate debate.

  13. Stay, go, delay: Joe Biden is trapped and has no good choices in Afghanistan. 28 February 2021.

    Of all the foreign hazards, snares, pitfalls and timebombs left behind by Donald Trump, Afghanistan is arguably the worst. Joe Biden must decide in the coming days whether or not to abide by his predecessor’s shabby “peace deal” with the Taliban and withdraw all US troops by the end of April. It’s a president-sized trap.

    The point being, there is no peace, no viable deal, and no easy answer. All three main options – leave now, delay the US and Nato departure by, say, six months, or stay indefinitely – are fraught with danger. Biden may be damned whatever he does. The war is a hole dug by others. But he’s in it now – and it risks becoming his hole.

    There is no hazard except that chosen. The United States should get out of Afghanistan because their presence there is not only voluntary but also perpetuates the war; a war that they cannot win. This isn’t going to happen of course, Joe needs a War and there’s no better place for one than this hellhole, largely created by the United States.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/feb/28/stay-go-delay-joe-biden-is-trapped-and-has-no-good-choices-in-afghanistan

    2. Until the Pashtuns stop hating the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks and vice versa, there will never be any chance of winning a war in Afghanistan.

      This is a summary of what I regarded as an excellent analysis of the situation in Afghanistan: (http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ww2010.weblog.htm)

      Afghanistan’s last generational crisis war was an extremely bloody, horrific civil war, in 1991-96. The war was a civil war, fought between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the Northern Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban are radicalized Pashtuns, and when they need to import foreign fighters, then can import their cousins from the Pashtun tribes in Pakistan.

      Indeed, it’s much worse than that. The ethnic groups in Afghanistan are COMPLETELY NON-UNITED and loathe each other. Pashtuns still have scores to settle with the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks that formed the Northern Alliance, especially the Shias. These opposing groups have fresh memories of the atrocities, torture, rape, beatings, dismemberments, mutilations, and so forth that the other side performed on their friends, wives and other family members, and they have no desire to be friends or to work together. They’d rather kill each other.

      So when Jens Stoltenberg (secretary general of NATO) says that Nato wants to give the peace process a chance, he knows that statement is delusional, and the only relevant statement is the one by the unnamed European diplomat: “This war is not winnable, but Nato cannot allow itself to lose it pitifully.”

      Naturally the Guardian would blame it all on Donald Trump!

      1. ‘Morning, Sguest, the same tribalism that prevents both Africa and the Middle East from ever achieving education, industry and clear thinking.

    3. It was when St.Tone opted to support a war in Afghanistan that I decided he is, in fact, an ignoramus. Before I thought he was just a snake oil salesman, the extent of his ignorance of history came as a surprise.

  14. Ancient Wisdom

    Keep this in mind the next time you are about to repeat a rumour or spread gossip.

    In ancient Greece (469 – 399 BC), Socrates was widely lauded for his wisdom. One day an acquaintance ran up to him excitedly and said, “Socrates, do you know what I just heard about Diogenes?”

    “Wait a moment,” Socrates replied, “Before you tell me I’d like you to pass a little test. It’s called the Triple Filter Test.”

    “Triple filter?” asked the acquaintance.

    “That’s right,” Socrates continued, “Before you talk to me about Diogenes let’s take a moment to filter what you’re going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made
    absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?”

    “No,” the man said, “Actually I just heard about it.”

    “All right,” said Socrates, “So you don’t really know if it’s true or not. Now let’s try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about Diogenes something good?”

    “No, on the contrary…”

    “So,” Socrates continued, “You want to tell me something about Diogenes that may be bad, even though you’re not certain it’s true?”

    The man shrugged, a little embarrassed. Socrates continued, “You may still pass the test though, because there is a third filter, the filter of Usefulness. Is what you want to tell me about Diogenes going to be useful to me?”

    “No, not really.”

    “Well,” concluded Socrates, “If what you want to tell me is neither True nor Good nor even Useful, why tell it to me or anyone at all?”

    The man was bewildered and ashamed. This is an example of why Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high esteem.

    It also explains why Socrates never found out that Diogenes was banging his wife.

    1. What are we going to do when you come to the end of “1000 of the Worst Jokes in History”?

    2. What are we going to do when you come to the end of “1000 of the Worst Jokes in History”?

  17. A belated Good Morning and another chilly start here in Derbyshire. -3°C again with a clear sky and a bit of a mist that will soon clear.

    A bit of a pain getting on, the internet dropped out shortly after I first logged on and it only just came back on.

  18. Good morning, all. Late on parade. Bright sun (so the fog forecast was bollox) but very heavy frost.

    No news again, I see.

    1. BREAKING NEWS: Phizzee had bacon, pancakes and maple syrup for breakfast. Yesterday it was half a packet of chocolate biscuits. :@)

      1. Good grief. A bowl of nourishing – and artery unstopping – porridge, with chopped banana.

  19. Every day there is outrage upon outrage coming from the US which inevitably has a profound effect on the accelerating downward slope upon which Britain is suffering.

    For example, today, Dolly Parton is being vilified because “the idea of whiteness underlines her image”.

    But, perhaps more serious, is the confirmation hearing of Biden’s transgender choice for assistant secretary of health.

    Based on her previous pronouncements ‘she’ failed to answer these two questions:

    Do you support the government intervening to override the parent’s consent to give a child puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and or amputation surgery of breasts and genitalia? You have said that you’re willing to accelerate the protocols for street kids. I’m alarmed that poor kids with no parents who are homeless and distraught, you would just go through this and allow that to happen to a minor.

    Do you believe that minors are capable of making such a life-changing decision as changing one’s sex?

    The transgender industry seems to have come to the fore since Biden was elected, notwithstanding the coronavirus and other health matters affecting far more people than a handful of unfortunate children who, it appears, are being manipulated by some left-wing freaks..

    1. Shades of forced lobotomies.
      The Land of the Free can be a bit selective over to whom it grants freedom.

    2. I sometimes wonder if the whole objective of the Biden administration and his puppetmasters would be to cause the maximum amount of division across America so that there can be a very clear split between old-fashioned Judaeo/Christian values and the modern woke BLM Marxist movements which have taken over the Democratic party.

      Conservative Whites and Blacks and Latinos will become a minority in a few years, through mass immigration and population increases among the “have nots” and American cities will become lawless and ungovernable tribal wastelands.

          1. I was thinking more of the ‘lawless and ungovernable’ bit. I don’t care much about the colour of people’s skin.

          2. Unfortunately there appears to be a close correlation between the two, particularly in the cities.
            And whilst correlation may not be causation the number of places it applies follow a similar pattern.

    4. Thinking you are something you are not is a mental illness. It’s not clever, not brave, not some revelation of identity.

      The bit i don’t understand: if I go to my doctor and bark at him and pretend to be a dog, he won’t indulge me, he’ll rightly send me to a psychiatrist. Yet if I go along and say ‘I’m a woman!’ he’ll praise me and say how brave I am.

      It’s a psychosis, and should be treated as such.

    1. I wonder if the Derek Wellman mentioned is the same as the 60s schoolboy violiniist in Gloucester. He’d be in his late 70s now.

      1. Transitional, you say? I didn’t know they had special classes for pupils “transitioning” back in the first half of the 20th century.

        How very avant-garde Greyfriars must have been.

      2. When I arrived to teach at Allhallows the Remove was the form for those who took 3 years to get to “O” level rather than 2. It was then changed to be called the Fourth Form and the first year was called the Third Form and everyone took three years to “O” level.

        In my day at Blundell’s we entered the the Lower Fifth when we arrived at the school and took our “O” levels the following year in the Upper Fifth. Those who needed more time to get to “O” level standard went into the Middle Fifth. There was also a class called 5X for those who did not get enough “O” levels to go to Sandhurst – it was also known as The Army Sixth.

        I remember getting six of the best for poor fagging and insubordination from a muscle-bound school monitor in 5X who, after several attempts, finally got enough “O” levels to get into the army. He ended his career running the CCF at Wellington College. This chap was the Devon junior squash champion, Victor Ludorum in athletics, held the School Javelin record and had full colours in Rugby and cricket as well. The red, purple and blue lines across my naked buttocks became a tourist attraction to boys in other houses who came to inspect the stroke work of this efficient sadist at communal shower time after games. This chap certainly knew how to wield a cane even if he was almost illiterate and innumerate.

    3. Nigel Molesworth is my schoolboy hero.

      His creator, Geoffrey Willans, was at my old school both as a boy and as a master. Of course Ronald Searle’s drawings were splendid too.

        1. Actually it was Roger in the Swallows and Amazons series who was my real soul-mate. His elder siblings, John and Susan, were a bit too respectable and conventional for me but the younger members of the family, Titty and Roger were potentially more lively and rebellious. (The fifth, Bridget, who obviously is the consequence of one of Commander Walker’s shore leaves, is too little to take any active part in the stories.)

          I also enjoyed reading about Mason in H.F. Ellis’s stories about the Maths teacher called A.J. Wentworth. But I only met him when I was actually a schoolmaster myself.

          Mason teased Wentworth with his quick replies:

          When Wentworth warned him: “You and I will soon be at loggerheads”‘ Mason replied, “You may be Sir, but I’m going to Cheltenham.”

          And Wentworth had explained Pythagoras’s Theorem to the class Mason asked:

          “That’s all very well, Sir, but would it happen in real life?”

          “Er, what do you mean?” asked the beleaguered Wentworth

          “I mean Sir that it would be a pretty good fluke if, in real life, Sir, a real life triangle with a right angle in it was arranged in such a way that each side had a square on it?”

  22. Good morning from a Saxon Queen with blooded axe and well sprung longbow .

    Hello, its a very foggy morning here, I am hoping it’ll clear, my husband is out walking but I’ve decided to stay in the warm.

      1. Morning. Daddy would know that his daughter was home baking cakes this morning and doing a better job then he did.

  23. 329765+ up ticks,
    May one ask, can anyone name without doubt the politico doorman at the Dover illegal entry point, who is allowing the importation of, we have been told, a great many highly contagious plague carriers,maybe a current party member can shed some light on it ?

    May one also ask why these highly contagious plague carriers are given
    preferential treatment whilst the indigenous are incarcerated as a fed & watered herd under daily instruction / orders & welfare threats.

    Must it now be admitted that the 650 politico’s have pulled off a major coup
    assisted by the electorate ?

    2. He has a very ethnically Scottish Gordon Brown physiognomy there. The wee Krankie looks like Lulu.

  25. Good morning all. I shan’t be here long as I have a lunch arranged with friends who live some distance away. To settle the Battle of the Birthdays , raging elsewhere on here I will endeavour to clear things up. I am Ped, not Peddytheviking, we are occasionally mistaken for each other but are separate entities. My tag on the Telegraph letters should have been Per, which is Breton for my real name, but it ended up as Ped. My birthday is 29th Feb but I usually celebrate it on the 28th. If I don’t reply to any of your good wishes it’s because I will be celebrating, not sulking. Thank you to all in anticipation and see you tomorrow – Deo volente. Hic!

          4. They gave their bodies for the Common Good and receive each for their own memory Praise that will never die, and with it the grandest of all sepulchres; not that in which their mortal bones are laid, but a home in the minds of men where their Glory remains fresh.

            Pericles Funeral Oration. Probably the greatest speech ever given, though Churchill gives him a run for his money.

    6. I shall be posting something on the strike of midnight – that moment between 28th February and the 1st March.

      (Anne Allan has already made the reference I was going to make to piratical apprenticeships!)

      Of course you are not obliged to tell us the year of your birth but if you did I could work out your G&S age in birthdays.

        1. Midnight French time is better for me as that is what I use and I don’t have to stay up so late to post our birthday greetings.

    7. Ped, have a happy whenever it is you’re celebrating and enjoy your meal and drinks.🎉

    11. Happy Birthday Ped! I expect you’ve already had a wonderful time so I hope it was as good as you could have wished! Best wishes to you! 🍾🎂

  26. Good morning all again. Happy Birthday to Ped/Per today, hope the celebration at lunch time is a good one.

    I have a proble with notifications for some reason, started yesterday, so if I’ve not replied to anyone please excuse me, not intentional. I do try to reply to you …

    Have just ordered some Daphne shrubs, small ones, hopefully be here ready for spring planting. They have such a beautiful scent. Have a good day all.

    1. I noticed from watching the rugby yesterday that it is LBGT month, deep joy. I wonder what interesting perversions we shall learn about.

      1. I have stopped supporting the England Rugby XV – they will not win anything while they continue their absurd gesture by kneeling to black racist communists who wish to destroy capitalism and the family. Their morale and integrity have been fatally damaged.

        2. About half of the English team went down on one knee yesterday, while none of the Welsh team did. Are those Englishmen who carry on kneeling too stupid to realise that this gesture has had its day, and that it is in support of a political organisation, not a civil rights movement?

          3. For my money the only England player who would get into a Lions first team is Itoje and his indiscipline would probably rule him out too.

          5. Yes, you only have to look at the plethora of silly haircuts and tattoos
            How are you now Phil?

          6. Managing my condition better than i had. Provided i don’t walk very much i can sleep at night.

            More scan and appointments coming up. Should have a full diagnosis in a month.

            Thank you for asking, Alec.

      2. Regardless of who wins, the DT always publishes ten times as many articles analysing England’s performance than their opposition’s.

        Back in the Five Nations days, at least the other teams had one weekend in each tournament when they got some press coverage.

    3. 329765+ up ticks,
      Morning Bob,
      It is a good gesture that Boc puts forward BUT it is only biting the tainted meat provocation campaign that has been triggered against honkies, me inclusive.

      Lets us make March a
      meditation / contemplation / preparation period regarding the 6th May and as to why we will NOT be supporting
      voting for the lab/lib/con coalition candidate, they are a serious threat to the indigenous peoples as the last three decades have surely shown.

    1. We’ll be safe, by the time he gets connected for the conference call he’ll have fallen asleep.
      By the time he wakes up he’ll have forgotten.

  30. Morningall.
    Another distressing message this morning another old friend i grew up with has passed away. To re-coin a phrase, I’m going out now and i maybe some time.

    And does any one have the home address of that disgraceful Frog ‘Referee’ he needs a damn good thrashing. Why do they still have their vindictive revengeful feet still firmly stuck in the mud of Agincourt ! What a pathetic way to carry on an ancient feud. And It all stands out so much like dog’s dangly bits.

    1. I remember Mother saying that when you get to a certain time of life you end up going to more funerals than weddings.

      Sorry to hear your news. Try to remember the good things/times about him.

      1. Like when my mother complained about having no friends any more. I pointed out that she was 95 and most of her friends were dead.

        Agreed, remember the good times.

      2. As happened when we first came back from Oz we lived with the in-laws and their old friends were dropping like flies.
        His daughter emailed this afternoon and would like some amusing anecdotes we as friends may remember……….well.

    2. Yes, I agree that that knock on decision was a howler.

      But it serves a team right when it humiliates itself by kneeling in honoured memory of a black criminal who held a loaded gun at the stomach of a pregnant black girl while his friends were robbing her house.

      1. The knock on decision was correct. The TMO very carefully reviewed the sequence and determined that the ball went backwards from Rees Zammit’s hand, although it didn’t look like it in real time. The referee correctly did not over rule the TMO.

        You can download the match and watch the sequence at 1/10 speed to see what happened, or 1/4 speed on youtube. RZ got his right hand on the ball and brought it in towards him. No knock on at that stage as his hand remained in contact with the ball. He then brought his left had across to try and get control of the ball, but only succeeded in knocking it backwards. Backwards, the ball did not go forward from his hand. That’s what the TMO saw, that’s what he told the referee and there was no knock on.

      2. I didn’t see very much of the game. England just were not good enough. But kneeling is such stupid nonsense no one should ever have done that.
        What annoyed me Richard was, it reminded me of the final in Sydney when England won the rugby world Cup the Ref was South African and he handed so many very dubious penalties to the Australians, it became so obvious he was completely bias. They are supposed to be neutral what ever their nationality or the occasion.

    3. I’m sorry about your mate, Eddy. That’s hard. I seem to be most of the way through it now, unfortunately, so can sympathise..

      1. Thanks Obs it wasn’t Covid, I just had an email from one of his daughters, he had lymphoma of the brain. He’d been very poorly since last August.
        He Died at home with his family by his side.

      1. It really is going down the DM route. I’m not sure what readership it thinks it will attract.

          1. It needs a separate branch for news coverage and magazine type stories.
            A start would be to be able to opt out of the supplements you don’t want when buying the printed version and just pay for what you want. I stopped buying the Sat and Sun papers years ago because 80% went straight in the bin.

            If they did this it would cost less and I might start buying it again. It would also save a lot of trees.

            A bonus would be if the dross could also be filtered out from the website.

          2. I haven’t bought the DT since my dear parrot died last year.
            I used the spread to line the bottom of his cage to catch all his bits and pieces .

          3. I buy it occasionally. I miss the crossword. It’s just not the same doing it on t’internet.

          4. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f43e684f71e4ea485c867e66adcdd119267c79d79b7182f687ce43f5917f3298.jpg Why don’t you just draw a blank crossword grind on a sheet of A4 paper and copy it each day from the internet?

            I drew this Soduko grid on a sheet of A4 and I make copies on my printer (both side of each sheet). I can then use it to copy four single Soduko puzzles or one large (Big ‘X’) type puzzle. For ‘Killer’ Soduko I connect all the boxes for each section with a highlighter pen. It works a treat.

          5. Good afternoon Grizzly!

            http://www.websudoku.com/

            This link gives you a limitless number of sudokus at 4 different levels: Easy, Medium, Hard and Diabolic. I usually print a few at a time and keep them on a clip-pad in the downstairs loo. You can also do them interactively on your computer.

            I usually do the Hard ones because I need to take notes when I do the diabolical ones. I can keep all the relevant information in my head when I do the hard ones.

          9. Buy the online ‘virtual paper’, like I do, for £26 a month. This includes all the supplements without a single tree being chopped. You simply turn each page as you do with the real newspaper. I’ve had it for years now.

    2. Oh dear the poor luv, is she espousing suffrage and perhaps mental health issues…………
      I’ll get me secateurs and start pruning the climber.

        2. I thought a libido was an outdoors swimming pool… we had one in Newport Pagnell in the 80s. Bloody cold, it was, too.

          4. There was one at Ruislip – where the 151 bus went. I was not allowed to go there because of the risk of polio.

      2. Women’s Lib’s destroying my libido
        And I just won’t stand for it anymore.
        My macho’s getting mangled, my morale is sinking fast
        My self-esteem’s not been so low before.
        I used to wear the trousers in our happy little home
        I used to rule the roost in kingly style
        But women’s lib’s destroying my libido
        And I find it hard to even raise a smile.

        (Part of an RCT song from 1970’s)

        When I perform this song Caroline always points out that I wrote it long before I met her

      3. Women’s Lib’s destroying my libido
        And I just won’t stand for it anymore.
        My macho’s getting mangled, my morale is sinking fast
        My self-esteem’s not been so low before.
        I used to wear the trousers in our happy little home
        I used to rule the roost in kingly style
        But women’s lib’s destroying my libido
        And I find it hard to even raise a smile.

        (Part of an RCT song from 1970’s)

        When I perform this song Caroline always points out that I wrote it song long before I met her

  33. I am not advocating this so don’t shoot me down in flames. I’m merely using the example to ridicule the current take on historical events.

    If the BAME population gets compensation for perceived injustices committed centuries ago, why should women not receive the same for being denied education, being burned as witches, being ducked on ducking stools…

    2. Or every person under 16 for their counterparts in former years being sent down mines and up chimneys as well as working in cotton mills?
      David Livingstone – Mill worker aged 10 (12 hour day)
      Mary Slessor – Mill worker aged 11 (at fourteen she worked a 12 hour day)

    1. We blame the milkman for the birth of our 3rd, Student Son.
      He woke us up early one morning and we couldn’t get back to sleep again!

  35. The BBC website today has an article regarding the new law in Hong Kong that has been used to arrest political activists.
    The BBC does not have an article on the stand alone personnel policy that the Scottish Government introduced, without consultation, to allow disciplinary action to be taken against former Ministers of the Scottish government. This policy was not integrated with the rest of personnel policy and procedures as an an update of the general rules, as would normally have happened.
    It is self evident that this policy was introduced with the sole purpose of bringing action against Alex Salmond. One of the revelations that the Press have overlooked, just as they have overlooked that Mt Salmond was not on trial in this inquiry. The inquiry is not into his conduct but that of the Scottish government, the present First Minister, and the associated actions of the Lord Advocate and the Head of the Civil Service.

    2. It is impossible to protest peacefully. The police will not allow it. They will wade in with physical provocation. See not the MSM.eg Rebel News.

  37. Today is the Curse of Father Ted day. I expect Ardal O’Hanlon and Pauline McLynn will be glad when today is over, and they live to see another year. Pity about the other two – the 28th February got them both!

    2. Some TV shows appear to cause many an early death. Being a sci-fi fan myself, I couldn’t believe how many of the main cast from Babylon 5 went to an early grave:

      Michael O’Hare – heart attack (60) but had suffered from paranoid delusions during filming and agreed to leave for the good of the show at the end of the first season;
      Jerry Doyle – natural causes (60) but was exaccerbated by chronic alcoholism;
      Mira Furlan – complications from West Nile virus (65 – just last month);
      Richard Biggs – complications stemming from aortic dissection (44);
      Stephen Furst – complications related to diabetes (63);
      Andreas Katsulas – lung cancer (59);
      Jeff Conaway (60) – various causes, including aspiration pneumonia and encephalopathy, attributable to drug overdoses.

      That’s nearly half the entire main cast over 5 seasons who didn’t make it to 70. Admitedly, unlike with Father Ted, they all made it to the natural end of the show.

      Another show where many cast members died – either during production or just after leaving, was BBC’s Ballykissangel. Ironically, all the cast members who actually died never were referred to as dying (as their characters) in the show, whereas all those actors whose characters died in the show are all still very much alive!

  38. Snooker.Players Championship Final £175,000 on the line
    First frame John Higgins calls a (invisible,ref didn’t see it) foul on himself when in a position to close out the first frame………….
    Interesting contrast with our cricketers,footballers and other sportsmen

    1. Afternoon Rik. Most games in the world were invented by the English. Since they were play it was thought undesirable to have too many referees etc, since this would mean those chosen for this task being unable to participate. So a generous allowance was made for honesty and self- governance commonly called Sportsmanship. As soon as they were appropriated by foreigners this vanished and the games became increasingly mercenary and rule bound with the pleasure of playing subordinated to mere winning!

      1. Then you get the Paul Newman (i.e. American) version of fair play: “Show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser!”

    4. To be fair to the players, its far easier for the TV cameras (and normally, the audience, never mind the ref) to catch them out, so not doing so and then being caught is a big faux-pas. Besides, Higgins got caugh and was banned for 2 years (if I recall) some years ago for chating via a betting ring, so it’s in his best interests to be proverbially ‘whiter than white’.

  39. Next door neighbour is up a ladder, fiddling about with his garage roof, in rural England – with his clinical face mask on.

      1. Or in my case, Dangerous things neighbours. I was warned about her, by a complete stranger, before I had even seen the person who was going to move in next door. He was proved right. She is evil. 100%.

          1. The lad who warned me, just stopped me in the street and said “you’re getting a new neighbour aren’t you”. As I don’t think I’d seen him before I was shocked to realise he even knew where I lived. Then he told me that the neighbours there were throwing a party because she was leaving – and finished with the warning about her – followed by F***ing Good luck with that ( her) – You’ll (me) need it.. Then he left. Due to my job and hours I didn’t even see her for months. She was ok to start with, then it started going downhill and downhill and downhill. Then somehow she got a “boyfriend” ( clearly no eyesight or taste ) – and he moved in.
            I won’t tell you what else as I cannot prove it. No film of it. If I won the lotto and moved I would have this house done up – then move a family of immigrants or Roma in – just for revenge.

          2. Sounds awful…. I hope you aren’t semi-D. We are semi-D but in a cottagey sort of way – our immediate neighbours are what one used to call yuppies, very aspirational and were even heading out to China to adopt a Chinese baby à la the Sunday supplements, it was all the rage at the time. They are very much into virtue signalling, and how better to signal your virtue to all than by having an adopted Chinese child within the bosom of the family? However the Chinese authorities put a stop to that sort of thing almost as they were boarding the plane. They have had extensive building work and landscaping done, in fact the builder next door when I was in conversation with him said it must be really difficult living next door to people like this! However, they aren’t evil…. neighbours are perhaps the most important thing to consider when buying a house but most of us just hope for the best. And then, like you, and us, one has no choice at all because they simply arrive anyway.

          3. Sometimes you don’t get a say in who your neighbours are; I had perfectly delightful and helpful neighbours who sold up and moved out and were replaced by some stinkers. C’est la vie.

          4. Its not the ones I am connected to – they are so quiet they are wonderful – I don’t even know they’re names after a year. The car goes – the car comes back and stops about 3 steps from their door. I assume it is a couple “50s” and an adult daughter who appears to have mobility probs as the car she has is a Mobility and the one time I saw her – and said hello – which was returned – she was using crutches to stand. The “mother” – I have only seen drive off and return. The “father” works at a factory about 8 miles away (accidentally got a letter for him but only noticed after I opened it. I have said hello twice to him but he only replies hello – and makes no attempt to stop and even chat for 5 minutes. I’m ok with that.

            The problem is the ones I am NOT connected to. Neither working or retired, but just live on benefits, sit in all day with tv, smokes and drink. I know she has told lies and spread rumours but cannot prove it. Before we all got a bin, specifically for glass, tins and plastic bottles ( and having to put the bin out the previous night for first thing collection ) they used to go out and fill MY bin, with THEIR bottles about 1am. Theirs was already full. The new bin gave them enough room. That problem solved.

        3. I’ve only ever had one problematic neighbour in over 40 years of home-ownership – three houses so far – and that was a slightly batty old woman who started out as a friend but turned into someone who saw issues where there were none.

          1. We had some problem neighbours at our previous address – we left there 26 years ago. The first was the next door family who delighted in throwing their rubbish into our garden. They eventually moved out and a nice couple moved in and proceeded to have two well-behaved children. They moved on and the house was sold, and shortly after that let to students. They kept changing, and finally a woman moved in who got them sorted (they were extremely noisy) and the house was sold on again.

      2. Unfortunately surgical grade masks don’t stop asbestos. Far high grades of PPE and precautions are required.

        1. Yep.
          When my son, who is pretty near the top of the tree in that particular field, sets off in his “full” PPE one might be forgiven for thinking he was about to enter Chernobyl.

    6. Have you noticed that many people, such as your neighbour, openly and unashamedly display levels of stupidity that no other species of living organism is capable of?

    7. I’m glad to say that nobody we encountered on our walk today – and the world and his wife was out and about today – was wearing a face mask apart from one woman who had hers round her chin.

      1. Same here – and the sunshine brought just about everybody out, dogs, children, grannies; they were all there.

      2. Jim Croce’s I Got A Name was originally the theme song from the 1973 film The Last American Hero.

  50. 329765+ up ticks,
    Rustled from breitbart comments,
    The user name looks familiar , up Grimsby way methinks,

    mike hook • 2 days ago
    Simple solution, If you want to eradicate these illegals entering the UK via Boats and trucks, at the next General Election vote for The New Reform UK party, if you strongly want political changes for the UK working classes, you will vote REFORM UK.
    I know Nigel Farage is not every ones cup of tea, BUT he brought in BREXIT to exit the UK from the EU.
    They will sort out all the Tory and Labour wrongs that have blighted the true working class voters lives. So if you want real change this is the way to go.

    Like the farage chap sorted them out last time, by the by UKIP worked 28 years bringing in the referendum & four million gave a hand at the final push.
    He,farage was the mouthpiece of the party resigning once/twice, then went to get his life back.

    His mass ( 30000) knife work on the UKIP membership was envied by the lab/lib/con coalition.

    Good blokes & a very credible party under Gerard Batten were put down via treacherous actions from the nEc / nige inputs.

    1. ‘Afternoon, Ogga, “The user name looks familiar , up Grimsby way methinks”

      Are you sure it’s not everyone’s favourite friend, Mike Hunt?

      1. 329765+ up ticks,
        Afternoon NtN,
        I know what you are saying but I believe it could have more serious connotations as in support for farage ( imo unwarranted /
        undeserved) from the fisherman’s friend M, Hookem, Grimsby.

    2. Trouble is, you’d be having to make pit-stops every couple of miles if you were to drink that much on the journey.

      1. 27,8 gallons – about 1/2 gallon a week, that’s 4 pints. Wow.
        To maintain the accuracy of that statistic, I need to double my consumption as SWMBO doesn’t do alcohol.

  53. Just discovered a recent ‘interesting’ reply to a comment I made on a YouTube channel some time ago.

    I originally posted:

    Little Boy: “Mummy, when I grow up I’m going to be a Socialist!”
    Mother: “Well, make your mind up, son. You can’t do both.”

    Someone called Seán 1912 has just retorted:

    If my kid said that I’d say “Fantastic you’ve been raised not to be greedy self centred and selfish and totally rulled [sic] by thinking money is your god!!”……. I’m proud of you! You have decency compassion and morals.

    Could I resist? Of course not:

    And if my child (a ‘kid’ is a baby goat!) said that, I’d think he had been brainwashed by the failed ideology of Marx, Lenin, Chavez, Pol Pot, Nicolae Ceaușescu, Papa Doc, Mao Tse Tung, Bernie Sanders, Erich Honecker and a thousand other Pinko totalitarian scum dictators who wish to preach equality whilst getting filthy rich from the sweat of the very workforce they have duped with their poisoned rhetoric.

    How easily the simple are hoodwinked, especially those living in the poverty and squalor (Venezuela , anyone?) caused directly by Socialism. I bet your baby goat wears Nike trainers, manufactured by a free market economy.

    I await the arrival of more Marxist ‘Cultural Theory’.

        1. There ain’t no cure for stoopid.

          I feel so sorry for the next generation growing up in Scotland if the
          SNP make law their new hate crime Bill and gender recognition act –
          where you can legally change your gender at will, with no checks,
          doctors agreement or anything. …

          ‘Doctor, we’ve been unable to conceive a baby’

          ‘They’d because your both biologically male’

          ‘No, I’m a man and my wife is a woman’

          ‘No, your wife is biologically male’

          ‘Biological? What’s that? She’s not a man’

          ‘It’s a taboo science thing, it explains how men and women reproduce’

          ‘But I’m a man and she’s a woman. You need a man and a woman to
          reproduce, we learned that at school’

          ‘No, you’re both biologically men, you both have penises and testes’

          ‘No, I’m a man with a penis and my wife is a woman with a penis. And
          everyone knows men can have babies now anyway’

          ‘Yes, but those men who have babies are actually biologically women’

          ‘OMG!!! I’m reporting you to the police for a hate crime and I demand a
          second opinion from a doctor who is not a transphobe!’

          1. The new hate crime law is intended to silence critics of immigration, immigrants, muslims and muslim criminals. It just is worded in a way so as to disguise this intention, as well as making any opinion about anything illegal.

    2. Another one of those deluded fools that say the whole system must be brought down and rebuilt better and fairer , completely oblivious to the fact that history has repeatedly proven that utopias always have and always will fail consistently as long as humans are involved.

    3. ‘If you’re not a liberal when you’re 25, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative by the time you’re 35, you have no brain.’

    4. Children are not taught what socialism is, nor the horrors of communism. Most don’t understand capitalism either. All they see is ‘he has more than me’ and they think they think they should have it.

      1. “…he has more than me’ and they think they think they should have it.
        The positive in that is the thought “I wonder how I can be like that, well-off?” followed by hard work & risk taking.
        The negative thought is “How unfair he has more than me. He should have it taken away & given to me”.

        1. It seems to me that the first one is (or used to be) the American outlook, while the second has become the standard British response.

      2. The exponential rise in human stupidity is down to a combination of imbecilic parents and clueless teachers.

    7. Additionally, socialists killed (outside of the World Wars) around 100M of its own citizens, more than everyone from both WWI & II.

      1. Just reading a book called “Morningside Mata Haris” about MI6 and MI9. One of the points made is that reports on the atrocities committed by the Russians in WW2 rarely made it into light and if they were published, spin was put on it to exonerate Uncle Joe. Plus ça change …

    1. Apparently the most significant effect in on the tongue. Also highly transmissible, as the many consonants in a row in the name induce the person saying it to spit all over people nearby…

  55. I see more (justified) moans about the quality of the DT. It is hardly surprising, given that the editor, Chris Evans, is ex-DM.

    Extract from Wikipedia:

    After 11 years reporting for The Daily Mail, Evans joined The Telegraph as a news editor in January 2007. He ‘kept a low profile’ while managing to rise to high office. He is said to have a ‘solid news background’ with populist news instincts.

    In 2017, Evans expressed his view that fake news is “great” for the news industry, in the sense that it fostered more trust in traditional news brands by contrast, thus “increasing [their] value”.

    No wonder the DT is a shadow of its former self and is gradually turning into a tabloid magazine!

    1. I rarely find news in the DT, just airhead fluff. Can’t be bothered to look there any more, and certainly not pay for anything.

    2. I have some sympathy for them. The Press have an enormous problem – there’s no money. ITV cut into their prior monopoly on advertizing via publications, that is now gone completely and also there is very little profit from newsprint sales. Only the DM made serious money from the internet and that has declined since Dacre left. Evans was brought in to try and repeat that success of the DM, which is fair enough. The DT used have a lot of reporters like all the nationals, now they can afford very few.

      They are a small organization living off a big name and desperately trying to keep the plates twirling. Unless someone finds a way for newspapers to make money, they will all die off.

  57. For most of its history, without exception during the Bamber Gascoigne era, and for most of the early Jeremy Paxman era, contestants on University Challenge invariably introduced themselves thus: “Hello. My name is James Smith (Helen Murgatroyd), I’m from Rugby (Aberystwyth) and I’m reading History.”

    In this ‘woke’ age, all that tradition has been demolished. Nowadays you get this drivel: “Hi! I’m Jack (Sophie), I’m ‘originally’ from The Peak District (London, England) and I’m doing (studying/just done/just passed/got a degree/working for) film studies/PPE.”

    It seems that no area of life is immune to the onward march of mediocrity.

    3. Seems a fair change to me. I studied Mathematics, and no you don’t ‘read’ Mathematics – that is for the arty farty subjects – you study it. It’s no use just reading a theorem, you have to think about the premise, work through and attack the proof, link any corollaries back to the theorem. Mere reading won’t get you a pass degree. Even more so Engineering. If you read Engineering instead of studying it, then what you make doesn’t work.

        1. I have a couple of books (one of them is in Swedish!) on Paper Aeroplanes – so I do read paper aeroplanes 🙂

      2. I can vouch for that. I always loved my mum’s cheeky riposte by saying ‘Joe, Bloggs, reading books’.

    4. Good evening Grizz

      There is now a 1st Class Honours Degree for Mediocrity and I understand it has a pass rate of 150%.

    5. Applies to the (deleted) comment below.
      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.
      F**kwit is not reasonable debate. Deleted.

    6. I turned off years ago in protest at the lack of engineering questions (and other subjects) on the show. Most of the questions tend to be on (and in order of frequency): art, music (though more now on ‘modern’ music), history, the three main sciences, politics, film.

      Also, Bamber was MILES ahead of Paxman, who I cannot stand because of his huge ego and style.

  58. The submission of Peter Hitchens.

    I’ve had the Covid jab – and all it cost me was my freedom

    So sorry, Your Majesty, but I have had my first Covid vaccination for wholly selfish reasons. I did not do it for the good of others but for my own convenience. And I will have my second for the same purpose.

    A very important part of my family now lives abroad and I am deeply tired of not being able to see them. I get the strong sense that any sort of travel, and plenty of other things, will be impossible if I don’t have the necessary vaccine certificate.

    I hope it becomes known as the Blair Passport – as it is largely the warmongering Creature’s idea and people will come to hate it, as they have come to hate so many of his actions. So I have been more or less forced to have an immunisation I would not normally have bothered with.

    Don’t, if you are wise, dare call me an ‘anti-vaxxer’. I have, in a long life, been injected against tetanus, smallpox, TB, polio, diphtheria and yellow fever. I’m a fiend for preventive medicine and the precautions I take when I’m in malarial areas are so elaborate my companions laugh at them – from swallowing horrible protective medicines to blasting my hotel room with ultra-strength death sprays to exterminate any possible mosquitoes. These are all terrible diseases and I think it’s wise to do this.

    And if you think Covid is as dangerous as them, I certainly don’t want to put you off the jab. Indeed, I don’t want to put you off in any way. It’s your business, not mine, and not even the Queen’s.

    I dislike her growing habit of getting involved in politics and I’d feel the same if she supported any cause I liked. Of course, my selfish injection didn’t hurt. I’m a blood donor (so also please don’t call me selfish), used to far bigger needles in my arm, for a lot longer. But I did feel a pang of regret and loss.

    For me, the vaccination was a gloomy submission to a new world of excessive safety and regulation. I’d tried to fight against it but I lost. The New Jerusalem, in which we allow the state to boss us around even more, in the name of our own good, is now coming into being.

    And so we are just going to be under surveillance a lot more, recorded a lot more and bossed about a lot more. I’m reminded of the great Edwardian satirist Saki’s bitter 1913 novel When William Came about an imaginary German invasion of Britain. Its hero returns to a transformed homeland from a long expedition to Tsarist Siberia (during which a fierce marsh fever has laid him low and left him in a coma for weeks).

    When he finally reaches his London home, his wife apologises that she has to fill in a long police form to report his presence, explaining that it is ‘a stupid form to be filled up when any one arrives, to say where they come from, and their business and nationality and religion, and all that sort of thing. We’re rather more bureaucratic than we used to be, you know’.

    Well, and so are we, and it will now get worse, because we have been through a revolution, in which we gave up real freedom for the illusion of safety. For me, almost all I need to know about it is that Mr Blair likes it so much.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-9307363/PETER-HITCHENS-Ive-Covid-jab-cost-freedom.html

  59. The submission of Peter Hitchens.

    I’ve had the Covid jab – and all it cost me was my freedom

    So sorry, Your Majesty, but I have had my first Covid vaccination for wholly selfish reasons. I did not do it for the good of others but for my own convenience. And I will have my second for the same purpose.

    A very important part of my family now lives abroad and I am deeply tired of not being able to see them. I get the strong sense that any sort of travel, and plenty of other things, will be impossible if I don’t have the necessary vaccine certificate.

    I hope it becomes known as the Blair Passport – as it is largely the warmongering Creature’s idea and people will come to hate it, as they have come to hate so many of his actions. So I have been more or less forced to have an immunisation I would not normally have bothered with.

    Don’t, if you are wise, dare call me an ‘anti-vaxxer’. I have, in a long life, been injected against tetanus, smallpox, TB, polio, diphtheria and yellow fever. I’m a fiend for preventive medicine and the precautions I take when I’m in malarial areas are so elaborate my companions laugh at them – from swallowing horrible protective medicines to blasting my hotel room with ultra-strength death sprays to exterminate any possible mosquitoes. These are all terrible diseases and I think it’s wise to do this.

    And if you think Covid is as dangerous as them, I certainly don’t want to put you off the jab. Indeed, I don’t want to put you off in any way. It’s your business, not mine, and not even the Queen’s.

    I dislike her growing habit of getting involved in politics and I’d feel the same if she supported any cause I liked. Of course, my selfish injection didn’t hurt. I’m a blood donor (so also please don’t call me selfish), used to far bigger needles in my arm, for a lot longer. But I did feel a pang of regret and loss.

    For me, the vaccination was a gloomy submission to a new world of excessive safety and regulation. I’d tried to fight against it but I lost. The New Jerusalem, in which we allow the state to boss us around even more, in the name of our own good, is now coming into being.

    And so we are just going to be under surveillance a lot more, recorded a lot more and bossed about a lot more. I’m reminded of the great Edwardian satirist Saki’s bitter 1913 novel When William Came about an imaginary German invasion of Britain. Its hero returns to a transformed homeland from a long expedition to Tsarist Siberia (during which a fierce marsh fever has laid him low and left him in a coma for weeks).

    When he finally reaches his London home, his wife apologises that she has to fill in a long police form to report his presence, explaining that it is ‘a stupid form to be filled up when any one arrives, to say where they come from, and their business and nationality and religion, and all that sort of thing. We’re rather more bureaucratic than we used to be, you know’.

    Well, and so are we, and it will now get worse, because we have been through a revolution, in which we gave up real freedom for the illusion of safety. For me, almost all I need to know about it is that Mr Blair likes it so much.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-9307363/PETER-HITCHENS-Ive-Covid-jab-cost-freedom.html

    2. I’m very disappointed with this cop-out, especially as Hitchens of all people must understand the implications of vaccine passports, namely that they give permission to the government to jab whatever they want into our arms in the future, as they will be maintained by regular jabs.

      This comment was under the article. Does anyone know if it’s true?
      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e9287327986510c94fa9980babece7afd5f1fde13df07572696b786b3d22720f.png

        1. Fairy nuff. But is the Oxford/Astra Zeneca vaccine worse than the mRNA variants produced by Pfizer et al? I had the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 jab last Friday. Apart from mild aches and bruising around the left shoulder, there are no obvious side effects* I remain sceptical about the vaccines, but accepted mine since the writing on the wall suggests that ‘normal’ life will be impossible without accepting it.

          *For what it’s worth, I’ve developed a swelling on the left elbow, which is prolly Bursitis, since having the jab. It’s probably unrelated, but who knows?

          1. I don’t know about them. I have declined the jab. The article is really about the manufacturing process and ethics. Whether the vaccine works remains to be seen.

        2. Thanks. I will read it tomorrow.
          The commenter’s logic is hard to disagree with. I think people should face up to reality about abortion. But they don’t want to, because it shines a light on what they as human beings are capable of doing. Note that I am not necessarily ruling it out, or even using the bodies of the murdered people.
          But we should be honest about what we as a society are doing, and about how we are purchasing our luxuries.

      2. Given what pharma companies have done in the past (see what they did as regards the fake Swine Flu pandemic of 2010), then I wouldn’t put it past them. Notice also the distinct lack of transparency generally as regards the vaccines and the high amount of ‘collaboration’ between them, governments and the MSM – and not in a good way – particularly on discussions about the vaccines, testing, side effects, etc etc.

        1. My feeling is that if you give the power to Gates or other vaccine proponent to inject what he wants into the arms of the masses, then he may be tempted to abuse it.

          1. I think he (and they from big tech/pharma) already has abused that power, and for a long time now.

    3. I think many of us have had routine inoculations against many diseases from childhood onwards. In my case I have had immunisations against: polio, diphtheria, tuberculosis, typhoid, paratyphoid, tetanus, influenza and hepatitis ‘C’.

  60. The media are getting wound up about the abuse heaped on Sonja McLaughlan. Now I don’t hold with abuse except possibly in a heated argument, but I am getting fed up with these girls entering the man’s world of men’s sport, insisting on behaving like men, “I interviewed him just like a man would” and then bursting into tears at the inevitable abuse that anyone, male or female, would get if they interviewed a losing captain like that.

    The problem is they just don’t care, not really, but they copy what men do, not realizing what strong emotions they are walking all over. At least if a bloke did it, you would know he understood this was going to upset people and there would be flak, and lots of it.

    2. When my wife suggests at the end of the interview that the interviewer was being unnecessarily aggressive and trying to get a reaction that could later be used against the interviewee, I know that the interviewer has gone totally OTT.

        1. The rugby is bad enough, the post match interviews are worse, much worse.

          I think that the woman in question brought a lot of the on-line abuse on herself.

      1. If they just did it ‘as women’ it would be so much better. But women as imitation men are completely useless.

    4. I haven’t seen the incident you describe, but the gist is so familiar. I am utterly fed up with the spoiled successful graduates of a feminised education system and positive discrimination/quotas trying their BS on in the real world.

    5. Rather like the England female cricker who ‘mocked’ our men’s side’s defeat to the Indians and then (and the rest of the wokerati) didn’t like it when the male players told her where to go.

  61. I am about to leave you. Spent two hours this arvo shifting ten barrow loads of compost for the roses. Knackered. However, in 24 minutes a glass of special medicine will be available.

    Have a smooth evening – don’t forget your mask, poppiesmum!!

    A demain.

    3. A sorted out the saplings I dropped yesterday, then dropped a small 4″ diameter ash with the S@H’s assistance.
      I’ve 5 8″ or so ash to drop and a couple more 4″, but will need to pull them up towards the top of the garden as I cut them to make sure they miss the road.
      I’m stacking the trunks of the larger trees I’m dropping up the garden until the end of the year when they’ll be cut & chopped for winter ’22.

    6. We are withdrawing from the EU practice whereby you can nominate an EU country to pay your tax in regardless of where the sales are made. Therefore with effect from tomorrow the likes of Amazon, Starbucks and many others will pay corporation tax on all profits from sales in the U.K.
      This will mean we will be able to reduce personal taxation in many instances.

      1. At the same time as Dishi Rishi is putting a levy on online sales/delivery.

        ***I know. Let’s protect one failing business model (The High St) and penalise the successful model (Internet sales).

        Sounds Gordon Brownian to me.

        1. I agree up to a point.
          However, where the online businesses are moving their local profits to a low tax regime, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to tax them on the profits made in the country where they are trading.

        2. My view is to take the money from those who are making profits in this country but not paying the tax that would be due if they paid their tax here instead of Luxembourg.

          As an individual you try working in this country but saying you don’t have to pay income tax because your chose country if registration is Luxembourg. I bet you’d get an extremely short answer. That’s all I’m saying.

        3. I deeply resent contributing to Jeff Bezos’ bank balance. But Amazon are actually rather good at what they do. I subscribe to Prime, not just for the video, but the free delivery. Supermarket delivery slots are as rare as rocking horse droppings. Amazon Fresh offers same day delivery (or next day at the latest). Most of Amazon’s offerings are cheap Chinese rubbish. But try and find a British equivalent. We have given up making things.

          Given the punitive nature of business rates, I’d willingly pay a surcharge on online deliveries. To a point…

          1. “Most of Amazon’s offerings are cheap Chinese rubbish” True, but a lot of what were goods made by quality brands in the UK or Europe or the US, have now been outsourced to China. I see this with 99% of fishing tackle, but it’s also clothing and electrical stuff.

        4. The problem is that the very same internet/tech giants were the very ones pushing governments for lockdowns precisely because it drove more custom their way and gave them far more power, as shown by Amazon (who own about 90% of all servers [website hosting] worldwide by storage capacity) cancelling parler’s contract to host their service with 24hrs notice because of the lie that the Jan 6th ‘riots’ at the US Caiptol building were organised on parler, when in fact it was almost soley on Facebook and some of twitter.

          Something needs to be done to curb their power, which is also being used to drive up their profits at everyone else’s expense. Many industrialised nations could end up the way of Brazil with a small uber-rich class and the masses being poverty-stricken, even if it doesn’t come immediately. Wait a few months for huge numbers of job losses in the UK and in many other countries after furlough schemes are wound up.

          I agree that taxes may not necessarily be the way, or least the only one.

        5. The problem is that the very same internet/tech giants were the very ones pushing governments for lockdowns precisely because it drove more custom their way and gave them far more power, as shown by Amazon (who own about 90% of all servers [website hosting] worldwide by storage capacity) cancelling parler’s contract to host their service with 24hrs notice because of the lie that the Jan 6th ‘riots’ at the US Caiptol building were organised on parler, when in fact it was almost soley on Facebook and some of twitter.

          Something needs to be done to curb their power, which is also being used to drive up their profits at everyone else’s expense. Many industrialised nations could end up the way of Brazil with a small uber-rich class and the masses being poverty-stricken, even if it doesn’t come immediately. Wait a few months for huge numbers of job losses in the UK and in many other countries after furlough schemes are wound up.

          I agree that taxes may not necessarily be the way, or least the only one.

      2. Any company has to pay tax on it’s UK operations, always has had to. What companies like Starbucks do is charge a fortune for IPR (Logos etc) that goes back to the parent company, that mops up all the UK operating profit, so no tax on profits. But the VAT always stayed in this country and we paid a majority percentage to the the EU. HMRC have made a start at valuing IPR and ‘Management services’ (the other heading for draining out operating profit) but there is a long way to go and this is all governed by international tax treaties. It will not change quickly, but I think they are making progress. The whole IPR finagle took a body blow when Swissair had the name valued at 1Bn SFr in their accounts when they went bust. It’s actual saleable value turned out to be zero.

        Amazon went further. Your contract was with Amazon in Luxembourg and the VAT was paid there. The UK operation was just a commissioning organization that shipped the stuff out on the orders of Luxembourg, but there was no profit in the UK. It seems that the contract is still with Amazon Luxembourg, but the VAT is now paid in the UK. The VAT was more complicated than I am describing, but this is not a tutorial.

        1. If I understand correctly it’s a legal swindle that should be illegal.
          However in answer to Plum’s original post I would still like to see it in the budget.

        2. “The VAT always stayed in this country” is a bit misleading. VAT is an EU tax and a proportion of it went (and if the truth be known, probably still goes) to the EU.

    8. Where to start…
      A commitment not to fund any more illegals.
      No more green subsidies or taxes.
      Defund the BBC
      Stop handing out so much money to big charities, or come clean that they’re government departments.
      Halve the number of bloodsuckers on the taxpayer teat.

      1. Add to that:

        Defund any department / university that suppresses free speech, goes woke/supports BLM or cancel culture (including getting rid of statues/revisionism, etc) or accepts money from China etc in return for ‘considerations’. That and runs cr@p or woke courses, where funding of student loans will be pulled for them as well.

        TBH, government/councils should never fund charities – the only things they should get involved with are co-ordination efforts concerned with relief efforts after wars and natural disasters or the like. Only individual citizens should be able to give money to charities, also no businesse should either, rather like all those big multinationals funding BLM.

        Reverse the stupid change to new electric car sales only from 2030 and put it back to 2050 at least. 2040 and 2035 were bad enough.

      2. Add to that:

        Defund any department / university that suppresses free speech, goes woke/supports BLM or cancel culture (including getting rid of statues/revisionism, etc) or accepts money from China etc in return for ‘considerations’. That and runs cr@p or woke courses, where funding of student loans will be pulled for them as well.

        TBH, government/councils should never fund charities – the only things they should get involved with are co-ordination efforts concerned with relief efforts after wars and natural disasters or the like. Only individual citizens should be able to give money to charities, also no businesse should either, rather like all those big multinationals funding BLM.

        Reverse the stupid change to new electric car sales only from 2030 and put it back to 2050 at least. 2040 and 2035 were bad enough.

    9. Cancel HS2. Use the money to double Defence. Use International Development budget as a win/win – ie spend the money in the UK to provide material assistance abroad.

    11. A bit of fiscal responsibility? A realisation that tax hikes are NOT what we need for a recovery budget and a recognition that there is no such thing as a magic money tree.

  63. Anyone in need of a calm moment?

    I posted the link to the Danish String Quartet’s version of Mit hjerte altid vanker this lunchtime.
    Here is the original song quite beautifully sung by Danish chamberchoir Coro Misto.

    https://youtu.be/Ijp-cCeQCLs

  65. Interesting one:
    Nearly a quarter of NHS staff in London are refusing Covid vaccines
    Almost a quarter of NHS staff in some parts of the country are refusing Covid jabs, with official statistics showing more than 200,000 health and care workers putting patients at risk, Laura Donnelly, our Health Editor, reports.
    NHS figures show that 91 percent of front line healthcare staff across the country have taken up the offer of a vaccine, but that dips to 76 per cent in London – the worst refusal rate.
    In total, more than 41,000 front line healthcare workers in the capital, including medics, hospital porters, cleaners and laboratory staff, have not had the jab.
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/28/quarter-nhs-staff-areas-refusing-covid-vaccines/

      1. Maybe because quite a few have seen first hand what it is to die drowning as a result of Severe Acute Respiratory syndrome?

          1. Perhaps those unwilling have not had to deal with the really severe cases?

            A few weeks back I spoke to a friend of mine, a retired doctor but currently serving on the Ethics Committee of a major London Teaching Hospital. He couldn’t wait to be called for the vaccine.

        2. My ex-partner’s former husband just died around 5 pm, genuinely from Covid-19, after 5 weeks in hospital, mostly on a ventilator. Not quite 70, diabetic and somewhat overweight, I’m still surprised that the dreaded lurgy got him. I was never a member of his fan club, but – while remaining sceptical, I do feel sorry for his kids, and his widow.

          I would just add that funerals almost disappeared in 2020. Typically, I’d play the organ for two or three a month. Last year? Four. None were Covid-related.

          1. A local funeral director said a few days ago that he had absolutely no idea where the NHS is getting the death figures from, as he has had no change over the past 12 months. He actually collects bodies from the hospital too.

    3. The comments in the Mail under this article are very depressing. Mostly of the “Sack’em if they don’t comply instantly, I have had my jab and now I want everyone else to have one too” variety.

        1. East Croydon station this morning was full of police, I think they were trying to put people off going into London

          4. I wonder how they decide which places to pick on. Shepherds Bush has LBHF council people around during the week but no police on foot for months now. Maybe because we have real crime around here.

        2. East Croydon station this morning was full of police, I think they were trying to put people off going into London

    5. Why do these clips always start just before the arrest? I would have more sympathy for those arrested if I could see the events leading up to the arrest, otherwise it all suggests it is taken out of context.

      1. Following your logic, the Iron Curtain and the Berlin Wall would never have fallen.

        Be good little people, do what the criminal regime says, or we’ll beat you up.

        That poor girl was put through hell by those bullies and all you and David Wainwright can do is equivocate.

        Shameful !

  71. Key moment in aviation as Rolls-Royce develops its electric plane

    “It’s really a flying propulsion system with an aircraft attached,” says Stjohn Youngman, managing director of Electroflight, a start-up which is working with industry giant Rolls-Royce on the Accel project which Spirit of Innovation is the centrepiece of. “The power system weights 700kg (1,543lb) and the airframe is just 300kg.”

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5721bdb9e13a98bec4a1f61ff4c5b0bc20068000138463b72008622f1bf8e9c5.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/61f7a8aca24c46450dd6ab55f1a89a19c7eaefc458ded1a043c3fc23e86c584f.png

      1. Only if you’ve carved out half the wings! Oh, and changed the undercart to fold inwards (Spitfires’ undercarriages fold out into the wings which is why they are better in the air than on the ground – Hurricanes were much more robust in that respect).

        1. The good news is they are aiming for a performance that is 100mph faster than the German Fokker…..(sic)

        2. Slight sideways swerve but still aviation. With fields of solar panels going up – all facing South – do they create big areas of reflection into pilots eye who are flying generally North?

          5. Another really old line – but remembered by lots of people. The other one? – -Don’t call me Shirley.

          6. The local ones near the airfield played havoc with the Sky Dive club. They had to stop taking on beginners.

      3. Maybe is like those toy cars that you would pull back to load up the kinetic energy, then press the button or just let it go and off it goes! Wind up the propeller a thousand times, like the wind-up radio? Pedal powered?

        1. You’re far too young, E_A; I was referring to home-made, balsa wood and doped-tissue, model aeroplanes …

          1. lacoste, my father – who worked for Rolls-Royce in the Aero Engine Division, was a keen flier of model aeroplanes and won many prizes as a result. I always remember him using a hand-wound “drill” connected to the nose of his aeroplanes to wind up the rubber band which turned the propeller when released.

  73. Evening, all. Made it before midnight tonight! Why can’t historic houses open? They won’t have had time to write all the information about those horrible whiteys who made money out of slaves, I expect.

    1. Evening, Conway.
      I doubt that the Earl of Harewood would make a meal of that stuff. His family actually did own a plantation in the West Indies. I worked with a woman from Barbados back in the 80’s who told me the Lascelles plantation still existed, though of course by then the Earl’s family had long since ceased to have anything to do with it.

    1. Has Dover put that lorry scanner back in use yet? Millions spent only for someone to complain and it was switched off. I know most seem to be arriving by BF but 18? were found in a lorry a few days ago.

      1. There is no sign whatsoever of a serious attempt to curtail the ‘French Armada’ of illegal RIBs.

        Perhaps that’s on Carrie’s verboten list ?

        1. It certainly looks that way but everyone knows a flood of people at this rate is NOT going to end well. The culture who wants everyone to obey them will not stop coming while they get “punished” by being put in a hotel.

      1. They’re too bashful to remind us that Thereson May signed the UN Invasion Pact.

  75. Just for a larf:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/family/life/like-boris-had-tame-wild-lockdown-look/

    I’d say he looks more like Bert from The Big Bang Theory than Captain Haddock from Tintin.

    Simon Heffer: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/family/2021/02/28/simon-heffer-beard_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqqVzuuqpFlyLIwiB6NTmJwfSM8Sv5nIxQonD2k-JCC_U.jpg?imwidth=960

    Bert: https://3qbqmv3k0dsayahrd3pw8jru-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/the-big-bang-theory-dependence-7-750×422.jpg
    Captain Hddock: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3a/Captain_Haddock.png

  76. As I mentioned earlier today the best time to celebrate Ped’s great day is at midnight between 28th February and Ist March

    It has been suggested that this is done using French rather than English time

    So Ped my old grandfather clock is just striking midnight so I shall press the POST key now!

    Ped

    Many Happy Returns

    and we look forward to 2024 when your next real birthday will arrive on 29th February

    Very best wishes from

    Caroline and Rastus

    1. Ped

      Again – many more happy days.

      PS

      Knowing how old you actually are is a mystery as we do not have your year of birth.

      Usually on the turn of the century there is not a leap year but on the turn of the millennium there is.

      So 2000 was a leap year meaning that calculating the number of birthdays you have actually had is found by simply dividing your age by 4.

      Of course if you had been apprentice to a pirate like the chap in the Pirates of Penzance you would have to wait until you were 84 before the terms of your articles of apprenticeship were over on your 21st birthday.

      (According to my Nottler records only Dellboy, the Legal Beagle and Sguest have reached the Big 80)

        1. I haven’t got him on the list as the G&S high lord executioner would say. Can you help?

          1. No – I don’t know his birthday but I’ll ask him to let you know next time I see him here.

    2. Am I getting confused, Rastus? I thought it was Peddytheviking not Ped whose birthday was on February the 29th. Or are Ped and Peddy one and the same?

          2. Thank you, but it is now just turned midnight so I think that instead I shall lie down (in bed). Good night all.

          3. As Winnie said:

            “Economy of effort. Never stand up when you can sit down, and never sit down when you can lie down.”

    3. Thank you very much, Caroline and Rastus, and the many others who sent me good wishes. I was feted and treated by friends and went for a long walk around the lake and town of Huelgoat, in an area steeped in Celtic history and Arthurian legend. I have survived so far and have no intention of letting the ‘Coconut virus’ beat me. It is no fun living without access to the company of friends (I mean boozing) but we have ways and means. The biggest problem is the six o’clock curfew, but I am hoping it will be relaxed soon. Thank you again and best wishes to all. Keep safe, Per (Ped).

Comments are closed.