Thursday 9 April: The Government must win people over to obey the unenforceable

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 blacklisted.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/04/08/lettersthe-government-must-win-people-obey-unenforceable/

1,019 thoughts on “Thursday 9 April: The Government must win people over to obey the unenforceable”

    1. That cartoon is completely unmerited and ridiculous. It’s just stirring the pot.

      1. If you want to get on your high horse, take a look at Bob’s in the DT today. Raab is renowned for ordering the same prêt sandwich every day.

    2. Personally, I’m sick of the constant media sniping at Raab.
      It’s a branch of Boris Derangement Syndrome.
      Could any of these clever dicks do any better if they suddenly found themselves in the top job at a time of national meltdown?
      There’s keeping the government to account and then there’s deliberately destroying morale. The media have now opted for the second option.
      As ever, Kipling had it right: ‘Power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.’

      2. I haven’t seen as much sniping at Raab as I have seen fabricated stories about ‘power vacuum at the core of government’ and similar guff.

        The one person I know involved in providing daily analysis and advice to HMG (not in a medical role) has remarked on how well Raab has stepped into his de facto function and is respected by all in government. He listens, he asks questions, he decides. As regards the media, gov’t doesn’t care too much and are keeping their powder dry for a big push-back when the time comes to talk openly about exit strategy, which is ‘not yet’ despite Keir Starmer’s frothing at the mouth.

        1. Surely, by definition, fabricated stories about ‘power vacuum at the core of government’ is sniping at Raab? At present, he is the core of government. More power to his elbow.

      3. Because the MSM work in little fiefdoms fuelled by egos. They don’t understand the concept of deputies and delegation within a hierarchical organisation.

  3. Has anyone else noticed that the drivel/lefty quotient of the Tellygraff has soared since lockdown was imposed and the scribes, especially the younger less mature ones, have been working from home or is it just me?

    1. As far as I’m concerned it’s perpetually sky-high, so I can’t say I’ve noticed it getting worse. I was disgusted to read a Telegraph article recently that accepted the opinion of a globalist (possibly 50r05 funded) group as expert opinion, without questioning it!

      Had a look at the Times this morning – what a load of unadulterated crap! They truly do live in a different world.

  4. ‘Morning All

    A racist virus…….who knew………….

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/08/coronavirus-black-people-ethnic-minority-deaths-pandemic-inequality-afua-hirsch#maincontent

    Nothing to do with high incidents of obesity and diabetes,it’s Evil Whitey

    Again……………

    Meanwhile Taipei are waycist to the WHO

    https://twitter.com/JMichaelCole1/status/1248051818698924032?s=20
    Surely there must be a spending limit on these race cards……………
    At some point they must be declined

  6. Good morning, all. A grey and cloudy start to the day in yer Narfurk.

    No news again, I see.

  7. Priti Patel accused of avoiding MPs’ scrutiny during national crisis. Wed 8 Apr 2020 19.24 BST

    The home secretary, Priti Patel, has been accused by an influential group of MPs of avoiding scrutiny at a time of national emergency, a tranche of correspondence has revealed.

    Yvette Cooper, the chair of the home affairs select committee, has written to Patel six times – most recently in a letter issued on Wednesday – in an attempt to fix a date for the home secretary to give evidence in public to the committee, but a date for a hearing has not been confirmed.

    After repeatedly ignoring correspondence from Cooper, Patel replied to the committee chair on Tuesday telling her she was “disappointed at the increasingly adversarial tone of our exchanges” and declining an invitation to give evidence remotely on 15 April.

    She reluctantly agreed to appear before the MPs at the end of the month, but did not set a date.

    Morning everyone. So far as I’m concerned Patel’s reticence is welcome. Who in their right mind would wish to be interviewed by Cooper? There is far too much talk about “crisis” as if the Government were required to sleep around the cabinet table waiting to leap into action the moment someone in the MSM thinks up something else to whinge about. They could all probably go home and vegetate with the rest of us for all the difference it would make. If anything we could do with a lot less Government in everything! Perpetual rule has proved to be a disaster for the people of the UK where it’s presence is assumed to indicate competence. Another fallacy of the modern world!

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/apr/08/priti-patel-accused-of-avoiding-mps-scrutiny-during-national-crisis

    1. Priti Awful has been conspicuous by her silence. Can’t imagine what she does all day. Launders her shalwar kameez, I suppose.

          3. Yes, please, Annie. Korky hasn’t yet given me any of his, and I am down to my last four portions of my rhubarb crumble.

    2. Priti:

      “Dear Mrs Cooper-Balls,

      There are more important matters currently on the go. I suggest you find some.”

      (Up) Yours,

      Priti

      ‘Morning, Minty.

    3. Priti:

      “Dear Mrs Cooper-Balls,

      There are more important matters currently on the go. I suggest you find some.”

      (Up) Yours,

      Priti Peeved

      ‘Morning, Minty.

      1. p.s. How are your refugees enjoying the lock-down chez Cooper-Balls?
        Hope you’ve given them plenty to do to help pass the time.

      2. I’m surprised the poisonous pixie finds the time to bleat; between flipping homes and feeding all those refugees, she must work 27/8. Best to ignore her and move on.

    3. And the first person in any group who stops clapping will be dragged away by the wannabe NKVD.

  9. Quarantine illegal Channel migrants for 14 days to prevent spread of quarantine, says MP. 9 April 2020 • 6:45am

    Illegal migrants must be placed in quarantine after reaching the UK in small boats from France to prevent the spread of coronavirus, a Tory MP has demanded.

    Natalie Elphicke, MP for Dover, made the plea after some 130 migrants were rescued from the Channel after making the crossing since the weekend.

    You have to laugh! This woman knows nothing! No quarantine is required. It is quite obviously a ferry service where the Border Force accepts these people on a quid pro quo arrangement and sends them on to their destination!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/04/09/quarantine-illegal-channel-migrants-14-days-prevent-spread-quarantine/

  11. Morning again

    SIR – I was disappointed by William Hague’s sanguine conclusion to his piece about China’s threat to the world (Comment, April 7). He blithely says: “We need the Chinese and they need us.” If there is anything that recent years have taught us, it is that China emphatically does not need us.

    From rampant technology theft to the institutionalised bribery of the Belt and Road initiative, which has seen infrastructure development and investments in nearly 70 countries, China has for years been able to grab what it wants, whenever it wants. It has perpetrated grotesque human rights abuses in Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong with no more than the faintest hand-wringing from the West. Its carbon emissions are greater than the USA, EU and India combined.

    China is also developing its military power with an enormous shipbuilding programme; the construction of overseas Chinese naval bases in Sri Lanka and Djibouti; and the colonisation and resource exploitation of the disputed Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea.

    China has learnt that the world is its for the taking and, despite everything, we are still not cancelling the Huawei 5G network deal, so I despair that anything will change.

    Robert Frazer

    Salford, Lancashire

  12. SIR – In considering the overturning of Cardinal George Pell’s conviction on sex-abuse charges (report, April 8) it is important to pay attention to the weight of evidence in his favour and the unanimity of the High Court judges’ ruling that overturned the verdict.

    Cardinal Pell was wrongly convicted on the testimony of one man against a body of evidence from which, the High Court rightly ruled, it would be impossible not to conclude reasonable doubt.

    A great miscarriage of justice has been overturned.

    Sir Edward Leigh MP (Con)

    President, Catholic Union of Great Britain

    London SW1

    1. 317941+ up ticks,
      Morning GG,
      I did believe that the Nottlers virus the grope
      grape had missed the Hammersmith bus but he did not let me down.

  14. Reading the local news on facebook group, all the local parks have closed their car parks over the Easter, the majority Warden Hodges on there are really pleased, it is starting to get really worrying how stupid some people are under totalitarian rule when they stop thinking and get angry about something that cannot possible hurt anyone but the few people that want to walk their dogs or get a bit of fresh air.

    2. Well said Bob. Many people don’t have the luxury of living in a big house with a large garden. For many, a walk in the woods or a park is the only fresh air and exercise they can get. We can’t go to the pub, gym, theatre, cinema, church so what exactly are we supposed to do to keep fit and healthy?

      This country is becoming a pressure cooker, and the authoritarian response of the police and local councils is only going to make things worse. Do they want to see riots?

      1. ‘Morning, JK, riots are only allowed for one hour a day, then only if really essential and rioters keep the statutory 2 metres apart while respecting directions from your local, friendly neanderthal.

  16. Papist Easter Liturgy

    Most emphatically, I am not trying to convert anyone to Rome but for those who might be interested (and you don’t have to be a left-footer) this is a link to the livestrream broadcasts being put out by Ampleforth Abbey for today, Good Friday, Easter Saturday (the most important day in the liturgical calendar since it marks the end of Lent and we can start boozing again) and Easter Sunday.

    https://www.ampleforth.org.uk/abbey/service-times

    It’s very easy to use. I have just been listening to Maundy Thursday Matins with a few nice chants Most broadcasts are audio only. The main events (e.g. 6:00pm Mass this evening; Staions of the Cross 3:00pm tomorrow; 10:00am Mass Sunday) are video. I think it is far preferable to anything put out by the Beeb these days and the ever diminishing number of monks are doing a good job.

    Up the Benedictines! (so to speak)

    1. Oh, it’s in English. I was expecting the services to be in Latin. I’m old-fashioned.

    2. Thinking about Maundy Thursday, I assume the Queen will not be distributing 94 purses to chosen pensioners today.

  17. Posted last night, but again…

    “… The closure of choir schools beyond the normal date for resumption after Easter could do lasting damage, and place at risk the precious tradition of outstanding daily choral music in our cathedrals.”
    James Little

    Mr L has few real worries on his life, obvs

    1. Morning, BSK.
      It was their tradition of choir singing that kept the Estonian culture alive during 40 years of Soviet occupation.
      The Poles determined adherence to their Roman Catholic religion helped keep their identity during those same dark days.
      That is why the deliberate distortion of the English language is such an assault upon the ties that bind a country.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Singing_Revolution

  19. Morning all.

    Could someone tell me please – who is running the country? Are we really going to drift into an extension to the lockdown just because the Cabinet is frightened to make a decision in Boris’ absence?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/08/coronavirus-lockdown-could-place-may/

    Any competent company would have a clear succession plan with delegation of authority, so if the CEO is taken ill then business can continue. Did the UK Government not ever plan for a pandemic and the possibility that the PM could get sick? If not, why not?

    1. Morning, JK.
      I suppose the quick setting up of the Nightingale Hospitals suggests that there was some thinking on the pandemic possibility.
      That was probably Forces’ thinking; the beds, for example, must have been stored somewhere. The lack of testing equipment could be due to the virus being new (origins under discussion, but the Middle Kingdom would seem to be implicated). The shortage of equipment would appear to be down to the multiple quangos and trusts that infest the NHS.

      1. A retired Col Royal Logistics Corps is a near neighbour and confirms your theory; additional muscle provided by the Gurkhas. They didn’t hang about after finishing Nightingale and started on Manchester next morning. Of course, the equipment rooster-ups were NHS/PHE and squabbling civil servant related.

        Good moaning.

      2. When the chips are down, only the Army and the private sector get things done. NHS management and Public Health England have shown themselves to be as much use as the proverbial chocolate tea-pot. They exist only to provide cosy, well-paid jobs for political toadies.

        1. Same on the wards – even back in the seventies.
          The union obsessed staff were so busy telling us what wasn’t a nursing duty that they lost sight of what the job actually entailed.
          It was worse in mental nursing because then there were so many more male nurses than in general nursing. The older ones were coasting up to retirement and wanted an easy life.
          Fortunately, I had chums (and a husband) working on other wards, so I could always get clean clothes for patients, despite the charge nurses insisting that we relied on the patchy laundry service. My particular triumph was a nursing officer running around the hospital on a Sunday, collecting up bags of clean linen for our geriatric ward. Wards run by sisters had washing machines and the patients were as clean as circumstances allowed.

  20. ‘My NHS badge is a badge of honour’: Syrian refugee turned BAFTA-winning film-maker quits to become a health service cleaner to help in coronavirus battle. 8 April 2020.

    A Bafta-winning Syrian photographer and filmmaker who has temporarily changed careers to serve on the coronavirus frontline as a hospital cleaner says he was desperate to help after ‘England welcomed me with open arms’.

    Hassan Akkad, who fled to the UK after he was imprisoned and tortured in Syria, is working at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London after deciding he had to do something to help.

    Being the miserable old sceptic that I am I wondered about this paragon of gratitude. He seems almost too good to be true so I did some surfing and came across this!

    Niall Bradley. 2 years ago.

    So a Syrian from Aleppo who claims he was tortured after being arrested for protesting the Assad govt (no one knows when) is contacted by the BBC and agrees to ‘make aliyah’ to Europe if he can film the journey. He has perfect English (including an American accent), has “friends in the US”, has a contact phone number for “the coastguard” (presumably Turkish), is for Western bombing of his country but against Russian operations, complains once he makes it to the UK that he had it much better “in Damascus”, and hasn’t a word to say about the fact that Aleppo has since been liberated by the Russians and Syrians and hundreds of thousands of his fellow refugees are returning home. It sounds like more made-for-TV anti-Assad propaganda.

    His cleaning episode sounds more like a publicity gimmick than reality!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8199175/Syrian-born-refugee-hospital-cleaner-England-welcomed-open-arms.html

    1. Will any politician in government ever have the guts to admit that we backed the wrong side in Syria and have made matters infinitely worse as we usually do when we interfere in the Middle East?

    2. Will any politician in government ever have the guts to admit that we backed the wrong side in Syria and have made matters infinitely worse as we usually do when we interfere in the Middle East?

    3. ‘Morning, Minty, cynical old me wonders if he joined the NHS as a cleaner, to get an NHS ID card in order to queue-jump at the local supermarket.

      Just wondering…

    4. Will any politician in government ever have the guts to admit that we backed the wrong side in Syria and have made matters infinitely worse as we usually do when we interfere in the Middle East?

  21. An old man is sitting on his front porch down in Louisiana at six in the morning watching the sunrise and sees the neighbour’s kid walk by carrying something big under his arm. He yells out “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

    The boy yells back “Roll of chicken wire.”

    The old man says “What you gonna do with that?”

    The boy says, “Catch some chickens.”

    The old man yells “You damn fool, you can’t catch chickens with chicken wire!”

    The boy just laughs and keeps walking.

    That evening at sunset the boy comes walking by and to the old man’s surprise he is dragging behind him the chicken wire with about 30 chickens caught in it.

    Same time next morning the old man is out watching the sunrise and he sees the boy walk by carrying something in his hand. The old man yells out “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

    The boy yells back “Roll of duck tape.”

    The old man says “What you gonna do with that?”

    The boy says back “Catch me some ducks.”

    The old man yells back, “You damn fool, you can’t catch ducks with duck tape!”

    The boy just laughs and keeps walking.

    That night around sunset the boy walks by coming home and to the old man’s amazement he is trailing behind him the unrolled roll of duck tape with about 35 ducks caught in it.

    Same time next morning the old man sees the boy walking by carrying what looks like a long reed with something fuzzy on the end. The old man says, “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

    The boy says, “It’s a pussy willow.”

    The old man says “Hold on, I’ll get my hat.”

  22. I know we’ve got mice in our compost heap, and I’ve often seen the neighbours’ cats waiting patiently in the undergrowth around it. This morning I went out to empty the compost, and found one of the cats perched on the little fence around the compost heap. Bit uncomfortable, but not a bad strategy.

  23. 317971+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,
    Truth be told the “virus” is being used in a show of power manner by the
    political domestic staff.
    Prior to the ” virus” descending upon us the peoples were beginning to get
    uppity about such much needed necessities as HS2 / Huawei 5G, & even demanding a report on paedophilia activity, this called for removing the political velvet glove and showing our true nature. as politico’s.

    YOU will come to heel, walkies when WE tell you to walk, etc,etc.
    What the political elites fear happening is that people power when abused
    (and abused in many cases it is, currently) can, when realised if ever by the peoples, be used beneficially via the polling booth.

    Power regardless of consequence is the political agenda.

    1. Or, as the powor hungry would sing:
      🎶
      “When it rains, it always rains
      Covids from heaven…”

      1. 317971+ up ticks,
        Afternoon Anne,
        Every cloud has a silver lining if scammed properly.

    1. I suggest the setting up of a charity which buys inflatable dinghies which automatically deflate completely and sink in fifteen minutes. The UK coast guards and other current taxi service boats should be given a generous supply of these deflating dinghies and obliged to take all the illegals to a five minutes paddle distance from the French coast and leave them to sort themselves out.

      This would be both humane and efficient because if the illegals acted quickly they would have ample time to reach the shore and would not have to drown.

    2. ‘Morning, Mags, never mind quarantine, ship ’em straight back to France, check marine radar for boats stopped in mid-channel off-loading the scum, intercept before landing, ship back to nearest French beach and confiscate the boat.

      1. Instead of police using drones to harass people in parks why can’t they be used to intercept the illegals coming across the channel? Or at least fly the drones along our beaches and likely landing places.

        2. It would be a better idea to intercept & sink the Mother ships that carry them to withing a couple of miles of the beach before they transfer them into the rubber dinghys.

          1. It would. There doesn’t seem to be the will, or the necessary boats, to carry it out.

        3. The illegals are landing because the Government wants them here. That seems to be the only explanation that I can think of. The comments above show how they can e stopped. It would be perfectly fine to shoot these people dead. We can remember when the borders of East Germany were defended with guns, similarly China.

          1. I’m pretty sure that when all the channel hopping illegals really got going some time back a certain Admiral West suggested taking them back to France and then scuttling the boats. He had the right idea as far as I’m concerned.

            Edit – added. I tried to find an article regarding this but can’t. However have attached a link with the Admiral’s views on the border farce and our ability to cop e with incoming illegals across the channel. As usual nobody listened.

            https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/683826/Brexit-Britain-surge-migrant-vessels-crossing-channel-EU-vote

    1. Good morning, Maggie

      I should imagine that Dorset, Devon and Cornwall have relatively low rates of cv infection. In our department, the Côtes d’Armor, there is the lowest rate in France and people are being imported from Paris and elsewhere in secure ambulances to be treated in Breton hospitals which have more room. Brittany, like the west of England, has one of the highest levels of holiday home ownership.

      Garden centres are beginning to offer their services and you are allowed to put buying garden equipment on your ‘exeat chit’ as it is considered an essential thing. However, you have to order and pay on-line and collect the goods yourself.

      1. Only a few weeks ago I was pointing out that our county, Northumberland, one of the largest counties in England, but also one of the least densely populated with 300,000 inhabitants had up to that time no infections at all. We were right at the bottom of the table when other areas were really getting going.

        Then there were 4 (4th March), the first records for the county, the next day 6. By 27th March it was taking off (45). Yesterday the figure of 272 was announced and Northumberland has in no time at all risen from the bottom of the league to above mid-table (70th out of 148).

        https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/f94c3c90da5b4e9f9a0b19484dd4bb14

        Something happened.

        I don’t know what.

        (My wife has just come back from her daily exercise period and was told by a friend (from a safe distance) that someone who lives two or three hundred yards from us has died with the virus).

          1. That would have increased the number, but not the league table position, because everyone else’s number swould have changed for the same reason.

            We’ve gone from 148/148 to 70/148 in three or four weeks, overtaking 70-odd other hospital authority areas. Maybe it’s more disease in the county, maybe it’s cases being brought to our small number of hospitals from elsewhere, I don’t know.

    2. Just let locals know that you are flipping your primary residence to your second home, I think that it has been done before.

    1. Morning Geoff

      I can never find the cartoons in the ‘new’ format online Speccie. What’s the magic trick?

      1. I went to the Speccie website; clicked on “magazine” then clicked on “cartoons” in the left hand column.

        Only one came up. Odd.

  28. Funny Old World
    What do we think of David Icke??
    “Oh you mean the Lizard man”
    “Yes that’s the chap”
    “Harnless nutter pretty much”
    Yet THPTB seem desperate to censor him,you tube video taken down calls for a tv station that gave him a platform to lose their licence
    https://twitter.com/davidicke/status/1247235162137559040
    As per usual the cretins have no clue 65000 live views has turned into 4 MILLION views over multiple platforms like vimeo,bitchute etc
    The attempted censorship has failed miserably as it always does in this internet age,all it does is give Icke’s outpourings more (possibly unwarranted) credibility

    1. Good morning, Rik

      It is not just that I find the chap loony – my main objection is that he is very boring. However the fact that the PTB want to censor all those with erratic views is far more worrying than the erratic views they express.

      I have still not got over the total digustingness of Emily Maitlis. If anyone needs to be taken off the airwaves then it is she rather than Icke.

      1. Exacto (c) Peddy
        Ironically I haven’t bothered to watch the video myself for that very reason,it’s only the (failed) censorship that arouses interest
        Streisand Effect in action!!

  29. Yet another example of the refusal of a section of a society to accept a result.

    The High Court of Australia has quashed the conviction of Cardinal George Pell – on the ground that there was no evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that he had committed the crimes for which had been imprisoned. In other words, he is innocent.

    The “victims support” mob have been painting slogans about “no justice” on the cathedral. Just like the Remainers; the Liebour party after the general election etc etc.

    Makes me very depressed.

    1. In the absence of a group, sexual assaults generally have few witnesses, so it is always “he said” or “she said”. What proof do they expect?

          1. In my experience, it very often comes down to who can tell a plausible story that stands up to examination. That sort of liar usually can’t.

        1. Eventually. He was convicted, failed on appeal and then the highest court quashed the conviction on appeal. One worries that some cases may be decided on sentiment and bias rather than facts.

    3. Good morning, Bill

      That used to be the difference between rugby and kevball. In rugby you accepted the decision of the ref – in kevball you disputed it.

      Of course kevball is followed mainly by leftards. (Should I wear my tin hat here?)

      1. A work colleague was Chairman of the soccer referees association on Jersey where they experimented with the ten yards back for dissent rule. He told me that the players soon realised that a simple to defend free kick was suddenly becoming akin to a penalty. He said that dissent vanished from matches almost after the first week. It was a huge success, so naturally they dropped it.

        1. Good morning Bill

          No, this is a term widely used in the West of England. The sort of people who play this game are often called Kevin. I believe there was a chap called Mr Keegan who played it.

          1. Maybe – but Wendyball is the name for it in NoTTLand.

            It was coined by Brian Moore.

          2. He is the best rugby commentator available. None of the others are much use, at any rte the more considered commentators are simply talked down by the louder mouths . The present practice of having three commentators at the same time results in them having a cheerful conversation. The viewer or listener is none the wiser about what is happening on the park. They even babble when there is a ref mike so we cannot here what the ref is saying. Few things are elucidated.

    4. He committed the cardinal crime of being a “socially conservative”, ie. Bible believing, Christian. I’ve bitched about Pope Francis being a Marxist but during “lock-down” he’s been walking the streets of Rome, albeit with his security guards following six feet behind. Remind me, Cantaur and Ebor are where?

        1. Ebor = York?

          I suppose that’ll be where the well-known Yorkshire expression “Eborgum!” originates.

    1. Don’t know why Colchester is praising the bin men; they only collect food scraps nowadays and my garden waste, paper, bottles, etc. are just mounting up in the garage.

      1. All those who normally work in offices who are now having to work at home are suddenly realising that there are people doing jobs they’d rather not do themselves. They’ve never actually seen a bin being emptied before and they thought that the contents of their bins vanished courtesy of the bin fairy while they were slaving over the coffee machine in the office.

        1. God knows what they would think if they ever saw the bin men we used to have working, in the days before plastic bins with wheels that are lifted by a hoist on the wagon.

          Galvanised steel bins full to the brim with ashes (wet if the lid wasn’t on properly), steel, not aluminium cans and a host of unpleasant stuff, hoisted onto the shoulder and carried to the wagon before being manually tipped into the hopper.

          1. When I was young 99.9% of anything & everything was burned in the Rayburn (Poor man’s Aga)
            “Free Hot Water” . As a result the bin was 99.9% ash.

            Collected every Thursday – some dropped on the paths coming up to Xmas – 2/- or maybe 2/6p (12.5p) solved the issue for another 11 months.

          2. We had an open fire to do the job of your Rayburn.

            Even wet potato peelngs burn, given time and a good fire.

          3. My grandmother used to make a big bundle of all that sort of waste and wrap it up in newspaper, to simmer quietly on the back of the fire until it had dried out sufficiently to catch fire. The initial smell was awful.

          5. That’s the beauty of putting it into the Rayburn; once you’ve closed the door, you’ve cut off the smell 🙂

          6. Still the case here. I constantly have run-ins with the council over the weight of the ash in my bin. Well, if you will collect it only once a fortnight, what else can you expect?

          7. Then returned to your house where they had taken it from. Ah, those were the days!

    2. Just out of the picture, bottom right, it reads:

      “A Allan – own unaided work. Please give generously”.

          1. OK. Clever Dick.
            And expert in ladies’ attire.
            There, that’s dropped you in it.

            🙂

  32. Morning all 😊
    I spent some weeks without success trying to log into Nottlers on my mobile.
    By some quirk of unexplainable process it now works.
    Now once more and back to square one i can’t log in on my PC ! 😠
    The system is flawed, it keeps telling me that my email address is already in use……well of course it is….
    Even so, I don’t usually have effing LOG IN. it use to be automatically logged in.

    1. I’m logged in all the time on my laptop even if I log out. My phone (before it died) had my old account logged in.

      1. I’ve gone from my phone not being able to log on and the pc okay. To the complete opposite. It’s driving me nuts 😟

    2. I have to log in every time I refresh. My iPad automatically refreshes if I change from one tab to another.

        1. Only takes a few seconds as I only have to touch the D for Disqus and it automatically logs me in. As you say, annoying but not life threatening.

        2. Only takes a few seconds as I only have to touch the D for Disqus and it automatically logs me in. As you say, annoying but not life threatening.

  34. “Before I get to the astounding difference

    in reporting on ‘Our NHS’ between The Times and the DT, let me mention

    just a few snippets from their COVID-19 coverage, illustrating their

    general attitude. For example, any talk about COVID-19 cures is –

    populist, as Mr Finkelstein writes in The Times: “The worldwide hunt for a coronavirus wonder drug is being hijacked by populists who will only cause us more harm” (link, paywalled) – so shut up talking about alternatives, peasants!

    We also had a report which should come under

    ‘inciting class war’, namely that, according to Tesco, it wuz the

    horrid English Middle Class in the SE of the country who did all the

    stockpiling and delivery-slot hogging … (link).

    Are those the same people who keep telling us to love ‘Our NHS’, to

    stay in our flats, and who presumably are also in their majority

    Remainers? ‘Not enough data’ sez my computer …

    Then there was the incredibly inappropriate

    (I’m very polite here!) statement from the lady who is president of the

    British Veterinary Association, that cats can transmit the virus and

    should be kept indoors during the lockdown. After their site crashed,

    she had to back-pedal – not ‘all cats’ were meant to go in Lockdown,

    only those with infected owners. Nevertheless, No 10 had to get

    involved:

    “Larry the Downing

    Street cat is not socially distancing. “Larry is absolutely fine,” the

    spokesman said. “I’ve seen him myself this morning. He’s going about his

    business in the usual way.” In response to a follow-up question he

    added, with barely a hint of weariness, that Dilyn, the prime minister’s

    dog, “is fine”. The government is clearly of the opinion that while

    cats might pass on the disease to other cats, they cannot do so to

    humans. A lot rides on that assumption. Larry is known to fraternise

    with Palmerston, chief mouser at the Foreign Office. And Palmerston, in

    turn, serves Dominic Raab, who is not only the foreign secretary but

    also de facto prime minister.” (link, paywalled)

    So now we know! This brings us nicely to the state of our government and the Lockdown. According to the DT Cabinet won’t make a decision until Johnson is out of Intensive Care:”

    https://independencedaily.co.uk/your-daily-betrayal-thursday-9th-april-2020-21th-covid-19-pandemic-special-day-17-of-lockdown-britain-maundy-thursday/

    1. I didn’t realise the Middle Classes shopped at Tesco.
      I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked.

        1. Waitrose and John Lewis are no where near as good as they used to be.They were greedy to attract the lower end of the market and reducd the quality to sell more. I avoid if i can.

        2. I’m dead posh.
          I shop at Lidl and ALDI.
          And then spend the money I’ve saved at a proper butcher’s.

          5. Good day, O Highland Laird.

            “Butchers” = have a shufti.

            I’ll get me sporran.

        3. I refuse to shop at the socialist cooperative masquerading under the Waitrose brand name.

          1. It was a joke.

            Anyhoo…what is wrong with the workers getting a share of the profits in a successful business.

          2. It’s the Co-op that’s off limits for me with it’s financial support for the Labour Party.

      2. Tesco and M&S are the best in our area. It very much depends on the area, the local management and the local population.

      3. Tesco and M&S are the best in our area. It very much depends on the area, the local management and the local population.

        1. There is a branch of Lidl to the North of Düsseldorf (posh area) where the car park is always full of top-end BMWs & Mercedes.

      1. By conflating the causes of death, the PTB can keep the population suitably cowed.

      2. The whole numbers game is a waste of time.

        Our Ontario Premier blew another fuse yesterday over testing. Although they are set up to do around 13,000 tests a day, they are only doing about 3,000 because the test centres are making up rules and restrictions on the fly. He was extremely not pleased!

        So unless there is testing for all (that would check out the theory that last Novembers flu was the lurgi) and clear rules for cause of death are in place, none of the counts are worth anything.

  36. My next door neighbour works at Cadbury’s. According to his wife they are short staffed with almost half the staff self-isolating at home, and, at the same time, facing heavily increased demands – wholesalers/retailers seem to have doubled orders. Thus, the remaining staff are working 7-days a week. His wife (she is Russian, he Egyptian) said they feel “blessed” to have this work.

    Blessed that the government did not classify this production of Easter Eggs, Choc Bunnies, and Cadbury’s Dairy Milk as “non-essential”.

    Shame they haven’t suggested to the police that it is a step too far to inspect shopping bags for “non-essentials”.

    1. On a production schedule note: the Easter stuff would have been made in 2019.
      They’re probably producing foil wrapped Father Christmases.

    1. BTL:

      Elie Mae’s Grandad —
      9 Apr 2020 12:28AM

      To win people over to obey the unenforceable they must be convinced that the decision to do whatever is their own, informed, voluntary, in the best interests of everyone, them included.

      For that to happen, their must be sound advice from credible people, people with a track record of that, people who are trusted. After all the anti-Brexit shenanigans, who might that be?

      The art of successful management is to get people to do what you want them to do, because they want to do it.

      1. ‘Morning, Citroen, I whole-heartedly agree with Elie Mae’s Grandad ( still plugging on at the DT Letters – he was there in the early days before NTTL) when I worked in industry trying to get people to change to better methods, my ethos was always, “Motivate, not manipulate.”

    2. “… they encourage public to name and shame stupid and officious police officers on social media”

    3. Good morning all.

      The police deserve not to be respected any more. With no one on the streets what the hell are they doing all day long? They don’t bother catching criminals any more and there are few motorists around at the moment. And they encourage the public to name and shame transgressors but you wouldn’t be allowed to do that to a criminal – it would be against his human rights. I do hope people don’t snitch – it’s just not cricket!

    4. “… they encourage public to name and shame stupid and officious police officers on social media”

  40. Please tell me I am dreaming. Please tell me this is just some kind of late April-fools joke. Please tell me these words were not uttered by a British police officer:

    Chief Constable Nick Adderley of Northamptonshire Police said they force will now ramp up the enforcement of coronavirus regulations.

    Mr Adderley said the “three-week grace period is over”, and people in the county could now face fines or a criminal record.

    He said the force may have to resort to more extreme measures such as road blocks and searching shopping trolleys should people continue to break the rules.

    Mr Adderley said: “These are not guidelines anymore. This is the law.

    “We’ve had examples of people sunbathing in the park, having barbecues in the park, we’ve had large gatherings of family members.

    “To those people, I am saying ‘your time is up’.”

      2. Probably under £200 worth – nothing to see here, move along while I go and nick that bloke who just bought an Easter egg!

    5. And just where is the forceful statement from Priti Awful telling this idiot to pull his had in?

      1. Probably somewhere, but the MSM won’t publicise it. They are only interested in Mrs Ball’s complaint that Patel didn’t attend her committee.

      2. Indeed. And when did they make these kind of statements about actual criminals? You know, the stabbers and muggers?

        1. Looks like the loss of respect they were warned about is coming along nicely.

          1. Must make a nice change from policing Twitter for hate speech. Now the whole country is their playground!

    6. 317971+ up ticks,
      Morning JK,
      The time is fast approaching when an incarceration or
      a fine or two will be a must on a CV, claiming to be of an
      honest & common sense nature it will be known as the
      Tommy Robinson era.

    9. It isn’t the law, though, is it? He should read the Act. These are rules and only rules.

    2. Excellent Rik. Clearly explained – well worth watching. Let us hope more doctors are sensible enough to prescribe Ivermectin before seriously ill patients die.

      1. Quite so, Bill. In his eagerness to get away from the dock he seems to have forgotten that ships tend to steer from the stern. One can only imagine his panic as he ordered the helmsman to pile on starboard rudder whilst screaming down the intercom for max revolutions. No sign of any thrusters either, which is odd on a ship built in 2018. Perhaps they are extras, only found on the GLS version…

      1. He’s claiming his foot slipped off the brake and on to the accelerator.🙄

        1. Might not have been a “he”, of course….(Dons tin hat and takes cover)

  43. Morning all

    SIR – The willingness of the people to comply with instructions to stay at home has diminished, especially in the fine weather. Yet restrictions had been imposed with encouragement by the best medical and scientific minds.

    To see people flouting them brings to mind a discussion by the judge Lord Moulton in 1912 of the domains of human action: positive law, free choice and, crucially, obedience to the unenforceable.

    We should bear in mind his conclusion that the true measure of a nation’s greatness is “the extent to which the individuals composing the nation can be trusted to obey self-imposed law”.

    Alan Skennerton

    Bracknell, Berkshire

    SIR – I know, as a retired prison-service manager, that being locked up for 23 hours in prison is rightly criticised. This is exactly what is asked of people living in small, urban high-rise flats.

    David Robinson

    Poole, Dorset

    Advertisement

    SIR – We have been looking after an old lady living alone in a nearby flat. She is healthy, but in recent days has shown signs of giving up on life. Will she be listed as a coronavirus victim?

    Evan Llewellyn

    London SW3

    SIR – Charles Moore (Comment, April 4) is completely wrong about the NHS.

    First, in a remarkably short time, the NHS has freed up 33,000 of its own hospital beds for coronavirus patients.

    And contrary to Mr Moore’s claims, the NHS itself led, designed and created the new Nightingale Hospital in London in under a fortnight, with welcome support from its civilian contractors and the military.

    Secondly, rather than rejecting public-private partnership, NHS England rapidly secured the biggest collaboration with private hospitals in the history of the health service.

    Thirdly, almost all other European countries, including Germany and France, have introduced temporary lockdowns, despite each having very different health systems. So the reason for these measures is patently not because of some unique shortcoming in our own NHS. It’s because reducing contact between people means fewer get the virus and die.

    Lord Darzi of Denham

    Professor of Surgery

    Imperial College, London

    SIR – Pharmacists are concerned by greatly increased footfall in their shops. NHS England could ease this at the stroke of a pen.

    Before this pandemic, doctors were told to reduce repeat prescriptions to one month’s supply instead of the previous two. The result doubled the visits patients make to the pharmacy.

    Stephen Wallis

    Billericay, Essex

    SIR – It would be simple at the door of Boots, say, as people are let in one by one, to take a quick temperature reading remotely.

    Elizabeth Haynes

    Lymington, Hampshire

    1. The NHS “freeing up” 33 000 beds is nothing to be proud of when one remembers that this feat was achieved by cancelling cancer treatments.

      1. ‘Morning, BB2, you beat me to it. Darzi fails to mention the postponement or even cancellation of cancer treatments and transplant ops. A woman awaiting a liver transplant to save her rapidly failing life was on R4 earlier, and her desperation was obvious. So not everything is as hunky-dorey in NHS-land as Darzi would like to make out.

        Edit: Apparently there are approximately 8,000 liver transplants annually, none of which is currently taking place.

        1. Good lord; I didn’t realise the number was that high.
          Will they be listed as ‘dying of’ or ‘with’ C19?
          Imagining their plight is stomach churning. Hearing a friend sobbing her heart out because her hip replacement operation had been cancelled was bad enough.

    2. Evan Llewellyn shouldn’t count his statistics before they’re dispatched.

    3. Apparently three people arrested and two stolen vehicles recovered. The accident was yesterday.

  47. SIR – Dr Dee Dawson (Letters, April 3) asks why British supermarkets do not match the drive-through collections that are currently being set up in France. A local farm shop set up this system two weeks ago. If small shops can provide such a service, why can’t big supermarkets?

    Geoff Vaughan

    Warrington, Cheshire

  48. SIR – I live in North Yorkshire, in the village of Grewelthorpe, at the eastern end of Wensleydale and Nidderdale.

    I have stopped driving to even more remote places for my occasional walks. I now walk, two or three times a week, from my cottage, and I continue along small country lanes for about 60 to 90 minutes, without meeting anybody.

    If, because of the unbelievable stupidity of other people, I am denied this “freedom to exercise” (report, April 8), I will probably disregard the Government directive.

    I can understand that urban life at the moment is more oppressive than ours in the country. Most city-dwellers chose to live where they are, as I chose, many years ago, to live where I am. They include young “wheeler-dealers” earning vast salaries, with properties many times the value of my own.

    I should not be penalised because of their arrogance and lack of consideration.

    Peter Ellis

    Grewelthorpe, North Yorkshire

    SIR – Living within the Dartmoor National Park, I went for a bike ride from home yesterday over the moor and through narrow lanes.

    It was a joy. I’ve been a keen cyclist ever since I learnt to ride in the Fifties. My day was like being transported back in time. No traffic, no tractors: just me, the wife and the open countryside.

    Stephen Woodbridge-Smith

    Tavistock, Devon

    SIR – Why am I still vying for space on the pavement with cyclists, when roads are very nearly empty of cars?

    Shirley Parfitt

    Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire

    SIR – Man lying on beach sunbathing with no one within 25 yards. Heinous crime (report, April 8). Man running in park breathing heavily within a few feet of everyone he passes. Quite acceptable.

    Who is briefing the police who now appear on our streets, parks and beaches (after years of absence)?

    James Jones

    Rochester, Kent

    1. “…the wife…” Mr Woodbridge-Smith? Good of you to let the little woman join you, old chap.

      ‘Morning, Epi (manners).

      1. I saw that.
        If MB used “the wife” he would added to the Covid 19 statistics. Minor details like a hammer buried in his skull wouldn’t appear on the death certificate.

          1. 🙂 We have some stonking Victorian hatpins. The women who used those sported serious hair.

        3. Good morning Anne.
          I like the way you think.
          I presume you are recovering well from your op. 🤞🤞

          1. Yup. Yesterday I was very sleepy, but that may have been the effect night after night of having to sleep in what is, for me, an uncomfortable position.
            From experience, I know that some people with ‘health issues’ can become rather self-centred. I’m amazed at how obsessed I’ve become with minor changes in my progress. Maybe this will be the birth of a new, empathetic me.

          2. Delighted your progress is going so well for you. Probably will change you somewhat if you’ve been coping with progressive pain over a number of years.
            I had a knee op in January, not a replacement, but have recovered well from that but they also drilled away some stage 2 arthritis and it maybe 6 months or more before the knee fully recovers. In the meantime my other leg, from knee down to big toe, Has been extremely painful. Was having NHS physio but that stopped because of CV. Am now using online physio using Zoom video. She thinks it’s to do with misaligned back. I have 10 exercises, twice a day, to do and within a week I am so much improved. She sends me an illustrated exercise plan. Worth every penny so far.
            Keep up the good work.

          3. The first thing I noticed was that my knees didn’t hurt.
            Then I noticed that an irritating knot where my neck and shoulder met had disappeared. For at least 3 years physios and I had been trying to keep that at bay and the darn thing kept returning.

    2. Lots of men congregating with bums in the air on a Friday is not just acceptable, it’s untouchable 🙁

    1. …and it’s all the bits of dirty black grime in the air that the monsoons pick up and dump on the Himalayas which then directly absorb the sun’s radiation causing the glaciers to melt. That is very, very different to Global Warming.

      Morning Maggie

  50. Brendan O’Neil

    Giving Mouthy Maitless the bloody good verbal kicking she so richly deserves

    Delicious

    “We’ve seen much grotesque hypocrisy and opportunism during the Covid-19

    crisis, from the Corbynista left virtually cheering the virus on in

    order to expose ‘Tory failings’ to the curtain-twitching sections of

    society relishing the new opening for squealing on their neighbours and

    agitating for a police state. But last night’s Newsnight, and

    in particular Emily Maitlis’s staggeringly hypocritical and deeply

    patrician mini-lecture to the nation about life in lockdown Britain,

    took the biscuit. Reader, the elites are straight-up taking the piss out

    of us now.

    The chattering classes and the regressive left are, naturally,

    fawning over Ms Maitlis’s solemnly delivered platitudes, treating her

    virtually as the Princess Diana of Covid Britain. What did she do to

    deserve such cringe-inducing accolades? She had a pop at the government –

    as is her wont; Maitlis is one of the least objective journalists in

    the already objectivity-challenged BBC – and she asked us to feel sorry

    for poorer people in small homes who will be having a hard lockdown.

    Yes. We know. Unlike Ms Maitlis, some of us actually know and are

    related to people like that, which is why we cautioned against a

    stringent lockdown precisely as the media elite, including the BBC, were

    incessantly barking at ministers: ‘Where’s the lockdown? Bring it on.

    Put us under house arrest.’

    Maitlis’s soppy sermon was the BBC at its worst.”

    Rest here,treasure every word

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/04/09/the-staggering-hypocrisy-of-the-bbc/

    1. A wonderful example of why public funding of this body should cease forthwith. Emily Nomates should be amongst the first wave of sacrifices.

  51. The Bill Gates conundrum.

    The UK is not pursuing a cure using existing drugs by testing them on patients, with permission, in hospital wards.

    Why not ?

    If lockdown ends without a viable treatment, the virus looks likely to return and overwhelm the NHS.

    The herd strategy, over a period of time, looks like creating mass casualties in the high risk groups.

    So why isn’t the government pursuing a cure on the wards using existing drugs as a total top priority.. and why instead are they doing dubious deals with Bill Gates of all people ?

    Is someone being paid off ?

    It looks the most likely explanation.

    1. ‘Afternoon, Ims2, Just to be a little picky; while I understand, Carlson is doing his best, his subtitle writers have problems in hearing and then writing the correct words.

      At about 3:21 into, Carlson uses the word ‘nuance’. the subtitle writers put that up as, yes, ‘New Wants’. Oh, America, English 101 – FAIL, again. How we laughed.

      1. The subtitlers may be stenographers. Apparently sometimes the computer programmes misinterpret their own short hand systems.

        1. US news subtitles are usually produced by stenographers – with sometimes hilarious results. In the height of the Gulf War, an NBC news staffer was trying to explain the religious make up of Iraq, and stated that it was majority Shiite. What went across the bottom of the screen was that “Iraq was mostly shite”.

          Many a true word, etc.

      2. I think the subtitles are automatically generated, like the ones on BBC news, etc, and YouTube video captions.

      1. My software can plate it with gold though. I’m doing a special offer for climate scientists this month!

    3. Arrest them all

      They did not maintain ‘Safe Distance’

      They then could have put the child’s death down to ‘the virus’

    4. Quick – snitch on them – not social distancing!!

      Edit – OLT has beaten me to it!!

  55. Puke time. (Cut and pasted, with typos.) Please don’t read this until you’ve finished lunch.

    Our new Public Service brand campaign

    Hello all,

    It goes without saying that these are unusual and challenging times for all of us, and our audiences.

    But now, more than ever, we see the unique value of the BBC. We have always had a remit to create social cohesion and community, something that may seem at odds with this period of isolation.

    And yet, through all we do, we are keeping our audiences connected to British culture and community.
    This togetherness is so vital and so valuable we are launching a pan BBC campaign – incorporating the breadth and brilliance of all we are doing in response to coronavirus – to demonstrate that with the BBC many of us may be at home, but we are never alone.

    That the BBC is ‘Bringing us Closer’. Brought to life in our brand film, we will launch this tomorrow night at 9pm across BBC One, BBC Two and BBC Four.

    It’s a powerful piece of film featuring a poem entitled Don’t Quit, beautifully read by Idris Elba, that captures the mood of a nation and our role in it. It’s the BBC in a nutshell – using creativity and storytelling to create social cohesion and a sense of national identity.
    I hope you will all take as much pride in it, and what is says about the BBC, as I do. Please do share it with friends, family and followers.

    In subsequent weeks you’ll see other films bringing to life the vital News service we are providing audiences, the great content we’re making available that helps audiences find escape and entertainment – and of course the significant education offer we are launching through Bitesize daily.

    It’s unprecedented to create a pan BBC campaign championing so much of what we do across our portfolio. But these are unprecedented times, when not only does the BBC comes together – we bring the nation together.

    Have great Easter weekends,
    Kerris

    Kerris Bright
    Chief Customer Officer

    4. Can’t they just stick to ‘Repair Shop’ on a loop? That would do me nicely for the next few days.

    5. British culture? They wouldn’t know it at the Bbc if it reared up and kicked them in the teeth! For the sake of my health and sanity I give the Beeb as wide a berth as possible.

      1. Smug, self-satisfied individuals, on special tax schemes – the BBC has loads of them.

    8. What is a Chief Customer Officer? The only actual “customers” the BBC has are entities that choose to buy its content.

    9. Yuk. I’d finished lunch, but I don’t think it was completely digested…

      1. What are we reduced to when we’re even grateful that our national broadcaster uses the term “Easter”?

    12. ‘Idris Elba’ and ‘nation’ shouldn’t appear in the same sentence.

  56. 317971+ up ticks,
    Stolen from breitbart comments,
    Joe Biden is also sitting up in bed.

    1. BBC News at One reports that COVID casualities are heavily weighted towards African, Asian and Hispanic communities. But London also has European, Chinese, Jewish, Islamic and Arabic communities but I don’t think the Nordics feature very much.

      What a racist pathogen!

        1. There’s a lot of coordinated talk going on. As soon as your lot started talking about flattening the curve, so did ours. They are following the same instruction sheet.

          Canada apparently has a pandemic plan, it matches fairly well to what is happening – not being followed.

    1. Happened to the wife of a friend of mine back in the 70s. Tragic, he was left with 2 young children.

    2. Professor Jonathan Grigg, at Queen Mary University of London, puts the increase in asthma deaths down to two issues.

      “The reason for this is very complicated. It’s certainly on one hand to do with the environment – we’re breathing in air pollution which we know makes asthma worse and actually we have new cases of asthma due to air pollution, but also our health care system is really not taking asthma as seriously as it should do.”

      I don’t recall the real pea-soupers that the UK used to get, I was too young. But air pollution was far worse in the fifties and sixties than it is now. I don’t recall anyone dropping dead from asthma caused by pollution back then, but I could be wrong. I’m not sure I even knew anyone with asthma.
      As with food allergies, I suspect it’s more to do with over-cleanliness with children when they’re very young, and their immune systems not being sufficiently challenged when they’re babies and toddlers.

      1. There was a constant pall of smoke over our town when I was a lad, thousands of houses with the housewife throwing another shovel of coal onto the fire so that there was a nice blaze going for her man coming in from the pit (one of several around the town).

        Our school had four year groups, each with three classes of 36, so over 400 pupils at any one time, refreshed over the 4 years I attended.

        I knew one who had asthma. He was called David.

        1. I remember walking to school in Newbiggin and tasting the fog as I went.

      2. There was a constant pall of smoke over our town when I was a lad, thousands of houses with the housewife throwing another shovel of coal onto the fire so that there was a nice blaze going for her man coming in from the pit (one of several around the town).

        Our school had four year groups, each with three classes of 36, so over 400 pupils at any one time, refreshed over the 4 years I attended.

        I knew one who had asthma. He was called David.

      3. I knew a couple of girls at school who had asthma – and one of those did die suddenly. This was in the early 60s.

      4. My theory is that the tendency to close off fireplaces and rely on central heating has led to an increase in asthma. The air isn’t being circulated as it once was thanks to the elimination of draughts and the aim of producing a hermetically sealed environment.

      5. That stacks up.

        It is well known that farm children face exposure to many potentially fatal pathogens in the environment in which they are brought up and as a result their immune systems are robuster that city children.

        1. Some of the other Nottlers remember people who were asthmatics in earlier decades, but I really don’t, and I’m not sure they were as common as now.

  59. ‘Morning, all.

    In today’s DT Letters, Mr Robert Frazer writes

    SIR – I was disappointed by William Hague’s sanguine conclusion to his piece about China’s threat to the world (Comment, April 7). He blithely says: “We need the Chinese and they need us.” If there is anything that recent years have taught us, it is that China emphatically does not need us.

    I would only add that if there is one other thing that recent years have taught us, it is that we emphatically do not need William Hague.

  60. A few days ago, someone asked me how I was getting on with a 1938 Map of London Jigsaw. I meant to reply – but forgot.

    If he wishes to ask again, please ask again.

    1. When I was a boy we had a jigsaw with all the counties in Britain as individual pieces. The game was to see how quickly you could do it from scratch.

      The whole family knew exactly where each county was. Today I expect that many schoolchildren think that Hampshire lies to the north of Northumberland.

      2. Listening to the accents in our village these days I think Hampshire is actually in Northumberland. Local accents are in a steep decline and are being displaced by incomers.

        1. ‘Morning, Basset, for all the mickey-taking about Norfolk, there you have to be in residence for at least 40 years before you’re accepted as a local. Using the local dialect might not reduce your probation period but at least you’ll be understood.

          1. It’s the same for rural Shropshire. Most country dwellers regard a trip into the county town as a major excursion!

        2. Listening to the locals in my Hampshire village, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard a Hampshire accent.

    2. It wasn’t me Bill but how are you getting on with your 1938 Map of London jigsaw puzzle.

      1. Finished it in January! It was difficult to start with but, having lived in and around Lunnon for 30 years, it became simpler.

    3. Hi Bill, that was me. I have the same puzzle – it’s driving me mad.

  61. Morning all!

    Did my food shop yesterday and thought I could relax this morning but the blasted light in my hallway started flickering last night and I checked my little store of bulbs but the only suitable one was incandescent. It absolutely refused to come out of its box on account of how it’s not green and Greta would be furious. So I plodded along to Waitrose first thing this morning and bought two new ones. Light bulbs so rarely need changing these days that I actually had to pause for thought. Anyway, all sorted. The one I replaced is the early energy saver type that looks rather like an old fashioned kettle element. Lasted well though. It was the latest style when I first put it in.

    1. Yo Sue.

      Were you incandescent (sic) with rage, that you had to buy a new one

    5. The bulb in my hall (probably dates from the early 1980s) is of the incandescent type. It’s the only bulb in the house which actually gives a good light instantly!

  62. DT Lead ‘Live’ News

    Roadblocks and shopping trolley searches could be considered

    Chief Constable Nick Adderley of Northamptonshire Police said they force will now ramp up the enforcement of coronavirus regulations.

    Do we have police officers with the necessary intelligence – but above all the common sense – to administer this reasonably and impartially? For example the supermarket where we shop sells some of the things you find in hardware shops such as glue, tools, screws, brackets etc. etc,

    After the Easter Egg fiasco could British plod be trusted not arrest a person for buying a pot of glue at the same times as buying his vegetables, meat and fish in the same shop?

    1. Who is to say the pot of glue isn’t essential, even more essential than the pound of sausages in the same trolley?

      Emergencies happen in the home that are more easily sorted by application of glue than a slice of pork sausage.

      2. Yes – the point is that I can see that, you can see that – but can Plod see it?

        1. Just so. It’s a question that shouldn’t be raised. If it’s legal for the shop to be open, anything for sale in that shop may be bought.

          That’s what the covid law that they brought in the other week says, and it’s not for someone with peaked cap syndrome to question that.

          1. The burning question: What would happen to Grizzly if he bought some paints and brushes at Sainsbury’s along with his diet food?

            Would the zealots who have replaced his generation the police force service treat him fairly?

    2. Who is to say the pot of glue isn’t essential, even more essential than the pound of sausages in the same trolley?

      Emergencies happen in the home that are more easily sorted by application of glue than a slice of pork sausage.

    4. If stopped and told you have ‘non essential’ items ask for the Statutory Authority for their actions i.e. Act of Parliament and section/sub section that says the items are not essential/illegal. That should shut them up.

      1. And take the plod’s number and report him to the Police and Crime Commissioner – and tell the local press.

        1. The problem with that is that it’s the press who are driving the witch-hunt and getting the police to step beyond their remit.

          If you did that you’d have a mob outside your windows with half bricks, firebrands and pitchforks as soon as the papers’ interpretation of what happened hit the streets, telling you that ‘people are dying’ and that it’s your fault for buying a roll of sellotape..

        2. The problem with that is that it’s the press who are driving the witch-hunt and getting the police to step beyond their remit.

          If you did that you’d have a mob outside your windows with half bricks, firebrands and pitchforks as soon as the papers’ interpretation of what happened hit the streets, telling you that ‘people are dying’ and that it’s your fault for buying a roll of sellotape..

          1. To be fair, if the responses I read on F/B and elsewhere are anything to go by, the (mainly young, I think) sheeple are demanding still more oppressive measures. As they have been indoctrinated under corpus juris, why would they appreciate what it’s like to live free under common law?

        3. Spot on. The phrase I suggested was often used by Legal Advisers in court challenging a solicitor who quote some obscure precedent. Stones or Archbold etc. used.

          1. Yes – and, sometimes, their name: “Khan”; “Mohamed”; “Dickhead”…

          2. Yup. It was on their tunic collar in the 19th century, but on the shoulder epaulettes in the 20th.

    6. Yo Rastus

      If my trolley was searched and some items were deemed ‘not essential’, i would demand that the Police issued a list of what may be purchased and all other products removed from ALL retail establishment shelves.

      I cannot see Tesco, Aldi, Lidl et al putting up with that

    7. “Do we have police officers with the necessary intelligence — but above all the common sense …”

      Once upon a time we did, alas.

    8. Why aren’t they arresting the people who put them on sale? Shouldn’t give them ideas.
      Are they saying it’s legal to sell them but illegal to buy them?
      You couldn’t make it up.

      2. Going to be easier money than speeding tickets isn’t it.

        Park a couple of PCs at the supermarket door, give them a couple of doughnuts to tide them over till lunchtime and have them check every shopping bag.

      3. NIck Adderley clearly hasn’t read the relevant law, and does not understand the difference between law, guidance and advice.

  63. Has the ruling on Garden centres been lifted yet?
    The busiest gardening weekend of the year with fine weather forecast….

    2. No, our local GC was firmly closed.

      Just got back from w/rose.10 minute queue to get in, but there was a good display of health bedding plants in the car park, which we had to circle.

      Bought all I wanted inside, empty roads to & from, not a flatfoot in sight anywhere.

  65. I listen to the gardens outside and I hear happy children in this sun. After so many wet months it is so strange that it has been so mostly dry and sunny for the three straight weeks of lockdown.

    2. And little rain forecast for East Anglia for at least 10 days ahead. Garden already bone dry despite all that rain.

  66. Somewhat aside from Corona and asshole police, others were having a worse 9 April a while ago.
    Today is the 80th anniversary of the German invasion of Norway.
    Acting without orders (because the minister didn’t want to know), Oberst Eriksen shot at the German cruiser “Blücher” with the 28cm guns at Oskarsborg fortress, and torpedoed the ship as it passed by on fire. Blücher was carrying thousands of German troops, most of whom drowned. Those that made it ashore were cared for by locals living close by.
    The action allowed the King, government and gold reserves to escape to the UK.
    After the war, Erikson was court martialled for acting without orders.
    The politicians were from the Labour party.

    1. They always go on about labour winning the election at the end of WW2. They never say why they only lasted one term then were thrown out. Its not easy to find out but my parents told me why. They cared more for germany and the germans than our own people and when Germany came off rations and we stayed on us for 3 more years. etc.

      2. Your parents got that wrong. Germany was surviving on aid from the US, not Britain – Britain was broke, but was expected to make it on its own.

        1. Fourteen years of food rationing in Britain ended at midnight on 4 July 1954, when restrictions on the sale and purchase of meat and bacon were lifted. This happened nine years after the end of the war.

          2. Later on it was not at all intrusive, mostly chocolate and the like. People lived just fine at the time. A lot fewer fatties around though.

            The German post war rations, by the way were much lower calorie wise than the British rations.

          3. If you ever get to see the Film “The Wooden Horse” made in 1950 you can see the rib cages of all the actors taking part in the PE exercises. I’m pretty certain none of them had to lose weight to take part in the film…

          4. True – and for many more years after that. I remember seeing kids’ ribs showing in PT and the showers all the way through the ’50’s. Lower calorie input and a lot more exercise will do that.

          6. A lot of consumer goods in on sale in British shops were ‘export reject’.

        2. But rationing of certain stuff, such as sugar went on in Britain until 1953.

          The hangover from that was that for some years afterwards sweets were looked on as a once-a-week treat for us.

          1. 1954. I remember going with my mum to get the National Health orange juice and other goodies.

          6. I liked that orange juice, rectangular bottle with a screw cap, collected from the clinic behind Woolworths. It had a taste all of its own, different to the stuff the milkman brought.

          10. 1954. I remember going with my mum to get the National Health orange juice and other goodies.

          11. 1953? That would coincide with the start of the exponential rise in obesity then.

          12. That was post 73 and probably some time later, maybe even 83. Everybody was as skinny as a rake that I knew when I got married, apart from one or two that we considered fat, but who now wouldn’t get a second glance, because of their lack of girth.

          14. Sweets are still known as lørdagsgodt -Saturday goodies – in Norway..

          15. Goddis in Swedish, because the Swedes are stuffing themselves with them every day.

          16. I remember sweets coming off ration. I also remember my parents opening up the blue sugar bags and the tea packets to extract every last grain and leaf.

        3. The loan taken out from the Americans to finance the UK recovering from the war was paid off in 2006. The amount lent was £4.34 billion – worth about £27 billion in 2006 according to the Independent journalist, but by my reckoning 1d in 1946 is worth 20p today, a better estimate of today’s value is about £208 billion, which seems more realistic.

          The Labour Party won more votes than the Conservatives in the 1951 Election, but fewer seats, thanks to a skewed voting system. Conservatives 321 seats with 48%; Labour 295 seats with 48.8%). Labour attracted more votes in 1951 than it had before and has since (including all Tony Blair’s elections). The record for any party was only broken by John Major’s Conservatives in 1992.

          1. I refer learned Nottlers to my recent letter to the Salisbury Review, which you will find on their website. (Spoiler: you probably won’t like it.)

        4. Sorry. The labour government were doing far more for germany than for britain. Perhaps you could tell me why you thought they lost.

      3. They wrecked the economy, like all other Labour administrations, Johnny. The Attlee government even managed to achieve deprivation where Herr H had failed; it put bread on ration!

    3. My first Airfix ship model in about 1960-ish was HMS Cossack (L 03), the Tribal class destroyer that boarded the Altmark in Norwegian waters and released hundreds of British prisoners who were being held on board.

      1. That nearly caused the Labour government to declare war on Britain! The carrying out of military operations in Norwegian waters was unbearable to the Labour politicians.

        1. The incident was quite a while before the Germans invaded Norway.

          Strange that they tolerated a German prison ship in their neutral waters.

          (Well, not really, but they changed their tune a couple of months later)

    4. This time on the 9th of April 1989 we were out at our sea front and my eldest daughter ( 11yo at the time ) slipped on some rocks and and hit her head badly on them, she spent 6 weeks in an induced coma, we were summoned on three different occasions to be warned she was not going to make it through the night but if she did there would be serious impairment of her faculties, but against all odds she made it and was discharged after 3 months in ITU , she’s made a full recovery and has managed to graduate as a clinician and is now fairly high up the Macmillan organisation and given us a wonderful son-in-law and two beautiful grandchildren . That was a bad April 9th, nothing since then has really made me feel sorry for myself about anything.

        1. It made me appreciate that PTS is a real thing and not just people being a bit sensitive, it was a good 2 years before I stopped having fits of the vapours every time I heard an ambulance siren, even now all these years later very occasionally something will remind me of those months and it stops me dead in my tracks

          1. Your story is something to have PTSD about though. Glad it had a happy ending.

      3. There are few questions quite like:

        “has he/she been baptised and would you like us to call the priest?”

        to bring one up with a jolt.

          1. I hope that that completely tactless reply was in response to your asking the humanitarian question.

        2. According to my parents I was Christened twice in hospital and then once more, less urgently, when I was finally home. The nursing sister who saved me became my Godmother. She was a very saintly lady, but sadly she was afflicted with dementia three or four years before she died, when she became anything but saintly, poor thing.

  67. Somewhat aside from Corona and asshole police, others were having a worse 9 April a while ago.
    Today is the 80th anniversary of the German invasion of Norway.
    Acting without orders (because the minister didn’t want to know), Oberst Eriksen shot at the German cruiser “Blücher” with the 28cm guns at Oskarsborg fortress, and torpedoed the ship as it passed by on fire. Blücher was carrying thousands of German troops, most of whom drowned. Those that made it ashore were cared for by locals living close by.
    The action allowed the King, government and gold reserves to escape to the UK.
    After the war, Erikson was court martialled for acting without orders.
    The politicians were from the Labour party.

        1. The vomiting one is fine, thanks.
          The coronavirus one is still sick in bed. This morning she was tired and breathless – says it feels as though someone is constantly pressing on her chest. Still no fever though. Apparently aching arms and legs was also an early symptom – she thought she was just tired from long days at work.

  69. BREAKING NEWS

    The first trombetti seedling (from the third sowing) is just beginning to show… Phew…!

    1. I once heard a barmaid ask a crowded pub after receiving a telephone call if anyone had seen his brother Mike.

    2. I once heard a barmaid ask a crowded pub after receiving a telephone call if anyone had seen his brother Mike.

      1. 317971+ up ticks,
        Morning B,
        On a job once where the head engineers name was bates ( an orrible bastard) and the distortion over the tannoy supplied his nickname.

          1. We had a Bobby Hind in the office – he was always referred to as ‘Mr R Hind’ on the tannoy, until the day we had a temp on the switchboard…

          2. 317971+ up ticks,
            Morning N,
            The job I mentioned the first six on it ( construction) were all
            john’s like a bank of toilets in America, the seventh was a welder named Roy………. Rogers.

            Just another cowboy.

        1. It was a Friday night and the place was full. She had to yell at the top of her voice to make herself heard, which she did in fine style. Everyone looked and there was a momentary lull as it dawned on her what she’d just said.

          The bar erupted as she blushed to the soles of her feet.

          A good looking lass called Caroline.

      1. One of the perils of washing up on a shore with no ID I suppose, at a time when we had a government minister with the same name.

        Sadly, it is clear we HAVE to have ID cards and cease the copious production of incomer’s national insurance cards.

      2. Because she was so incensed about Brexit that she and her husband relocated permanently to Venic, Italy.
        Just as the virus outbreak started.
        Snigger.
        We just wondered how that was working out…

    2. Short on greens and what the hell is that bread doing there?

      HP Sauce? Somebody is having a laugh.

    3. If it’s mince and tatties, it should be mashed potatoes.

      Oh come on autocorrect, tatties not patties.

      .

    3. Yup.
      Precisely what I found
      The moment they knew I was a Conservative supporter, I was confined to opining on day-glow orange juice and something called a dongle.
      I told them to stick it.

      1. That’s how they managed to get a survey that showed 65% (or something like that) wanted to extend the Brexit transition period. See the Daily Excess yesterday.

    4. It was run for years by the outstanding lefty Peter Kellner
      who is married to the brilliantly successful EUSSR “High
      Representative” – who almost started WW3 on her own,
      and then was paid €400,000 as she left (on top of her
      enormous, tax-free, pension, natch).

  80. Unfortunately it is the public sector people, that is the non-wealth
    creators in our society, who are ‘organising’ & ‘managing’ this
    complete shambles, they don’t really have a ‘dog in the fight’ as their
    jobs are not under threat and salaries continue to flow into bank
    accounts ..
    Lockdown for them is a minor inconvenience not a financial tsunami that is about to hit as it is for the private sector

    1. True – we are also lucky (those of us who are pensioners) as we have no jobs to lose and will presumably still draw our pensions. We do have quite a lot to be thankful for, even if our investments have all but disapreared.

      1. Most of my pension is my house ( value dropping) and investments (ditto!). Hope it all recovers by the time I retire…

        1. IMHO I was let down by the Pension companies – Capital Growth was modest or non-existent even during periods of high inflation. Then the annuity yields plummeted,

          I also had a Plan “B” and and a Plan “C”
          Plan “B” was other monies salted away
          Plan “C” having 3 bright sons all earning handsome salaries

          So far Plan A – Pensions are sufficient – after retirement and as I age my expenditure falls. You do not need the new xxx or yyy, pleasures are simpler and less costly.

          2. Unfortunately I have Chemo induced neuropathy – walking is tricky, sleep patterns are chaotic ……… home is best.

          3. Sorry to hear that. Remember, old age is a beggar, but better than the alternative! 🙂

          4. I went from nearly 64 to 74 overnight.
            I am now 74, so I guess I must be around 84 now.
            However, 10 years ago they thought I had some 12-24 months with a bit of luck.
            All my fellow travellers have gone before me.
            I was a Lucky Boy, to quote my new surgeon who gave me my last colonoscopy 2.5 years ago.
            The original surgeon having retired to private practice and a quieter lifestyle – top man!!

  82. I am off for today. My Income Tax return arrived this morning. Funny how they never forget.

    Have a jolly evening. A demain.

    1. “My Income Tax return arrived this morning”

      See you in a week or two. Stay cool.

    2. When you heard it hit the floor I’ll bet you thought it was the Yellow Pages had arrived…

      1. Our Yellow Pages has been shrunk to save paper, but the print is so small anything less than an electron microscope and you still can’t read it. Why can’t they put it on CD for those who ask for it in that format. Lighter, quicker to make and easier to distribute. CDs can be recycled just as paper can.

      2. Whereas the neighbours heard the thump and knew it was that rich Mr Thomas, getting his annual April comeuppance.

  85. Roast Pork tonight,joint’s out to come to room temp well rubbed with salt pepper crushed garlic balsamic and dijon mustard resting on its trivet of veg now to marinade
    Usual trimmings roast spuds and roast onion,steamed carrots and broccoli to prepare later

    Living alone rarely bother with a roast these days but I’m bored with my usual fare,time to make the effort

    2. If I had been in the UK, Rik, I’d be banging on your door tonight. :•)

      [With a suitable bottle or two, of course!]

    3. I have to admit, if I lived alone, my diet would consist of baked potatoes and/or scrambled egg.
      Fortunately, I do like fruit, so would possibly be vaguely healthy. (As long as I didn’t store any ice cream in the freezer.)

    4. I can understand the hassle of having a nice roast for one. Here’s a tip.

      Get yourself a nice big piece of belly pork. Marinade.

      Slow cook or slow roast.

      Leave to cool then cut into 2 or 3 inch squares.

      Bung them in the freezer.

      When you next fancy some pork take out one portion allow to defrost then pan fry on all sides.

      Skin side last. Then paint it with miso and oyster sauce.

      Only takes a few minutes in the pan and you have all those other portions waiting ready for next time.

        1. Same to you with brass knobs on.

          I use guinea fowl to make Rillons, too.

          Edit…I’m confusing Rillons with Confit.

          1. I have an exceptional book on pork cookery called Pork & Sons by Stéphane Reynaud. His recipe for pork rillons is also delicious:

            1 kg pork belly
            1½ tablespoons salt
            1 teaspoon ground mixed spice
            350 g lard
            3 tablespoons sugar.

            Cut the meat into 50 mm cubes. Place the into a bowl, add the salt and mixed spice mix well and leave to marinate in the refrigerator for 24 hours.

            Melt the lard in a large pan. Add the pork and cook over a medium heat. stirring frequently, for about 10 minutes, until lightly browned all over. Lower the heat and simmer gently for about 2 hours, until tender. Stir in the sugar and cook, stirring frequently, until the meat is caramelised.

            The rillons can be eaten hot or cold.

            Duck rillons are also delicious, as you probably know.

          2. Not keen on Daffy.

            Your recipe sounds good. My original was based on the Chinese crispy pork. The marinade would reflect this if i had posted it.

          2. Thanks.

            I should say the pork comes out better when slow cooked in stock. Especially if most of it is going in the freezer.

          3. I have c&p’d it all for future reference. I c&p many recommendations from the blog, a truly invaluable source of information in all areas.

  86. Just unsubscribed from the DT. They pleaded with me to stay, offered me various discounts, even said I could sleep with the Editor’s wife. OK – the last bit may be a slight exaggeration. I’ll miss the Letters page, but nothing else. Hopefully, I’ll still be able to copy the link to the latter each morning, but if this site implodes in early May, you’ll know why…

        1. As the letters page opens & before the grey curtain comes down, hammer away at the esc key. That allows me to read the paywall articles (if I can be arsed). Tapping with a finger on the pad often works. You may have to clear DT cookies, though.

          2. I did that once, the other week, and since then there has been no paywall. I can see all the articles free of charge!

    2. I wonder if anyone at the DT has been bright enough to work out by how much their readership might increase without subscriptions and how much extra revenue that might generate through increased advertising revenues?

      1. I don’t think ads alone are enough. The ad traffic from the Daily Mail has to be seen to be believed. What I would pay for, would be a subscription that would allow me to browse all the newspapers, paying per article clicked, or something like that.
        Then I could move around and cherry-pick only the good writers from each publication, I’d get my news fill, they’d get some money (at present they’re getting a big fat zero from me), and we’d all be happy.

          1. Oh well at least I’m saving the money I would be putting in their pockets. And probably saving a lot of wasted time too!

      1. There’s nothing positive there, Paul. It’s no longer remotely conservative. There was a thread under a Speccie item, where several (including our own Hoppy) said they’d unsubscribed, and I found I couldn’t disagree. The Speccie subscription is also under constant review. At the moment, with a handful of notable exceptions, I only go there for the comments…

    4. Last week I wrote an excellent article (well I think it is excellent and so does Caroline!) and submitted it to the DT who has published my stuff in the past. They have not even had the courtesy to acknowledge my contribution.

      2. The letters’ editor, Christopher Howse, has his favourites. There is a coterie of favoured correspondents who get their letters printed every week without fail.

      1. The wendy suckers have a point.
        Cut their salary by x thousands and the owners profit and the exchequer loses the tax.
        Encourage them to donate to worthy causes (their accountants will get the tax relief for them no doubt).

        I get thoroughly pissed off by public sector “workers”, like MP’s, telling everyone else to make financial sacrifices when they are still in work and being paid.

        How many non-essential public sector workers have been laid off? Not many I’ll wager.

    3. This is an outrage. Sheer and total filth.

      We are offering our courses at 25% of their normal rate because we are still running our courses but with our students at home.

      By that token the MPs should have a CUT in their pay of 75% as we have done.

      Has a single MP the integrity to stand up and say that he, she (or it) refuses to be rewarded while others are being bankrupted

      2. Three weeks ago, I classed myself as ‘semi-retired’. Now, I’m merely ‘retired’. The CofE have specifically ruled that organists may not take part in funerals, services and weddings (obviously – there aren’t any). I can’t be Verger any more, since I’m prohibited from entering the building (the clock ‘lost’ 20 minutes today – I’m not allowed to correct it (yeah, right)). We’ve a virtual service on Sunday. I’d record a bit of organ music and a few hymns, but that’s not permitted. How I’m going to infect/be infected in a deserted church is known only to Justin Welby.

        The Parish can’t meet the demands of the Diocese. We’ve used funds that were never intended to meet running costs to keep the wolf from the door. I get to live in a Verger’s Cottage, which was built in 1936, thanks to the generosity of Miss Dorothea S Courtauld (of the fabric dynasty), who lived in a big house (currently on the market for £3m) in the village. It’s the only disposable asset the Parish owns. There’s another house, tied up with the school, but the trust is set up so that – were it to be sold – the Church Commissioners would take every penny. There’s no money left to pay me, so I’ve voluntarily laid myself off. Meanwhile, the Parish is effectively bankrupt.

        So – the plan was to sell this place. It’s been valued at £700k. I would be offered a new 5 year contract, where my existing pittance salary would be increased by the equivalent of my rent (up to a ceiling), if I moved to a new home within three miles of the Parish. I found a shiny new apartment in a new neighbourhood in what was once Aldershot South Camp – now a Conservation Area, and was given the go-ahead to move there. Two days later, I was told to ‘hold fire’. There’s a legal issue which needs to be sorted out by the Diocese, and the person dealing with it has left their employ. In common with the rest of the CofE hierarchy, everyone has fucked off to a place of safety. I think this means that I’m now officially a squatter.

        Still – could be worse. Here, I have a large garden, and the best view in the village. Had the timing been different, I could have been barricaded into a flat. I’m so glad that we’re paying our MP’s what they’re worth. Oh, wait…

      3. 317971+ up ticks,
        Evening R,
        Yes I do know know of one, & that is that well castigated far right racist when he was an MEP,
        one Gerard Batten.

      4. That is very good of you Rastus.

        How are our MPs working? They’re not “debating”. Perhaps they are answering thousands more letters? We the public need to be writing to our MPs complaining about the extra £10,000 for them to work from home. Is this so they can pick up their emails at home when they couldn’t before? Presumably, to somewhat compensate, their travelling expenses at least are being cut.

        Altogether the MPs are greedy, arrogant bar stewards, a disgrace one and all.

  88. I went into my local branch of TSB this morning. They said they were only open for emergency business, whatever that means. I told them i wanted to withdraw some cash. They asked for my card and ID which i gave them. They asked me how much money i required. I told them i wished to withdraw £5000. They asked me what i wanted it for. I told them it was none of their business. They said couldn’t i transfer the money to another bank. I said yes, i can do that and at the same time i will be transferring my account too.

    And their online banking is down.

    2. apart from a duty to report anything remotely connected with ‘money laundering’, the cashiers are aware of scams where people have been persuaded to first withdraw large sums of cash and then to hand it to a motorcycle courier.

      1. My Mother tried to withdraw £6,000 for a sofa that two bastards “sold” her. Transaction halted, police brought in, bastards didn’t get the money & mother got to keep the sofa.
        So, not such a bad thing.

      2. I understand. But they should recognise me by sight by now. I recognise them.

        I thought the amount where questions were asked was £10,000.

  89. Just a query, I have lost 87,000+ upvotes and none now are being recorded

    How can they be recovered

    1. 317971+ up ticks,
      Evening OLT
      May one ask,why did you allow it to continue with no input from yourself ?

        1. 317971+ up ticks,
          Evening N,
          Where there is a negative there is a positive I saw no reason why I should allow some odious embryo the satisfaction of indiscriminate pruning of peoples up votes without some input from me.
          I checked my tally from prior to the pruning and add the daily total.
          It is not the returning to zero that counts ( no pun) but the submission I could not accept.

          1. what on earth is going on? Is there a downvoting bot, or are inane little antifas sitting there down-clicking away to try and silence conservative views?

          3. Programmed and run by said moronic antifas I assume. Another of their tricks on the internet like doxxing people that help to make them feel important.

          4. 317971 + up ticks,
            Evening BB2,
            I have a personal one, every ogga post
            is down voted, it seems very much to have protective feelings for paedophiles, in it’s case pity is the order of the day.

    2. They can’t. It’s a long story, but those of us who commented on the old “channels” have all been targeted. Truth be told, you are probably in negative upvote territory. Either ignore it, or set up a new account with Disqus. The only downside of negative upvotes, is that you may be prevented from commenting on other sites.

      I haven’t checked for months, but my upvotes were into minus 100s of thousands territory. Disqus have failed to address the issue, and it’s widely believed that it’s an attempt to silence anyone with views to the right of Owen Jones…

      1. True, not just the old Channels though. Anyone deemed to be vaguely ‘on the right’.

    3. Wear your zero with pride.

      It tells you that some mean minded leftie thinks that your opinion is improtant enough to try to silence it.

    4. I lost around 15,000 but at least still remain in positive territory, and new votes still count. I don’t think you can get them back, unfortunately.

    5. I don’t think they can. I started a new account with a different email address and it seems unaffected. My old one will be well into negative figures by now.

    7. They can’t be recovered I’m afraid.

      You will continue to lose votes . . . forever. Although your account will show zero upvotes you will continue to receive unvotes and your real count will be less than zero.

      (I have an old ID that is now several million votes in the red)

      This is where you are right now:

      https://disqus.com/home/discussion/realm-solutionsonly/free_for_all_profile_runs_032920/#comment-4867831239

      As you can see you’re now at -15,000 votes. So you’ve lost 87k and another 15k on top. In other words you’ve been unvoted 102k times. And that will continue.

      Here’s my last ID:

      https://disqus.com/home/discussion/realm-solutionsonly/free_for_all_profile_runs_032920/#comment-4867835425

      My loses seem to have slowed, a mere -105k so I’ve only lost 372,000 votes!

          1. I may be being obtuse here, but there doesn’t appear to be anywhere to put the profile in.

          2. I’ve run a query or you. Here’s the result (310k negative votes):
            User sosraboc :
            Realms Link: sosraboc
            AuthorID: 43677489
            Rep: -10.867662
            Posts: 54149
            Approved: 54075 (99.86 %)
            Flagged: 658 (1.22 %)
            Spam: 0 (0.00 %)
            Likes: -310,137
            BotWarning: This account may be targeted by a downvote bot.
            Joined: Thu, 14-02-2013 04:55
            Power Contributor (AllStar): False
            Closed: False
            Forums With Posts: 33
            Forums Followed: 1
            Followers: 5
            Followings: 0
            https://c.disquscdn.com/upl…

          3. Thanks for that.

            I wonder why the other one didn’t show.

            Oddly enough, the details are still incorrect.

            I joined long before 2013 and have never been anything other than sosraboc.
            I’m guessing it must be something to do with disqus/the DT records.

          5. Did you actually join Disqus before 2013?

            I joined the Telegraph, directly, (grizzly with small ‘g’) in June 2010 — my tenth anniversary is coming up — but I only got a Disqus avatar (Grizzly with capital ‘G’) a few years later.

          6. I’m not sure.

            Probably not, because I suspect Disqus itself isn’t all that old. I presume the DT ran its own platform.

            I was “contributing” before we left the UK in 2008, so it could have been any one of a number of iterations. But I’ve always signed on as sosraboc.

          8. Strange – my userid has been around for 12 years yet I have but miserable 1 post, albeit with 20 likes! (Assuming I’m reading the results correctly)

        2. Go to this site:

          https://disqus.com/home/forum/realm-solutionsonly

          The guy who runs that site has some grasp on the workings of Disqus works (not enough to counter the unvoting problem however although he did try). Then find the most recent ‘Free-For-All Profile Runs’ thread.

          Which is currently this one:

          https://www.realms.chat/t/7942603093

          Leave a comment containing the following (and nothing else):

          !userinfo

          The bot will then reply to you giving the basics of your account in the same way I linked to earlier.

          If you want to check someone else out, let’s invent one called randomusername, then it’s written as:

          !userinfo @randomusername

          However, looking at that thread, I’m too late, you’ve already sussed it out! I’ll leave this up in case anyone is interested.

          1. PS.

            Thanks for all the assistance.

            I’m only disappointed that I don’t have a million down votes!

            This time next year, perhaps?

        1. MB still watches the Beeb.
          Personally, if left to me, the telly would hardly ever be switched on.

          2. I briefly reinstated my TV licence, since a friend was likely to stay here while she moved house. Last time I watched TV was Christmas Day, until I fell asleep. The licence has gone for good. As has the telly. OK – I still have a portable, but it’s not installed, nor will it be…

  91. This board has definitely benefitted from the weather – so many posts have sunshine streaming through between the lines (not many NoTTLers confined to 17th floor flat).

    1. Those of us who have gardens and immediate access to the countryside are very lucky. All these threats and about increasing the ‘policing’ of parks and shopping must be riling (even more than us lucky ones) many many people around the country.

        2. What we have never been told is how many she was shopping for.
          Was she suddenly landed with children and husband to cater for?
          Does she have elderly or disabled rellies who can’t get out?
          That was a typical DM slur by implication.

        3. That’s not panic buying, that looks like my weekly shop before some of my children left home! She’s probably got a husband and a few teenage sons at home.

  92. Technical note (after watching BBC News) – the Covid19 deaths should separate out a category “Hospital-transmitted Covid” – these are people who visited or were in hospital with (say) a broken leg or post-operation and caught Covid there … Could be a fairly significant proportion.

    1. I know of a lady in her nineties who broke her hip, was taken to hospital, caught covid and dies three days later.

  93. Did MPs demand the £10000 payment and/or who authorised the payment.?I cannot think of any justification for it. They are on £80000 plus expenses as it is. The Chancellor has no control over spending and this morning the Bank of England decided in effect to print more money to help us through. Wheelbarrow sales will take off.

  94. MOH has decades of experience of illnesses of patients of many ethnic backgrounds in a major London hospital group.
    We were discussing why Africans, Asians and Hispanics were reported by the BBC of outnumbering other groups in COVID deaths.

    There are known genetic factors amongst these groups:

    Africans are noted for elevated platelet disorders.
    Asians are prone to high blood pressure.
    Hispanics have a high incidence of Sickle Cell Trait

    All these factors dispose the associated groups to higher levels of morbidity over average populations.

    I was interested to hear that a doctor interviewed about mortality rates in COVID patients remarked that a lot of them had had a history of high blood pressure. Well that is known to correlate with high mortality rates anyway.

    These ethnic groups are therefore likely to be first in line for COVID susceptibity purely on the basis of their genetic background.

    1. The BBC has been featuring this today and try as they might, the interrogators presenters couldn’t force their guests to say the higher rate is largely prejudicial.

    2. Crivens.
      Coved 19 is a killer. Covid 19 has ground the entire planet to a halt.
      But …. but….. it gets worse. Far, far worse than anything we could have imagined.
      Covid 19 is ….. WAYCIST!

    3. The disproportionate effect of Covid-19 on mortality rates on African Americans has been noted here. It seems that the black community tends to develop high blood pressure rather younger than whites, leading to heart and stroke problems. Diabetes is also disproportionate, as is obesity even among young people. Basically, more underlying conditions are present.

      Glaucoma is also a real problem for this group.

      Sickle cell anaemia, btw, is most common here in African Americans rather than Hispanics.

    1. None of that inconvenient God stuff. Nice to know the Poop doesn’t think we’ve peed off the Big Man.

    2. Er … NO, me old pontiff.

      It is nature’s response to far too much unprotected human shagging!

    5. I believe there is a perfectly rational explanation for this.
      It is my theory that Francis knows perfectly well that eco-paganism is a scam.
      But he can see that a lot of people are falling for it, because they have had non-Christian upbringings in the west, so they are gullible enough to fall for the idea that they, as humans should be guilty for being human, and assuage their guilt with regular sacrifices (green taxes).
      So he is doing what the Catholic church have always done, that is to swallow up a competing religion.
      In order to do this, he has to temporarily incorporate their essentially pagan beliefs into Christianity, resulting in the kind of nonsense spouted in this tweet.

      2. Interesting theory. I’m Anglican, but I’ve attended RCC worship and helped out with the music. For the last ten years or more, I’ve kept bumping into an ex-Anglican, married, RCC priest. I joked that Catholic priests all look the same. In the past, I’ve attended RC churches in the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. And been told that their worship was relatively “Low Church”. A few years ago, I agreed to join the choir one Christmas Eve at St Joseph’s, Guildford. The place was packed; another hundred or so were crowded in the Narthex. Back home for midnight Mass, we had around thirty worshippers. Still think Francis is a Lefty shill, though…

  96. This site has some very weird stuff happening. For a couple of weeks or so now, I have had to re-login in every time I go to the the day’s discussion. Even if I just reload the page, I have to re-login. But, if I go to http://www.disqus.com, I am recognized immediately. no login required. Also my profile is inaccessible from here, I get an error message every time. But it is accessible from http://www.disqus.com.

      1. Whoops. Before I noticed, I thought you were mocking my Prince of Wales accent in some incomprehensible way. Now corrected.

        1. When I’m posting I go through and check for typos and correct them. Then I check for typos again and correct them. Then I do it again and once all the typos are gone I hit ‘Post’.

          Then as it pops up on the screen there’s a typo standing out like a sore thumb.

          I swear Disqus inserts typos as part of the posting process.

          1. Not disqus, I think that it is the internet that does it. Probably a pre 5G virus.

          2. I’ll get onto David Icke and see what he’s got to say about it.

            He might have a solution

      1. With the ‘interesting’ reference possibly a mandarine Duck (with the wrong plumage)

          6. What defeat?

            Schickelgruber/Schicklgruber are pronounced the same.

            Schicklgruber/Schicklgreuber have completely different vowel sounds.

          7. You, a German language teacher, and self confessed pedant, misspelled his name whilst saying I had done that very same thing. I don’t profess to being a German linguist, but I thought you did.

  99. Just scanning the news and the media all seem to be unpleasantly surprised by the unemployment figures.

    Really? Whole countries are shutdown and the armageddon mongers are having a field day about record unemployment.

    I would have thought pleasant surprise if unemployment is only at 15%.

    Some good news, there is at least one job opportunity. New Jersey are looking for staff. Their benefits system was written in Cobol and none of the staff know this old time language. That’ll teach the woke generation if they manage to kill off the oldies, no one left to look after the benefit cheques.

          1. I used that as well – and Basic, Ada and PL/1 but nothing beat 360 Assembler..

          2. Best assembler I ever used was Macro-10. Also did a lot of low level OS programming on the old GE (later Honeywell and NEC) mainframes. All my stuff was for online systems, not batch.

            Simpler times.

          3. Indeed and not that hard to code at the assembler level.

            In later years when I was using C or C++, I wanted to cry over how inefficient things had become.

          5. Yeah, when I started memory was measured in K’s, not M’s – and there weren’t many of them, either. And “cycles” were hoarded. The old mainframe instruction set manuals told us how many cycles each instruction took – necessary information at the time.

          6. I started in a computer bureau. Great excitement when the memory of our IBM mainframe was upgraded from 4MB to 8MB (yes MB)

          7. Ooh I was spoilt, our 360/30 had 32k, upgraded to 64k. I am not sure what the Elliot 803 had but the cores were big enough to count them.

          8. 360 Assembler – now that takes me back. Programming down on the metal – proper coding.

      3. Ah, FORTRAN – that brings back happy memories of writing programs that had questions like “Do you want the answer in miles or kilometres. Answer yes or no”.

    2. Millennium bug nothing. Years earlier, I once had to amend a COBOL program which stopped working properly at the end of a decade – the programmer had only allowed one digit for the year.

      2. With the fuss about the model used to estimate coronavirus deaths, I wonder how bad that old code will be. Many mods, probably not documented and obviously the author is not around to explain anything.

        The real fun was when money was decimalised and everyone wanted patches to existing programs so that they could maintain old currency transactions as well as the new.

        1. There’s another question, where did you spend Dec 31, 1999? I was at work until well into the next day in case any of “my” systems crashed…and my guys were parked in our data centres. Cost me (well, the company) a very nice night out for all when it was over.

          1. I registered one of my children’s birth on the first working day after 1st January 2000. I have a hand-written certificate, because the Council’s printer hadn’t been fixed.

          2. Kiawah island, having a paddle at midnight. We had done our bit and for some reason were off the hook,

          3. Shooting marine seismic offshore Nigeria. We shut down a line at 2330 and just looked at each other and all the computers nervously. Come 5 minutes after the witching hour we, almost disappointed, started shooting the next line. We had specialists on board and for the whole year running up to it we were preparing for the dreaded collapse of civilisation.

          4. I used to work with someone who’d been doing that in the late 60s/early 70s. They were trailing a length of Cordtex, or Superflex or something of the sort on a pre-determined course behind a boat, streamed out as they moved along. The Nigerian on board had the instruction to set off the charge at a particular time, so that their array could pick up the results.

            The boat was continuing on its course when the engine failed and it lay dead in the water. At the planned moment the NIgerian pressed the button on his firer and off went the charge, right on time.

            Unfortunately, while the boat had been floating about, the charge, losing lift provided by forward motion had sunk into a vertical position directly beneath the boat.

            When the charge went off the shotfirer blew himself out of the water. One of the many day-to-day hazards of employing local labour, apparently.

          5. When we lived there, it was said about Nigerians that “Give us the job and we will finish the tools”!

          6. Another incident he told me about was when they were using a ripper behind a dozer to lay a cord in the rip in soft ground. The ripper happened upon a large buried boulder, causing the tractor to kick violently and the operator to be thrown off, unfortunately sustaining injuries that proved fatal.

            My friend was rather distraught, not having been long in country and thinking about the poor unfortunate on the ground, asked the gaffer ‘What do we do now?’

            ‘Get another driver from the village’ was the reply.

          10. Many good stories from when explosives were used. I joined marine seismic quite late in life, 1990, and we had air gun arrays for our sound sources and a single streamer chocabloc with hydrophones. Things changed constantly and by the time I left, 2010, up to 12 streamers and perhaps 8-10km long. Bloody nightmare.

          12. It would certainly have been more fun. My first 10 years were good too, very relaxed on the HSE side. Had some great fishing from the ship and saw some amazing sights. Then the competition started and fun went out the porthole.

          13. I made a tidy sum out of Y2K. It really irks me when I meet people who say the whole things was scam. The systems I worked upon would have failed within ten minutes of the clock over to 1st Jan 2000.

        2. I worked with code about ten years ago that had been around pre-decimalisation. The currency fields had been modded so that there were 1200 uniits to the pound so as to allow easy conversion from LSD to £s and pence.

          1. Yes that was the method, something that gave accuracy in both formats.

            Absolute pain to ensure that every currency reference in every program did the needed conversion.

    3. I sometimes have pleasant dreams about learning COBOL and funding my retirement by charging an astronomical hourly rate, because nobody else can do it any more.
      Then I remember that it would involve hours of rooting around in spaghetti code fixing 40 year old bugs. 🙁

      1. My experience is now even older; not sure I could punch a card by hand now! 🙂

      1. It’s the effluent that comes out of the other end after you’ve drunk proper beer.

      1. There’s an ozzie joke in that but it’s too long……..
        Oh alright then.
        Couple of shearers hit town after working flat out for 6 weeks. They ask the guy at the hotel where the best place in town was to get a couple of loose Sheila’s along side a few decent coldies.
        The hotelier points them in the right direction. He phoned ahead and as they arrive there’s a two decent women and a crate of bottled coldies each. They say g’day and Bruce takes a bottle from the crate and one of the Sheilas turns away and bends over in front of him. He steps away and says hang on a mo we need a drink first.
        She looks over her shoulder and winks, she says sure thing, but don’t you wanna open the bottles ?

          1. That reminds me of another ozzie joke.
            3 shearers sitting in a pub in a country town they see a new face on the opposite side of the road.
            One of them says ‘ho’s ‘e I aint seen ‘m in town before.
            I dunno go an’ ask ‘im.
            So matey pops across and says g’day mate how yer goin’ ? I ain’t seen you around before where yer from ?
            The guy says oh hi I’m Michael I’m on holiday from England. Oh yeah where abouts ? London actually.
            Oh right wadda you do over there ?
            Well I’m a taxidermist.
            Oh yeah says the shearer what’s that then ?
            Michael explains.
            Right mate me beers getting warm I’ll catch yer ladder.
            He sits down with his shearer mates and they say well who is he then ?
            I dunno really some bloody taxi driver from London called Michael………but he’s one of us.

          1. He use to live about 200 yards from my elder sister.
            Eric Morecombe live a 200 yards in the other direction.

  103. BBC One Newsflash

    “Boris not on ventilator.
    That’s good because ventilators are used for only the most sickest of patients with round the clock monitoring.”

    I think it’s reported that there could be up to 4000 ventilators at Excel so that could be a lot of most sickest patients being looked after by the most sickest monitoring anaesthatists and nurses.

    https://www.excel.london/

    https://www.excel.london/news/nhs-nightingale-opens-at-excel-london

    1. Most sickest? Ye gods! Does NOBODY understand grammar these days? Most with the standard adjective (usually if it’s a polysyllabic one – ie most beautiful) or add the suffix -est to the standard adjective (as in sickest), but NOT, repeat NOT (nigdje) both together!

    3. I wasn’t aware that he had ever been on a ventilator. He’d been on oxygen for a while, but not a ventilator.

      What other things that haven’t happened are they planning to report?

  105. Got QT on at the moment. Why do they have these z-list celebs we’ve never heard of? Dan Whatshisface is rabbiting on and on about various issues and is totally p*ssing off the other participants and probably 90% of the viewers. Also, the Labour woman hasn’t twigged that removing the lockdown won’t get us back to normal any time soon, as we have to either develop herd immunity or wait for the vaccine to be developed.

    1. I thought we had to reach post peak and then they’d let us out so the NHS wouldn’t be swamped.

      1. Post peak is achieved by the majority of the population catching it and developing immunity. The trick is to slow that process down sufficiently so that the NHS isn’t swamped at any one time.

        1. If that’s the case, then we’re months away from the end of lockdown. ” the majority of the population catching it and developing immunity” is surely a long term goal.

  106. Just returned from a run into Inverness to pick up a special prescription for Mrs. Mac, which the doc had ordered online. Pleased to report that the pharmacy wasn’t busy, so straight in. That’s where my luck ended. The assistant was cloth-eared.

    She ordered me to stand well back from the counter and asked for the name, which I duly provided, but she obviously didn’t hear me properly and asked me to repeat it. I was a little surprised since I hadn’t spoken particularly quietly, but I obliged. She still couldn’t hear what I’d said and asked me to speak louder.

    Now as a former CSM, I’m quite good at ‘speaking louder’, you could say it’s my forte – see what I did there? – so in my best parade ground voice, I gave her the name for the third time. Not only did she hear me but the shelves behind the counter rattled and two other people rushed out from their cubby-hole to see what was going on. After she had recovered her wits, she said rather crossly “There’s no need to shout.”.

    Seems you just can’t please some people.

    2. I had a similar problem last week when picking up a prescription from a south London pharmacy for an 85year old bed bound friend. The Pharmacy Assistant was barricaded behind a wall of thick perspex. I could see her lips move and I heard some sounds but couldn’t make out what she was saying. It was only when she opened a small hatch above the counter that I discovered she was asking me a question in a broad Scottish brogue!

        1. I knew it I just knew it – I was paying homage to the Scot’s use of the term brogue rather that the namby-pamby word ‘accent’…

    3. There’s a Scottish jobsworth in our local Boots pharmacy. You can see she positively relishes chucking out or barring people from the shop.

  107. Nicked from GP

    Wife asked if I could put a bird table together. Totally misunderstood.

    I put her fifth and she is absolutely going mental.

  108. Just a thought…what is the likelihood of being fined for sitting around in the park in the rain looking miserable? Or are we only fined for enjoying ourselves?

        1. Note that he has an umbrella instead of a mask because viruses in the upper atmosphere are likely to be more prevalent in supersaturated air and fall to earth in rain drops.

      2. Kelly performed that routine in one take … despite suffering from a stinking cold.

      2. I’d say rather “don’t you know there’s a panic on?” We seem to be bombarded with doom and gloom such as to make us constantly in fear of our lives. I don’t think that the war instilled panic to such an extent. The phrase, “don’t you know there’s a war on?” was more to do with shortages, largely, but not entirely, down to the Battle for the Atlantic.

        1. Received on email today:
          I talked with a man today, an 80+ year old man. I asked him if there was anything I can get him while this Coronavirus scare was gripping America.

          He simply smiled, looked away and said:

          “Let me tell you what I need! I need to believe, at some point, this country my generation fought for… I need to believe this nation we handed safely to our children and their children…

          I need to know this generation will quit being a bunch of sissies…that they respect what they’ve been given…that they’ve earned what others sacrificed for.”

          I wasn’t sure where the conversation was going or if it was going anywhere at all. So, I sat there, quietly observing.

          “You know, I was a little boy during WWII. Those were scary days. We didn’t know if we were going to be speaking English, German or Japanese at the end of the war. There was no certainty, no guarantees like Americans enjoy today.

          And no home went without sacrifice or loss. Every house, up and down every street, had someone in harm’s way. Maybe their Daddy was a soldier, maybe their son was a sailor, maybe it was an uncle. Sometimes it was the whole damn family…fathers, sons, uncles…

          Having someone, you love, sent off to war…it wasn’t less frightening than it is today. It was scary as Hell. If anything, it was more frightening. We didn’t have battle front news. We didn’t have email or cellphones. You sent them away and you hoped…you prayed. You may not hear from them for months, if ever. Sometimes a mother was getting her son’s letters the same day Dad was comforting her over their child’s death.

          And we sacrificed. You couldn’t buy things. Everything was rationed. You were only allowed so much milk per month, only so much bread, toilet paper. EVERYTHING was restricted for the war effort. And what you weren’t using, what you didn’t need, things you threw away, they were saved and sorted for the war effort. My generation was the original recycling movement in America.

          And we had viruses back then…serious viruses. Things like polio, measles, and such. It was nothing to walk to school and pass a house or two that was quarantined. We didn’t shut down our schools. We didn’t shut down our cities. We carried on, without masks, without hand sanitizer. And do you know what? We persevered. We overcame. We didn’t attack our President, we came together. We rallied around the flag for the war. Thick or thin, we were in it to win. And we would lose more boys in an hour of combat than we lose in entire wars today.”

          He slowly looked away again. Maybe I saw a small tear in the corner of his eye. Then he continued:

          “Today’s kids don’t know sacrifice. They think a sacrifice is not having coverage on their phone while they freely drive across the country. Today’s kids are selfish and spoiled. In my generation, we looked out for our elders. We helped out with single moms who’s husbands were either at war or dead from war. Today’s kids rush the store, buying everything they can…no concern for anyone but themselves. It’s shameful the way Americans behave these days. None of them deserve the sacrifices their granddads made.

          So, no I don’t need anything. I appreciate your offer but, I know I’ve been through worse things than this virus. But maybe I should be asking you, what can I do to help you? Do you have enough pop to get through this, enough steak? Will you be able to survive with 113 channels on your tv?”

          I smiled, fighting back a tear of my own…now humbled by a man in his 80’s. All I could do was thank him for the history lesson, leave my number for emergency and leave with my ego firmly tucked in my rear.

          1. I had a good friend whose husband fought in the Far East with the Chindits.
            For five years she didn’t hear from him; she had no idea whether he was alive or dead.

    5. And what’s the problem with buying Easter Eggs? They are simply a foodstuff packaged a little differently from other chocolate products.

      1. …& differently priced. I was thinking of buying an E egg out of defiance during my shop today, but I was horrified at the cost. So I bought 2 large slabs of CDM instead

        1. Lindt do a very dark chocolate with chilli flavouring and I’m almost addicted to it! CDM is told sickly sweet for me.

          1. I’m not a particular fan of chocolate in general, but that Lindt chilli stuff is very nice.

          3. Another of those typos that I corrected within 5 seconds of the post appearing. 🙂

          7. I’m not a particular fan of chocolate in general, but that Lindt chilli stuff is very nice.

          8. Yes, that’s good, so is the one they do with salt.

            I also bought some limoncello ice cream today; looking forward to trying that.

          9. Lemon – my favourite. Sorbetto limone, limoncello, SWMBOs lemon drizzle cake.. mmm!

          10. Whereas I, on the other hand, dislike lemon-flavoured desserts. It takes all sorts …

          12. I much prefer lime to lemon. I make a delicious ‘limecello’ with lime zests and strong vodka.

            Lime and vanilla — and lime and ginger — are favourite combinations. I have a jar of pickled herring in a lime and ginger marinade, which is wonderful.

  109. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been moved from intensive care back to the ward at St Thomas’ Hospital — Downing Street. With luck the worst is over.

    Andrew Neil.

  110. Afternoon, all. Been another fine day. Usual routine – walked the dog for my permitted excursion then decided to laze and read in the sun. Now that the sun has moved to the front of the property I am here to bore the pants (other garments are possible) off you. As the sun is over the yardarm somewhere in the world (the Empire was very useful in that respect!), I have indulged in a glass of (Sarf Effrikan) red with my meal. It isn’t tea because a) I haven’t made a pot and b) it’s really a very late lunch as I didn’t bother with eating at one.

    1. I’m ready for my beddy, too, Ready Eddy. Good night to all NoTTLers, especially Peddy.

    1. Another Caroline listener! 3 weeks ago we made the trip out to the Ross Revenge and had a guided tour of the whole ship, while live broadcasting. We were the last visitors before the Corona lockdown. A great day out! The ship is, on the one hand, an antiquated piece of broadcasting history and on the other, a high-tech sophisticated user of today’s technologies. Recommended!

      Have you been out there, Ims2?

      1. No. We never went when we lived in Essex, and are unlikely to go now we’re in Narfulk. I don’t think I’d persuade my OH to go, though it would be interesting.

        I listen to Caroline most of the time, apart from Ferrari first thing, and Farage occasionally. It’s nice to be able to avoid all the politics, and just listen to good music.

        1. Purely out of interest, where in Narfulk? Uncle Bill is in the Narf, there seem to be a few others, and I lived in “Fetford – sniff” for a decade…

        2. All very well, but they also tend to damage car tyres. The road between here and t’next village is narrow and twisting, as well as being a part of the National Cycle Network. It’s prolly (© 2016 BT) narrower than it once was, since the high verges have clearly crept across the tarmac for the last century or so. Many’s the time that I’ve rounded a bend, only to be met by a nuisance* of MAMILs, who eff and blind at me, and gesture (more or less) in the manner of WSC, simply because I’m sharing the Queen’s Highway with them.

          *Better collective nouns for Lycra** Louts – on a postcard, please.

          **Pink Lycra, mainly. Not 200 yds from my kitchen window is Wyndy Milla. They’re closed at the moment, which is odd, since bicycle shops are permitted to open. Their cheapest bike costs more than the most expensive used car I’ve ever bought. Fine, I say, but all the poseur cyclists in Surrey have to wear their custom Lycra gear. Which – apart from being ludicrously expensive – is pink. I rest my case…

          1. How about an entitlement of Lycra Louts? They are a polychrome peril when sneaking up behind me while I’m out on a hack. You don’t hear them normally until they swoop past. It isn’t only the horse that jumps, I can tell you!

  116. I’ve just read this article from quora.com.

    It further explains how prior to the stay at home rules earlier in January 2020 MOH would have received a high viral load of COVID-19 whilst cuddling our grandson for an extended period. We think he was the source.

    Whilst we are married and live happily in the same home, we sleep apart with our own bath/shower rooms because we wake each other up snoring.

    MOH had a strong and sudden sore thoat about four days later working in the garden lodge followed by a high temperature and severe flu like adverse effects lasting over weeks.

    I had milder symptoms which commenced about a week after the start of MOH’s exposure. We both still have an enduring viral lethargy.

    The viral load principle would explain why I could have got a significantly lower dose of the virus and consequently a much milder reaction.

    We hope we have had COVID-19 and survived.

    https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-the-more-exposure-you-have-to-the-virus-COVID-19-the-sicker-youll-get

    1. I drink to you and your’s survival, recovery and a full and happy life together. Slainte.

    2. Glad you’re still with us and hoping you’ll be back to normal soon.
      I put this up about Viral Load a few days ago on Going Postal:-

      Blindsideflanker • 6 days ago
      Virus load is said to be a critical element in surviving the Chinese virus. The Nightingale hospitals with 500, may be 4,000 patients in it, would seem to be concentrating the virus in one building, and making it a lethal place to be treated. I hope their ventilation system is really good,

      2
      •
      Share ›

      Avatar
      Bob of Bonsall Blindsideflanker • 6 days ago
      Correct.
      The smaller the viral load on first infection, the longer it takes to get established which gives the body’s immune system a chance to sort its self out and clobber it, often before we are even aware of the infection.
      A large viral load gives a rapid progress of the disease which swamps the immune system.

      •
      Share ›

      1. It all makes sense now.
        The immigration entrance to the US at Ellis Island had an isolation hospital modelled on Florence Nightingale’s concept of a large ward complex with ample distribution of fresh air with large overhead access to the outside.

        https://www.libertyellisfoundation.org/immigration-museum

        It was built on an artificial island in the middle of the Hudson and was staffed by the very latest medical teams to detain and treat all those immigrants carrying disease.

        This facility provided important protection to the US, as it was then, against foreign pathogens.

        The isolation hospital still exists in a ruined state and is being featured in YesterdayChannel repeats.

  117. Pretendy PM has just come out of his hiding place to tell us that life will not start getting back to normal until a vaccine is freely available for the lurgie.
    I guess that is this years golf season shot then isn’t it.

    1. What is the real fatality rate?

      SFA to a jam tart.

      It’s all about scaring the people to control the people.

      1. The politics of fear – make the people fearful they are easier to control…

      2. Paranoia is treatable these days. Seriously, plenty of evidence that there are a lot of fatalities. Probably the worst hit here are old people’s/care homes – 50% and up mortality rates are typical. One gets it, they all get it. Probably from a carer.

        1. You’re doing it again.

          Blaming Covid-19 when the real cause of death is anything but.

          I do not hold with your view that because someone has symptoms that they must have died because of it.

      3. I often wondered what all those FEMA camps and piles of coffins in parts of the US were all about.

    2. Until they start taking a less haphazard and cavalier approach to the recording of deaths we will have no way of knowing how many people it is actually killing and maybe more importantly how the measures being taken are working.

      If there are deaths being wrongly attributed to Covid then the figures will remain higher than they should, the disease will appear to be more dangerous than it maybe is and they will have no datum against which to measure when it is safe to end the quarantine. To record anyone who dies with a severe chest complaint as being a Covid death distorts the truth and the fact is that since they are not testing for it even among the dead they literally have no clue about how many it is killing.

      These people should be held to account and made to produce meaningful figures.

      2. There was a doctor on Scottish News saying the they are building a model to look ahead to get a handle on numbers of sick, numbers for ITUs and so on. The data is not yet reliable. Why is there no reliable data? They have had exercises in the past and the thing hit us about ten weeks ago. The number one priority, apparently unrecognised, was discrimination between types of sickness, that is Covid-19 and ordinary ‘flu, chest infections etc, and set parameters for recording the discrete illnesses in a coherent and consistent way. This was not done, and that still seems to be the case.
        This is either unforgivable bungling, or deliberate obfuscation. (As the reality of being put on a ventilator has not been aired much – 50/50 chance of surviving – I’m leaning towards deliberate obfuscation. Against that one has Dr Whitty, strongly suggesting plain incompetence.)

        1. They’ve imprisoned the entire country for weeks and they don’t even know the size of the problem because they have denied themselves the means of measuring it.

          Incompetence or not, they’ve betrayed us.

    1. That repilsive POs has probably never done a days productive work in his life. He lives solely from forced contributions.

    2. It would serve that bastard right if he died alone and none of his family were permitted to enjoy his funeral.

  121. National Theatre are about to stream “Jane Eyre” on you tube at 7:30 pm – If nothing else it will drown out all the clapping…

  122. Isn’t it wonderful that those who are normally considered to be performing rather ordinary mundane jobs or are seen as easily replacecable in the type of work no one really wants to do. Their hard honest work now stands out and they are now the people who are keeping the country running. I won’t stand at my front door and clap. But i recognise joint efforts, thankyou so much all of you.

    1. Valley View grocers are the only bods who can get food to my Mother just now. Mega hat tip to them!
      The charities need cash to buy food – how the F do you go and get cash when in lockdown?

      1. There are so many anomolies in this situation Obs.
        Where abouts does your mother live ? I wonder if a Nottler could be of assistance.
        I am still very suspicious of everything that is and has taken place. China wirhbits huge population barely effected by the virus but it’s where it all started.
        China’s economy barely troubled but the whole of the western world in deep doodoo.
        Countries towns and cities thousands of miles away suffering catastrophic problems.
        It makes little sense. Maybe they have actually found a way to push shonet up hill.

        1. I think I have the best that can be organised, thanks. There’s no slots for supermarket delivery, Healthy@Home say they want cash before shopping but the grocer will deliver & I can pay by bank transfer.
          Most supermarkets except Morrisons insist on a UK credit card, and Morrisons Click & connect is in Newport, so not much help.
          Grocer gets the business!

      2. You are permitted in law to get cash. Of course, if your isolating other methods have to be found.

      1. Same here – my neighbours went out ringing a bell and clapping. I think they were the only people in our small village. It strikes me as ludicrous form of virtue signalling, especially as the people it is intended for aren’t going to hear it. I stayed firmly indoors for the duration of their exhibitionism.

    3. I find the whole thing totaly un English but the snowflakes need to do it, classic virtue – signalling. They are banging tin lids now like true peasants.

  124. I’ve got ITV 3 on waiting for a replay of Lewis. They have interrupted transmission so we can all “get out there and clap”. What?

    1. Coercion.

      They want you to feel guilty and force you out to pretend to signal your virtue.

      Virtue-signalling must not only be done, but must be seen to be done.

      Otherwise it is pointless.

    3. I bet they edit/cut the programme to put themselves back on schedule. They certainly won’t cut the ads.

  125. Just watching the NHS staff standing outside their hospitals, applauding themselves on TV. Very moving, but why aren’t they following the social distancing guidelines or wearing masks?

    1. They know they’re all probably, if not almost certainly, going to catch it. I don’t think they can treat a patient, or work with each other, at 2m distance. Outside though, you would think they should ‘appear’ to be keeping up appearances.

        1. Believe you me … if I said what I really thought, it would have been a lifetime ban from NOTTL.

        1. The ‘flatfoot’ reference was due to Bobbies pounding the beat and ending up with flat feet. I don’t think that idiot’s done much beat pounding, meat pounding perhaps.

      2. I tweeted that he should read the statutory instrument, and that he has shit for brains.

    2. No social distancing then.
      On the bright side, they are in the queue for the passport machines which means they aren’t arriving from China. Italy, Spain, US maybe but not China where it all began.

    3. Where are all the Social Distance Police? Were their journeys essential and necessary?

      1. ‘Evening, Tim, and who gives a flying f…?

        …if the government and Border Farce doesn’t, why should we?

    5. I’m confused. A Government Minister and a SNP MSP were castigated for flouting the lockdown rules, yet thousands of people from God knows where fly into the UK every day and the Government still claims the latter have little impact on the spread of the corona virus? Talk about mixed messages.

    1. Well, well, well…

      I just wonder what he might be doing. Picking up parcels for breakfast time delivery to Doncaster/Sheffield Airport?

      Morning Bob

      1. Or is it trying to spot the mother ships dropping them off into their rubber boats?

  132. Picked up on Going Postal that WHO has hinted the virus may have originated in Taiwan. Are WHO laying the groundwork for a Chinese invasion?

  133. Charlie Brusquini plays Bach Fugue in G-minor

    https://youtu.be/ZdCuA7SbzaM

    Played this video again on ZenPad tablet.
    Superb video production in high resolution widescreen displaying the talents of this young organist.

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