Tuesday 21 February: Britain is fighting a proxy war yet the PM refuses to prioritise defence

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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627 thoughts on “Tuesday 21 February: Britain is fighting a proxy war yet the PM refuses to prioritise defence”

  1. Good morrow, Gentlefolks, today’s story

    Clever Monkey

    A guy walks into a bar with his pet monkey. He orders a drink and while he`s drinking, the monkey starts jumping all over the place. The monkey grabs some olives off the bar and eats them, then grabs some sliced limes and eats them, then jumps up on the pool table, grabs the cue ball, sticks it in his mouth and swallows it whole.

    The barman screams at the guy, “Did you see what your monkey just did?”

    The guy says, “No, what?”

    “He just ate the cue ball off my pool table – whole!” says the barman.

    “Yeah, that doesn`t surprise me,” replies the patron. “He eats everything in sight, the little twerp. I`ll pay for the cue ball and stuff.”

    He finishes his drink, pays his bill, and leaves. Two weeks later he`s in the bar again, and he has his monkey with him. He orders a drink and the monkey starts running around the bar again.

    While the man is drinking, the monkey finds a maraschino cherry on the bar. He grabs it, sticks it up his butt, pulls it out, and eats it.

    The barman is disgusted. “Did you see what your monkey did now?”

    “Now what?” asks the patron.

    “Well, he stuck a maraschino cherry up his butt, then pulled it out and ate it!” says the barman.

    “Yeah, that doesn`t surprise me,” replies the patron. “He still eats everything in sight, but ever since he ate that damn cue ball, he measures everything first!”

    1. It just illustrates that Khan is NOT the man for the job and hopefully (vote-rigging aside) the May elections might see the end of this idiot.

      1. Morning, Elsie. Khan’s pets are pumas but they identify as dogs. It’s the way of this topsy-turvy world we live in.

    3. The Mayor is much safer.

      Been listening to Radio London most mornings, they often have Khan on.
      The presenter who has been in the job for twenty years said that Ken Livingston used to arrive via the underground and walk, Boris Johnson used to ride his bike in.
      Mayor Khan turns up in his bullet proof car with four armed body guards.

    4. Why does he need an escort? (other cars are available, it seems, and much more luxurious).

    5. “Mr Khan, if London is as safe as you suggest, why do you need armed guards and bullet proofed cars almost everywhere you go?”

      “Silly question, I need protection from right-wing terrorists”

      “But the rest of us don’t?”

    7. Khan: “I’m very happy to have a discussion about what the definition of robbery actually is.”

      Oh? In that case, allow me to help you; since the definition of robbery is not up for debate. Robbery is defined [S.8 Theft Act 1968] thus: “A person is guilty of robbery if he steals, and immediately before or at the time of doing so, and in order to do so, he uses force on any person or puts or seeks to put any person in fear of being then and there subjected to force. The offence is not triable summarily.”

      It must also be noted that only people are robbed, not buildings. Stealing from a building is burglary. It should also be noted that there is no such offence as “mugging”. That is nothing other than trite, vapid, Americanese slang for the offence of robbery (as described above).

      1. mugging (n.)
        1846, “a beating;” by 1939 as “a violent physical robbery;”. I.E. Robbery with violence.

        1. It is still a slang expression, in the same way that “heist” is. Robbery, by definition, must be accompanied by violence (either actual or a definite threat). The expression “robbery with violence” is then, by continuance, tautological. Robbery without violence is simply theft.

  4. Medley Time

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/bbba8f0373d666dcc9e2ec2fad6312e873e8bb7db238912bd24e43291fcc05fb.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2841a032685df5f2a5d60f0ef9fb3f9a4e1e19eb41425c3e967533b11f7cf5aa.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3ff24a7f0ee19a55fbb3e3b07d64e423843ed89519ccee19b5ccbf0260bc7f09.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ec23831787c8d812cab84fce2f617923637d6ec7d944e3b2a1fe529a3c9a5b10.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b307e475b2c95ef862e7d966d80217e0c5d5363ea8dff04cf7896cc57c1be428.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5781bea67675ecdf4978b8c592f8245f296b588647db80e753281351308fe65c.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9a0552b20c225ce0e925789609a8cf5934a3a07aca621fc8d0661b072a8a0e00.jpg

  5. Good Morning Folks

    Another cloudy start here.

    I thought it felt cold yesterday but the weather lady just informed me that temperatures were well above average.

    2. “Well above average” is the almost subliminal verbal trick they use to continue the narrative of global-warming/climate change in the minds of the public.

      We also thought it was cold yesterday.

  6. Putin attempting to sabotage North Sea energy assets, Netherlands warns. 20 February 2023.

    Russia has been secretly collecting intelligence to sabotage Netherlands’ North Sea energy infrastructure.

    A Russian ship collecting intelligence on energy infrastructure was discovered at an offshore wind farm in the North Sea, according to the Dutch Military Intelligence and Security Service (MVID).

    Dutch marine and coast guard ships escorted the vessel from the North Sea before any sabotage effort was successful, said Jan Swillens, MVID’s head general.

    These gaslighting stories become more ridiculous with every article! The only actual sabotage that has taken place is that of the Baltic Pipeline by the Americans and no one is writing about that!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/02/20/ftse-100-markets-live-news-uk-house-prices-eu-energy/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    1. On the subject of off-shore power generation, surely it can’t be too hard to destroy or very severely disrupt it?
      It must be extremely vulnerable to sabotage yet we are vigorously pursuing the idiocy.

      2. A quick search has revealed that the box-like structure amongst the turbines is the offshore sub-station. Taking that one building out would appear to be the way to go for a sabotage mission.
        With all these coincidental explosions and fires happening would one or two more be noticed?😲

        1. And if you can find that information so quickly, I wonder what makes our defence ministry and energy security civil servants think other people couldn’t too?

          1. The PTB must be aware of all the vulnerable points in such a complicated system as would any enemy wishing to do harm. Taking a ‘farm’ out, whether British, German, Dutch etc could be an excuse for escalation in the Ukrainian situation. Now, we wouldn’t want that, would we?

    2. That’s getting some traction now.
      Saw a first YouTube video on it last night, for example.
      And a picture of someone at a demonstration with a poster. The story is leaking out. And there’s a court case about to start in Germany on the covid vax damage…

      1. Morning Ndovu. Yes he did but he is the exception that proves the rule. Thirty years ago every tabloid would be screaming it in their headlines. The Germans would be frothing at the mouth. In fact of course the Americans would never even have attempted it! The whole thing is a demonstration of how far we have sunk in the estimation of the Political Elites. They can lie with impunity!

  7. Putin attempting to sabotage North Sea energy assets, Netherlands warns. 20 February 2023.

    Russia has been secretly collecting intelligence to sabotage Netherlands’ North Sea energy infrastructure.

    A Russian ship collecting intelligence on energy infrastructure was discovered at an offshore wind farm in the North Sea, according to the Dutch Military Intelligence and Security Service (MVID).

    Dutch marine and coast guard ships escorted the vessel from the North Sea before any sabotage effort was successful, said Jan Swillens, MVID’s head general.

    These gaslighting stories become more ridiculous with every article! The only actual sabotage that has taken place is that of the Baltic Pipeline by the Americans and no one is writing about that!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/02/20/ftse-100-markets-live-news-uk-house-prices-eu-energy/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

      1. Nor had I until yesterday (Monday the 20th) Tom. And it was only this morning (Tuesday the 21st) that I realised that I had missed my sister’s birthday yesterday. Aarghhh!

    1. What? Twelve minutes after your first post, Tom? You must be a really fast drinker. Lol.

      1. No, Elsie, what I neglected to say was the first one was made at 05:00 by the ambulance nurse, who attended and helped her colleague to get me off the floor and upright, after I attempted to get up and make tea at 04:00.

          1. Just about, Jules. When I’m flat on the floor I don’t have the strength to get upright, unaided, despite there being grab handles all over the place.

            I shall survive, willingly or otherwise.

          2. When my knee goes I can’t much move either. I find if I roll on my prodigious tummy, then get my hands under my shoulders, push upward and then on to my knees, then upright from there I do OK.

          2. Bust the back of my head on our kitchen one a couple weeks ago. Fortunately, the tiles didn’t stain.

          3. I just have a blood smear on the cupboard (wardrobe) door where my arm and elbow hit it.

            Got out of bed and stood up too quickly.

            Apparently my blood pressure goes down quite rapidly, if I stand up from lying down too quickly.

            I keep forgetting that.

            Now I shall be more careful, no matter how I might be busting for a pee or even a cup of tea.

    2. I’m not sure they were ‘wrong’. Folk did as they were told. They knew no better. They didn’t challenge, argue or fight it because the state, full of authority said ‘do this’ and we did.

      After the second lockdown people should have started to ask ‘hang on…’ and when masks didn’t help, when the deaths kept getting jumbled up so no one could trace week to week… then they should have refused outright. But folk didn’t. It reminded me how obstructive, difficult and tedious people are.

      1. The Health Institute here are advertising for people to join a research project on how effective the masks are. Saw the ad in the bus this morning. Might sign up for more info – out of interest, if nothing else.

  12. Good morning, all. Flat cloud, dry and calm this morning.

    Last evening poppiesmum put up the recent explosion and fire at a metal works in Ohio, I was keeping that for this morning. Well done to poppiesmum for getting that out early.
    However, it didn’t take much effort to find yet another fire, this time in the Netherlands. A polystyrene warehouse fire erupted in Groningen.
    Coincidence? Or is there a plot to add explosions and fires to premises that by the nature of their business spread toxic chemicals into the air and eventually the land?

    https://twitter.com/nbreavington/status/1627819266576723970

    2. I’ve already fallen foul of the DT censorship bots by referring to Helen Bannerman’s children’s classic.
      The memory was sparked by an article on pancakes.
      Hands up, all you evil colonialist whiteys who remember Little Black S@mbo.

      4. Critics of the time observed that Bannerman presents one of the first black heroes in children’s literature and regarded the book as positively portraying black characters in both the text and pictures, especially in comparison to books of that era that depicted black people as simple and uncivilised. However, it became an object of allegations of racism in the mid-20th century due to the names of the characters being racial slurs for dark-skinned people, and the fact that the illustrations were, as Langston Hughes expressed it, in the pickaninny style. In more recent editions, both text and illustrations have undergone considerable revision.

        I wonder if his father and mother, Black Jumbo and Black Mumbo, have been changed too?

  17. 371420+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,
    Tuesday 21 February: Britain is fighting a proxy war yet the PM refuses to prioritise defence

    Really should read,

    Tuesday 21 February: Britain is fighting a proxy war yet the PM refuses to prioritise defence of the home turf, the British Isles
    as a matter of fact ,for the attention of tory party (ino ) members / supporters / voters he is actively overseeing a daily foreign invasion of the home nation whos numbers have passed critical long ago and are now well settled and mounting in the danger zone

    There is no moneys for nurses & settling the score but plenty for zelinsky and prolonging the war

    Methinks the money laundry is in top gear awaiting the chinese
    input and extra mushrooms.

    Ps,
    The legacy being left to any who remain when the dust settles is of two options, fight of flight, to a less contaminated area.

    1. There’s not many places left to go. Where there is is overrun by Lefty wasters.

      We’ve got to push back. The 20 million dross here have got to go. Where? Who cares. Push them on to a container ship and flood it for all I care, just get rid of them.

  18. Boris Johnson and Liz Truss urge Rishi Sunak to send fighter jets to Ukraine. 21 February 2023.

    Boris Johnson and Liz Truss have urged Rishi Sunak to send fighter jets to Ukraine during a debate in the House of Commons.

    Truss said she “could not wait to see fighter jets over Ukraine” during her first contribution as a backbench MP since her resignation in October, while Johnson, her immediate predecessor who resigned in July, urged the government to “cut to the chase” and “give them the planes”.

    Their interventions added to the pressure on the prime minister to send British fighter jets to Ukraine.

    This is just grandstanding and sticking it to Sunak. We have no jets that the Ukies could fly!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/20/boris-johnson-and-liz-truss-urge-rishi-sunak-to-send-fighter-jets-to-ukraine

  19. Here’s one for you: If you are awake at 03:00 or so, why is it so difficult to think happy, peaceful thoughts until getting back to sleep? Gloomy thoughts, however… :-((

    2. If I awake at that time, my mind is going gang busters; not necessarily gloomy, just wishing to get on with the jobs in hand.

      1. A tip from a professional ‘morning waker’ (stop sniggering at the back) – get on and do them. Whether it’s emptying the washer, doing the washing up, hoovering, dusting, getting dinner ready – get on with it.

        Your mind will thank you, the time will pass and then you can get back to bed.

    3. I was like that last night. It was coming up to 04.00 before I got to sleep. No particular reason, I just couldn’t drop off. In the end I switched the light on and read a few chapters of a book.

      1. Is there a job that can’t be accomplished with an electric chainsaw and a bucket of wet cement?

  21. Good Moaning.

    As a veteran of rationing queues in post-war London, Littlejohn’s piece today resonates more than somewhat.
    “But the prospect of formidable fishwives fighting over the last rasher of strictly rationed streaky bacon in Corporal Jones’s butcher’s shop is not something which we should willingly contemplate.”

    As a child of those bleak years, I was amazed – at roughly the age of 10 – hearing a woman actually insisting on the type of bacon she wished to buy. I hadn’t realised there was such a thing as choice in foodstuffs.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11773431/RICHARD-LITTLEJOHN-thought-Bog-Roll-Bandits-bad-aint-seen-yet.html

    1. All the way into my teens the major weekly grocery shop was known to us as getting the rations.

      1. Because I was sweet and had blond curly hair, shopkeepers used to take pity on me (tough luck, Mummy) and would let me sit inside the shop out of the cold.
        Once, a greengrocer gave me 3 grapes! (It’s all right, he was white, English and probably a Christian.)

        1. I remember a little blonde haired girl with blue eyes from my first school. Dentist’s daughter. Set the mould…

        2. I remember a little blonde haired girl with blue eyes from my first school. Dentist’s daughter. Set the mould…

    2. We watched “A Private Function” last night – nothing like as funny as I remembered and actually a rather sad depiction of post war Britain.

    1. I must read less quickly.

      I registered that as Putin’s monstrous censorship, because it was in the Guardian..

    2. Well… what did you expect from the guardian? It hates the current world and wants to destroy it. It supported the Nazis. Given a chance the demented communists writing for it would leap at burning books.

        1. Woofles are fine. Harry thinks he is a tasmanian devil or speedy gonzales. He is really fast. Dolly plods along behind him.

          Still can’t walk far. I avoid the pain killers as they make me dozy.

  26. SIR – If proof were needed that we haven’t had a Conservative government for 30 years, the attitudes of successive Tory prime ministers to defence provide it in spades.

    Ever since David Cameron axed our (then) only aircraft carrier and flogged its Harriers to America at a cut price – only to discover within a year that they would have come in handy for his Libyan venture – Tory leaders have blithely acquiesced in the wholesale reduction in our capability, so much so that today we cannot place a single war-fighting division in the field. We certainly couldn’t mount an operation like the retaking of the Falklands.

    And now, despite effectively fighting a proxy war that is eating up vast stocks of ammunition, Rishi Sunak equally blithely assumes that it is not necessary to reassess what is required for the defence and safety of the realm – historically (though no longer, it seems) the first duty of government. If the present situation – including the growing belligerence of China (to which we still send aid), the increasingly desperate actions of Russia in its war with Ukraine (the resolution of which is nowhere in sight), and the machinations of Iran (hell-bent on developing nuclear weapons) – is not sufficient to move him, what on earth will?

    We live in a world where sheer common sense dictates that one’s own defence must be the utmost priority. Instead, the money for it is perennially regarded as the go-to option whenever economies are being sought.

    Philip J Ashe
    Leeds, West Yorkshire

    Michael Staples
    1 HR AGO
    On Philip Ashe’s excellent letter, it has been obvious since we started supporting Ukraine that munitions supplied would have to be replaced at the very least.
    A government that failed to do so is criminally neglectful of its first duty to its citizens. But what do you expect of the current shower?

    * * *

    Quite so, Mr Staples. However, we have local elections in May and the big one at or around the end of next year. If you think this is bad (which it surely is) things will be even worse thereafter.

    2. Let’s spell it out for them – a government’s FIRST duty is Defence of the Realm

      Clear enough, Sunak?

      2. He doesn’t believe that. To him it’s an annoyance as he wants to waste the budget on bringing in criminal gimmigrants or buying welfare votes, or – because he has made energy expensive – subsidising it to win votes of a gullible, ignorant public.

    3. The MoD is constantly fighting the last war. Notice that useless new tank. All part of FRES – future rapid effects system. A non-mine protected, tracked armoured vehicle. It’s designed to be adaptable and multi role yet isn’t suited to the current battlefields nor combatants we face – namely muslims with crappy rocket launchers and IEDs.

      The foxhound, Mastiff and so on were the right vehicle to have. We should buy more of those and helicopters and drones. The MoD should be reduced by 90% and as each is booted out tell them that they should join the army.

  28. SIR – I recall having to write with an ink pen (Letters, February 20) and, being left-handed, experienced great difficulty in my attempts to prevent smudges.

    In my O-level year, our English teacher went round the class telling everyone what grades they were likely to achieve. As he came to me he said: “You will fail – they will look at your handwriting and presume you are backward.”

    All left-handed people who experienced writing with ink will sympathise with me.

    Jackie Allen
    Pangbourne, Berkshire

    As a left-hander I can say that this is very true. My late mother was initially a left-hander too, and in her day this brought about many raps on the knuckles with a ruler from her teacher in an attempt to convert her. She obliged – and became fully ambidextrous. She could write with whichever hand picked up the pen or pencil, although the styles were very different. I, on the other hand, remain very left-hand dominant, and that goes for sport when I played it in my younger years.

    1. We had a chemistry teacher who could do that too; what was extraordinary was his ability to write on a blackboard with both hands simultaneously and be writing different sentences.

    2. My father was ambidextrous. He played golf and cricket left handed. His writing was right handed and immaculate. An accountant.
      Our 3 year old youngest grandson seems to be duel handed at the moment.

        2. Right handed at snooker as well.
          In my working life I had three working partners who were left handed. Very useful indeed.

          3. Good job. 75 mm Insulation under the roofing felt and above the ceiling ?
            One of my first jobs as an apprentice was making stairs. Good old Ernie was my boss. He was a leftie. If you can imagine a stair case on its side on the bench, the treads and risers were glued and wedge in place. With our mallets and big chisels left and right handed we made quick work of it.

      2. When my boys were growing up I used t play ping pong against them and I played left -handed until they could easily beat me. I then switched to playing right -handed and they have yet to beat me!

    5. Our second son, Henry, is ambidextrous and his handwriting has always been atrocious to the extent that if affected his exam performance when he was at school. However he is highly intelligent and was awarded a Distinction in his M.Sc degree in Computer Science with Data Analytics. He now rather terrifyingly works on computer programmes to do with Artificial Intelligence.

    6. Our second son, Henry, is ambidextrous and his handwriting has always been atrocious to the extent that if affected his exam performance when he was at school. However he is highly intelligent and was awarded a Distinction in his M.Sc degree in Computer Science with Data Analytics. He now rather terrifyingly works on computer programmes to do with Artificial Intelligence.

    7. Left handed too. Tried to correct me at school. Apparently I came home crying. My mother charged down, had a go at them and I was never bothered again. Had the same problem with fountain pens smearing the ink but learned to write with the page on a vertical slant rather than horizontally. My handwriting is excellent, resembles a simplified form of copperplate, get lots of compliments for ease of reading. Death to the right handed fascists. We lefties are, on average, more intelligent than them, someday we will dominate the world. Now it’s time for my pill.

      1. I could never understand the attitude that any form of difference is not allowed, and should be punished/excommunicated/altered to the norm.
        Why do so many people care to the extent of interfering and commenting at length? What business of theirs is it? As long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else, be and do what you like.

        1. It is actually damaging to force left handers to be right handed. It was one of the major causes of people stuttering and it is a major cause of dyslexia and dyscalculia. I have dyscalculia and it isn’t fun because a whole world is cut off from me that I would love to understand. Dyscalculia prevents me from understanding in great depth, a lot of science, a subject I’m passionately interested in. But left handers, too, die, on average, earlier than right handers. The theory is that the stress of living in a right handed world shortens a left handers life span apart from the obvious that you are prone to more accidents due to the way things are built for a right handed world. For me, at any rate, I cannot use a tin opener and so avoid cans that don’t have a pull on them, even electric tin openers are an effort. Irons are a problem as well so I use a steamer instead. a lot of things are inconvenient.

      2. Thanks for the reminder, Johnathan, just taken my 5 morning pills and two puffs on the inhaler.

    8. Left handed too. Tried to correct me at school. Apparently I came home crying. My mother charged down, had a go at them and I was never bothered again. Had the same problem with fountain pens smearing the ink but learned to write with the page on a vertical slant rather than horizontally. My handwriting is excellent, resembles a simplified form of copperplate, get lots of compliments for ease of reading. Death to the right handed fascists, we lefties are, on average, more intelligent than them, someday we will dominate the world. Now it’s time for my pill.

    1. 371420 + up ticks,

      O2O;
      Will the wretch cameron be consulted his approach to animal husbandry was beyond belief.

      1. In Old Mexico by Tom Lehrer

        Now, I’m sure you’re all aware that this week is national gall-bladder week. so as sort of an educational feature at this point I thought I would acquaint you with some of the results of my rece
        Searches into the career of the late doctor samuel gall, inventor of the gall-bladder. which certainly ranks as one of the more important technological advances since the invention of the joy-bu
        And the dribble-glass. doctor gall’s faith in his invention was so dramatically vindicated last year, as you no doubt recall, when, for the first time in history, in a nation-wide poll the gall-
        Er was voted among the top ten organs. his educational career began interestingly enough in agricultural school, where he majored in animal husbandry, until they caught him at it one day.

        1. 371420+up ticks,

          Morning SE,
          After seeing the wretch camerons approach to the pigs head on a platter, with his toolkit in his hand, doc sammy gall could very well be the wretches role model.

      1. 371420+ up ticks,

        Morning RE ,

        Don’t know about the fighting bit although the bull will get a bit anti if what is legalised is put into practice.

    5. Yo all

      A very old joke

      A young officer is posted to an Regiment in deepest, darkist Africa, with only soldiers around him

      After a month asks his CO, what one has to do, to have Sex
      The Boss says, “Use the Camels”
      Tw0 nights later, a sentry sees said Orficer, committing bestiality with a Camel
      The man is Charged
      When ‘up before’ the CO, he says ‘You told me to use camel’
      CO says “yes, to ride into the village”

      1. In the extended version of the story that I heard the young officer was called Caruthers. When the story was told about his adventure with the camel the raconteur said: But you can rest assured that it was a female camel. There’s nothing queer about Caruthers!.“

    6. 371420 + upticks,

      Heard tell button flies and now more popular in parlianment as the zip is to audible on the approach.

  32. SIR – That the ultra-low emission zone charge is being levied against owners of compliant vehicles is no surprise.

    In September 2021 I registered my car online for Ulez auto pay. In May 2022 I drove to south London. Weeks later I received a letter from the Ulez office in Darlington telling me that I had failed to pay £12.50 after entering the zone in May as well as a penalty charge allegedly issued after that. It demanded I pay a £240 penalty charge.

    I immediately telephoned Darlington, where a representative found my auto pay details but could not understand why I had not been debited. He then set up a new auto pay account but said that he could not accept the £12.50. He gave me another number; I phoned it and explained the situation again but was told to write in.

    My subsequent correspondence resulted in Darlington sending standard responses, ignoring my comments and telling me I had failed to explain myself adequately. I invited Darlington to refer the matter to my local county court in Chelmsford or Basildon, where I might explain my dispute to the district judge.

    In January 2023 I received an “order” from a penalty enforcement office linked to, but not part of, Northampton County Court. I was invited to make a statutory declaration in front of a solicitor, which I did, stating that I had not received the original penalty charge notice and enclosing copies of my letters to Darlington by way of a witness statement. I received a notice from Northampton County Court telling me the court had on January 26 2023 revoked the penalty charge notice and cancelled the original notice.

    I had thought the matter was closed but the Darlington Ulez office subsequently issued a further penalty charge notice quoting the original penalty reference and totally ignoring the Northampton County Court revocation. The situation is quite mad.

    John Pritchard
    Ingatestone, Essex

    What a complete farce and further evidence that very little in this wretched country works any more. I suggest he ignores any further notices with a “See you in court” response, together with a counterclaim for harassment.

    1. Just institute legal proceedings against kahnt, he started it which would suggest he’s directly responsible for the errors.

    2. Considering that we pay these people and all they do is fine us, the most obvious situation is to sack every single person involved in this farcical chain.

      The state exists to provide a service. Not to force arrogant tax hiking spite in the pretence of ideology. Could someone point out the waste of public money involved in all this farrago? That if they got rid of this nonsense they could actually provide more services or does the council chief want a Bentley instead of his Landrover chauffeur car?

  33. Good moaning all,

    Another cloudy start at McPhee Towers, calm and 7℃. Continuing with the interior redecoration today but not before spitting out my porridge over this in the Gatesograph:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/02/20/boris-johnson-liz-truss-heap-pressure-rishi-sunak-send-fighter/

    They keep mentioning our Typhoons of which we have about 150 maximum including those in storage – not even enough for our own defence. Yet they want to send them to Ukraine! Who will fly them? Not Ukrainians for it will take so long to train them the war will be over before any could be launched into action. Therefore to make any posssible early contribution to the conflict they would have to be flown, armed, refuelled and re-armed and serviced by RAF personnel.

    Johnson and Truss are mad, literally mad.

    1. They’re politicians – they have no connection to logic or reality. [or science, come to think of it, or ethics or …].

      Edit – “no connection”

    2. They’re politicians – they have no connection to logic or reality. [or science, come to think of it, or ethics or …].

      Edit – “no connection”

    3. As he Typhoon is an incredibly complicated plane to fly yes, it would have to be our pilots, mechanics, ground crew and so on.

      They don’t care. The intent at this point is not to actually do anything, but to get headlines saying they are doing something.

      What Ukraine really needs, as a guerrilla war fighting army is light ground vehicles – we have those in abundance thanks to the rubbish snatch landrover, lots of man portable heavy weapons for taking out tanks and supporting SAM launchers.

      However, in reality what they need is to be brought, with Putin to the negotiating table.

  34. Morning all 😉 😊
    Grey start again but, I must remember that I sat out and enjoyed the sunshine 🌞 for at least an hour yesterday. So it can’t be all bad.
    I read that once again because the film award ceremony winners were predominantly white, people of colour are moaning once again 🙄 .
    What can they learn from this ?

    1. Hmm, it should taste of the flavour of the wine – not the alcohol which should be boiled/burned away.

      1. Very true…but…some chefs will add a splash of wine at the end to finish the dish.

        I have had a look on Tripadvisor Chez Jules. The owner is incredibly rude and sarcastic when people complained about the poor offerings and incredible noise. The staff appear to be surly and rude. Probably members of his family. I wouldn’t go and i love French bistros.

  38. Love him or loathe him you have to concede that George Galloway is a fine orator.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvHIbpy1LWM

    I find that these days the old terms ‘left’ and ‘right’ are increasingly meaningless in this fight against the planned technocratic tyranny. I’m on George’s side and he’s on mine, despite his unwillingness to remove his trademark fedora when indoors.

      2. For a man. Not if you’re a woman in church or a married woman in a synagogue. (Unmarried women don’t cover their heads in a synagogue.)

        2. Good morning, Sue

          Was it you who tweeted a quotation from Isaiah 5:20 : Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter. referring to those who claim that Covid jabs are beneficial rather than destructive?

      3. The man is arguing that you don’t fight for your country.

        Although, given who you’d be fighting for there’s no point. The state is trying to destroy it, the government is importing the invading army. There’s no point fighting. The enemy is the state.

  39. Are any lessons being learnt? Perhaps we believe that there are greater priorities than defence.

    Of course there are Sir

    The elimination of the ‘sexes’

    UK ethic minority to be native born Brits

    Child groomers to be protected

    Wokism is the law in UK

    Enforcement of Net Zero

    Hospitality Industry to be wiped out, by housing thousands of ‘refugees’ in hotels

    ad infinitum

    1. I watched a pikey throw a cigarette but on the floor after walking past a bin. Some people just need to be collared and chained until they learn how to behave.

        1. Just plain flogging. Littering, graffitiing should all come with severe penalties – flogging followed by cutting a thumb off.

        1. In Singapore they have stubbers on top of the bin – any littering at all earns a S$ 50 fine.

  43. Vlad’s ripping into the west in his long speech.
    I haven’t seen all of it but he’s making a lot more practicle common sense than the idiot people who are stirring it all up.
    I’m surprised that the bbc are allowing this commonsense shower to land in our homes.

    1. Now the subversive bbc are adding their own BS along side the broadcast footage. Calling it false narrative.
      And still stirring up the fighting.
      Dreadful people.

    2. Read the whole thing. He said nothing that was untrue. It is a sad commentary on our society that most people think he is lying and this is all propaganda. Reading the comments below the article it’s obviously pointless to argue with the posters, they have brought into the USA/NATO propaganda hook, line, and sinker. But the truth will out. GB News is inviting guests on that are telling the truth. There have also been several videos on You Tube. Eventually enough people will cotton on and it will be impossible for the propagandists to continue pulling the wool over peoples eyes.

  44. From the TCW :

    “ FORMED during the latter half of 2022, the UK Commission on Covid Commemoration are tasked by the government with setting out how, as a nation, we should remember the pandemic, and commemorate its victims and heroes in the future.”

    Apparently this is to be recorded in the history books for future reference, another way of teaching the young the lockdowns and having our freedoms removed were all for the greater good.

    What a load of absolute garbage. I didn’t even know this Commission existed, did you? HMG has so much money to waste! It made my BP shoot up. Words almost fail me. It beggars belief.

    Good morning BTW. Link below.
    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/this-covid-commemoration-is-a-travesty/

    1. How about… 70% cuts in government spending? Better disciplinary proceedings for hospital procurement staff. Closing the now name changed public health England? Using machine learning to only pay companies that have filed accounts for 3 months?

      Perhaps some common sense in public spending and radical reform of the NHS?

    2. It’s one of several coats of whitewash to obscure the stain of what Johnson, Hancock et al. did to the people and the Country during a so-called pandemic. Declaring a pandemic and enduring one are two very different things. The excess deaths are appearing after the ‘cure’ was released and everyone involved is baffled.

      1. From May this year HMG won’t need to “declare a pandemic”, the WHO will be doing it for them. This will be a legally binding treaty/agreement/whatever afterwhich all signatories will have to implement any and all “remedies/actions” the WHO decrees.

        Something to look forward to, eh?

        1. IIRC, when last year the WHO first proposed these changes there was quite a to-do, much of it on social media. The idea that an unelected supranational NGO could force its decisions i.e. override a country’s sovereignty, on the UK was challenged. The government replied that the WHO’s recommendations would be just that, and that the government would have the final say. Sovereignty would not be compromised.
          I stand to be corrected.
          However, it wouldn’t surprise me to know that circumstances have been changed. Non-compliance will have to be the order of the day.

    1. Outrageous. Those cops should be ashamed of themselves.
      Time to get Dopey Wokey True-Doh out.

        1. Just doing their jobs, really? Was he trying to create a riot or something? Did he have a bomb at school? Or was he merely putting forward an opinion? The western world has gone mad. There are only two sexes and for a school to call the police in because this lad said so is beyond understanding.

      1. 371420+ up ticks,

        Morning JN,

        Surely a court case must arise from it and the lads doctor / lawyer must point out the unbearable stress and horrific nightmares the lad is suffering,in seeking a very LARGE compensation package.

    1. Morning all! Another gloomy day. Oh Well.
      With regard to the Turkish earthquake…
      The machines used to artificially simulate an earthquake by geologists researching the phenomenon can, in no way, cause a real earthquake. You can find videos about these machines on You Tube. I love James Delingpole and his gadfly thinking but this is sheer crackpottery.

    2. Hmmmm . . . Not convinced – and I have an interest in geology/science. The energy required would create more than a few ‘telling’ clouds.

    1. Not convinced. A large number of the writers on Taki hate Trump etc more than they hate the Democrats. It’s something of a stretch to claim Trump called Desantis a paedophile. He just retweeted a picture already published by Democrats showing Desantis at a high school party with seniors.

    2. Next manic episode? Seymour Hersh—new hero of the right—claimed the U.S. blew up the Nord Stream pipeline. And his proof? An anonymous source told him.

      Hersh’s proof is not that an anonymous source told him but what they told him. He writes in the greatest detail about the operation, if he had manufactured the story gaping holes would appear in it. Meetings that he talks about could be proved not to have happened. The people he mentions would say they were on holiday. In all these things we have to find the balance of probability. The United States not only blew up the pipeline because they were the only ones who benefited from it but also because they were the only ones who could do it! Only they had the resources military and political. No one else would have dared do it!

      https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/how-america-took-out-the-nord-stream

    1. This week’s “Disaffected” podcast had the host (who has no children) exposing what is going on in Vermont’s “public” (state) schools – complete hijack by the trans mob. In addition to exposing a new piece of legislation recently passed (and tacked on to a pro-abortion Bill) which makes Scotland’s recent Gender Reform Bill look positively benign.
      Coupled with the second TakiMag piece below, it is beyond depressing what is happening to the world.

      1. Canada is becoming even worse.

        My fear is that the Trump DeSantis battle could easily gift the next election to the Democrats and if you think they’re bad now, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.

    2. He’s right in the defocussing element, but both sides do this. The urgency to ‘move on’ to the next thing rather than to actually stop and think about it, to have someone say ‘look, there’s a problem here’ is something we just don’t get any more. The closest ironically are youtubers who start up specifically to point out the consistent repetition of issues (such a every character being made gay) in comics or film.

  49. I first came across Roald Dahl’s writing in his short stories for adults: Kiss, Kiss and Someone Like You . These stories were all very macabre. He also wrote a collection of stories about his time as an RAF pilot, Over to You and some very scurrilous stories of a sexual nature. Aficionados of Dahl might enjoy this short film (Less than 10 mins):

    https://www.google.com/search?q=My+Uncle+Oswald&oq=My+Uncle+Oswald+&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i512j46i512j0i512l6j0i390.9847j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:db8ed4b5,vid:f8sqYmF0oPU

    1. I never like Dahl’s writings for children. That was heresy at the time. They were dark, depressing and there was nothing aspirational about them. I suppose that is why they were promoted.

      1. I have always been a big fan and my son loved his books too. They are a little dark in places but nothing compared to some fairly tales or moral tales that were written for children.
        My son’s favourite book was Matilda.

        1. This is my favourite “Matilda”:

          Matilda (1907)
          Hilaire Belloc
          Matilda told such Dreadful Lies,
          It made one Gasp and Stretch one’s Eyes;
          Her Aunt, who, from her Earliest Youth,
          Had kept a Strict Regard for Truth,
          Attempted to Believe Matilda:
          The effort very nearly killed her,
          And would have done so, had not She
          Discovered this Infirmity.
          For once, towards the Close of Day,
          Matilda, growing tired of play,
          And finding she was left alone,
          Went tiptoe to the Telephone
          And summoned the Immediate Aid
          Of London’s Noble Fire-Brigade.
          Within an hour the Gallant Band
          Were pouring in on every hand,
          From Putney, Hackney Downs, and Bow
          With Courage high and Hearts a-glow
          They galloped, roaring through the Town
          ‘Matilda’s House is Burning Down!’
          Inspired by British Cheers and Loud
          Proceeding from the Frenzied Crowd,
          They ran their ladders through a score
          Of windows on the Ball Room Floor;
          And took Peculiar Pains to Souse
          The Pictures up and down the House,
          Until Matilda’s Aunt succeeded
          In showing them they were not needed;
          And even then she had to pay
          To get the Men to go away!

          It happened that a few Weeks later
          Her Aunt was off to the Theatre
          To see that Interesting Play
          The Second Mrs Tanqueray.
          She had refused to take her Niece
          To hear this Entertaining Piece:
          A Deprivation Just and Wise
          To Punish her for Telling Lies.
          That Night a Fire did break out-
          You should have heard Matilda Shout!
          You should have heard her Scream and Bawl,
          And throw the window up and call
          To People passing in the Street-
          (The rapidly increasing Heat
          Encouraging her to obtain
          Their confidence)-but all in vain!
          For every time She shouted ‘Fire!’
          They only answered ‘Little Liar’!
          And therefore when her Aunt returned,
          Matilda, and the House, were Burned.

          1. I went to a first night of the Second Mrs Tanqueray in Canturbury. The production starred Fenella Fielding. As I’d been on a gliding course which was cancelled due to torrential rain that flooded the field, I stood out in the audience thanks to my wellies and mud-spattered jeans.

  50. BBC Radio 4 today: What you are missing.

    9.00 Jim Al-Khalili talks to astrophysicist Hayley Gomez.
    9.30 Ellie Gibson speaks to Andrew Przybylski.
    9.45 Bible reading led by Richard Oppong-Boateng.
    10.00 Yazidi women, Black women swim, tweakments gone mad?
    11.00 Ukrainians in Britain: Olga asks where next for refugees.
    11.30 Professor Abigail Williams. Who owns the truth: Everything you read in 18C books is wrong.

    Catering for the masses? Can you see a connection? Just a small sample of the wonderfully diverse output from the world’s greatest broadcasting organisation. Aren’t we lucky

          1. The orchestration in that piece is superb.
            Did you ever hear this instrumental version?
            https://youtu.be/GkBNH6ANnxQ

            It used to be played every night during the interval at the cinema, (Odeon??) in Maidstone during the early ’70s.

          2. I’ve just listened to that through my Sennheiser headphones. The stereo separation of the orchestra is superb. It really lifts the music.

    4. Actually I once listened to an episode of “The Life Scientific” a few years ago where our Jim was the subject and he was fascinating. English mum, Iranian (?) dad from memory. I had been sceptical until them but I changed my mind.

        1. I like that. Apropos the last sentence, when I was on a Harrier Squadron we had an army major GLO who couldn’t believe the Wg Cdr went flying. He thought he’d have a competent NCO to do that for him.

          1. When I was on Lightnings our Station CO often flew them. We had a good crowd of jockeys – when the weather was too bad to fly I suggested to the Wing CO that the aircraft could do with a polish – he had the jockeys pile in with Wadpol.

        2. I remember a pilot who spent as much time with his ground crew and spanners as they did. He knew that plane backward, not only in it’s technical specs but in every nut and bolt (not that they really use them). He worked long hours at either end and while he never rose especially high rank wise, he was always proud of his effort.

  51. Getting ready for off now, so my attendance here over the next couple of weeks will be sporadic and dependant on wifi availability. Catch up sometime!

  52. Copyright and WoUKism altering the prose in printed books

    What does copyright protect?

    The types of work protected by copyright are vast and varied. They include:

    books, novels, technical reports, manuals, paintings, sculptures, photographs, music, songs, dramatic works, films, television, and radio
    broadcasts, engineering, technical plans, promotional literature, advertising, computer software and databases. The copyright in each type
    of work exists independently. For example, a song recorded on an audio CD may be protected by more than one type of copyright, with the score
    protected as a musical work and the accompanying lyrics as a literary work. In addition, the sounds recorded on the CD capturing the
    performance of the song may be copyright-protected as a sound recording.

    How long does copyright last?
    In the UK copyright protection for published works can last up to 70 years after the author’s death. However, the duration of copyright
    differs depending on the type of work and whether it is published or unpublished.

    Roald Dahl (13 September 1916 – 23 November 1990)
    https://www.bl.uk/business-and-ip-centre/articles/what-is-copyright

        2. Apparently it permits them to issue “new” versions and plagiarise to their hearts content, which is what is happening here, in essence.

  53. By pandering to the woke for his Coronation, Charles begins his suicide note
    The value of the monarchy is in pomp and excess – not a slimmed down Coronation
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/columnists/2023/02/21/pandering-woke-coronation-charles-begins-suicide-note/

    Might I suggest another event for the Coronation:

    The ceremonial putting the tail on the King.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9154f56dbf1899920a0787398eea0a5ca759dc1b171dc351601b8e30838469e2.jpg

    and might I suggest either Prince Harry or Prince Andrew to be armed with the tail.

    1. Frankly, I think King Charles has done rather well so far. However, I am cognisant of the fact that there are a lot of people out there who are not willing to give him a chance and were condemning him even before he ascended to the throne. Such people are going to look for what they conceive as failure. It is called ‘confirmation bias’ a well known psychological propensity.
      Confirmation bias:
      “Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one’s prior beliefs or values. People display this bias when they select information that supports their views, ignoring contrary information, or when they interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing attitudes.”

      God save the King. Because once people succeed in tearing down the monarchy, you will know that our country has been administered the coup de grâce.

      1. We could hang on for one bad king.
        But William the Woke is in the pipeline, and in any case, Charles and William’s close alliances with foreign billionaires are against this country’s best interests.

  54. Spanish transport secretary resigns after new trains too big for tunnels. 21 February 2023.

    Head of state rail company, Renfe, also quits as anger rises over fact trains built in £227.5m contract are too wide

    Spain’s secretary of state for transport and the head of the state rail company have resigned amid continuing public and political anger after it emerged that dozens of new trains ordered for two northern Spanish regions were too big to fit through some tunnels.

    They would never have resigned here!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/21/spanish-transport-secretary-resigns-new-renfe-trains-too-big-for-tunnels

        1. Reminds me of the graffiti exchange in the public lavatory:

          I feel I must write a complaint on this wall
          The seat is too high and the hole is too small.

          I feel I must give the obvious retort:
          Your bum is too big and your legs are too short

      1. Nobody ever resigns here -especially in politics, quangos or publicly-paid for positions. Unless there is a huge payout.

  55. “J EREMY HUNT must dismantle pensions freedoms that allow older workers to access their pension pots aged 55 to stop more of them from retiring early, according to a Labour-leaning think tank.
    The Chancellor has been urged by the Resolution Foundation to raise the age at which people can access tax-free private pension wealth to discourage them from leaving the workforce before the state pension age, which is currently 66 for men and women.
    It said the current system, introduced by George Osborne, chancellor at the time, in 2015, “supports early retirement, particularly for wealthier individuals” because people are allowed to take their money in lump sums, regular or occasional income payments or a combination of these options. Before April 2015, most people used their defined contribution pension savings to buy an annuity…”

    A) re first para, of course it does.
    B) I didn’t fully appreciate Osborne’s reforms at first, but I did come to regarded them as genius. Because the people benefitting most from this reform are members of Personal Pension Defined Contribution schemes (as far as I can tell – but stand to be corrected).

    The reason it is genius is that members of risk-free, Defined Benefit pension schemes generally cannot benefit from this change and only access their risk-free index-linked benefits when they are 65 (say). So, whilst, say, fat-cat civil service pensions are extremely generous (and risk-free in a way private pensions never can be), they cannot get their money “early”*. And it drives them wild.

    I assumed Osborne made the change to encourage the fat-cat Civil Servants etc to transfer out of their risk-free generous pension schemes and thus ultimately save the tax-payer money. But I suspect that hasn’t happened as the fat-cat public sector wants to eat its cake and have it too. Hence the left-wing think-tank wanting to row back on this benefit to having a private pension.

    *I realise pensions are emotive and this is not a dig at “normal” workers. But I refer you to “Dame” Cressida and her very very generous pension pay-off when our esteemed Mayor of London (PBUH etc) got rid of her. The top brass in the civil service also want out at 55 not 65 and are seething that they have to keep working (unless they transfer out which they don’t want to do as they lose all their protection
    S)

    1. One of the things that seldom seems to be discussed in these debates is that by retiring younger more senior positions are opened up within the workforce, which in turn allows career progression. Losing a job in ones late 50’s and being unable to either find a similar new position, being too old or able to draw ones pension being too young, isn’t to be recommended.
      Often those in senior positions are not properly up to date with the latest developments in their fields (I’m referring to technical rather than woke) so the employers can benefit too.

      1. Those who are younger may be up to date with the latest developments, but they may not be the best equipped with experience. M&S found that out a few years ago when they substituted their older executives with young ones. Big mistake, as they found out.

      2. That’s why I retired at 52 – to give someone else an opportunity (or was it the immediate index linked pension, lump sum and a years salary? – can’t remember now)

      3. But there is something to be said for stepping down from a very responsible job and acting in a much less well-paid but nevertheless valuable support job, especially if there is corporate memory involved. I’m just not sure companies think like that (and i understand is a bottom line).

    2. Not quite right – anyone in a Defined Benefit scheme (within a very short limit of their retirement date) can transfer all their benefits to a DC scheme, and then take some of their money out early. Whether this is a good idea or not is another question, but it can be done.

      Plus, even people in DB schemes can take their pension early – it is simply subject to a reduction (and, obviously, to the rules of the scheme concerned).

    3. The resolution foundation is a desperately Left wing bunch of wasters. The idea is that we should keep working for as long as the state wants us to, regardless. Our purpose is to provide it with tax. Nothing else.

    1. If only – somebody needs to give that woke twit a shake up, and God doesn’t seem to have done it.

        2. He is a Presence in many of the old Church buildings, usually when they’re empty of people.

          2. Matthew 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

        1. Some people seem to be given enough rope to have hanged themselves several times over and nothing happens. Look at Jimmy Saville – he died (no doubt gloating) before his drop.

        2. The troublesome priest, Justin à Welby, should be called into Canterbury Cathedral.

          History does, at times, repeat itself.

          3. Oh but he is RC now. So thinks he can lie/buy his way out of anything.

            (No aspersions on genuine RC believers, but it seems that people from that belief can also fool themselves to a great degree).

    2. From his speech today: “I would like to tell the West – look at the main books of world religions. It says that the family is the union of a man and a woman. But even these sacred values ​​are questioned. The British Church is considering the idea of ​​a gender-neutral God. Forgive them Lord, they don’t know what they’re doing. The elites of the West are going crazy, leading people to disaster. And we will protect our children from degradation and degeneration”.

    3. Canterbury’s only hope is to turn it into a 15min City. Putin and his boys will need more time than that, driving tanks around the ring road.

      1. Na, then.

        I’ve just had a session in the kitchen making 13 jars of seville orange marmalade (tweaking Elsie’s recipe for use in a pressure cooker). I found myself with a quarter of a jar’s worth of marmalade left over after jarring. I shall use it tonight. I will warm it up a bit then mix in a good glug of Cointreau, then pour it over my crêpes.

        Crêpes are beige. Did you know?🥞

    3. If they had said they enjoyed the parody they would have gained respect. But no. Their lawyers are involved.

      1. It would take more than that for those two to gain any respect from right-thinking people. They would only have laughed it off because it was more sensible, anyway, but then they don’t do sensible.

      2. Well, the answer they usually give to criticism of their own slagging off of the RF is: “It’s just our opinion, not fact”. So, the South Park producers just have to use the same defence if they get sued.

      3. Just the latest in a long line of wrong turns taken by Meghan. It’s so sad – she could have had all the popularity she clearly craves if she had been just a bit less of a bunny boiler.
        A genuinely feisty American outsider would have given the Wokes a run for their money…

    4. She’s been insulting and being mean about the late Queen and the Royal Family for ages. So now she gets a taste of her own medicine and doesn’t like it- tough titty.
      Maybe it will shut them up for a while but I doubt it.

  61. Ireland has just sent it’s first manned flight into space, one astronaut
    and one monkey.
    As soon as the rocket clears liftoff the monkey takes his helmet off,
    un-clicks his seatbelt and reaches up to grab his mission objectives
    from a sealed brown envelope.

    After reading his orders he closes the binder and starts to flip
    switches and turn dials while Paddy impatiently looks on.
    Finally the monkey settles back down in his seat and Paddy reaches up to
    grab his orders.
    Inside the envelope there is one A4 piece of blank paper.
    Paddy turns it over and it reads
    ‘Do NOT forget to feed the monkey’

    2. When my wife’s nephew uses that phrase in a restaurant I quip: “You know, it’s not self-service!”

    3. Customer:” I’m looking for the book that has been written for impotent men who want to have sex. I can’t remember its title.”
      Bookseller: “It isn’t in yet.”
      Customer: “Yes! That’s the one. I’ll take a copy please.”

      2. There was an old man from Koblenz
        Whose bollocks were simply immense
        It took several laymen
        A priest and three draymen
        To carry them thither and thence.

        This was one of the ones in the book of limericks published by the Olympia Press in Paris before 1963 and before either the Chatterley case or sexual intercourse had been invented. Most of them I learnt by heart.

        https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a2d5be85e6951dd66a5c5f8195cb3fe2a8d8ba4a1c16730c86359ae212bef854.jpg

        [Rather milder than what I sometimes put up so I have risked not using the spoiler – I hope I haven’t offended too many of you!]

        1. There was a young fellow from Buckingham,
          Stood over the river at Uppingham.
          He was watching the stunts
          Of the c*nts in the punts,
          And the tricks of the pr*cks that were f*cking ’em.

          1. A great Limerick to try and perform after a few beers with a penalty for every naughty word not elided! We used,

            The gay young Duke of Buckingham
            Stood on the bridge at Uckingham             – then the same.

  67. Just asking.

    Why does everybody routinely refer to His Majesty the King as “King Charles”? I have yet to see him correctly addressed as “His Majesty” or “HM the King”.

    Everywhere I look.

    The late Queen was invariably addressed as “Her Majesty” or HM the Queen”. It was only clueless Yanks who routinely called her “Queen Elizabeth”.

    We know the King’s name, but it is unnecessary to routinely use it when referring to him.

      1. He is spoilt and woke. Unfortunately, our Beloved Brenda doesn’t appear to have turned out to have been a very good mother.

        2. She was juggling a career and motherhood, and going on foreign business trips a generation before anyone else in the UK.

          1. True. But Andrew and Harry all show the regrettable results of having being thoroughly spoilt and got their own way far too often. Charles too in some ways. As a result they are to a greater or lesser extent brats. I don’t know what the answer is: Anne and Edward seemed to have turned out to be decent and reasonable human beings.

          2. Charles and Andrew are thoroughly spoilt. Charles’s world view seems to be of himself as infinitely more important than anyone else, apart, presumably, from the Rothschild head who is allowed to poke him in the chest. He wants power and status as much as Andrew does; the only difference is that he has got it, due to lucky timing and winning the sperm lottery.

      2. He is spoilt and woke. Unfortunately, our Beloved Brenda doesn’t appear to have turned out to have been a very good mother.

    3. Once when I was very small I asked my mother, “What’s the Queen’s name, Mum”? The answer was, “The Queen”. “Yes but what’s her name”? I’d only ever heard HMQ referred to as The Queen but I figured she must have a given name and mum either didn’t see what I was getting at or was being bloody minded because she didn’t tell me!

      2. In the thoroughbed breeding register HM is simply referred to as “The Queen”. In the owners register Charles is now listed as “The King”.

    5. I am just getting used to the change of Monarch.
      I am about to say ‘Prince Charles’ & hastily change it to ‘King Charles’…

      That’s my excuse!

    6. “HM” will always be Elizabeth for me, I think.
      I just refer to him as “Charles” most of the time.

      2. #Me too. Unless I find him particularly contemptible, in which case I refer to him as “Charlie”.

    1. Used to be a good pub in Cong but I can’t remember its name. A group of us used to go now and then and it was great.

      1. Looks a place where a couple of nights stay to sample the local hostelries might be worth while.

    1. I have found three salad plants that will grow outside all year round, even under snow apparently.
      Lamb’s lettuce, wild rocket and another one whose name escapes me – I am going to try planting them in late summer and hope to have fresh salad through the winter.
      Lots of veg planned in the garden through the summer too!

  71. Anyone been to confession to be shriven today? As Elizabeth I had it, “All May. None Must. Some Should”.

    1. Pure as the driven snow, me. Unless you want me to confess to envy about my friends house extension.

        1. They had the entire back walls of their house removed and extended it another 15 ft in glass. Looks fantastic.

          1. I hope those back walls weren’t load bearing or your envy will collapse pretty quickly (along with their extension) – just sayin’

          1. I don’t feel that good and MH isn’t doing too well today. I was really talking about my behaviour which can be wicked;-)

          2. I was also talking about bad behaviour , but not mine .. and then I crumble . I cannot cope with bad temper or procrastination .

            The snag list grows in this house , and I need to get in a practical pair of hands , cracked velux window glass , jammed shower extension in bathroom , a list not too long , but requiring an hour or so .. Moh is alwas tired after golf , and I have been busy clearing cupboards .. Moh says money money.. I say golf = money money .

    2. No, but I did go to a memorial service. I shall be ashed tomorrow. I am currently churchless and drifting until I find a safe (i e High Church) haven … (or the rectorette gets her marching orders to be replaced by a proper priest).

    1. ‘Toy Story’ was created by Pixar, but they had to use Disney as co producers, and Disney took the rights to any sequels. The Mouse is a corporate machine designed to extract money from IP, eg rides and merchandise.

          2. I have some Shropshire blue arriving tomorrow.

            Also some chocolate ice cream to go with the Pruneaux you sent me. I also have in my larder the golden raisins and sultanas soaked in rum to add to the mix. Think i might use my knickerbocker glasses. It’s crying out for whipped cream with a cherry on top !

          6. You could be a little nicerer ! We don’t all live in a Chateaux with wine cellars. Some of us have to buy wine boxes !!!

          9. Back in 1988 I was in a tourist café at Carrbridge, up in the Cairngorms, when I ordered a plate of roast chicken portion and chips. As I was about to tuck into the roast chook a friend smacked me on the hand and warned me not to bother!

            I turned the chicken over and its underside was completely blue with mould. The proprietor told me to order something else by way of ‘apology’ (she was reluctant to give me a refund). I told her that if a full refund wasn’t forthcoming, immediately, then I would remove an expensive piece of her kitchen equipment, in lieu of payment, and that I would send a photograph of the blue chook to the health department, and to the local and national press. My refund was very quickly given.

          10. I wish I had known this years ago .. I never ever thought about boiling an orange for 20 minutes , then squishing up into a pulp , then adding it to cake mixture , I always used warm marmalade .

    2. I’m glad you posted this, Grizzly. My menu for this evening was to be a combination of pancakes with lemon and sugar or golden syrup. But now I think I will use up the final half jar of home-made marmalade spread on the pancakes.

    4. Thanks for the tip, Grizzly. Rastus and I have just feasted on pancakes with a sauce made of home-made marmelade and Cointreau, and it was truly excellent. I think that’s the first time we have enjoyed pancakes as much as when we put lemon and sugar on!

      1. My pleasure, Caroline. It’s funny what things your mind conjures up when the ingredients are just sitting in front of you, daring you to improvise. 😊

    5. This year, instead of buying ready-made pancakes I made my own. None of them looked like that, though 🙁 The dogs thought they were okay 🙂

      1. Check out the video clip in the Mail of Princess Catherine trying to make a pancake at a care home….very funny and she was laughing her head off.

    2. I thought that Emma Peel paled alongside Elsie Bloodaxe when you tasted my home-made marmalade, young Grizzly. Lol.

      1. That is indeed true, Auntie Elsie.

        As I mentioned elsewhere on this forum, I use your wonderful recipe but make it in my pressure cooker for convenience and speed.

      1. We don’t know how lucky we were. Just made it in the nick of time…. well we did have 15 months leeway in our case….

    2. Rank those countries in the order of what they offer to gimmegrants, health care, accommodation, pocket money, education etc etc.

    1. Nasty bogie for me.
      Wordle 612 5/6

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

    2. Five today. Used a duff letter twice, which of course didn’t help.

      Wordle 612 5/6

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

    1. That probably was an acetylene cylinder exploding. They probably didn’t turn the oxygen feed off before turning off the acetylene and it exploded after a flame back along the acetylene feed.

      1. Remarkable that someone had a camera trained on the place where the bang had not yet happened…..

    2. Thanks, vw. Bookmarked.
      I’ve been following this on a USA site. Some in the USA believe that Biden et al. are using this dangerous nonsense to destroy their Constitution.
      With the CCP and the globalists being deeply involved with the WHO it’s clear that control and the loss of people’s bodily autonomy are two of their main aims. UK politicians of all stripes are the enemy of the people. Big trouble coming.

      1. I believe it was the USA who suggested the “amendments”. It is quite clear that complete control is the aim and I really can’t see a way to prevent them. Other than civil disobedience. For which we would need young people. And any such protests would be quelled with riot police.

  82. 371420+ up ticks,

    Far from being mistakes hers was planned treachery mogg knows that full well.

    Dt,
    Politics latest news: Rees-Mogg says Sunak ‘repeating May’s Brexit mistakes’

    1. As far as May was concerned she made no mistakes in her handling of Brexit. She wanted to kill it off.

  84. For those who have not heard of them, I commend “Not Our Future”

    Hi everyone
    We’re designating this as our first “newsletter”!
    It’s been a very busy three months since we launched Not Our Future on 21st November.
    Oxford Leafleting Event
    We decided just after launching that the Oxford 15 Minute City issue was a perfect way to show how NOF works, i.e. getting information out to the public about issues they would not normally hear the truth about, if at all.
    As you know, the event was a great success and helped spark interest in 15 Minute Cities all over the country.
    Not Our Future on target
    Not Our Future will still be about getting information to the wider public on many topics to make them realise that something is not right with the future being built for us by default. We will ramp up our leaflet creation and delivery. Lots of groups all over the world want to help deliver them and it’s definitely the beginning of something big.
    Crowdfunder
    To help us fight 15 Minute Cities we decided to launch a crowdfunder to raise £10,000 to pay for leaflets and the associated costs of delivering them. We raised the money in one week which was fantastic. This has allowed us to plan things a bit more. We have had lots of requests from different towns for help besides our targeted four of Bath, Bristol, Canterbury and Edinburgh. We’re looking at ways to cover them all.
    One mistake we made was we forgot that Edinburgh has one million residents! So we can’t leaflet the whole city in the same way as we plan to do the others. However, the plan we have in place means we should have a permanent team in Edinburgh going forward who can help whenever we need.
    The crowdfunder is still open so please make a donation if you can. We appreciate every bit of help.
    New “Call to Action”
    We have been thinking long and hard about our next step.
    If you have read “The Plan” on the main Not Our Future website, you will have seen that, when we have a large number of people signed up, we want to start taking action. We have over 20,000 signatories so far and have decided to begin this process sooner rather than later.
    Our current pledge has served us well but we are going to retire it shortly and we’ll be asking all newcomers (and you!) to sign a new pledge but one that has a real-world impact. We will also base our future volunteering around this pledge. We’d love to tell you more right now but we’ll wait until launch-day to announce it.
    We genuinely believe this could have a huge impact on public awareness and help us win the “war”.
    Canterbury Event
    We are tentatively looking at holding an event – not a protest/march – in Canterbury on 18th March around noon. If you live in Kent or don’t mind travelling please let us know via the contact form in the main menu. Let us know how many in your group.
    The event will be by invitation only (if you email us to say you’re coming then you’ll be invited). You will have to follow some basic orders on the day i.e. where to stand and what banner to hold, etc. It won’t last long but afterwards we may ask you to deliver some leaflets if you’re willing.
    The event is part of our new “pledge” and we think it could instantly be copied by every town in the country so you’ll be helping create something very important. We will discuss it in a bit more detail later but we’d like to start getting an idea of how many people are interested at this stage.
    That’s enough for now. Thanks again for your support. None of this can happen without people like you turning up at events, leafleting and making donations. We need to keep pushing and I think you’ll really like our new pledge.
    Regards
    David Fleming

  85. That’s me gone for today. Brilliant lecture about a little known photographer* who took black (sorry) and white photos of English artists between 1960 and 1995. Fascinating to see famous names when they were unknown. The icing on the cake was a member of the audience who spent several weeks with the photographer on a course in Wales in 1971-73.

    *https://www.jorgelewinski.com/

    Have a spiffing evening building your fallout shelter.

    A demain – one hopes….

    1. Yes, but also:

      Dick Barton, Special Agent;
      The remarkably prescient Journey into Space
      and
      The Goon Show . . .

          1. Angel Radio has been playing them on a weekly basis for around 80 weeks, lacoste. Sadly, the final episode was played earlier tonight at 6.30 pm.

  88. Many people will be familiar with the virtuosic 2nd movement of this work, especially old sods like me who remember it being played on the Billy Cotton Band Show by Winifred Atwell.
    But how many have heard the entire work?

    https://youtu.be/ilyTv978X6w

    2. Well, I have now, BoB. But all I remember of the Billy Cotton Band Show (on the radio) is him saying to Alan Breeze “Take it away, Breezie!”

  89. I see that the demonization of Kate Forbes (SNP) is underway. I await the questioning of the slammer candidate on his views on gay marriage.

    1. Slow death by extended torture would be my choice for that rancid specimen of camel’s smegma.

      1. Why waste the effort?

        Guilty, straight out and hanged.

        Unless of course he could be offered to sadists on a pay per cut to cover the cost of the trial.

  94. Death penalty part two:

    Man, 52, admits raping and murdering ‘vulnerable’ woman, 26, after plying her with alcohol and taking her back to his flat
    Elizabeth McCann was strangled to death with a t-shirt in August last year
    Goold will be sentenced tomorrow after guilty plea to rape, assault and murder

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11776953/Man-52-admits-raping-murdering-vulnerable-woman-taking-flat.html

    Would the existence of the death penalty have been a deterrent?
    Probably not.
    But that isn’t the point.
    It’s a punishment to fit the crime and it would save the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds.

  96. BBC Radio 4 news at 6pm this evening, Russian editor Steven Rosenberg:
    “The invasion of Ukraine has not gone at all according to plan but there was no hint of remorse or regret. Putin took the stage and took aim at the west, repeating the Kremlin’s false narrative – that Western nations are responsible for the war in Ukraine.”

    It is a pointless war in that it’s achieved nothing other than to cost thousand of lives and billions of [name your currency]. Putin has turned the world against him – but that was a world that was blind to the corruption of Ukraine and the violent coup of 2014. That was, ultimately, a result of the break-up of the Soviet/communist bloc, after which the West treated Russia as the continuing enemy. The Communist Party was the enemy – of Russians and all the peoples of the USSR and the Iron Curtain countries. The West should have embraced Russia. It’s the eastern border of Western European civilisation. Our real enemies lie beyond it.

    Say any of this in public and fear for your safety. Make a case that the roots of the war lie in the 1930s and listen to the mocking laughter. Ask people if they know of the Holodomor and wait for the blank looks.

    Nowhere is any of this discussed on the BBC which, until not long ago, was regularly expressing its grave concern at the state of Ukrainian politics and the shadowy men who followed the politicians around, men who so scared the corporation’s reporters that they did not dare to use the F-word in public. This is the same BBC whose reporters can probably spot a ‘far-right’ activist on the surface of the moon.

    I have little sympathy for Putin but I reserve my contempt for the world’s media and their dishonesty and cowardice.

    Who shall save The West?


      1. I don’t think he threatened us with something ghastly, it was more along the lines that he intimated something interesting may well occur. We’ll have to wait and see.

    2. The BBC reporting on just about every topic is full of shit. They are wrong on most events and spout politically biased drivel, far removed from real events and outcomes. Ukraine will prove a point in fact.

      1. I don’t hear anybody complain about the hideous blackness of Lagos, Kinshasa, Luanda…

        1. I complain about the hideous blackness of UK TV, particularly the adverts. I could do with a blackout 🙂

      2. It is the same in America. Blacks are only 10% of the population but commit most of the crimes, a lot of those crimes against each other.

        The blacks refuse to accept responsibility for their position in society and expect those who work and aim for a better life to compensate them for their pathetic inactive lifestyle. They breed, the men neglect their children, attack, bully and rob those who have succeeded and have possessions and yet, a recent novelty, demand compensation for ‘slavery’ when most of the bastards never picked cotton or cut sugar cane.

        The constant recital they and their lefty promoters iterate is the concept of ‘white supremacy’. That is a complete corruption of history. There are many blacks who succeeded by the same means as successful whites viz.
        hard work (get a job you lazy black bastards) and learn a trade or profession. Then work hard and apply yourselves to productive activity.

    2. Silly me! I thought the BAFTAs were about awarding an accolade on merit. Clearly, it’s about giving it to bleks regardless.

  98. Anglican leaders oust archbishop over same-sex marriage decision
    https://punchng.com/anglican-leaders-oust-archbishop-over-same-sex-marriage-decision/?dicbo=v2-rnrn2hs
    A group of Anglican church leaders from around the world, under the aegis of Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches, have ousted the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, as their head following the decision to allow the blessing of same-sex couples in England.

    The church leaders in a statement according to Daily Mail, said they no longer consider Welby to be “leader of the global communion”, and it has “disqualified” the Church of England from being its “mother church.”

    Earlier in February, the General Synod, which is the Church of England’s legislative assembly, passed a motion to allow the blessing of same-sex couples in civil partnerships.

    However, in its statement released on Monday, the group accused the Church of England of taking the path of false teaching and going against the historical biblical faith by allowing same-sex blessings, saying the action ” breaks our hearts.”

    The group which said it speaks for 75 per cent of Anglicans worldwide stated that the Archbishop had “sadly led his House of Bishops to make the recommendations (for blessing gay couples) knowing that they run contrary to the faith and order of the orthodox provinces in the communion.

  99. Evening all. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/63be4b45a9a916b0b9cb65859366e23b194bfb6644a4ced4fbf1d8d0cfd341ad.jpg Happy Shrove Tuesday. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9eb7346c6c073bde874142224df56687337421ee16ac941599b8bda35b58daed.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1d7435aabaea7855be9afaa2e76cf0e062ef7a548064ccbaa0209e4e08c0f754.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7d13da0584d95eac0d372c91432cf716bae58c6c321458f975a5c537a3304d58.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a0641fb75a652439fc6115df60feef24acfd0869358430eec47738c17e10dd1f.jpg A busy day for me; I attended a memorial service then worked in the garden. The orchard is starting to look tidier now. Garden generally is more colourful. Spring is on its way.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b385b5516bbaa913f12b92f6069d48fec76ab475e808c1781bd2e1d1108ffd66.jpg

      1. Thanks, Sue. I put a lot of bulbs in last autumn, so it’s good to see some of them in bloom now (there are more in bud, so I should have a long flowering season). The clematis are sprouting as well. I may have lost a couple over the winter, but I’ll leave them in the hope they might sprout from the bottom.

    2. We’ve just planted 30 sarcococca confusa in a small curved border at the front, delightful fragrant shrub. They’re only about a foot high but can grow tom4ft+. We already have a hedge of it and the scent at this time of year is wonderful, evergreen too.

  100. Right, I’m off to bed!
    Two days of not doing anything in the “garden” so I think a bit of work is due tomorrow.

    G’night all.

  101. Good night, chums. My pancakes this evening were yummy. See you all tomorrow.
    PS – Poppiesmum, you seem to have downvoted this post. Was this an error? If not, I am baffled as to what you disliked about it.

      1. I had decided to cover my three pancakes with orange marmalade, golden syrup, and lemon with sugar respectively. But on checking my larder I discovered a complete absence of lemons (drat and double drat!) so I ended up with 2 marmalade ones and only one with golden syrup. As posted above, all were yummy.

    2. I have replied earlier, Elsie, to your later request. I see what went wrong. I was about to reply that my pancakes were tough and leathery this year (what went wrong?) and then I thought better of it, because who wants to know about tough and leathery pancakes. So as I cancelled, I must have inadvertently caught the downvote. It’s so easy to do especially when using a finger on the iPad, it’s not as precise as a mouse. Any ideas as to why my pancakes were tough and leathery, seeing I’ve mentioned it now? I used out-of-date flour by several months (not years!), I wonder if that could have been the cause.

      Of course, I could have perhaps subliminally downvoted your comment because I was so envious of your yummy pancakes !!

  103. I mentioned last evening that I had a nice story to relate but I was too tired. Here it is….
    A lot of American bashing goes on here but my American friends are super. Yesterday, when we were waiting for the nurse to come and do the vampire bit, there was a knock at the door. Delivery man with a parcel for me- looked at the customs label and it was from my dear friend in GA. I said to the guy that it was all the way from America; he wasn’t English but his English was good and he replied, ” And right on time.”
    Anyway, in the parcel was a book, some lovely soap, a sweet little notebook (handbag sized) and a homemade dishcloth. And a card.
    For the second time in two weeks, I burst into tears. It was so kind and thoughtful.
    I emailed my thanks and told my friend that it was a good day in my life when she walked into it.
    Her response was that she wanted me to know that she was thinking about us even though there was a bit of water in between us.
    I don’t have much family left; I have my dear husband but I am truly blessed in my friends and I never take them for granted.
    Do you know what the postage was? $73.

        1. We have an American friend we met in 2018 who lives in Nebraska and he too is an Anglophile. He talks of U.K. as the motherland, well, England. Lovely man.

      1. Thanks Max, many Americans are splendid and intelligent people. The majority in fact. Most of the morons, like the UK, are in the government and I mean both parties!

    4. She is one incredibly good friend, Ann. I too have a high regard for the citizens of the USA. They can be very friendly and have a wonderful “can do” mentality. Not all of them all insular and ignorant as some would suggest.

    5. It’s only the corrupt cabal at the top that I’m against. There is still a fantastic spirit among the people in the US

  105. I can’t tell you how jealous i am of all your pancake talk and i am beginning to lose it without having had a proper cup of tea for nearly three weeks. It’s the little things you miss most, isn’t it? Goodnight to those retiring to bed, i shall plough on over here for a few more hours.

    1. If it makes you feel better, we did not have pancakes. The plan was for bangers, mash and onion gravy but we didn’t feel like that either. So tomorrow.
      Urk, suspect the bangers and mash suggestion hasn’t helped- sorry.

    3. You wouldn’t have been jealous of mine, Mir. They were tough and leathery this year. The only thing I can think of is that I used out-of-date flour, otherwise I have no idea what went wrong. We did eat them, but best consigned to the memory bin.

  106. An Englishman, a Scotsman and and Irishman were enjoying a pint or three in the pub. The Englishman said: “When my son was born we wanted to name him after a memorable day, so we called him George, after St George’s Day.”

    The Scotsman then replied: “Och, that’s a wee coincidence, we did the same. We named our son Andrew, after St Andrew’s Day.”

    The Irishman then spoke: “Bejabers, we did the same too, to be sure. Have you met my lad, Pancake?”

    1. There was a GoodYear plant not all that far from me in NC. They often had a blimp flying over the area.

  109. Goodnight sweet princes and princesses….going to bed now, hoping to sleep.
    Tomorrow is another day.

  110. Wednesday 22nd February, 2023

    GRIZZLY

    https://www.google.com/search?q=swedish+rhapsody&oq=Swedish+rhapso&aqs=chrome.0.0i512l2j69i57j0i512j46i512j0i512l2j46i512j0i512l2.10765j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:f7799e1e,vid:Rtw78l0LO0k

    This may not be your favourite type of music but it is geographically appropriate and is a change from the Policeman songs we posted for you in the past!

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2710e66bba82e40c29dd4a57b0089ef07171c770f0aa1ba6fc8ed0b334c71718.jpg

    and very many joyous returns of the day.

    With very best wishes,

    Caroline and Rastus

    P.S. Caroline made some very good pancakes and we followed your advice and made a homemade marmalade and Cointreau sauce to go with them Delicious.

        1. Many thanks, Alf. That’s the trouble, isn’t it. They come like buses … one after the other!🤣

  112. You seem to have downvoted my post, poppiesmum. Any reason why, or was this a mistake? I seem to have posted this in the wrong place, so will repeat it where it belongs.

    2. I haven’t downvoted your post, Elsie, I never downvote anyone. I move on if I disagree, life is too short! I am a happy upvoter! As I use an iPad and scroll by finger, I a) must have caught the downvote accidentally, or b) downvoted intending to upvote due to fat finger syndrome. My apologies.

      1. Fine Fanx Sue

        I will be off to Sally Army shop later, to return my bedding.
        Awake far too three early this morning

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