Tuesday 9 May: What voters need to hear if the Conservatives are to win back support

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here.

579 thoughts on “Tuesday 9 May: What voters need to hear if the Conservatives are to win back support”

  2. Morning all 🙂😉
    Grey as usual. It’s been raining nearly all night.
    And yes want more votes, Stop the boats. And stop lying all the time.

    1. The BBC is an annoying organisation that has the funding model, the heritage and history to rise above pettiness and to simply respect the traditions, present the evidence and equally and fairly balance both sides of the argument.

      If it had any integrity it would do so. Instead it persists in a big state, Left wing dogmatic arrogance.

  4. The warping of sex education. Spiked. 9 May 2023.

    Lessons are normalising extreme sexual behaviour and teaching trans dogma as fact.

    Sex education has changed. Long gone are the days when an embarrassed teacher fumbled his way through a couple of lessons on the facts of life. As recent reports have highlighted, puberty, periods and pregnancy barely warrant a mention nowadays. Instead, anal sex, fisting, rough sex and polyamory are the order of the day. Classes involve children ‘stepping away from heteronormative and monogamy-based assumptions’ in order to appreciate that ‘there are a variety of sexual preferences and practices’. On top of this, many children are also being taught that they have a gender identity that may be different from their biological sex.

    I was opposed to sex education in schools when it was first mooted long ago. This is admittedly partly because I had a visceral objection to being told what to do by anyone, but also because, even then, I was aware of the Slippery Slope Syndrome in government where what starts out as one thing ends up doing the opposite. I am still waiting to see the benefits of this policy forty years later. Has it made boys and girls more responsible? They are probably more technically proficient but the divorce rate says that’s not enough. Has it led to happier nuclear families? Well no, it’s helped to destroy them actually. In fact its effect has been totally malign and this latest iteration is by far the worst. Instead of informing children it has made them servants to a vast paedophile interest. They have become the sexual doxies and latent prostitutes of the New Order.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/05/08/the-warping-of-sex-education/https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/05/08/the-warping-of-sex-education/

    1. They’re teaching children sexual perversions that the parents don’t even know about. I am very thankful that my children weren’t educated in Britain. Are private schools as bad, or is this just a state school thing?

      1. That is an interesting point BB. I have no idea if they are required to conform to the same rules.

        1. There is also the spectre of some official coming round to home-schoolers’ houses to check that their children are au fait with the latest perverse sexual practices.

          1. Now imagine a world where the state has been defunded by over 70% and cannot do this pointless task. Where it cannot promote it’s own ideological arrogance. Where, frankly, thanks to school vouchers the only role the state has is in paying the education provider the funds the voucher represents.

            No council or tombstone to failure being involved. Just the parent, the student and the school.

          2. I don’t think they will be able to afford it for much longer. What a prospect – hordes of starving, unemployed, marxist Diversity Officers, Coordinators and Inspectors roaming the country!

          4. Now imagine a world where the state has been defunded by over 70% and cannot do this pointless task. Where it cannot promote it’s own ideological arrogance. Where, frankly, thanks to school vouchers the only role the state has is in paying the education provider the funds the voucher represents.

            No council or tombstone to failure being involved. Just the parent, the student and the school.

      2. It’s a concerted effort to spread and normalise perversions and thereby cause confusion in young minds with the final aim of upsetting and marginalising concerned parents. It’s a part of the elites’ agenda. Happening in the USA as well.

      3. They’re heading that way. The state doesn’t like to be refused. As one Jocasta pointed out they were sick of bloody cliamte change – and that was some years ago.

      4. In my mind this is mass grooming. No way should our children be having this kind of lesson.

    3. A decorator should be technically proficient with a paintbrush but it doesn’t mean that he/she could paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. A bit of artistry in relationships is good, n’est-ce pas?

    4. Human reproduction was part of the ‘O’ level syllabus.
      By then most of us had a pretty good idea of what was involved, though possibly the example of rabbits and cats was not a good grounding.

      1. Cats?? Good grief! We were stuck with frogs! ‘Morning Anne of the clean cardi!

        1. Most of us had pet animals. Those guinea pigs …. snigger, snigger ……

      2. In my O level biology class we did the rabbit reproductive system. Then, over the holiday, we were instructed to read the next chapter – the human reproductive system.

    5. The Left are trying to normalise paedophilia. By allowing the trans nutters to be accepted rather than sectioned they are desperate to almost enforce child rape. This is what they want. It will ensure the abolition of their greatest enemy – the family.

    6. In my view, the introduction of sex education (a how-to manual without any morality attached) was designed to destroy the nuclear family.

  5. The warping of sex education. Spiked. 9 May 2023.

    Lessons are normalising extreme sexual behaviour and teaching trans dogma as fact.

    Sex education has changed. Long gone are the days when an embarrassed teacher fumbled his way through a couple of lessons on the facts of life. As recent reports have highlighted, puberty, periods and pregnancy barely warrant a mention nowadays. Instead, anal sex, fisting, rough sex and polyamory are the order of the day. Classes involve children ‘stepping away from heteronormative and monogamy-based assumptions’ in order to appreciate that ‘there are a variety of sexual preferences and practices’. On top of this, many children are also being taught that they have a gender identity that may be different from their biological sex.

    I was opposed to sex education in schools when it was first mooted long ago. This is admittedly partly because I had a visceral objection to being told what to do by anyone, but also because, even then, I was aware of the Slippery Slope Syndrome in government where what starts out as one thing ends up doing the opposite. I am still waiting to see the benefits of this policy forty years later. Has it made boys and girls more responsible? They are probably more technically proficient but the divorce rate says that’s not enough. Has it led to happier nuclear families? Well no, it’s helped to destroy them actually. In fact its effect has been totally malign and this latest iteration is by far the worst. Instead of informing children it has made them servants to a vast paedophile interest. They have become the sexual doxies and latent prostitutes of the New Order.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/05/08/the-warping-of-sex-education/https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/05/08/the-warping-of-sex-education/

  6. Good morning all.
    A bright & dry start with 8°C outside.

    A shopping trip to Belper for the greengrocer’s this morning, then I might get the van washed!

  7. Good morning, all. Wet at the moment but the forecast is for a dry period until mid-afternoon.

    As if losing 1,000+ local council seats isn’t an indictment of the failure of the now non-conservative party, the disgruntled are starting to have their say in print.
    It’s obvious that the now non-conservative party has sold what’s left of its soul to the globalist cabal and is working hard to force that cabal’s agenda on to the people of the UK. That agenda is in no shape or form Conservative in nature. The foot soldiers will be left high and dry as and when the party slips into oblivion.
    There is a huge void appearing on the right of the British political scene but there doesn’t appear to be anyone ‘BIG’ enough to organise the necessary forces to fill it.
    Tice has aspirations to fill that gap but IMO is seriously lacking in charisma and is far too technical and detail heavy, in a political sense, to gain the people’s interest. A figurehead to engage with the people and who leaves the detail to those best suited to that role is required.

    https://twitter.com/MartinDaubney/status/1655086698672398336

    1. I’d think Quiet Life is being kind. The betrayal, the deceit, the treachery is monumental. The sheer, utter stupidity of this gormless government is colossal. They take tax advice from a group that refuses to accept that tax cuts create growth. Why does this group deny that? Because if they accepted it then their every policy would be ‘cut taxes’ and they can’t have that because ‘government needs high taxes to pay off the debt’ – the stupidest, most moronic empty headed bare faced lie uttered this year.

      They lot of them need to be dragged out, flogged, collared, chained and forced to look out of their own arse for a change and see the horror the nation is suffering under.

  8. Good morning, all. Rain overnight. Looks like a dry morning.

    No news again, I see.

  11. Morning all, not raining and not cold, nor hot in Norf Zummerzet.

    I went to the doctors the other day complaining about my sore feet.

    He said “Gout!”

    I said “But I’ve only just walked in!”

    Edited for lazy typing.

  12. Paranoid Putin ‘to send body double to host major Russian military display’ in Red Square, says Ukraine because despot leader ‘fears for his life’. 9 May 2023.

    Ukraine claims Vladimir Putin will send a body double to host a huge military parade on Red Square on Tuesday due to a ‘paranoid fear for his life’.

    The extraordinary claim came from Kyiv government official Anton Gerashchenko.

    ‘Putin will not dare to appear at the parade on May 9, but will send a double,’ he said.

    Like his supposed multiple health issues there is absolutely no evidence to support this assertion.

    When this war is over (assuming we survive it) I look forward to the revelations in the MSM that the Ukies are liars on a truly epic scale!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12060841/Paranoid-Putin-send-body-double-host-major-Russian-military-display.html

    1. No revelations likely, as the MSM would have to reveal their own role and duplicity – or, that they were fooled and were credible idiots…

      1. Probably related to the recent efforts to replace Biden (his time) with the body double with the plastic mask.
        Caught in the act when ‘it’ scratched its neck and the mask reacted differently to human skin.

    1. An excellent video. We urgently need to recycle and reuse much more than we do.

        1. The warqueen gripes at my t shirts that are practically rags. They’re painting t shirts, or crap work t shirts. When they eventually tear I rip them into clothes for polishing/wiping if I do workshop stuff.

          My only complaint is that the metal isn’t shredded for re-use – maybe it is elsewhere?

          2. It’s socially acceptable to recycle everything for gardening, I have discovered. My trees are tied with old nylon stockings (thank you Gardeners’ Question Time ca 1975 for this gem), my seedlings are in trays that used to be upright freezer drawers, I’m about to construct a raised bed from pallets etc.

          5. Tights have many uses – emergency fan belt and horse’s tongue tie being but two 🙂

    1. It is easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled.

    2. How simple it really is to sum up the human waste……oh whoops, I meant human the race.

  15. Good Moaning.
    A momentous event took place this weekend.
    What? No, no; nothing to do with London or the Windsors.
    The Dower House now has a functioning fitted wardrobe. And …….. wait for it …… yer actual clothes are hanging in it.
    Only another 73 bags and boxes to empty, but Rome wasn’t built in a day.
    (And although I STILL haven’t found that patchwork bedspread, I can now wear a different cardi.)

    1. I refused fitted wardrobes as they couldn’t be moved about. One day I came back to find a couple of carpenters following plans created by the wife.

      73 boxes of clothes?! All my stuff fitted into two boxes!

      1. 🙂 Remember maffs is not my strong point: it could be 64 boxes and bags. Anyway, I ran out of fingers and toes.

      2. I rue the day I lost the ability to move all my goods, chattels and a stacking stereo system in a Ford fiesta. Think it was something to do with getting married.

        1. When we were gearing up to move, I found myself sneaking stuff into charity warehouses that didn’t seem too grateful for my donations.
          “More bloody books, wall plates and non-matching cutlery.”

          1. I gave away about 6 foot of older games books to folk. I figured they were gathering dust with me, so I should give them to folk who either missed them or couldn’t afford them.

            One lady, collecting for her 12 year old, when I handed her a stack of hardback rulebooks – it took her two trips to her car – said ‘Are you sure? These are really expensive!’ I said yes, they had sat on my shelves collecting dust. I hope your son enjoys them.

      3. The good thing about fitted wardrobes is…..it hides all the junk until you have to move house.
        They are very similar to garages. And sheds.

        1. My first one (the current one). She’s the only one who’d get away with it!

  16. Had lunch with a chum yesterday. He used to work for BP and complained, bitterly that they knew about ‘climate change’ and had done nothing until the planet was burning.

    Of course, he’s ignorant that the Left have been banging on about climate change since the early 50’s as a means to control people.

    Then he leapt into his favourite topic (apart from himself) about how peple couldn’t afford to eat due to low pay and why that is the fault of companies. Again, he’s wrong because he’s ignorant. When government heavily taxes individuals and companies it stops jobs being created and wages rising. More, it stagnates the economy preventing people from earning more from competition. By importing millions of immigrants (apparently we should take in millions more because that’s good) it creates a huge supply probem which again suppresses wages.

    I don’t know why he can’t put 2 and 2 together to make 4. It seems an odd cognitive dissonance to want more state spending ‘for da poor’ to hammer ‘da wich’ and bring in millions more illegal immigrants and then to complain that he’s worse off every year. He’s not a stupid person (well, despite having significant debt in his home and loans he’s wanting to buy a new flash car with his redundancy money) so why does he hold these backward ideas?He griped about how awful it was that we worked 8 hours a day and suggested bringing someone from the 18th century would be so shocked – and I argued that they’d be amazed that we get to sit on our backsides all day, that we’ve hot and cold clean running water, food from around the world on tap, that we are warm and cold on demand.

    Why do people hold these backward ideologies? Why do they hold utterly contradictory views and never accept the underlying problems are caused by their own attitudes? To me it seems obvious.

    Am *I* wrong? Should rich people pay more tax? (that doesn’t work) Should government give that to the poor? (why should it?
    Why should government break the maret so)? We’re doing that at the moment and it clearly, evidentially does not work. We keep being told to pay more tax to stop ‘climate change’ and yet… it’s not making any difference to the planet but we’re all poorer and unhappier.

    1. Government must scale back it’s activities, and take much less tax to match. Stick to policing, roads, military and health insurance. The rest people, with their reduced taxes, can pay for if they want to, or not, as the case might be.
      The concept that everyone should be paid more so we can afford to buy more (without understanding where the increased pay comes from – the shoppers) seems common over here as well, also infects my brother. Maybe it comes from the belief that all money comes from Government..?

      1. I just do not understand the ethos. This idea that ‘people are poor because of rich companies not paying them enough’ is gormless.

        High taxes and generous welfare suppress the need to work. As you say Oberst, low taxes, small government and, critically no sodding mass gimmigration reduces the supply of labour, the cost of living, increases wages and creates an environment for business competition so small companies can challenge the big ones.

        As it is big companies then buy legislation from big government. My chum seemed to ignore this fact. It’s sodding tiresome. Are all Lefties thick? Even the brighter ones? Why do they all believe the same lies?

        1. A glance at salaries in the 1950s measured in gold, compared to salaries today measured in gold, is eye-opening.

          I can’t remember where I saw this data, sorry, but the gist of it was that people were earning far more in the 50s than they are today if measured in real money, ie gold.
          Fact is, the West was producing stuff in those days. We can’t expect to be rich when we aren’t producing stuff.

          1. My father, who died in 1953, at the time earned £12 per week as an engineer. I started work in 1966 and was paid £6 per week.

          2. Twenty years after that, I was paid 92 pounds a week in my first job. Such was the devaluation of our currency during the seventies…

          3. My first job, as a graduate management trainee in the early 70’s, paid the princely sum of £23: 30p a week.

            It was quite a good wage, some of my contemporaries earned even less.
            One trainee solicitor in NI was on £1,800 and we were all very impressed until he told us that that was the total he would be paid for three years work!

          4. In 1974 my first salary was £112 per mensem after deductions. It wouldn’t quite buy me the cheapest colour television!

          6. Don’t invest too much faith in gold as a store of value. I’d say it’s at least three times over-valued by historical standards, maybe not if we go back to pre-Columbian times.

          7. Over-valued compared to what? “Gold is money – everything else is credit”

          8. Compared to purchasing power. I’d say that, historically, silver has a greater claim yo be ‘real’ money.

          9. Yep. Folk just don’t understand the devaluation massive expansion in the moeny supply, currency debasement and crippling debt has caused. They all demand more money for ‘da poor’ but never link that to them paying it – they assume someone else will – da wich they hate so much yet… when you try to claw ever more from high earners, with wealth being mobile it is rightly moved away from them.

            It’s a hypocrisy the Left wing mind doesn’t understand.

            But, I suppose as he had his debt paid by someone else, his mortgage deposit came from his folks moving rather than saving and spending every penny he earns he’s the ideal socialist: it’s always someone else’s money at risk without having to change how he lives.

          10. He probably never lived through the seventies when high taxation, inflation and a Labour government wedded to those very ideas he supports led to the brain drain, Britain becoming the sick man of Europe and the need to go to the IMF with a begging bowl.

    2. When I was a working fella, I used to say all the senior managers from the company used to go to a convention with other senior managers from other companies to get their brains removed.

      Today I can see that all the governments of the world’s “leading” countries go to a convention to have their thinking programmed.

      The convention is of course Davos and the programmers are the WEF.

      In answer to your question you are not wrong, you just happen to be in a diminishing number of people who can see what should be, but can also see the truth, our wellbeing is of no consequence to them.

      1. Yet why, when the evidence that the current attitude is failing are we forced down this course of action? Are there so many stupid people in the country now that facts and evidence no longer take hold?

        The Warqueen tells me I am shouting into a void and should just let them get on with believing black is white while she does the other side and mocking the fanatic’s ideology.

        1. There is reason to just let them self destruct, after all they have brought it upon themselves and we at our age will likely be gone and spared the final madness.
          Most of us however have children and grandchildren, that is why a lot of us still shout as you say into the void, trying to spare them the final misery.

    3. Darwinism not in action.
      Until a century or so ago, people that stupid would not survive long enough to breed.

      1. Thing is, he’s not stupid. He’s a very bright fellow. The problem is he’s not thinking.

        As he set out his diatribe I said ‘there’s no point as you won’t accept the reason’. They don’t want to see the truth because it doesn’t match what they believe.

    4. I’d like tips on how to achieve cold on demand, especially when the Mercury rises to 90F.

      1. A reverse micro-wave oven would be useful so that within a few seconds something warm could be cooled

      2. It’s easy for us men, all that’s needed is to make a comment on male superiority and your glare will chill us to the marrow!

        };-))

    6. You’re not wrong. Your chum sounds deluded. Paying people to do nothing is counter productive. Taking away people’s hard-earned cash removes any incentive to work hard. The husband of one of my fellow students turned down promotion because he would actually have been worse off (it would have taken him into a higher tax bracket).

    1. Thanks Korky, I will watch that one later. David Martin is very good.

  18. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12062459/Giant-barge-house-500-migrants-docks-Falmouth-refit.html#newcomment

    I don’t want another barge. I want that one packed to the gills until they criminals are pushed out the top and then more jammed in. Then I want it floated away and forgotten about.

    Oh but they’re human beings! Yes, and they’ve passed through a dozen countries which have all ignored their duties under law and it’s not our problem. Oh they’re fleeing war and persecution – from albania? And barely 3% are families. These are an invading horde come to defecate in this country and sponge off us.

    1. Ah but, once in and processed they will be allowed to apply to send for their families to join them.
      Grandparents, parents, siblings, uncles, aunts, wives and all their extended families.

      1. Tens of millions of vermin pouring in, demanding money, raping the nation. Yay.

        The horde must be stopped. If this government refuses to then we must take measures ourselves.

        1. The government will do nothing, nothing of course until they start to be murdered and their wife and daughters are attacked.
          Then they will cry they didn’t know it was going to happen.

          1. We’ve already had an MP killed by one of these scum. That’s not had them act. They’re not going to. They don’t *want* to.

          2. One senior German politician had a daughter who was raped & killed.
            He insisted on making a speech asking people not to turn against the policy of welcoming migrants.
            Some *love & respect* he demonstrated for his deceased daughter…

          3. The same thing happened with rouge electrical work in Kitchens. Until a politicians wife was electrocuted in their own kitchen, nothing had been done about it.

          4. The fragrant Jenny Tongue. We then had Susan Kramer and now a Horse. How the Lib-Dems punish the wicked sinners of Richmond and North Kingston.

        2. As has been said many Times, you want more votes……… Stop The Boats ⛔

    1. I was concerned when I arrived at 7 and he wasn’t about. But he was around in the middle of the night.

      1. Good to know that people care – thank you for your concern, Sue.

        You’ll know if and when I’ve popped my clogs.

          1. I took part in a seance once – in Rome. One of the scariest things I’ve ever done.

  20. Morning All,
    Yesterday I posted here a missive explaining that the Monarchy is not a choice and that the King, his antecedents and successors could possibly qualify for the label “modern slavery”.
    I confess to being surprised that my post whilst initially appearing seems to have been removed????

    1. Disqus was playing up for me yesterday.
      I refreshed the page periodically and posts that had vanished reappeared.

      Good to see you back, I hope all goes well with you and yours.

      1. Well, working (?) for the Civil Service means I have some time on my hands now and then whereas when I am working for the Private Sector I never seems to. Interesting that 🙂
        Otherwise, not much changes – life goes on here on the farm – mostly around me rather than involving me except when things go t*ts up.
        Horses are going well. Oddly my homebred ID has a form of skin cancer on one foreleg. He is receiving ($$$) treatment from one of the foremost equine immunologists – hope for a positive response by August. It has not affected his soundness – nor his character as witnessed yesterday when some pedestrian waved and umbrella at us and I found myself departing up the road at an unsafe rate of knots.
        Sadly my Border Terrier (Muppet) is visibly deteriorating. She will be 15 this year so I suppose it is to be expected. So hard to know when to make the call – don’t want to do it too soon nor do I want her to suffer.

        So life chunters on….

        And if any of you are of the twitterati you can follow me on that platform UKIP Agricultural Spokes…..
        Still beating the government up over it’s total abandonment of food security.

        4. I’m not on Twitter, but I’d like to observe that the manifesto proposal to make it illegal to have a dog off a lead near livestock could have unintended consequences. What about sheepdogs and hounds?

    2. You may have a point about it being a form of slavery. They are kept in a cage of duty.

      But, as has been shown, they can put that aside in exchange for losing all the benefits the role offers. Certainly I would never want to be king. having someone tell me where to go, what to wear? Give over.

      1. Really they don’t have a choice. They have a job thrust upon them which they never applied for and the only way out of it is the nuclear option of abdication. This is a rare occurrence as they are all instilled with the duty to serve from the time they are born.

        1. One of my neighbours said to me this morning when I was returning from walking Kadi that she didn’t think Charles would last long; he’d abdicate in favour of William. I said I didn’t think he’d last long, either, but I forebore to add that I thought the monarchy would go with him.

  21. Brewers turn to bubbly beer as sales of cask ales fall flat

    The brewer of Old Speckled Hen is moving its focus away from cask ales as Britain loses its taste for traditional beers.

    Greene King plans to double down on fizzier keg beers after the successful release of its first craft beers last year.

    Nick Mackenzie, chief executive of the pub and brewing company, said: “Certainly, there’s been some challenges around people drinking cask ale … that’s why we’ve then rolled out two new brands of more premium modern beers to try and counteract that.”

    The Suffolk-based brewer began its first foray into craft beer last year with the debut of Flint Eye, a dry-hopped lager, and Level Head, a session IPA.

    Mr Mackenzie said the brewer was “developing new [kegged] brands, which are going to definitely appeal to a different consumer”.

    The focus on kegged beers at the 224-year-old beer maker comes amid declining sales of cask ale.

    Sales of cask ale in Britain were down almost a third compared with pre-covid levels in the 12 months to March, according to CGA, a consultancy firm that tracks the bar and restaurant sector. Demand for the centuries-old beer style, which is served at room temperature, has almost halved since 2015.

    Paul Bolton, of CGA, said craft beer had won over younger drinkers with “more appealing branding”. It is also increasingly preferred by pub landlords because the product is easier to store and serve, and has higher profit margins compared with cask ale.

    This a return to the bad old days of the 1960s when gassy, sub-standard keg pseudo-‘beer’ held sway. It was impossible to buy a decent pint of cask-conditioned ‘proper’, old-fashioned English ale until the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) started up their formidable campaign. This was the most successful consumer organisation in history. Their sterling efforts brought back traditional , excellent quality ales to all discerning beer drinkers.

    Unfortunately the old guard of CAMRA are long gone, their places having been usurped by a woke gang of the clueless. This new move marks a complete U-turn and these so-called “craft” beers are nothing more than the modern-day equivalent of fizzy cat-piss in the same dismal mould of the dishwater of old, such as: Watney’s Red Scrape-The-Barrel, Whitbread Tankard-of-Vomit, and Double-Dreadful Diamond.

    1. Good morning Grizz and all
      Are you saying that Nottlers are cask ale?

      1. Good morning, Alf.

        I certainly hope so. Any NoTTLer who was keg ‘beer’ (or Chorleywood-process ‘bread’) wouldn’t be the sort of NoTTLer we would want, would he/she?😉

    3. The big brewing companies will go down the usual route, saying “There’s no demand” and use that spurious argument to switch away from cask ales to keg beers. It’s because keg beer is easier to keep (cask ale requires knowledge and skill to produce and keep in good condition in the cellar of the pub).

      Fortunately there are still smaller independent brewers to produce proper beer, but given the economic situation and the damage done by the Covid scam, it will be harder for them to stay in business. The Black Sheep Brewery is going into administration – I wonder how many more will follow suit.

      1. “There’s no demand for it” is the response our politicians give when asked why so few of them have any integrity, honesty and good judgement!

      2. Stroud Brewery nearly went under during the lockdowns and had to appeal for funds – but since then they have bounced back and it is a very successful business.

      3. That was precisely the point CAMRA made in the early days. Keg beer, in which all the yeast was filtered out to produce a stable but lifeless liquid, was easy to store, especially in the backrooms of working men’s clubs (few of which had a cellar). This lifeless liquid was then mixed with various chemicals in order to ‘stabilise’ and preserve it. Then, at point of sale, it was injected with CO₂ from a canister to replicate the natural gassiness that had been removed when the yeast had been filtered out. The resulting ‘beer’ did the job required of it; a quick means at a cheap price of intoxicating masses of the non-discerning.

        Its success in the clubs meant that it soon moved to the pubs of the country where, for most punters, a cheap means of intoxication was preferable to a more expensive but natural and exquisite beverage that took a lot of correct handling to ensure it was kept in prime condition.

        It seems, from the article, that a less-discerning public prefer a return to this cheap muck over retaining the more expensive high quality ale of Old England.

        At least, that is what the purveyors of the crap will tell you.

    4. I drink more wine than beer I had 1 bottle of beer last month. Draught beer is so expensive it was never far more expensive than bottled beer as it is now..

      1. My home made cider went down well at our wet street party about 3.5 litres were consumed.

    5. My interpretation of that article is as follows:-

      Since the hundreds of new breweries have taken a significant chunk of our market share for cask ale with various high quality products, and since we have been getting away with cheap-to-produce low quality ales which our publicans don’t always get right and whose sales are falling, we need a propaganda piece which denigrates cask ale in general and repositions GK as a ‘craft’ brewer in anticipation of some forthcoming new products. These products will be over-chilled, over-carbonated and overpriced but we don’t care.

      2. “These products will be over-chilled, over-carbonated and overpriced but we don’t care.”

        And, as was proved in the 1960s, the masses who are not discerning and only want a cheap way to get pissed also don’t care.

    6. Mr Mackenzie ought to ask himself why demand for his company’s cask ales has fallen. The big brewers who produce a large %age of the UK’s cask ales may well be cutting production but the smaller brewers are still producing. The real problem is the assault on pubs, the only place where cask beers can be properly drunk.

      It’s more than 40 years since GK’s Abbot Ale was worth drinking.

      1. When I lived in Cambridge 40 years ago I would buy Abbot Ale from Percy Wings shop around the corner on Clarendon Street and return the bottles.

        Edit: Our local was The Free Press, favoured by rowers.

    7. Hi Grizz. Surely the reason for the reduction in sales of cask ales is the large number of pubs that have closed.

      1. Hi Del. Sad, isn’t it. I know one reason that pubs have closed is that countless people prefer to buy the beer-like-substance that is sold cheaply in tins in supermarkets and off-licences.
        They buy that muck so they can sit in front of the telly and get drunk. Much cheaper than being sociable and going to the pub for some decent ale.

        1. Unfortunately, George, the high price of drinking in a pub has now become prohibitive, hence my reason for buying a beer machine and using 5L kegs of Affligem – a very tasty Belgian beer.

          Not very sociable but that very much reflects my current lonely and isolated life.

        2. Unfortunately, George, the high price of drinking in a pub has now become prohibitive, hence my reason for buying a beer machine and using 5L kegs of Affligem – a very tasty Belgian beer.

          Not very sociable but that very much reflects my current lonely and isolated life.

    8. I don’t suppose their high profile support for BLM and slavery reparations has won them many followers. I used to enjoy their Abbot and IPA but have avoided them for the last three years.

    9. I’m glad my club serves Wye Valley Butty Bach bitter, as well as guest beers. About £3.50 a pint.

  22. If William wants to be the King’s liege man, he must forgive Harry
    The Prince of Wales may have to rise above his hurt feelings for the sake of the Crown if he is to fulfil the role he pledged to his father
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2023/05/08/prince-william-kings-liege-forgive-prince-harry/

    What is forgiveness? In my view there has to be a ‘forgivee’ as well as a ‘forgiver’ – what purpose is served by ‘forgiving’ someone who does not think he has done anything wrong?

    On the cross Christ said of those who crucified him : “Lord forgive them for they know not what they do.” In other words the fact that the crucifiers were unaware of what they had done gave them an escape clause. Harry knows exactly what he has done, what he intended to do and what he wants to carry on doing so that escape clause is not open to him

    A couple of BTLs

    Unless and until Harry and Migraine divorce and Harry admits that he made a terrible mistake in marrying her there is no chance that the family will be able to accept him back into it.

    On the subject of adultery the King had one adulterous sexual relationship during his marriage to Diana Spencer and he married the woman with whom he had that relationship – not immediately after his divorce but not until he was a widower. By contrast Diana had at least six adulterous sexual liaisons during her marriage to Charles.

    1. The parable of the Prodigal Son springs to mind. However, the son had to realise the error of his ways and seek forgiveness. Harry has to do the same for a reconciliation to be possible.

      1. I think Harry is a weak man led by a narcissist who has played on his feelings of insecurity to cash in. That’s all the wretched Megan wants – to profit from the suffering of others.

    2. Diana was an unhappy girl and wanted to be loved.
      Charles knew he was loved by Camilla, whom he should have married in the first place.

      I don’t blame either of them for looking for a happy relationship.

    3. “Forgiveness does not mean ignoring what has been
      done or putting a false label on an evil act. It means, rather, that
      the evil act no longer remains as a barrier to the relationship.
      Forgiveness is a catalyst creating the atmosphere necessary for a fresh
      start and a new beginning.”

      Martin Luther King, Jr

      i

    3. Are you near the meteorological office? I think it’s their rain-gauge.

    5. For displaying a bunch of cut flowers; the stake at an angle is to prevent the fabric tie from slipping downwards.

    7. Lost/dropped bucket hung up so it doesn’t blow away and can be reunited with it’s owner?

  24. May 9th 1898 – A third son and sixth child to Dr Henry Eugene and Emily Alice Tracey at The Gables, Willand, Cullompton, Devon.

    My very dear father was born 125 years ago today.

    1. My very dear paternal grandmother was born 130 years ago on March 5.

      I must have forgotten to mention it.

    2. Another era. My grandmother would be 135 this year – she was thirteen years old when Queen Victoria died! When I was a child, I didn’t realise how quickly the links to that era would vanish in the mist.

      1. My maternal grandmother would have been 140 this September. She was several years older than my grandfather.

      2. All my grand-parents were born in the 1870s. One GF died in 1926; the others in the 1950s. Astonishing to think how the world changed – internal combustion engine – string aeroplanes – jet engines – sound barrier shattered…. Telephones – electricity universal…

        Ah me….

        1. Yes. My grandmother’s life spanned horse-drawn carts and oil lamps to computers and space stations.

          1. All her life my maternal grandmother referred to “the horseway” rather than the highway.

          2. All my grandparents were born in the 1880s. One Nan was born in 1883, when the motor car and phone had just been invented. I can’t imagine how old she was before she ever saw either, let alone used one. She lived with us and died just after the first moon walk in 1969. Quite a span.

  25. G’day all,

    Late on parade at Casa McPhee today. It’s a bit cloudy with rain forecast for later, wind in the West, 13℃ so I’m off out for a walk before the heavens cascade.

    This letter caught my eye, knowing Pembrokeshire as I do:

    SIR – My wife and I have just returned home from a most enjoyable week touring Pembrokeshire. As soon as you cross the border into Wales you can see the improvement in the road surface, and while we were driving from Solva, where we were staying, we discovered why.

    There were reinstatement teams dealing with potholes and going about the task very professionally, not just throwing some tarmac on the hole and moving on to the next, as happens in my area. On the road from St Davids to Haverfordwest, the team used temporary traffic lights to close one side of the road and then, using first a jackhammer and then a circular saw, created a perfect square around the pothole. The decaying tarmac was removed from the hole and replaced with new, hot tarmac and then rolled to an even surface, before a seal was put around the edge.

    All along the road there is evidence of the work they have done over the preceding months, which will last for years. Why can local councils in England not follow suit?

    Lee Brown
    Mottram, Cheshire.

    While Mr Brown is right about the very good state of the roads in Pembrokeshire, the real reason is that they simply don’t get the pounding that roads do in the more populous parts of the country. Therefore the repair teams don’t have a massive back-log of repairs to catch up on. I’m pleased he enjoyed Pembrokeshire, SWMBO’s home county. If he went off-piste a little he will have driven on some of the multitude of single track roads which link farms and small settlements. They are characterised by high banks and hedges so that normal-sized vehicles can be hidden from view. The reason is probably so that they protect farm vehicles and their loads from the wind which can be brutal as evidenced by the sparse, near horizontal trees. They also serve to keep the farmers on the road on their way home from the pub.

    1. Good morningFiscal and everyone.
      Nice explanation about sunken lanes with high banks, but I once read that the appearance may indicate a medieval, or at least extremely old, road.

    3. Apart from the sparsity of traffic, they get a fair bit of dosh from the hated Saesneg.

  26. Oops, nearly forgot…

    Good morrow, Gentlefolks, today’s story

    A Rose By Any Other Name
    A drunken blonde goes into a bar in America. The bartender asks her what she would like to drink. She replies,

    “Gimme a beer.”

    The bartender then asks her, “Anheuser Busch?”

    To which she replies, “Fine thanks, and how’s your cock?”

    1. Glad you’re here Tom – I was worried when you didn’t appear earlier on. Hope all’s well, and you had a good sleep for once.

    2. Good morning, Tom

      She might have replied that she had just been to a Brazilian coiffeur.

  27. Morning all, tentatively back, eyes much improved thanks to medication.

    Weather here in West Sussex is mercifully spring like, cold and dull. Rain and thunderstorms this afternoon.😁

    I thought this interesting because Colonel Macgregor gives a short history of the origins of the Ukraine war and then goes on to discuss the present conflict. JFK jr contribution is also fascinating because of his direct knowledge of the Kennedys and the Russians in political history.
    JFK waffles on a bit at the beginning but hang in there and, I think, you will find it rewarding.

    Interview with RFK Jr – Massive Russian missiles rain down
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xl4L_9GHf4

    1. The Frankfurt School was formed to figure out why the Russian peasants didn’t embrace communism and work out what could be done to make the rest of us believe that it’s a really great system. They thought lying about western civilisation and making it “so corrupt it stinks” would do the trick. The present lot have learned nothing, have they? They refuse to admit that we’re neither nostaligic nor stupid. Communism is bad, bad, bad, downright evil – but they’ll refuse to accept that and that’s the problem.

      1. Similar to all dictatorships, whatever the political persuasion, it only benefits those in charge and their cronies.

  30. Strange that the authorities can do this yet appear to be powerless to stop the trannies.
    I fail to see any real difference re performance enhancement provided by male puberty and other drugs.

    Lira was found to have supplied drugs to Nigerian sprinter Blessing Okagbare, who last year was banned from athletics for 11 years.
    The 34-year-old was expelled from the Tokyo Olympics just before the women’s 100m semi-finals after it emerged she had tested positive for human growth hormone in an out-of-competition test in Slovakia before the delayed 2020 Games.

    https://www.bbc.com/sport/athletics/65531036

  32. ‘Morning All

    Deep Joy,after our court lunch and BBQ yesterday this morning I am getting pings of various people now testing positive for Convid inviting me to test and asking if I need masks

    Never jabbed,never tested,never masked and damned if I’m gonna start now should I develop a sniffle I shall treat it the usual way hot lemon and honey tea with a large dash of rum and paracetomol

    To hell with project fear

    Meanwhile……..

    The horror,the HORROR……..

    https://twitter.com/_B___S/status/1655675917300015135

      1. Hah!! like I would ever have downloaded that!
        No these are in house fear mongers all too many still in thrall to Poject Fear

    2. I got a cat when we had our first Golden, Lenny. (So called because he looked like Lenny the Lion.) They adored each other and slept together in Lenny’s basket at night.
      When we had to let Lenny go, poor lad, the cat was inconsolable and how can you explain?
      When Fred came along he was eager to be friends but was too boisterous and, although Basil the cat was willing, it never worked. The only time the cat fell in the pool was with “help” from Fred. You have never seen such an angry cat in your life.

      1. Didn’t you take your cat to see Lenny’s body? I took Charlie with me when I had Jazz put to sleep (they used to sleep together) so he knew. Self-centred little so-and-so took one look, thought, “he’s gone” and wanted to know whether we’d got biscuits for him!

        1. Our beloved cat Chaucer disappeared and did not return – we very much feared that the barbaric hunters (armed rural yobs) trapped or shot him. We were very upset but Rumpole, our boxer, was completely devastated. He stopped eating properly and he lost a third of his body weight and we had to get the vet to give us some canine Prozak which, miraculously, sorted him out.

          https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ea842653eac6925a7b28d69af6555203f1464c6706ef4b1ae8da90ca6a72fde4.jpg

    3. Gee – thanks a bundle.

      I played that just now without thinking. Gus and Pickles (downstairs) went absolutely ballistic – believing that they were under attack from some yowling outsider. Took 29 minutes to calm them down.

      I suggest that any NoTTLer cat folk DON’T play the video if their cat is anywhere near…..or within hearing range….

      2. Oh gawd! Too late! I’ve woken the sleeping naked cat and he’s leaping from windowsill to door to windowsill! 🙄

    1. The MSM and the PTB loathe people who tell the plain unvarnished truth.

  34. Got to go out now……. funeral of a table tennis club member – only 55.

    Got my knicks in a twist trying to make an online payment for his chosen charity – just hope it eventually went through only once but in the process I lost all my tabs and things I was doing……. hopefully back here now.

    1. I had a similar problem when I was buying eye drops for Oscar. The page locked up and I dared not refresh it in case the payment (not a credit card) went through again. I eventually managed to contact the company and they said it had gone through and only once.

      2. Lots of things have stopped working on the laptop as the browser is quite out of date. I should have used the desktop PC in the first place as it went through from there with no problem. The message is showing twice on the website but I think the payment only went through once.

          1. I’m very happy having stayed with Win 7 professional. Stuff Microsoft’s updates.

            Still got the disc if anyone would like a copy and password. See Hertslass for the e-mail address.

          3. Probably the best version – ever. I’ve been there since Win 3.1. (that’s all I remember)

  35. Just back from the barbers. He took nearly an hour to make me look like a Mr A. Hitler. All i’m missing is the silly mustache. Not going there again. Sieg heil !

  36. Popping in for a break from “sorting out” workshop. My God – the STUFF. Anyone want a quantity of 2½ in no 14 screws (in original box…?) Have got rid of a lot of dross. The box of used, rusty screws variés, for example. Amazing, too, what you find that you had forgotten you bought in 1988….

    Off for a beer and some crossword while the MR slaves on Zoom…..

    1. Ah; happy memories of grubby stained plastic boxes I have binned over the past few weeks (usually with added rainwater sloshing around).

  37. So in some areas foxes are becoming an endangered speciesl
    We spent hours trying to explain to the class warrior Tony Banks that this would be the outcome of the Hunting Act but Labour never cared. They were always more interested is portraying hunters as “Toffs on Horseback” than they were in animal welfare.
    We now need a closed season for the shooting of foxes to preserve the species.
    Hunting always ceased between March and September to protect the breeding season.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/09/hunting-ban-has-caused-catastrophic-decline-of-foxes/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    1. Is that the case in towns now?

      I see numerous foxes when I’m back in the UK.

      1. There was a family of foxes living in Brixton Churchyard – that used to scavenge the bins outside the shops in Brixton Road. That was in the early 1980s.

      2. Even if misguided people don’t feed them, there’s plenty of thrown away food for them to scavange.

    2. Not endangered around here, they’re not. Beautiful bushy tailed well fed they are!

      1. Yes we have had foxes, badgers and other vermin in our garden in Brittany but, after our moles which destroy the lawn, the wild boars are the worst nuisance when they search for grubs in the ground.

        1. The boar are so prolific around here that when they have visited it looks as if a farmer has been using a tractor.
          There is even a special dispensation for the hunt to go after them outside the hunting season. Our moles are bad but certainly not as bad as the boar. One of the locals said they had seen a sounder of more than15 recently.

    3. Hello m’Dear!
      Hope you’re keeping well.

      That is the problem when people make political decisions without fully investigating the likely effects or understanding what they are doing.

      1. There has been a raft of legislation with unintended consequences since 1997.

        1. Ah! The Law of Unintended Consequences!
          Close cousin to the Balls Up or Conspiracy Question!

    4. Hunting season is regulated by law in Norway, according to the species. Seems to work.
      Open season on Canada geese and wild hogs. They are both a pest and displacing indigenous species.

      1. There is an ever-increasing pest in the UK that is replacing the indigenous people.

        Time for a hunting season on that, methinks.

  38. Belated Medley

    http://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fu2p-wxWwAA1Ofh.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/dd68a1109a304949c23cf0bb88922690f9de0d0d45b3d21938d01d7a7f87efc1.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a5f0008f9d96a18894dde715e405741008c0f7f81d140a3abc3c4d633feda628.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a30a35160b8035ff249ac8002203681b2d4cad2cdbcab8169594a1b70e9cc3de.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5d59227e12312c556187d410da8d1aa454be2e1045ec5cb5a7fe87be3788f418.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d29fd78466d8d7bfd68e7fae82de7ff933df00c675572edbdb77811eae46b895.jpg

    Oops

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/eb16f1152abc19e7ac17b563f2bf32e4e88e1f6d7b343328a709b46f6a824c1e.jpg

      1. Look at the hands. I think it’s the Grim Reaper, although at first glance I did think it was a slammer.

      2. It’s the Reaper.

        And, for the record, the Warqueen is using my phone right now. She also reads my whatsapps – she was looking for a picture of a cake for Junior.

        I am boring. I am devoted to her. The idea that I’d betray her trust is anathema. What surprises me is that she hasn’t died from boredom realising the things I talk about to my chums are the same things I talk about to Mongo.

        1. Not betraying her trust is the kind of boring that any woman with her head screwed on properly wants.

    2. The David Cartland one is poignant – to the political class and left they didn’t force you. Think of degree of cognitive dissonance required to believe that, the arrogance, the doublethink and then you realise these people think themselves our masters.

  39. Afternoon, all – I nearly made it morning today! Don’t faint; Oscar is at the vets so I’m whiling away my time until I pick him up and pay a huge bill. When she mentioned how much it would cost, I had a quick intake of breath! Still, I want to do the best for him – I had a huge fight this morning to get his car harness on (he’s too lame to walk) and then muzzle him to put his lead on. They are going to do the full monty while he’s sedated; clip his nails, trim his fur and then investigate what’s the matter with his paw. I was told I should have given him gabapentin and trazadone two hours before he came to the vets … I pointed out I didn’t have two hours this morning as I rang up and got an appointment more or less straight away. Compare and contrast with the NHS. I was going to do some tidying up in the garden, but when I got back the heavens opened and we had thunder and lightning. The gods are clearly displeased. As for the headline; voters have been hearing sound bites that they want to hear for years. What is missing is the will to deliver on any of it.

    1. A muzzle to put his lead on? Why so? Despite the learner driver that is Mongo, Ozzie is good enough in the car – he worried initially as I think he remembers he was abandoned in one but oddly if I tell him where we’re going – seaside, park, vets, Rory (who gives them a wash and brush) he’s ok.

      We even went to see my sister, which is 4 hours in the car and he was far better than Mongo who pawed at Junior something awful. The bigger problem is even in the tank there’s no where a Newfoundland can lie down – Mongo’s nearly 4 foot long in the body let alone his battle brush

      Here’s hoping Oscar’s OK.

      1. Because he would take my fingers off if he didn’t want his lead put on unless I muzzle him. He has brought difficult and unco-operative to a fine art in his 13 years!

  40. Barge set to house 500 asylum seekers arrives in Cornwall. 9 May 2023.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0908a768e9b1c4c081b081d3516b623d99049ab5b8634b2975c61f07b7146a9d.png

    The scheme is, however, facing opposition from local Tory MP Richard Drax and Dorset council who are considering legal action to block the “inappropriate” plan. Dorset’s Police and Crime Commissioner David Sidwick is demanding extra funding from the Home Office to pay for the additional costs of policing the site.

    Mr Drax told The Telegraph on Tuesday: “It is a barge for 220 that is going to take 506. Even if you double up the rooms that still leaves 60 without a room. Some will have to be three or four beds.

    “What are the conditions going to be like in a barge with 506 young men from all over the world – some possibly disturbed mentally – couped up in a quasi-prison?”

    Yes far better for them to be roaming the streets. I’ll be greatly surprised if they don’t set fire to this before the years end. These people aren’t coming here to live on a Prison Hulk!

    No comments allowed!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/09/barge-house-500-asylum-seekers-cornwall-refit-dorset/

    1. We have totaly lost it a a free country. I wil never vote for any of the main parties again.

      1. Millions feel the same. Even general election votes are collapsing. The democratic surge over Brexit had people voting for Boris because they were sick and tired of the statists fighting to delay it. Regardless of how they’d voted in the referendum, they all wanted the result applied.

        Sadly, the Tories have refused to acknowledge that fact.

    2. It’s hard to think of a scheme more likely to fail – which I suppose is the goal of the civil serpents who organised it.

      1. If lawyers and councillors resent it and legally fight against it, then move them on to it – to better represent their clients.

        Then don’t let them off.

    4. Wait ’til it’s full, tow it out to sea and SINK it – problem solved

    5. What will conditions be like? They’ve lived in tents in Calais, then got in a boat, cramped together to illegal invade this country. Who cares? They have a choice. They shouldn’t be coming here if they’re bothered about discomfort.

      1. They’ll just set it alight.

        Then they will be given nicer accommodation in a four star hotel.

        Simples !

      2. I stayed on that barge in Shetland. It’s perfecftly habitable with en-suite rooms.

    7. Sail it to Shitholestan or wherever they come from.
      Amongst their own kind they’ll feel so much more at home.
      We owe them nothing and they shouldn’t be here.

    8. How long do they intend to keep them in barges? Forever? Or didn’t the vax work quickly enough for TPTB and this is a waiting game?

      2. I wrote a couple of disparaging comments a few days ago Times online

        I had an email from them telling me I was banned .

        What happened to free speech . The media has cloth ears or their heads are buried in the sand .

        The media wallahs do not care a jot about the public .

        1. You bad person, you. Riling up the Times like that!
          Well done, Belle!

        2. Nor those in Westminster, sooner or later people will be enquiring about the price of piano wire.

      3. I suggest it might be sunk if moored there, because of all the upchucking due to the bad weather

      5. In 1984 it took me a week to get from St Mawes to Corunna in Raua because we were becalmed. The Ushant Lighthouse was in sight for three consecutive nights – on the first it was a mile to the south, the second we right next to it and we could hear it and on the third night it was to the north.

        I got the sitting in the middle of the Bay of Biscay Blues
        There’s not a wind cloud in the sky
        There’s only lots of cargo vessels chugging by
        From Ushant down to Finisterre
        But we ain’t going no where.
        etc.

        1. I had a sailing holiday around the Greek Isles for a couple of weeks and had the donkey running at least half the time we wanted to go anywhere.
          Still enjoyed what sailing we managed though.

  41. Yesterday I decided to go for a walk in Holland Park so entered at the back and walked through the wild garden to the statue of Lord Holland, where it’s usually possible to access the path which runs across a large lawn at the back of the house and from there reach the rest of the gardens. I got there only to find that the lawn is fenced off and a notice has been attached stating that this is “due to an outbreak of avian flu”. I can’t recall the rest of the waffle but it made no sense whatsoever. The wild wooded part of the park is open and there were many people feeding the birds there. It was also possible to walk around the wooded area to reach the formal gardens, which were open. The ruin of the house (bombed in WWII) is always off limits at this time of year as the theatre is under construction in preparation for the summer opera season. The lawn at the back is a favourite picnic venue in good weather but while it was fine here yesterday, it was too cold to do anything more than walk through. Avian flu? They’re ‘avin a larf, shirley?

    2. Aren’t they a bit quick off the mark putting up their avian flu decorations? The WHO only announced the end of the covid season this week.

      Better lay in some powdered egg while you can…

      1. I noticed the last time I was in Lidl that they are restricting the sale of eggs to “two” per customer. Presumably they mean boxes, rather than individual eggs.

          1. I bought a box of a half dozen free range eggs when I was in Lidl. I don’t use a lot of eggs now I’m on my own.

    3. I encountered that at Holland Park in January, damned nuisance isn’t it. But the notice I saw suggested the lawn was closed to let the grass regrow, nothing to do with bird flu. On my various walks most of the bird flu restrictions have been removed now.

      Been monitoring NOTTL for ages, expect there are loads of us silent readers, maybe I should post more often.

      1. Yes, and GCHQ too. Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Welcome to nttl.blog!

      2. Oh yes, do! I figured they just want to keep people off the lawn and peering through from the other side, it is in very good condition now. The bird flu notice should be replaced with an honest, “Lawn Closed”.

    5. Is there still a colony parakeets there? Perhaps they were being rounded up.

  42. While riding my Harley, I swerved to avoid hitting a deer, lost control and landed in a ditch, severely banging my head.
    Dazed and confused I crawled out of the ditch to the edge of the road when a shiny new convertible pulled up with a very beautiful woman who asked, “Are you okay?
    “I’m okay I think.” I replied as I pulled myself up to the side of her car.
    She said, “Get in and I’ll take you home, so I can clean and bandage that nasty scrape on your head.”
    “That’s nice of you,” I answered, “But I don’t think my wife will like me doing that!”
    “Oh, come now, I’m a nurse,” she insisted. “I need to see if you have any more scrapes and then treat them properly.”
    Well, she was really pretty and very persuasive. Being sort of shaken and weak, I agreed, but repeated, “I’m sure my wife won’t like this.”
    We arrived at her place which was just few miles away and, after a couple of cold beers and the bandaging, I thanked her and said, “I feel a lot better, but I know my wife is going to be really upset so I’d better go now.”
    Don’t be silly!” she said with a smile. “Stay for a while. She won’t know anything. By the way, where is she?”
    “My guess is that she’s still in the ditch.”

    1. I was talking recently to a man with a fancy motorbike, possibly a KTM. I queried why the decals were bubbling up on the fuel tank, and he blamed it on ethanol (molecules) escaping from the plastic fuel tank.

  43. Have just had a chat with the vet and am to pick up Oscar at 5.00. He had an ingrowing toe-nail (and his dew claw was getting too long as well – a problem he’s had sorted before). It looks as though he’s going to have to go to the vets to be sedated when he needs grooming every time in future. I’m just a bit concerned about his being put under on a regular basis.

      1. Even when he’s whoozy, he’s still snappy and unco-operative. It was when he was recovering from his gabapentin and trazadone that he ripped my hand.

    2. Why do they need to knock the fellow out? Does the grooming cause him pain and to lash out?

      1. He has to be muzzled, but even with that, he twists and writhes and tries to bash you with his muzzle, growling all the while. As there’s only one of me, I don’t have enough hands to be able to control him and treat him.

          1. Stressed, anxious and very, very snappy. He’s a determined terrier and he’ll do his utmost to resist having anything that he doesn’t want done to him.

          3. Ha! When I had a rat problem he was useless. He ambled along and barked, so the rats scarpered. Even when I managed to trap one, he just looked at it. It doesn’t help that he’s partially sighted, so he can’t see to chase things.

    3. I’m sure you can get mild sedatives from pet shops.
      Might be worth trying them first.

      1. I’ve tried pet remedy and various calming tablets. Nothing works. He is hyper and loathes being brushed or groomed in any way, shape or form. I’ve bought some no water shampoo which I’ve yet to try – you towel it off. Mind you, he isn’t keen on being towelled dry! I didn’t try it out because I was worried about it possibly affecting his bad foot. I felt like a bad owner, but I do my best.

        1. Oscar is very lucky to have you as his owner and carer. I get the impression that Kadi is much less of a handfull. Do they get on together?

          1. Yes, although Oscar chases Kadi off “his” fleecy blanket at times. At other times they sleep together on it. Kadi has his own issues; he’s a bundle of nerves and barks a lot. I’m working on that with a training collar (it vibrates rather than puffs citronella which is what his former owner tried) and lots of praise when he’s quiet, which he tends to be when he’s wearing the collar.

        2. Full marks for your patience with Oscar, it must be very frustrating for you.

          1. I don’t really know what more I can do; I am calm (mostly!) and consistent. I spend a lot of time stroking him (that’s progress because he didn’t want to be touched at all when I got him) and soothing him. It’s only recently I’ve managed to get him to accept a few gentle rubs with a towel but he doesn’t accept a brush yet. He has been a challenge, that’s for sure. The vet said he was difficult – I told her that was the understatement of the year!

        3. You’re not at all. Don’t think htat way around. It may be that he’s nervous and frightened and thus reacts in the only way he knows. All I can suggest is calm, consistent training.

          I am convinced I got lucky with my dogs as all of them have been very even tempered. Mongo can be stubborn, but he’s also a bit dim and forgets why he’s being stubborn.

          1. All I can say is that he’s a lot calmer and happier than he was when I first got him, although that isn’t saying much. It doesn’t help that he’s nearly blind so everything must be a bit threatening to him.

          4. That was my conclusion; I suspect he resisted being groomed and was spanked with a brush because he tries to bite it when I bring it out. He would leap up and bite my toes if I walked near him (thankfully, something he has grown out of now) and the first time I stepped over him, he was hanging off the bottom of my trouser leg! I suspect he was kicked. I also think he was teased with his food, which is why he guards it aggressively. It will be two years on D Day that he’s been here, so you would have thought he might have realised by now that these things no longer happen, but old habits die hard.

          5. Just the opposite with our Lily – she clearly had a happy life with her old people – she couldn’t be more affectionate and loving. She’s standing on the keyboard now……..

          1. I do the best I can, but sometimes I feel I ought to do better. I am sure he doesn’t think he’s fallen on his feet!

  44. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/09/tom-hanks-boycotts-books-rewritten-modern-sensitivities/

    His reply is simple common sense. What isn’t is Puffin saying that text should be re-written to keep them up to date.

    Listened to the debate” and understood there were “very real questions around how stories can be kept relevant for new generations”.

    They shouldn’t be changed at all. There is NO DEBATE. No questions at all. If people are too weak, pathetic and desperate to erase history and language then they should be shot because such people start wars.

    2. A similar system operates in South Australia during Catastrophic Fire Alert days. All the known firebugs are locked up temporarily until the danger is passed.

  47. Here’s a long article on the latest craze over here – safe injection sites for druggies.

    The government has been pushing their belief that a safe drug supply would help reduce the deaths caused by taking illegal drugs. However, the truth is something else.

    https://nationalpost.com/feature/how-the-liberal-governments-safer-supply-is-fuelling-a-new-opioid-crisis?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NP%20Zivo%20Safe%20Supply%20March%209%20SUBS&utm_term=np_coronation

      1. It is supposed to be raining and thundering here. Mild and the sun is out. No rain at all- wait for the downpour….

        1. We had a few spots as we were heading gfor home. But it was nice earlier and we sat outside for the funeral wake.

    3. Some supporters of the Wee Pretendy Government in Scotland were full of praise for Krankie’s programme of drug rehabilitation. It’s a desperate indictment of society that it should have been needed at all anywhere; Scotland’s problems are particularly bad. The SNP may have failed on just about everything else but it put money into one of the few growth industries north of the border, the building of Cold Turkey Sheds.

    5. It’s been tried with much success in Canada.

      Their Care Pathway system does indeed, if implemented comprehensively, reduce the deaths caused by taking illegal drugs to near-nothing.

      1. Unfortunately that is not how it is working out, As the article says, they just sell their free safe drugs and go buy fentanol. End result is an increase in drug fatalities.

  48. Update – Gus is till prowling around the house and garden seeking the yowling cat (as shown on the video a couple of hours ago). Poor fellow – he is very anxious.

      2. Ah, but you don’t know what the cat in the video was saying! It could have been, “watch out, you’re about to be replaced” and Gus took it to heart.

  50. From the RT website that I can’t access at home.

    Globalist elites provoking bloody conflicts and coups – Putin
    The Russian leader has accused Western powers of trying to build a system of “robbery, violence and suppression”
    Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers a speech at the Victory Day military parade, which marks the 78th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany in World War II, in Moscow. © Sputnik / Gavriil Grigorov
    Western elites have forgotten the consequences of the Nazis’ “insane ambitions,” Russian President Vladimir Putin has said during his Victory Day Parade speech on Red Square in Moscow.
    Russia believes that “any ideology of superiority is by its nature disgusting, criminal and deadly,” the president pointed out.
    “The globalist elites keep insisting on their exceptionalism; they pit people against each other, split societies, provoke bloody conflicts and coups, sow hatred, Russophobia and aggressive nationalism, destroy traditional family values that make human a human,” Putin said.
    According to the Russian leader, all this is being done by the US and allies in order to “further dictate their will, their rights and their rules” and implement what is basically “a system of robbery, violence and suppression” on the international stage.
    “It seems that they have forgotten what the insane ambitions of the Nazis led to. They have forgotten who defeated this monstrous, total evil,” he stressed.
    Multiple foreign leaders to attend Victory Parade in Moscow
    Referring to the conflict in Ukraine, Putin said that “a real war has been unleashed against our Motherland. But we resisted international terrorism. We’ll also defend the residents of Donbass and assure our security.”
    The aim of the West is “to achieve the disintegration and destruction of our country, nullify the results of World War II, completely break down the system of global security and international law, and strangle any sovereign centers of development,” he insisted.
    The US and its allies are to blame for the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, the head of state said.
    “Overwhelming ambitions, arrogance and permissiveness inevitably lead to tragedies. This is the reason for the catastrophe that the Ukrainian people are now experiencing,” he pointed out.
    The Ukrainians became “hostages” of the coup that took place in the country in 2014 and were turned into “a bargaining chip” by the West, which uses the country to implement its “cruel selfish plans.”

    4. I am not sure about the aggressive nationalism – internationalism is nearer the mark, I would have thought – but destroying traditional family values is spot on.

    5. I’m inclined to agree with Vlad, I’ve never been convinced that the Russian government has been responsible for any of this violence.
      I believe these past 15 to twenty years have been the worst in the history of the US. They should never have interfered.
      They made fools of themselves when they went after ‘Bin Laden’. When they discovered they had made a mistake they dumped the man’s body in the ocean. Benaziar Buhtto told them he had died of multiple organ failure a few years previously. She paid for that with her life.
      The US don’t bat an eye lid when they make a serious mistake. It’s against their machismo.

    1. Oh Don’t…..☹️😵‍💫

      Today I tried to phone the department where I have an appointment tomorrow previously I’ve been 17, 25 and today number 30 in the queue to speak to someone. I expect two years later they’ll still be blaming it on covid.
      Alternatively try a private medical department and they answer and speak to you within 30 seconds.

      1. Try a vet – phone was answered second ring and I got an appointment for about 70 mins’ time. Mind you, it’s cost me north of £600.

        1. I was just going to reply similarly – the weekend of the first bank holiday, I phone the vet at 8.30 am, like yourself it was answered on the second ring and told to “bring her down now”. I explained we lived 20 miles away, we could be there by 9.30 – “it doesn’t matter, we’ll fit her in”, I was told. An hour or so later we were taking Poppie home (yet another occasion I thought we’d be coming home by ourselves). An inspection and injection – £100. We think she had probably overdone it the previous few days (but she did enjoy herself!) and her leaky mitral heart valve was protesting. She curled herself up into a little ball for the rest of the day and shut out the world, ignoring her heart meds and all food although she did stir to get a drink from time to time which gave us hope. The next morning she took some interest in her ham-wrapped ‘treats’ and then wolfed her breakfast. She was a bit wobbly on her legs and walking was slow but over the days her strength slowly returned again. I am shocked by your £600+ bill.

          1. Consultation, sedate and reverse, hospitalisation (day patient), sedator injection, Torphadine, Atipam, Nail clip, Alfaxan Multidose, Dematt B, Gabapentin, Trazodone, and Metacam (the last three to take away with me). Oscar is now finishing off his tea.

    2. Not funny.

      They are now talking about killing poor people – just that! If you are poor, off to the soap factory for you.

      1. ‘Excuse me, where are you from….’ That generally does the trick!

    3. And they think they deserve reparation for slavery? They should be put in chains.

  53. Food consumption in France has dropped back to 2007 levels.
    Some comments suggest possible reasons – people eating the stocks they bought during covid, people buying (and wasting) less because it’s more expensive, people eating more from their gardens (can’t see this one myself, not yet).
    The elephant in the room is population decline due to excess deaths….
    Could be a combination of the above reasons. Are there any more?
    https://twitter.com/heimbergecon/status/1655800032308633600

      1. Those were just passing through, though surely? To be replaced by others, as fast as they push them off onto us?

    2. Population decline could well have something to do with it. I’ve just gone onto the INSEE website (the equivalent of the ONS) which shows that in in 2022 deaths are up by 9.6% compared with 2019, but the graphs also show that there were more deaths in 2022 than in both 2020 and 2021.

      The graphs speak for themselves and you can see them here: https://www.insee.fr/fr/statistiques/6206305

      1. Thank you – the map of France by region in 2022 is a bit shocking isn’t it.

  55. Engineers must ‘save this planet from increasing catastrophe’, King Charles urges
    On his first engagement since the Coronation, the monarch praised the ‘remarkable’ Whittle Laboratory team working on net zero research

    ‘He made a return back to official royal duties on Tuesday, using his first engagement to bolster his lifelong support for sustainability and the environment by visiting a laboratory working on net zero research.’

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2023/05/09/king-charles-whittle-laboratory-engineers-save-planet/

    Good grief – it didn’t take long for the Miserable Meddling Muddling Monarch to meddle!

    Is he completely mad – didn’t he say he would keep out of controversial political matters? Can he be certified?

    When is the soonest he can be instructed in no uncertain terms that he must be persuaded to abdicate?

    1. They never say to what or whom they are saving the planet for.
      How long before they decide that people are the problem and the only way to save the planet is to eradicate them

        1. Endorsed by QEII. They are a nest… (and I am a monarchist, but Harry is not the only one who needs good talking-to).

      3. Saving it for people like them. There are too many plebs, all breathing out CO2. I always thought net zero was shorthand for getting rid of people as they all exhale CO2.

      4. Then we say ‘Great!’ You first.’ and all the fanatics then say ‘that’s not what we meant….’

        Which, of course, it isn’t. Whatever they pretend, their intent is slaughter.

    4. “Engineers…must save this planet from increasing catastrophe…”

      There is a sense in which he is correct but that catastrophe will be a world with fossil fuels fast running out and no adequate technology to replace them. All that is happening at the moment is that this country, more than any other it would seem, is obsessed with ’emissions reductions’ without any consideration of energy supply and cost. The problem is being approached from the wrong direction.

    5. Sir Frank Whittle was an engineer, RAF pilot and engineer who was educated at Cambridge:

      https://www.britannica.com/biography/Frank-Whittle

      He invented then patented the jet engine and even created a jet engine company which the Government eventually bought as a belated recognition of its relevance of aerial warfare in defence of the UK.

      However the use of fossil fuels in all forms of heavy haulage on land, in the air, at sea and in space remains a virtually intractable problem in the Government’s legislation for net zero targets.

      Zero carbon electricity as the solution towards net zero suffers from the fact that it is far more expensive than fossil fuels to safely store and distribute. A fact that Germany has recognised by getting the EU to reconise ‘zero carbon’ e-fuels as one of the answers to maintaining the viability of its ICE motor industry.

      Elon Musk has made big inroads to the acceptance of electricity for passenger cars but is now only achieving this by lowering Tesla prices to a level which makes competitor EV products uncompetitive – such undercutting can only be made through gigafactory production techniques and keeping ahead of latest innovations in electromechanical developments.

      Engineering and inventiveness are important for future prosperity but turning such ideas through economic and efficient production processes to make viable and affordable products is an entirely different matter – Net Zero legislation is an implicit inhibitory factor.

        1. From my reference:

          The son of a mechanic, Whittle entered the Royal Air Force (RAF) as a boy apprentice and soon qualified as a pilot at the RAF College in Cranwell. He was posted to a fighter squadron in 1928 and served as a test pilot in 1931–32. He then pursued further studies at the RAF engineering school and at the University of Cambridge (1934–37).

          During my studies at the University of London for a BScEng degree I went to a Cambridge University laboratory to study a data storage device – I returned the same day. 😉

    6. Perhaps he should make a state visit to China, cut a few ribbons opening up some new domestic coal-fired power plants.

  56. Par Four today.

    Wordle 689 4/6
    ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜
    🟩🟩⬜⬜🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. And me.

      Wordle 689 4/6

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

      1. Bogey Today

        Wordle 689 5/6

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

    2. Happy to get a par.
      Wordle 689 4/6

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

  57. That’s me for today. Busy, busy – clearing out and re-arranging. AND pacifying a worried cat. Pickles was bothered for five minutes – Gus still is, four hours later….

    Have a jolly evening avoiding videos of wailing cats….

    A demain

  58. ‘Night All

    Now this IS Awkward

    https://twitter.com/DocAhmadMalik/status/1655940946817875972

    (do scroll down)

    Is there no fragment of the media that is actually independent of Big Pharma and the Globos??

    Thank God for the internet (at least for now) until “Fact Checkers” and various “Harms Bills”

    make it as impotent as the MSM

    https://i.imgflip.com/h147d.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3e3335c993dee7fd74d129b545c4f1fc62476e14c82a4565f55f1d98efe19356.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/31f4b316915adc864c301792d08a7dbf322ffaf9b5332c39baac69b336a133c7.jpg

        1. I suppose I should have found an illustration of a big farmer for my pun as it is the bigger pharmaceutical outfits that want to have us by the short and curlies.

  59. Oscar is home, looking more like a poodle than a fox terrier! His muzzle has been shaved and it’s long and pointed! Ditto his front feet and they’re bony with long nails. I’ve tried to upload a photo but it’s failed every time. You’ll just have to imagine it!

    1. Oh bless him, Conway! And you too, for being such a caring and patient person in his life! Did Kadi even recognise him? 😘

      1. He is – and now he’s sparkly white because they gave him a bath! I made the mistake of having him bathed on his first trip to the groomers – he was so stressed by it she couldn’t clip more than half of him! We had to go back for round two.

  60. Dear NoTTLers,
    This is VERY disturbing. Luckily the effects of the jabs are getting more airtime…

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/doctors-concern-over-vaccines-in-pregnancy-are-brushed-aside/

    This article is by a practising doctor.

    WHEN more than 90 medical and health professionals wrote to the president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) in October last year, to express their concerns about the endorsement of Covid-19 vaccinations in pregnancy, the expectation was that their arguments would be considered and either accepted or rebutted.

    The expectation was also that this topic would be acknowledged to be of sufficient gravity in its consequence for the health of mothers-to-be and their babies, and with it the health of the next generation, that a meaningful academic exchange could be had with the college which oversees the care of this vulnerable population.

    The first and only response was received in November, in which the president acknowledged: ‘It is true that the current evidence cannot completely rule out the possibility that Covid-19 vaccination in pregnancy may be associated with the later development of some as yet unpredicted or unidentified adverse outcome for the woman or her child.’ However, the response essentially reiterated the position of the RCOG without taking any of the specific points made in the letter into consideration. The risks ‘of an unexpected adverse long-term outcome’ were termed ‘theoretical’. Furthermore, the president stated that the RCOG would be ‘campaigning strongly for pregnant women not to be automatically excluded from trials of therapeutic agents in future’.

    Nothing in this response alleviated any of the concerns which had prompted the letter in the first place, and the alarm at the intention to include pregnant women in trials of pharmaceutical products based on completely new technology in the future was communicated back to the president. No further reply was received.

    On January 25, 2023, the RCOG issued a position statement on Covid-19 vaccine safety in pregnancy and breastfeeding. Struck by the poor quality of evidence and arguments as well as blatant inaccuracies in this statement, the same number of medical and health professionals sent a further letter to the RCOG, accompanied by a Freedom of Information request asking for supporting evidence to justify this position statement. The reply we received stated that the RCOG is not a public authority and as such not subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

    We renewed our request for information, pointing out that even if not subject to the FOIA, surely more than 90 health professionals deserved a response detailing the evidence this public statement was based on, which would be used and quoted throughout the UK to inform patients and health professionals alike. The response from the RCOG contained references to the documents that had prompted the group of professionals to approach the RCOG in the first place with a comment that ‘the College considers this to be a full response to your inquiries’. Although all correspondences were sent to the president, there was no direct engagement from her after her initial response in November 2022.

    We surmised that any further complaints to the RCOG would not be fruitful or prompt any further meaningful engagement, and therefore a final letter was sent directly to the president Dr Ranee Thakar on April 18, 2023, stating: ‘It is now obvious that the RCOG has no intention in engaging in any kind of discourse on the subject, even though the referenced documents from the college are full of inaccuracies which do not stand up to scientific scrutiny.

    ‘It is most unfortunate that it is now clearly documented how the RCOG chooses to ignore and not even acknowledge the concerns brought by over 90 professionals regarding a recommendation that has the potential to cause serious harm in the short- and long-term to the vulnerable population of pregnant mothers and their babies, and with that the next generation.

    ‘We will end our attempts at engaging in communication with the RCOG with the notion that the lack of concern and the lack of due diligence in justifying advice to the public regarding this grave matter has been deeply disturbing.’

    After all of this, I am sadly left with no choice but to write this article to raise awareness of this disturbing negligence – anonymously, as otherwise I will be the one accused of bringing my profession into public disrepute. The irony!

    1. I read many of the articles in The Conservative Woman which appear each day. Too many people who write for it have to do so anonymously or under pseudonyms for fear of the consequences which might affect their professional lives should their identity be known.

      1. There are nasty little left wing activists who will search the internet looking for personal information they can use against someone, and will then create a profile of that person, labelling it as a “nazi”. That profile then becomes the first thing a future employer sees when they search the person’s name.

    2. I can’t bring myself to read all of that HL. One of our daughters inlaw is pregnant expecting a daughter in July. Their lovely 3 year old son has leukemia.
      Because of his broken immune system the poor little fella catches everything that’s currently going around. None of the available and genuine established vaccines for children would work.
      They already live on a medical knife edge.
      It’s so sad.
      And our elder DiL has advanced MS. They have a seven year old son and a lovely three year old daughter.
      Life can be so difficult and so unfair for so many people.

      1. Oh blimey, Eddy. That’s a burden of worry for you all. If it helps, I offer my sympathy. Nobody needs that in their loved one’s lives.

      2. When he was very young my brother had blood problems, Great Ormond never got to the bottom of it
        He was recently diagnosed with bone marrow problems just before Covid, and part of the treatment involved the destruction of his immune system (I don’t understand the ins and outs) Covid arrived just after it was done and all further treatment was put on hold, he’s now getting back on track so there is always hope.
        The very best of good luck to them all

      3. I can only join those wishing you and particularly yours, the very best over the ensuing years.

      4. Oh dear, how sad for you and your family. Life can be dreadful and unfair, what makes it worse is those in power who create or exacerbate such difficulties. Our PTB are unspeakable.

        1. Fortunately we and the inlaws live within a short drive of our eldest sons home and at the moment we are able to help out.
          Not sure what PTB actually means HL.
          But I do know that politicians in general are only interested in their own way of life. Despite what they tell us.

          1. What I meant by PTB (powers that be) are the people who control our lives “officially” be they politicians, quangos or the WEF/WHO. B*stards, all of them.

      1. No one … anywhere .. has ever made any beer and put it into a can. I care not what anyone says, that substance sold in cans is not beer. Beer is only available from casks or bottles.

  63. My husband is home- he left at 9 and is now home safe and sound. Once again, I cannot praise our cab company enough, they are simply the best.
    It’s been a long day for both of us but I have a tub of homemade soup for him, he loves soup, and some crusty French bread.
    After all the dire warnings of heavy rain and thunder, all we got was a little light rain and quite a lot of sunshine.
    To be blunt, I am knackered!

    1. One can feel the glow of love and care from here, Ann.
      Lucky man, YOH, to have you.

      1. Thanks Paul, it’s mutual. He’s coming with me when I go for my appointment and they’d better watch out.

        1. Get that Pinot opened, pet! You deserve it! Thinking of you both.🍷

    2. I know it’s easy to say, but good enjoy your evening and future.
      Cheers to you both 🍷🍷😊🤗

  64. !9:35 here in The Borders, the Sun is slowly sinking but still manages to dazzle me.

          1. Problem is, because of disability, i cannot stand for long.

            Thank you for the links – no good results but I just KBO.

          2. We have ‘phone buddies’ up here – you can request calls or make them to a designated ‘buddy’. There’s a visiting service too for those who need it, mind you it’s a lot smaller community than where you are – perhaps make some enquiries to see if there’s a similar scheme.

          3. I’ve been told that someone here will explore those avenues. I shall just wait results. I know what you mean, Spikey

          5. Tried that Connors, no positive response. Ah, well…

            I have to say that here on NoTTLers the most positive responses I’ve had, have been from:

            AnneAllan
            True_belle
            Poppiesmum
            Lady of the Lake
            Ndovu
            Damask_rose

            All Ladies I can salute and relate to,

            Apologies for any smelling mistakes.

            Thank you all. I appreciate your support

          8. KBO Tom, we all have our issues and must try to cope. God only knows that life is not easy.
            There are so many here who have had health issues; David, Anne’s husband, Jules’ husband, Eddy and so many others.
            Let us all cope as best we can and go on as long as we can, if only to piss off the government;-))

          10. I am now the last survivor of 9 children. It’s a very lonely position to be in.

          11. The funeral we went to today was of a man who was only 55. The last one I went to (OH was in hospital at the time) was his father. His mother and sister have now lost husband, father, son and brother within a few months. They fought back the tears today but were cheerful with it. His many children (five I think) and some nephews and nieces were there too. His mum said she “Has plans” – she didn’t specify what they were. A young girl gave a eulogy to her father.
            These are strong women who have coped with life. At his father’s funeral last December, the son told me that his cancer was terminal and he didn’t have long to go. The local crem was packed and people were standing at the back.

          13. I guess I am too. My brother only lived for five days. Parents, aunts, uncles and cousins are all gone. Sons are both single and childless.

          14. Please introduce me to this obviously very stable lady. I think we have ideals in common.

            HeartsLass has my e-mail address.

          15. So have I – but I don’t think she’s ready for that, being recently bereaved.

          17. Our lovely neighbour died unexpectantly over a month ago ..she and her husband were spending the night in a hotel before their flight overseas.

            We have lost some good people since Christmas .

          19. We were all in shock , proper shock when we were told . She was active , sporty and a thoroughly good egg.. felled by a stroke .. and that was it …

      2. Thank you for caring, Maggie, but I hate this all-encompassing feeling of exile, loneliness and Isolation.

        It certainly makes my thoughts turn suicidal.

        Don’t worry, I won’t, ‘cos as a believer in re-incarnation and that every life has a lesson to learn, suicide just means you have to come back again and re-learn that lesson. I think my current life’s lesson has been to deal with disappointment. NoTTLers help me to deal with that.

        1. See my list of stuff seconds ago.

          We all care , and some of us get down in the dumps as well .

          There are doors to open, and you need contact with people and a few smiles , but you must do your thing as well .

          2. Aren’t you able to chat with any of your neighbours? Was there a get-together for the Coronation?

          3. Never, We are RAFA, Royal Air Forces Associations. most females here are ex-army wives – no compatibility.

          5. The mind there is particularly vacuous. RAFA wives are more intelligent – they have to be. I speak from experience.

          6. I cannot edit but just have to say, “Tried it – no positive response.”

          7. I am the wife of a retired Lt Cdr RN, so you are writing Army and RN wives off in preference for RAFA wives whom you consider to be more intelligent ?

            No wonder your conversations are somewhat limited .

          8. Not RN, Maggie but Army wives are something else. I’ve tried but Thick comes high on the list.

          9. Not RN, Maggie but Army wives are something else. I’ve tried but Thick comes high on the list.

          10. That’s rather an arrogant thing to say, Tom – perhaps that attitude puts their backs up.

          13. I was an army wife once – yet we can chat and don’t always have to agree.

            Tomorrow I’m going to see my very frail friend who was in the RAF for years (as was her husband) and she has basically ruined her health by smoking, though she hasn’t since I’ve known her. Her stepson died a week or so ago. Everyone has stuff to deal with but we just have to carry on as best we can.

    2. I love sunlit evenings. One advantage of living in the North – when the sun shines, that is.
      Light overcast here, and a bumble-bee the size of a medium-sized cat is exploring the sitting-room. A buzz like a road-drill!

        1. Now evicted whilst it’s still light. Don’t know if the bee has Instrument rating for his flying licence.

          2. Indeed.
            Huge and fuzzy, dark with a white bottom. Rescued from the cats, and released to outside to fly home to its nest.

    3. We had an hour of the most violent thunder storm I’ve seen for years. Bound to be flooding nearby.

    4. A very disappointing afternoon weatherwise here in our part of Northants. Plenty of thunder and lightning, lots of angry colours on the rainfall radar but nothing more than a brief shower of hail.

      1. And yet, not so far away in south Cambs, we have had torrential rain (and thunder and lightening) – yet again – for several hours between 4.00 pm and 7.30 pm.

    5. Now 20:36 and the sun has set below the horizon. But it’s still quite light here.

    1. I wouldn’t read too much into that – what does Scobie know about children? He doesn’t strike me as a particularly intelligent person.

    1. The last thing the Democrats wanted was a fair trial. That’s why they refused a change of venue and a multi state jury.

      They are desperate. Tese are cowards, terrified of a future they cannot control.

      1. To be honest, I think Biden would beat Trump, almost any other serious Republican contender will beat Biden.

        1. People would only vote for Biden out of hatred of Trump. How demented do you need to vote solely out of rage?

          1. My view is that it’s not that that will do for Trump, it’s the number of potential Republican voters who won’t bother to vote

          2. You keep talking about the election as if the outcome can be the result of free & fair elections, with no irregularities…or if there are irregularities, or plain refusals to abide by their own local state laws….that there will be fair full & just investigations into these.
            This is not the history to date, including in Arizona ‘22.

            Trump’s ratings incidentally, continue to climb, whilst Biden’s continue to drastically fall, not least among Democrats, & unsurprisingly.

        2. Yes, if Santos can muster enough support he might just do it. I doubt it will happen.

          1. As you know Ann, most Americans are pretty much middle of the road for either party and Santos is proving rather more extreme for a lot of republicans comfort level.

        3. But then all they would get is the uniparty and more of the same, rather like elections here if Starmer wins

          1. There is an element of that, but the Democrats will deliberately destroy all vestiges of a white America if they can, the Republicans would not

          2. Hmmm- the only party who helped my ex and I sort out our issues with the INS in US was the Democrats. The Republicans didn’t want to know. Senator Dodd’s office got on the case and within a month or so, it was pretty much sorted.
            For the record, we are both white professional people.
            INS- Immigration and Naturalization Service.

          3. How long ago was that?

            Times have changed and I doubt very much that you would get that level of support today.

          4. Mid eighties. I never noticed any particular emphasis towards the black population over the white.

          6. Destroy away. Democrats will swiftly discover who pays all their bills.

        4. You are suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. Snap out of it or many will think
          you an idiot.

          Biden has advanced dementia and severe frontal lobe problems. The idea that this buffoon could carry on for more than a few months is fanciful. The poor man has to wear diapers because he has lost control of his most basic faculties.

          His vice president is a cackling hag high on Speed or some other narcotic.

          I accept that the Democratic hierarchy under Obama enjoy witnessing the World scream at this nonsense because they hate America and that includes the UK. Remember after we voted Brexit Obama threatened us with being ‘in the last of the line’ regarding a UK/USA Trade deal.

          The entire world can see the demise of America, politically and economically before their eyes. Most are laughing. Just remember that when the US economy coughs the rest of us catch pneumonia.

          The proxy war in Ukraine is proving an unmitigated disaster for the Ukrainian speakers in that former province of Russia. The Russian speakers are liberated from Zelensky, a US puppet, and glad for it.

          The US are denied supremacy of the Black Sea, a good thing.

          I read today that Bunter has been paid millions for speech’s in the US. Bunter was the bastard and traitor who, before his deposition as PM by Truss, travelled to the Ukraine in order to insist that Zelensky persisted with his war against Russia and pledging UK support.

          Bunter should be brought before the courts for his Treason.

          1. Apart from your accusation re my having TDS I agree with what you say.
            However, having Trumprose Tinted Spectacles TTS is equally bad if not worse.

            He’s damaged goods, Democrats will conduct leftwaffe lawfare throughout any attempt at standing and it would continue unabated throughout a Presidency. Even the dimmest of Republicans can see that and unless Trump stands back anyone, even Biden, can win it.

        5. You are suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. Snap out of it or many will think
          you an idiot.

          Biden has advanced dementia and severe frontal lobe problems. The idea that this buffoon could carry on for more than a few months is fanciful. The poor man has to wear diapers because he has lost control of his most basic faculties.

          His vice president is a cackling hag high on Speed or some other narcotic.

          I accept that the Democratic hierarchy under Obama enjoy witnessing the World scream at this nonsense because they hate America and that includes the UK. Remember after we voted Brexit Obama threatened us with being ‘in the last of the line’ regarding a UK/USA Trade deal.

          The entire world can see the demise of America, politically and economically before their eyes. Most are laughing. Just remember that when the US economy coughs the rest of us catch pneumonia.

          The proxy war in Ukraine is proving an unmitigated disaster for the Ukrainian speakers in that former province of Russia. The Russian speakers are liberated from Zelensky, a US puppet, and glad for it.

          The US are denied supremacy of the Black Sea, a good thing.

          I read today that Bunter has been paid millions for speech’s in the US. Bunter was the bastard and traitor who, before his deposition as PM by Truss, travelled to the Ukraine in order to insist that Zelensky persisted with his war against Russia and pledging UK support.

          Bunter should be brought before the courts for his Treason.

    2. Round 1, politics and money will change hands before anything serious needs to be considered.

      1. It will continue throughout any election campaign and be an utter distraction from the damage the Biden cabal has achieved, and will build upon, if he or any other Democrat gets elected.
        Trump should back off.
        It is very fortunate Harris has turned out to be a waste of space, because had she not been the people behind the scenes would have eased Biden out to give her a good shot at 10 years in power.

  71. Am tired beyond belief so going to bed.
    Thank you for your supportive comments tonight, it helps.
    I wish you all good sleep.

  73. I too am away, Goodnight and God bless, Gentlefolks, we shall meet up again in the morning’s light,
    hall

Comments are closed.