Wednesday 27 March: Who’d agree to a smart meter now that millions are known to be faulty?

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1,074 thoughts on “Wednesday 27 March: Who’d agree to a smart meter now that millions are known to be faulty?

  1. Good morrow, gentlefolk. Today’s (recycled) story

    FIXING THE DOG

    My neighbour found out that her dog (a Schnauzer) could hardly hear, so she took it to the vet.

    The vet found that the problem was hair in the dog’s ears. He cleaned both ears, and the dog could then hear fine. The vet then proceeded to tell the lady that, if she wanted to keep this from recurring, she should go to the chemist and get some “Nair” hair remover and rub it in the dog’s ears once a month.

    The lady went to the chemist and bought some “Nair” hair remover. At the till, the pharmacist told her, “If you’re going to use this under your arms, don’t use deodorant for a few days.”

    The lady said, “I’m not using it under my arms.” The pharmacist said, “If you’re using it on your legs, don’t shave for a couple of days.”

    The lady replied, “I’m not using it on my legs either. If you must know, I’m using it on my Schnauzer.”

    The pharmacist said, “Well apply the minimum amount and don’t ride a bicycle for about a week.”

  2. There’s nothing quite like a long gentle stroll in a tropical thunderstorm……!

    Good morrow NOTTLErs!

  3. Vladimir Putin can be tried for his crimes now. 27 March 2024.

    This month, the Russian people chose as their president for the next six years an international criminal for whose crimes they bear the same political responsibility as Germans who once supported Hitler. Both leaders are guilty of what the court at Nuremberg described as “the supreme international crime”, that of aggression – i.e. invading an unthreatening country for no good reason – and thereby becoming liable for “all the evils, all the horrors of war; all the effusion of blood, the desolation of families, the rapine, the ravages – they are his works and his crimes”.

    Blair, Bush, Cameron? Iraq. Libya. Afghanistan. Syria?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/26/vladimir-putin-can-be-tried-for-his-crimes-now/

          1. BELOW THE LINE

            Andrew Richards.

            If this article was designed to flush out the Russian trolls, it’s working.

            It’s not relevant to use the example of Goering who was captured and a prisoner at Nuremberg. Having been found guilty, he committed suicide to avoid the hangman.

            Putin is a modern day Hitler but he isn’t going to kill himself, no court ruling will stop him and his atrocities.

            The Telegraphs Inhouse Trolls have arrived! Lol! There will soon be mass deletions. I suspect that were it not for these actions the tide has turned against the official narrative. There are more Nottlers than on this Blog. /

      1. Morning Tom. The BTL comments on the Telegraph are almost the same. The trolls will be at them soon.

      2. Morning Tom. The BTL comments on the Telgraph are almost the same. The trolls will be at them soon.

  4. Good morning everyone, a bright blue sky with birds singing but freezing cold .

    1. Good morning,
      Dawn chorus, even with pigeons on the roof above the bedroom window, is fine. The recently acquired hens next door, barely 12′ away, are a blasted nuisance. Unsurprisingly, the neighbours sleep at the front of their house.

      1. Sounds very similar to me with the exception we’ve geese and hens nearby. The smaller birds make so much noise, we face the garden.

    1. Good morning,
      Our electricity meter is over 25 years old, so for a few years we have been getting a stream of letters telling us out meter ‘urgently’ needs changing.
      Call me cynical, but I wouldn’t trust a smart meter, even with the ‘smart’ function turned off. What’s to stop the power company from remotely altering that status without consent?

      1. Snap. I keep getting emails saying that my meter ‘needs’ to be changed to a smart one. I just ignore them.

        1. But does your meter need to be changed ‘urgently’? It used to be ‘needs’ but we were ‘promoted’ to urgent status. 😁

        2. I tell them they are welcome to fit a new one – just not a “Smart” (sic) one. They are strangely unwilling after that to do anything.

        1. And of course, once they ‘have’ you, there’s no going back. So much for consumer choice.

  5. Who’d agree to a smart meter now that millions are known to be faulty?

    Another win for the conspiracy theorists

    Are water meters any good,
    I don’t appear to have a choice if I have one, just got told they are fitting it.
    I suppose it wont be on my property

    1. Morning Bob. They have tried for the last two years to coerce me into having one of them. I have always declined.

    2. Water meter – it depends on how many people are living in the house. I had no choice in the matter – all eligible properties had a water meter fitted 11 years ago, when 4 adults were living in my house. There was an immediate saving of at least 25%.

      1. When we had a water meter fitted many years ago, our bill halved. A while ago (last year?), I spotted a man doing something at the meter. He was changing all the water meters to smart meters, and claimed we’d be informed when the smart function was turned on. It seemed there was no choice with Anglian Water.

        1. That explains my own problems listed above, MumIsBusy; my own supplier is Anglian Water. (Good morning, btw.)

          1. Good morning, Elsie.
            Any bets on when Anglian Water will be warning of a hosepipe ban?
            Plenty of commandeered fields and temporary traffic lights in this area for the new super-duper water pipeline that will take water from somewhere wetter up North to somewhere drier down south.

          2. Under Yorkshire Water you can have a meter to try, then have it taken out within (I think) a year.

        2. Water ‘smart meters’ are only smart in that they can transmit readings. They are installed on the manual stop valve and cannot be turned off remotely. Unlike energy, water companies do not have the legal power to turn off your supply.

    3. In my case, Bob3, I got told by a card through the letter box that they “will shortly be fitted” after they had been fitted. No wonder the water for my cuppa seemed strangely brown. PS. The card said to let the water run for a while until it became clear before making a cuppa! (Good morning, btw.)

      1. Be aware, Elsie, because of the amount of room that these wordle boasts take up, I have automatically ‘collapsed” them. This also collapses any subsequent replies.

    4. After 30 years of living without a water meter. Then having one installed. With only two of us in the property, we now save around 200 pounds per year on our pre meter prices. But I hate to think how much a family of 4 plus would have to pay on a meter.

  6. The BBC’s future can no longer be ducked. 27 March 2024.

    Next week, the BBC licence fee will rise by more than £10 to £169.50. The Corporation will argue that this is great value for money, less than £4 a week to fund its varied output, ranging from TV news to radio comedies, orchestras, documentaries and dramas. But the media landscape has changed so utterly in the past two decades that justifying a funding system first set down 100 years ago is almost impossible.

    It cannot be justified under any pretences. It needs to be shut down!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2024/03/26/bbc-future-can-no-longer-be-ducked/

    1. They don’t seem to have faith in their own beliefs. If they are so sure their services are what people want. They should try Pay to View. They’ll probably be bankrupt inside twelve months.

      1. Norway put the licence fee on income tax, so there’s no escape – even if you only watch Youtube.

    2. All those Leftwaffe luvvies and churnalists that rush to the defence of the bBC tv tax should be able to keep it afloat. Meanwhile, all politicians and civil service should be barred from claiming their bBC tv tax on expenses.

    3. ” great value for money,,,” Arggh! That old chestnut. If most households in the nation are paying the TV tax, then, yes, you get a lot for your money – a lot more of same old BBC dross. And “value” is completely subjective.

      1. Even if we had a Reform candidate, I suspect most people here would still vote Tory. You could stick a blue rosette on a donkey (and some would argue that is what our MPs have been), and it would be elected.

    1. In January Health Secretary Victoria Atkins hosted a large reception in Parliament for the One Nation group on the liberal left of the Tory party. The event was meant as a welcome to the new One Nation candidates who have been selected to fight the next general election for Conservatives.

      These people will vote with Labour after the General Election.

    2. In January Health Secretary Victoria Atkins hosted a large reception in Parliament for the One Nation group on the liberal left of the Tory party. The event was meant as a welcome to the new One Nation candidates who have been selected to fight the next general election for Conservatives.

      These people will vote with Labour after the General Election.

  7. Wordle 1,012 5/6

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

    Good morning, chums. Good to be alive on this dry (so far) day.

    Can anyone help me? A few days ago someone – I think on this site – mentioned an AI bot which, provided you invested £200, would then work out which shares to buy or sell whilst you were not bothering to check and as a result every time you did check you found you had accumulated ever increasing amounts of money. It was accidentally shown on TV (GBNews?) and I wondered (i) what is it, (ii) is it genuine (iii) is it a scam. Does anyone know?

      1. Thank you Tom, MIB, JD and Minty. I shall leave well alone. (A personal Good Morning to you all, btw.)

    1. I mentioned it – it was attributed to Robert Peston, who apparently accidentally disclosed a link to this insider scheme on his show.

      I have not bothered to follow it up. Most likely it is a classic scam, although there are precautions that can be taken. If one has £200 to lose to find out, best to sandbox it in a unique bank account and see what happens. If it were genuine, then it might explain why there is vast amount of money for oligarchs, but when it comes to spending on something worthwhile, “hard” decisions have to be taken when announcing cuts.

  8. Wordle 1,012 5/6

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

    Good morning, chums. Good to be alive on this dry (so far) day.

    Can anyone help me? A few days ago someone – I think on this site – mentioned an AI bot which, provided you invested £200, would then work out which shares to buy or sell whilst you were not bothering to check and as a result every time you did check you found you had accumulated ever increasing amounts of money. It was accidentally shown on TV (GBNews?) and I wondered (i) what is it, (ii) is it genuine (iii) is it a scam. Does anyone know?

  9. Poor old Joe, brain fading again. having claimed he’d ridden on trains over the collapsed Baltimore bridge many times.
    There has never been a railway on it.

    1. The double standards the wider Left have exhibited towards the man over the past 4-5 years has been astonishing. So yet again, imagine the industrial levels of derangement if this had been Orange Man Bad uttering such nonsense?

  10. Six missing people presumed dead as Biden vows to ‘move heaven and earth’ to rebuild bridge . 27 March 2024.

    Joe Biden pledged to “move heaven and earth” to rebuild Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge as he said the federal government would foot the bill for repairing it.

    Six people are missing presumed dead after a Singapore-flagged cargo ship destroyed the bridge in the early hours of Tuesday morning, in what the US President said was a “terrible accident”.

    I’m not going to belittle the personal losses involved in this but the official response can only be described as ludicrous. Apart from Biden electioneering over their corpses. The Governor sounded like he was declaiming Shakespeare’s St Crispin Day speech and the Mayor obviously wanted to go back to bed. Whose I cannot say. And another thing. Who are all these people clustered behind them?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/03/26/baltimore-bridge-maryland-ship-collapse-latest-news/

    1. One news item stated that the ship ‘had lost propulsion’ and therefore steerage way and it became unmanageable.

      Steerageway

      a rate of motion sufficient to make a ship or boat respond to movements of the rudder.

      The USA has suffered quite a few disasters since 2020: East Palestine and a spate of other train derailments, the Maui fire, tens of thousands of cattle dying last year, many food processing plants being destroyed by fire/explosion and the atmospheric pollution from wildfires in Canada to name a few.

    2. BTL Comment:-

      R. Spowart
      3 MIN AGO
      Message Actions
      I see Joe Biden has leapt straight in with electioneering on the back of this tragedy, but is that this is not the 1st collapse after a ship-bridge collision in the world or even in the US.
      I can’t recall the specific incident, but when the replacement for a bridge destroyed in a similar tragedy was designed, the replacement support piers were given protection against being rammed like this .
      Surely crossings over the exits of major ports need to be similarly protected?

    3. BTL Comment:-

      R. Spowart
      3 MIN AGO
      Message Actions
      I see Joe Biden has leapt straight in with electioneering on the back of this tragedy, but is that this is not the 1st collapse after a ship-bridge collision in the world or even in the US.
      I can’t recall the specific incident, but when the replacement for a bridge destroyed in a similar tragedy was designed, the replacement support piers were given protection against being rammed like this .
      Surely crossings over the exits of major ports need to be similarly protected?

    4. Baltimore is a Democrat hell hole, and is within touching distance of DC. The port is apparently the 13th busiest in the US.

      As to the ship. It had been reversed out from the dock and, having had room to turn towards the navigation channel under the bridge began to move forward. As it proceeded towards the channel all the lights (and power?) on the ship went out. The ship began to drift towards starboard before the lights were restored. At that point the portside flume was belching dark fumes which, more informed types than I, suggest that the skipper/pilot had thrown the engine into reverse (the portside anchor was also deployed) or that their was engine trouble. Regardless, there was a second loss of power and no way to stop the ship’s momentum as it continued drifting to starboard. The lights came on just before it ploughed through the buffers and destroyed the bridge support.

    1. When I was up to pump bilges in the small hours it sounded VERY wet outside.

  11. I see England gave another below standard performance again.
    It must be that flag of convenience causing the low self esteem and malaise.

  12. Good morning, all. Bright but everything is sodden from yesterday’s late rain.

    A simple thought of mine magnified by some late postings yesterday from PP, corrim etc.

    What can we infer from the resignations from office and decisions not to stand for re-election taken by Tory MPs, the latter standing at >60? Are these politicians tired of politics, have they all realised that they are neglecting their families or is it something else?

    Could this ‘else’ be that they fear what is coming down the line and whatever that is, be it:

    1) the eventual fallout from the “vaccine” – they can deny/avoid the truth all they want but the mounting data from around the World shows
    what a disaster that scheme has been. I’m sure that they remain believing that an airborne ‘virus’ and its ‘mutations’ were on the prowl in 2020 –
    2022.

    2) they know/suspect that more oppressive measures are in the offing from the ‘Uniparty’ no matter which actual party is in power and they want
    no part of that.

    3) the mass of the people finally wake up and wreak their revenge on those in power.

    Should 3) prevail I like to think that there will be no place to hide for anyone who was in power or held authority during this disastrous time.

    1. Or maybe 4) they know they will be out on their ears in a few months’ time, so announce it now and start looking for those non-exec jobs, before they get beaten to it.

    2. 385018+up ticks,

      Morning KtK,

      You can hum that tune again with claxons, sirens, and Christian church bells aloudly ringing.

      1. OK for some but too comfy for the leading villains: dragged behind a horse over the cobbles to the place where retribution would be exacted, as in days of yore.😎

    3. I’ve have been of the opinion for many years people who go into politics are only in it for what they can get out of it. The ‘Hardest work’ they actually do is claiming their expenses.
      Trying to get an answer or even an acknowledgement to an email nearly a month ago and a more recent reminder, seems to be beyond their imagination.
      Ours is fairly recent, around 8 years. But I think he’s realised what he can
      getaway with.

  13. Good morning, I don’t like strong winds, but they do say March comes in like a lion and leaves like a lamb – it might be the wrong way around .

  14. 385018+ up ticks,

    Wednesday 27 March: Who’d agree to a smart meter now that millions are known to be faulty?

    Well for one on past pedigree, the voting majority.

      1. My daughter was watching a youtube video posted by a South African who was explaining how she deals with electricity only being available for a few hours a day. Apparently she has a deep cycle battery, and when it comes on, the first thing she does is start charging that up.

  15. Good morning all.
    A bright sunny start after a fair amount of overnight rain and a slightly less cold 3°C on the yard thermometer.

    One letter writer seems to have some idea of what is wrong with the current Tory (In Name Only) party:-

    Sacking Sunak
    SIR – Sherelle Jacobs calls for Rishi Sunak to be replaced (Comment, March 26). However, there is not a single person – or leader – who could resolve the Tory Party’s current woes.

    It is not a change of prime minister that is required, but a clear-out of a large number of MPs who sit on the Conservative benches, are far from conservative and do not understand the meaning of loyalty. All of our last three prime ministers, even Liz Truss, were thwarted in their ambitions by a party at war with itself.

    Reform UK and the Tories must combine and use the next five years in opposition to gather a united and loyal group of truly conservative candidates to develop truly conservative policies.

    Barry Goldman
    Storrington, West Sussex

    1. The rot started under Cameron when he removed the right for the local party office to pick the candidates and they are all now picked by tory HQ, with a rubber stamp from the local party membership.

      1. I send my readings in each month, but they still insist we should have a smart meter. Ours meters are fairly new.

        Something went wrong, my reply on smart meters seems to have jumped.

    2. 385018+ up ticks,

      Morning Bob,

      Surely A civil war is called for first
      so as to set a firm patriotic base for the future political governance.

      I don’t believe anything can concentrate the political mindset quite as well as a political head on a pike.

  16. A bit random, but when did Alex’s old boss Clive decide to leave Megabank? Did I miss a strip?

  17. Morning all 🙂😊
    After a night of rain, a lovely sunny start, but more rain later.
    A Smart meter……never.

    1. We have one It was already in the property when we moved in and you cannot go back to an old one. So I had it made dumb and I had to read the meter every month and have had no problems.

    1. Happy Birthday, Spikey!
      Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!

      (My 83rd is coming up in July)

    1. 🎶 Happy Birthday to you both 🎶 have a lovely day each.🥂🥂 🍾🍾🤩🤗

    2. Happy Birthday Belle! Sending love and best wishes for a wonderful day! 🎂🥂🍷🎉🌹

        1. a little bit this morning which lasted about 2 minutes, rest of the day a bit wet

        2. a little bit this morning which lasted about 2 minutes, rest of the day a bit wet

    3. Good morning and thankyou Richard .

      Funny how the Sunset Strip thing came back to me .. when one of the characters used to be always combing his hair , and one of the girls used to say , “Cookie, cookie , lend me your comb”

      Remember that quite clearly ..

  18. Proof, if any was needed, that Starmer has abandoned the British people and especially the working class. Biden’s invasion of the southern border of the USA is in the same vein, an attack on the blue and grey collar workers.

    With millions out of work and on benefits why does the UK need more bodies and bear the cost of mass housebuilding for the incomers but not for the already homeless population?

    Starmer is a disgrace and yet people will vote for this man and these crazy and divisive schemes of his.

    https://twitter.com/juneslater17/status/1772746047632155044

      1. I was just searching for the source of that. It didn’t ring true, even for that eejit.

      2. OK thank you for the pause for thought, noted. However I notice the BBC link you provide is edited. Also I am sceptical of the claims of so called “fact check” websites.

        1. In which case, there must be a longer clip out there, one which contains those words, yet has it surfaced? Or, we are to believe that he said them off the record and not supposed to conclude that it’s a complete fabrication intended to make mischief. These unsubstantiated accusations make it harder to believe the well-founded ones.

      3. Why would someone put an untrue scurrilous hit piece about Starmer and his housing plans on X?

        It couldn’t have anything to do with his recent speech on housing plans, could it?

        Stephen Glover in the DM has an interesting and unfavourable article on the above. Massive plans for houses and new towns, yes, new towns containing all the goodies the inhabitants would ever need or want – 15 minute neighbourhoods anyone?

        Glover not only picks up on Starmer’s wonder planning but also the fact that Starmer doesn’t mention the elephant in the room re housing i.e. immigration and especially not, out-of-control mass immigration.

        …May I dissent — at least so far as Labour is concerned? My complaint about Sir Keir is that he isn’t telling the truth. Like so many politicians, including Tory ones, he talks about the housing crisis without ever alluding to the major contributory cause. Immigration.

        This word didn’t appear in his speech. Not once. Discussing the shortage of affordable homes without citing the effects of uncontrolled immigration is a bit like telling the story of Isaac Newton observing an apple fall from a tree without mentioning the effect of gravity…

        There’s no mystery about the effects of high immigration on housing. In 2020, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published various forecasts. One of them, called the ‘high migration scenario’, imagined overseas net migration to England at a constant 263,000 per year, which was the actual level in 2019. This would see the number of households increase from 23.2 million in 2018 to 27.9 million in 2043 — a rise of 4.7 million.

        Sir Keir’s shovels and cranes are going to be working very hard to fulfil that target since he envisages building a mere one and a half million new homes over an unspecified period, though this would admittedly be a spectacular achievement in comparison with what the Tories have achieved.

        In fact, immigration is running at a much higher level than imagined by the ONS. The statistically impeccable Migration Watch has estimated that if immigration were to persist at existing rates — by no means an incredible prospect — between six and eight million new homes would have to be built by 2046, which is equivalent to between 15 and 18 cities the size of Birmingham. Sir Keir’s shovels may never rest, while the manufacturers of concrete are likely to be rich and happy.

        The truth is, of course, that no government — not even Sir Keir’s imagined one — is going to be able to put up new homes at such a pace. If we want to ameliorate the housing crisis, we are going to have to bring down the rate of immigration by a significant amount. Otherwise demand will continue to outstrip supply…

        That is why I accuse Sir Keir Starmer of dishonesty. He poses as the protector of ordinary people. He claims he will sort out the shortage of affordable homes by creating new towns. But he refuses to acknowledge the contribution excessive immigration is making to the housing crisis. In fact, he doesn’t mention immigration at all, which suggests he thinks it’s a problem he can’t discuss, and that a Labour government would therefore be unlikely to do anything about it.

        Stehen Glover in the Mail – Starmers Housing Plans

  19. The climate change net zero madness grows every day.

    “North Sea oil rigs threatened with shutdown unless they start running on green electricity.
    North Sea energy companies could be forced to close oil and gas fields or be prevented from opening new rigs unless they slash emissions. Currently, more than 280 platforms extracting oil and gas from UK waters produce 3pc of the country’s total emissions, the equivalent of about 17 million tonnes of CO2 a year. However, UK oil and gas fields also account for half of the country’s energy needs. Despite this, the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), which regulates the offshore sector, has told producers that they must convert platforms to run on green electricity or low-carbon fuels. This means all new developments before 2030 must be designed to run on electricity, while all those after that must be fully electrified from the start.”

    NSTA another self important quango set up by Government with uncontrolled unaccountable excessive authority which does not report to Parliament whose directors are on six figure salaries, with the Chief Executive on £300k – taxpayer funded of course.
    https://www.nstauthority.co.uk/

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/03/27/north-sea-oil-rigs-threatened-shutdown-unless-run-green/

    1. All North Sea fixed installations run on electricity right now! It’s just generated onboard using gas turbines fuelled by gas straight from the reservoir!

    2. Here’s the explanation for what’s happening…………

      The chairman of the Energy Transition Commission is Soros’ accomplice Lord Adair Turner who was the first chairman of the Climate Change Committee which exists thanks to the Climate Change Act 2008 which Soros wanted the goundwork for which was done by Soros’ accomplice David Miliband who subsequently was given a highly paid Soros job just like Soros’ accomplice Lord Adair Turner who became chairman of Soros’ Institute for New Economic Thinking after he stepped down from the Climate Change Committee!

      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/9963050/Lord-Turner-forms-unlikely-alliance-with-Soros.html

      On top of which Soros’ accomplice Tony Blair received at least $25million from Soros in consultancy fees and Soros’ accomplice David Cameron who wanted the Climate Change Act because Soros wanted it and who appointed Soros’ friends to senior positions later received a Soros financed job and returned to power as Foreign Secretary because that’s what Soros wanted.

  20. The climate change net zero madness grows every day.

    “North Sea oil rigs threatened with shutdown unless they start running on green electricity.
    North Sea energy companies could be forced to close oil and gas fields or be prevented from opening new rigs unless they slash emissions. Currently, more than 280 platforms extracting oil and gas from UK waters produce 3pc of the country’s total emissions, the equivalent of about 17 million tonnes of CO2 a year. However, UK oil and gas fields also account for half of the country’s energy needs. Despite this, the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), which regulates the offshore sector, has told producers that they must convert platforms to run on green electricity or low-carbon fuels. This means all new developments before 2030 must be designed to run on electricity, while all those after that must be fully electrified from the start.”

    NSTA another self important quango set up by Government with uncontrolled unaccountable excessive authority which does not report to Parliament whose directors are on six figure salaries.
    https://www.nstauthority.co.uk/

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/03/27/north-sea-oil-rigs-threatened-shutdown-unless-run-green/

    1. He is a regular panellist on Patrick Christys’s programme on GBNews.

      He may not be the most fluid-proof condom in the box but he is not as completely senseless as his fellow panellist Amy Nickell-Turner.

      1. That bar is so low that even the JSO activists that JRM occasionally hosts find it hard to limbo under it (although they just about succeed). One does wonder where they found her.
        Gullis always strikes me as broadly OK.

    2. How about serving the public? You’re all so obsessed with your own identikit politics you’ve forgotten who you are there to serve.

  21. G’day all and 77th troops,

    It started bright at Castle McPhee but it’s now clouding over. Rain imminent again. Wind in the South and it’s going to be rather cool at 6℃ to 8℃.

    After the farmers’ protest in Westminster, the DT publishes this garbage from a 12-year-old.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fb8d0bc717cd4f7bfd27538e5f3eec17e0dda29603407441e56dacb1af2bf8d5.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/03/27/cheap-food-more-important-than-protecting-failing-farmers/

    He doesn’t seem to be aware of the globalists’ war on farmers waged through supermarket contracts and some supemarket’s desire to take over farms, enviro-nazi diktats about re-wilding, unnecessary nitrate fertiliser reduction and the attempted government theft of farmland through compulsory purchase. Nor the eat-ze-bugs-and-plants nutters.

    By all means let’s have imports of those food items we can’t grow or produce for ourselves but only after our own farmers have been given every opportunity to supply the market, by-passing the big supermarkets if needs be and selling direct to the consumer.

    As we live on a group of islands and no longer rule the waves the priority of any British government should be defence, energy security and food security. Our governments for a century have consistently failed on all three.

    1. Mr Lesh is not a farmer. He’s a metropolitan journalist. He is also seemingly ignorant of the realities of farming.

      Perhaps he should speak to Jeremy Clarkson, who has seen both sides – being both a journalist and a farmer? failing that, Harry Metcalfe, who is probably more down to earth.

      Heck, some people think Tesco make hula hoops and are ‘profiteering’ by making them more expensive.

    2. If we follow that moron’s advice, we will end up with no food except bugs from a factory and mRNA-infused salad grown in towers!

    3. Lesh is a clown, the sort of academic who spends too long designing perfect system models while not having a clue about risks, let alone human nature, the sort of man who confuses nations with ‘markets’.

  22. Soon after I met Caroline and told one of my best friends (who is now godfather to Henry, our second son) that I loved her and wanted to marry her, David said: “Does she pass the Wodehouse Test? You can tell whether or not a person is sound by his or her reaction to P.G.Wodehouse. If a person loves P.G. Wodehouse’s he or she must be all right.”

    Not all women pass this test but Caroline passed with flying colours. I expect that most Nottlers would also pass!

    Here is an extract from article about P.G.Wodehouse in today’s The Conservative Woman.

    “Cockburn concedes that he could ‘see an element of hyperbole in the claim made by one of my uncles that all regular and continuous readers of Wodehouse are so demonstrably superior to other citizens that they should be given two votes each in Parliamentary elections to save the country. Yet there was much to be learned by weighing people on the delicate Wodehouse Scale, or dipping them like litmus paper into Wodehouse and watching what colour they turned.’”

    Here is a link to the article.

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/that-reminds-me-more-homage-to-wodehouse/

    1. The Wodehouse test is a good one. In my opinion regular and continuous readers of Wodehouse should not have merely one extra vote in Parliamentary elections but a large number.

      Just like Muslims do.

      1. Jeeves’s Christian name was Reginald, Lord Emsworth’s was Clarence, Bingo Little’s was Richard and both the nerve specialist, Glossop, and the leader of the Black Shorts, Spode, were called Roderick but I don’t think Bertram Wooster’s parents ever thought of Christening him Mohammed.

    2. Another good one is, “Does he find Diary of a Nobody amusing?” It is perhaps slightly more exacting.

      1. From the Pakistan High Commission’s website in London, March last year.

        Pakistan’s flag hoisted on the rooftop of Westminster Abbey

        As per the tradition, the Westminster Abbey organized a Special Evensong to mark the Pakistan Day on the evening of 23 March 2023. The Evensong was sung by the Choir.

        https://www.phclondon.org/pressrelease/20682-westminster-abbey-marks-pakistan-day-with-special-service

        And from Westminster Abbey’s Flag day webpage.

        On top of the north tower sits a flag pole on which the Abbey flies flags – of the Commonwealth Nations, the Flag of St Peter, the Abbey Flag, the Union Flag, the Flags of the National Saints, the Royal Air Force Flag, and the Royal Standard.

        A National Flag is flown on the day when the High Commission of a Commonwealth member state is represented at Evensong.

        https://www.westminster-abbey.org/events/flag-days

      2. Happy birthday, I hope it’s a good ‘un.

        Ignore Phizzee when he asks you to strip.

    1. Add in repeal the HRA, migration pact and mod. slavery acts. Such exist in this country *because* of massive uncontrolled immigration.

  23. Three things I have avoided at all cost:
    ‘Smart’ meters
    EVs
    Covid ‘vaccines’

    1. 385018+ up ticks,

      Morning MT,

      In my case primarily lab / lib / con,

      secondary, the jab / evs /s,meters.

    2. I’m thinking of adding voting to that list. Irrespective of who you vote for, it has no effect.

  24. O T. I have recently come across an American author, poet and philosopher – Wendell Berry. He is now 84, and farms a smallholding in Kentucky. This is a short extract of one of his books, writing about values, this is about a neighbour farmer. “What the man knew increased the worth of his corn crop. So, if you have an economy that deliberately destroys this culture of husbandry, you’re destroying both the land and the people, the basis of the economy.”

    How apposite this comment is to today’s authoritarian Government which is hell bent on the destruction of this country.

  25. 385018+ up ticks,

    As in a reassuring act of fairness sunak should insist that the funding of the morally illegal immigrant invasion, hotels etc,etc, be left solely to indigenous voluntary input, and the welfare payout to aliens depending on whats in the collective fund that month.

    1. A Somalian taxi driver who spoke fluent Italian but very poor English told me that he had come here entirely because our welfare system would provide him with housing etc etc whereas, had he gone to Italy, any welfare would come via the church.

  26. Tribunal of gender-critical teacher collapses over panel member’s political and religious slurs

    Hearing of educator who wouldn’t use a girl’s preferred pronouns founders after one of board criticised Tories and expressed atheistic views

    Louisa Clarence-Smith, EDUCATION EDITOR • 26 March 2024 • 8:38pm

    A tribunal hearing for a teacher who says she was wrongly sacked for “misgendering” a pupil has collapsed after a member was accused of making anti-Christian comments and posting Tory slurs on social media.

    All three members of the tribunal in Nottingham, including the judge, have recused themselves to avoid a “perception of bias” against the teacher, who refused to use an eight-year-old’s preferred pronouns.

    The teacher claims she repeatedly raised concerns about the girl’s well-being after teachers were told always to refer to her with male pronouns, and to allow her to use the boys’ toilets and dressing rooms.

    The teacher, who cannot be named to protect the anonymity of the child, was told that her Christian beliefs, if acted upon, could be an act of “direct discrimination”. She is suing Nottinghamshire county council and one of its primary schools for unfair dismissal and religious discrimination.

    The decision of all the tribunal members to recuse themselves comes after social media posts that were alleged to “advocate religious discrimination” came to light.

    Jed Purkis, a non-legal member of the tribunal hearing, responding to a comment that only atheists should be in public office, said: “Damn right, you won’t catch us killing in the name of our non-god.”

    In another social media post, which has now been made private, he responded to the question, “What’s a good collective noun for Tories?” by suggesting a “tumour of Tories” and a “cesspit of Tories”.

    After the discovery of Mr Purkis’s comments, the teacher’s lawyer, Pavel Stroilov, made an application for refusal, alleging there was “a possibility of bias”.

    He said that in the social media exchange, Mr Purkis appeared “to agree with a view which expressly advocates for religious discrimination in public life”.

    He argued that it would not be sufficient for only Mr Purkis to step down, since the other two judges had presided over the trial together over six days and would be perceived as influenced by his view of the case.

    The tribunal, agreeing with the argument, acknowledged that “doubt would arise in the mind of a fair-minded and informed observer” regarding their impartiality, The Times reported.

    Responding to the recusal, the teacher said: “It means a further delay to me receiving justice, but I have to have a fair trial.”

    Andrea Williams, the chief executive of the Christian Legal Centre, which is representing the teacher, said the teacher’s story “exposes the confusion and untruths being embedded in primary schools over human sexuality and identity which are developing into a public health crisis.

    “We will continue to pursue justice for as long as it takes in this case.”

    Nottinghamshire county council is defending the claim, but has not commented. A spokesman for the judicial office said: “We would never comment on a decision made in a specific case.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/26/tribunal-gender-critical-teacher-collapses-anti-tory-slurs/

    _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    The more I read of cases like this, the more I find I am lost for words. How do you describe the nonsense of ‘pronouns’ (this special variety) without tying yourself in knots attempting to offer reasoned arguments against the unreasonable? That the teacher concerned is a Christian shouldn’t be relevant. This shouldn’t be a case of religious discrimination. It’s an offence against reason.

    And my first thought on reading of Mr Purkis’s comments about God was “I hope he isn’t a committed socialist, an inheritor of the great, rationalist, atheistic traditions of Uncle Joe & Co.” Well, he is (probably). He’s a former GMB official. Here he is having a nice day out somewhere in limestone country.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6ee874b9aeef198a5204a739faf018f86acb809eaeca9e862a8399050e08d345.jpg

    And here are his views on the EU (shame he doesn’t know his singular from his plural or his…)

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0809026e208adbd6eeaabb0194f7c0431a7493f8845979262c84b9f25ce8ee6a.jpg


    _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    BTL:
    Kate Wydra
    This is a massive safeguarding issue for the school. The teacher involved sounds like he or she is the only person looking out for the well-being of the child that thinks she is a boy. She isn’t.

    The school leadership team should hang its head in shame. This little girl should not be allowed to use the boys’ toilets and changing rooms. It’s bad for her and bad for the boys.

    Who told her she was really a boy? Who allowed her to use opposite sex pronouns?

    What are the parents doing in all this? Are they driving this? If so, I would seriously consider taking this child into care.

    Ian Perry

    If the parents WERE aware, and supported it, I would agree wholeheartedly. Sadly, in many cases the schools insist on lying to the parents, and the parents may even have been completely unaware of what was going on in the school.

    An eight-year-old will only have started saying she was “in the wrong body” because some “specialist” spotted her and encouraged her to believe she was in that situation. That’s grooming, and whoever it was should be dangling upside-down from a lamp-post.

    The ferocity with which some trans advocates fight *for* this child abuse (of young prepubescent children) is truly staggering. I very much doubt the child is at the centre of their concerns.

    1. He is permitted his views both religiously and politically. I doubt he would share the same approach toward me, but hey.

      Sadly, finding an unbiased decent person who will apply common sense who can also sit on such a panel is nigh impossible. The same type of person gets into these roles because of their views, not in spite of them. It’s a sad but true statement that the state likes people like this making these decisions. It’s how the madness is enforced.

      I’d go further and argue you’re prevented from this sort of role if you *don’t* agree with his sort of attitudes.

    2. The Victorian England meme is a classic piece of Leftist nonsense. Huff that gas.

  27. Tribunal of gender-critical teacher collapses over panel member’s political and religious slurs

    Hearing of educator who wouldn’t use a girl’s preferred pronouns founders after one of board criticised Tories and expressed atheistic views

    Louisa Clarence-Smith, EDUCATION EDITOR • 26 March 2024 • 8:38pm

    A tribunal hearing for a teacher who says she was wrongly sacked for “misgendering” a pupil has collapsed after a member was accused of making anti-Christian comments and posting Tory slurs on social media.

    All three members of the tribunal in Nottingham, including the judge, have recused themselves to avoid a “perception of bias” against the teacher, who refused to use an eight-year-old’s preferred pronouns.

    The teacher claims she repeatedly raised concerns about the girl’s well-being after teachers were told always to refer to her with male pronouns, and to allow her to use the boys’ toilets and dressing rooms.

    The teacher, who cannot be named to protect the anonymity of the child, was told that her Christian beliefs, if acted upon, could be an act of “direct discrimination”. She is suing Nottinghamshire county council and one of its primary schools for unfair dismissal and religious discrimination.

    The decision of all the tribunal members to recuse themselves comes after social media posts that were alleged to “advocate religious discrimination” came to light.

    Jed Purkis, a non-legal member of the tribunal hearing, responding to a comment that only atheists should be in public office, said: “Damn right, you won’t catch us killing in the name of our non-god.”

    In another social media post, which has now been made private, he responded to the question, “What’s a good collective noun for Tories?” by suggesting a “tumour of Tories” and a “cesspit of Tories”.

    After the discovery of Mr Purkis’s comments, the teacher’s lawyer, Pavel Stroilov, made an application for refusal, alleging there was “a possibility of bias”.

    He said that in the social media exchange, Mr Purkis appeared “to agree with a view which expressly advocates for religious discrimination in public life”.

    He argued that it would not be sufficient for only Mr Purkis to step down, since the other two judges had presided over the trial together over six days and would be perceived as influenced by his view of the case.

    The tribunal, agreeing with the argument, acknowledged that “doubt would arise in the mind of a fair-minded and informed observer” regarding their impartiality, The Times reported.

    Responding to the recusal, the teacher said: “It means a further delay to me receiving justice, but I have to have a fair trial.”

    Andrea Williams, the chief executive of the Christian Legal Centre, which is representing the teacher, said the teacher’s story “exposes the confusion and untruths being embedded in primary schools over human sexuality and identity which are developing into a public health crisis.

    “We will continue to pursue justice for as long as it takes in this case.”

    Nottinghamshire county council is defending the claim, but has not commented. A spokesman for the judicial office said: “We would never comment on a decision made in a specific case.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/26/tribunal-gender-critical-teacher-collapses-anti-tory-slurs/

    _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    The more I read of cases like this, the more I find I am lost for words. How do you describe the nonsense of ‘pronouns’ (this special variety) without tying yourself in knots attempting to offer reasoned arguments against the unreasonable? That the teacher concerned is a Christian shouldn’t be relevant. This shouldn’t be a case of religious discrimination. It’s an offence against reason.

    And my first thought on reading of Mr Purkis’s comments about God was “I hope he isn’t a committed socialist, an inheritor of the great, rationalist, atheistic traditions of Uncle Joe & Co.” Well, he is (probably). He’s a former GMB official. Here he is having a nice day out somewhere in limestone country.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6ee874b9aeef198a5204a739faf018f86acb809eaeca9e862a8399050e08d345.jpg

    And here are his views on the EU (shame he doesn’t know his singular from his plural or his…)

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0809026e208adbd6eeaabb0194f7c0431a7493f8845979262c84b9f25ce8ee6a.jpg


    _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    BTL:
    Kate Wydra
    This is a massive safeguarding issue for the school. The teacher involved sounds like he or she is the only person looking out for the well-being of the child that thinks she is a boy. She isn’t.

    The school leadership team should hang its head in shame. This little girl should not be allowed to use the boys’ toilets and changing rooms. It’s bad for her and bad for the boys.

    Who told her she was really a boy? Who allowed her to use opposite sex pronouns?

    What are the parents doing in all this? Are they driving this? If so, I would seriously consider taking this child into care.

    Ian Perry

    If the parents WERE aware, and supported it, I would agree wholeheartedly. Sadly, in many cases the schools insist on lying to the parents, and the parents may even have been completely unaware of what was going on in the school.

    An eight-year-old will only have started saying she was “in the wrong body” because some “specialist” spotted her and encouraged her to believe she was in that situation. That’s grooming, and whoever it was should be dangling upside-down from a lamp-post.

    The ferocity with which some trans advocates fight *for* this child abuse (of young prepubescent children) is truly staggering. I very much doubt the child is at the centre of their concerns.

  28. There’s been a lot of discussion on TV this morning regarding the NHS, it seems that the plan is to raise income taxes to help cover the increasing costs. Only honest working people pay income tax.
    But nobody, not one person as far as I have seen, has actually addressed the real and most obvious causes.
    There are currently hundreds of thousands of people in our country, who have never paid a single penny into the system but expect and even demand treatment.
    Perhaps these people should take out health insurance and also make card payments through bank loans to cover the cost of the treatment, they belive they are entitled to.

      1. Yes and have done all their working lives.
        I’ve been trying to get in touch, get a reply even an acknowledgment from my MP for over three weeks because my pathetic amount of State pension, which I willingly contributed to for over 47 years. Will be considerably less than he probably claims in expenses each month. I shall instruct/request, all my local friends and family not to vote of him.

    1. And so it goes on someone on bbc news from the health sector Nuffield Trust. Was talking about it just now blaming everything including ‘the pandemic’ but not the slightest hint of the real problem. Out of control Illegal immigration. People who don’t work and have no intention of working living entirely on state benefits. All using the NHS without making any contribution.

    2. The state does not like telling the truth. What will really happen is those already paying for the NHS will have to pay more to keep those who don’t pay for the NHS.

      Instead of, you know, the obvious solution of making the people who don’t pay, pay for it. Perhaps we could have some sort of card that identifies you and if you contribute and on that basis has access. Oh! We have!

    3. Make people pay cash at the surgery. We have that here, it’s about £22 per Dr visit. After £200 in a year, or becoming a pensioner (or being a child), the charge disappears.

      1. You know what our political idiots are like Obs
        The indigenous elderly are treated like dirt. A lot elderly Brits would actually be better off in jail. Or having arrived in a rubber boat.

      1. Oh I say! I’m very offended! Where do I sign for compo?
        I only married a Macfarlane!

      2. Oh I say! I’m very offended! Where do I sign for compo?
        I only married a Macfarlane!

  29. Here’s a bit of fun for y’all on a wet Wednesday. Go to the Academic Agent’s Unpopular Academy vital links

    https://unpopular.academy/vitallinks/

    Click on the Political Test box.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/64eb772f75d331a65ca6321385cd60a0fcc974a3854d3bfa4a19e390b673d7bb.png

    Take the test – about 10-15 minutes.

    Here are my results:

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a335135aa22a65724b378f5f26fe0ad6ebaeae2c0f96b679158b172db42ba21b.png

    From the top, I’m:

    73% in favour of free markets;
    86% believer in social hierarchy;
    63% believer that destiny is hereditary;
    53% believer that progress is due to ideas;
    81% believer in history being cyclical;
    96% believer in puritanism;
    100% for traditional culture.

    I guess that makes me moderately leftish far-right.

    I did the test quickly and without thinking deeply about each question – knee-jerk if you like. It might be interesting to do it again with a bit more thought to see if any difference comes out.

    1. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2993f9234b765d22d89a9742d06cc31eb8dffdead5598d0e117f3cf221269381.png

      I’m not sure I agree with it. Some of the questions are wrong. We are all pretty much biologically similar (excepting sex differences) but someone born to a wealthy family will do better than one not. However, the way to help people is not to give them money, but to unblock all the regulation that government imposes to restrict business.

      Do things come down to one issue? No, as it is either science or maths. Biology, chemistry, physics or mathematics, at the heart of things, so not one issue.

      Equally on the regulations – if aeroplane manufacturers decided standards planes wouldn’t take off. Some safety rules must be applied. Where this stops being rational is in government mandating where chocolate can be displayed.

      Regarding if science will solve all our problems – well, yes. But that’s called eugenics, or better, nanosuite health care, space exploration. Will it drive society forward? It already does, but giving an ape an iPhone does not make them a more better ape.

      History is a series of repeated events because government is a collective of gibbering morons who never learn when they are wrong. Sturgeon’s rent controls. So obvious they would not work – they never, ever have. Obvious what the outcomes would be – higher rents. Yet she did them anyway. Until the state is controlled we’re stuffed because it is choc full of fools who persist and insist on doing the wrong thing.

      I said that a woman can live as she wants because that is *her* choice. Would I be attracted to such a character? No, but it’s not my right to say how she would live as long as I am not demanded to pay for her choices. This also applies to trans folk. As Jordan Peterson has alluded, I’ll respect your choices if you respect mine.

      As with all these things I tend to come out as a free market libertarian, which I am because free markets provide the best range of choices and keep prices low through competition. I am a social libertarian because what you do is your own affair as long as (there’s that phrase again) it doesn’t make demands or impugn on my life choices. So yes, you can play your music at 100 db. But you can’t do it when it will disrupt me. If everyone sees everyone else as their own personal household God, or their grand mother, society gets a lot easier.

      1. It’s pretty worrying that 59% of people don’t realise that history is cyclical. Events are not just controlled by predictable stupidity but also by things like sun cycles – think warm periods and mini ice ages and how that affected history. As they say, millionaires don’t hire astrologers, billionaires do.

    2. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8f78bfb0588db25e8854410e090614d3982fec9b3f92bf1720e80db000d5d37b.png

      I have reservations about the “Forced Allocation” versus “Free Market” axis, which uses an emotive term for one and a neutral one for the other. It reveals a bias in the one analysing the responses. I prefer ‘Intervention’ against ‘Free Market’.

      It is both my highest score, and also the one where I vary with many nottlers here. I am considerably to the Left on economic policies, whilst remaining a firm believer in encouraging small enterprise, it being the seed corn of any future prosperity. To achieve this, however, needs careful stewardship so that the rank weeds of the self-serving and ruthless will not squeeze out the little people or those with higher aspirations than simply bigger cars and loadsamoney, especially those vulnerable when starting up or when tackling difficult times.

      I did not like the question on eugenics, exposing another bias in the questioner. The axis here is between nature and nurture, and I come down firmly in favour of both.

      1. Anything for their five minutes of fame.

        By the looks of it the he/she will not be famed for its high IQ.

      2. 385018+ up ticks,

        Afternoon A,
        I do beg to differ in the nicest possible way, check out the
        majority voters continuous
        voting pattern these last three plus decades,

      3. 385018+ up ticks,

        Afternoon A,
        I do beg to differ in the nicest possible way,check out the majority voters continuous voting pattern these past three plus decades.

    1. It worries me that he sees nothing wrong with wanting to kill a child for his own ego.

      We really have got to be clearer and say ‘trans man’ when it’s a man and trans woman when it’s a woman – not what they want to be, the truth.

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-11783243/Trans-woman-Roxanne-Tickle-takes-female-app-Giggle-court-membership-rejection.html

      This was on a video news channel yesterday – I think GB News, can’t remember – and the woman was very confident she would win because the definition of woman was enshrined in UN law. I don’t think she understands just how demented things are. She *will* lose. The Left are a cancer and the host is dying from it. The judiciary, the state – it does not care about the facts. All that matters is the ability to exercise power by distorting the truth.

      We are so far down the nutcase track that reason, logic and sanity are utterly absent.

  30. Martha Kelner, the Sky News reporter on the scene of the collapsed bridge in Baltimore, is getting on my wick. She repeatedly calls the vessel which struck it a boat.

    1. She’s a news reporter. They read an autocue.

      What is the technical difference between a ship and a boat?

        1. Exactamundo!

          A boat is a watercraft of a large range of types and sizes, but generally smaller than a ship, which is distinguished by its larger size, shape, cargo or passenger capacity, or its ability to carry boats.

          Small boats are typically found on inland waterways such as rivers and lakes, or in protected coastal areas. However, some boats, such as the whaleboat, were intended for use in an offshore environment. In modern naval terms, a boat is a vessel small enough to be carried aboard a ship.

          https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boat

          1. Perhaps they do, but it still doesn’t make a boat of an enormous cargo ship.

          2. What if a submarine boat surfaces under a little ship and lifts it? Does the little ship become a boat and the sub become a ship?

            Sorry, I’m pulling your leg now!

          3. Yes, because the CofG is well below the waterline which, when manoeuvring, makes the vessel lean inwards.

          4. Is that a pipe clamped between your jaws? You never see them these days. My father used to smoke a pipe, very often there was nothing in it but it kept him company.

          5. I gave up smoking cigarettes on December 31st 1987 and haven’t touched one since.

            I love my pipes and continued smoking them until I ran out of my stock of duty free tobacco but as I am not addicted – as I was with cigarettes – I was very happy when Caroline’s sister gave me a tin of my favourite pipe tobacco for Christmas so I still enjoy an occasional pipe!

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/37455acb6bf0ca69eafce1e8b3e1b8e3e9dcd5b241b31bad69d19851018786c5.png

      1. 385018 + up ticks,

        Afternoon W,
        I believe one to be 4″ longer than tother, hope this helps.

      2. I believe it depends on the centre of gravity and whether the vessel leans outwards or inwards when in a tight turn.
        A ship has a high CofG and hence leans outwards when cornering whilst in a boat CofG is low and therefore leans inwards.

      3. Accoring to my Lt-Cmndr son, boats in a turn lean inwards, ships lean outwards.

  31. It’s not that smart meters are faulty. I remember asking the energy people to fix mine for over 6 months. The problem is companies have no idea how they work. Their systems just are not set up to handle the changes, nor the morass of different versions installed as one bunch are found to be duff.

    It’s been a scrabble of integrations with the upstream hub – which collates all the data and forwards it on – to the providers. Notably the data is collected centrally, so two bodies have access to your account records, not just one and one you cannot deal with at any level.

    It is there that energy price time control will be set. See how cunning and spiteful the government is? It’s ensured no matter where you go, you cannot escape the control. Markets cannot stop the gouging as your supplier has no control over the price. They can’t offer a lower cost even if they wanted to.

    The state has thoroughly, utterly and completely broken the market for energy – deliberately. The intent was always to force down demand, never to meet it with adequate supply.

    This forced socialism of the utility that under pins everything means poverty, deaths and misery. The state just doesn’t care.

    1. It’s not just that they don’t care, HMG is actively pursuing depopulation by every means possible.

      1. Only depopulation of the indigenous, who know what should be possible. They are happy to import people from third world dumps, who know and expect no better than electricity being rationed by price or availability.

    2. The communication protocols aren’t standard, plus each electricity company can have the meters configured differently. So you have to have a tailor-made solution for reading them automatically. The meter manufacturers will sell their own app that will read their own meters along with the hardware, but you may have ten different manufacturers/models or even more. Someone switches to another provider, the new provider doesn’t have that tailor-made solution for reading that protocol, and they are too stingy to fork out for it. Even given an app, you have to know how the meter’s configured, and the customer may have changed suppliers five times since it was installed. That’s the problem.

      1. That was how the first generation SMET1 ones work. The current ones, SMET2, are in theory compatible with all suppliers. But there seems to be some sort of registration issue and when you change suppliers it can take ages until the new supplier has access. Last year I moved from SSE to EDF and it took several months before they could read the electricity one. At the beginning of this year EDF moved me to their new billing system, which was effectively a new supplier. The electricity moved over immediately, still waiting for the gas to move over so I have to send them monthly readings. Oh, and I pay real monthly direct debits, none of this extortionate fixed amount nonsense.

        1. I’ll believe “compatible with all suppliers” when I see it…even if they are on the same protocol standard, in practice they can be configured so differently that the meter readings can be compromised.

        2. I’ll believe “compatible with all suppliers” when I see it…even if they are on the same protocol standard, in practice they can be configured so differently that the meter readings can be compromised.

  32. Navy helicopters are making air-to-air kills like fighters. 27 March 2024.

    The southern end of the Red Sea remains an active war zone. Missiles and drones continue to menace any ship passing through. Coalition assessments that allied strikes on Houthi radars and missile sites had worked were premature. Remarkably, slow flying one way attack drones are now being taken out by helicopters flying from international warships seeking to keep the Strait open.

    I thought that we were going to sort these people out with a couple of bombs? Lol!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/26/red-sea-war-houthis-missiles-drones-helicopter-shootdowns/

    1. I’m not sure why folk are surprised. helicopters are a mobile weapons platform. In an ideal world they wouldn’t use rotors but some form of moveable turbines – which, yes, I know are really mini rotors!

    2. There’s a Yorkshire saying..’followed ‘t muck cart, he thowt it war a weddin’…….

  33. 385018+ up ticks,

    DT,
    Live
    Russia ‘tortures’ more than five thousand Ukrainians

    Does anyone know if the media in Ukrian is enlightening their peoples to the United Kingdoms indigenous peoples suffering physically & mentally, intensified these past four years to killer proportions

  34. Just looking at Sainsburys online. In their ‘offers’ section you can buy carrots 15p per kg. Potatoes 15p per kg. Savoy cabbage 15p. Swede 15p

    1.2 kg roast beef joint for £7.44.
    You need to be signed up to Nectar for these offers.
    Just thinking with Easter weekend coming up you could feed 8 people for under £10.

        1. I’ve been told all supermarket meat is halal, and school dinners too. The easiest option.

          1. When I’m in a supermarket, I furtively approach the halal section and sprinkle everything with holy water, while reciting the Pater Noster.

          2. A pack of bacon is easier to slip in unnoticed. They say they have to clear the entire section when people do that.

          3. I can well imagine the NZ is halal, probably enforced by the blessed Jacinda (pbuh). In my local supermarket, the frozen NZ lamb is much cheaper than local lamb..hmm..

          4. NZ lamb is inferior. It goes grey and is tasteless. British lamb particularly Welsh lamb is sweet and succulent.

          5. A neighbour has a flock of sheep she breeds to produce MUTTON. Brilliant it is, too. Want the address?

          6. Which is why i try and buy my meat at the butcher’s. My husband, not so much but he knows my halal/supermarket objections

          7. I’d give my right arm to buy lamb — of any cut and any provenance — here, in the lamb-free zone!

            Oh for some juicy single, thick, lamb chops with all the fat and meat still on the bone! “French trimming” should be a hanging offence!

          8. Only solution is to grow your own.
            Not common this side of the border, Grizz, I’m afraid. Almost zero decent butchers, as well.
            WTF is “French trimming”? Is it the meat equivalent of a Brazilian?

          9. It’s where you remove all the meat and fat from the rib bones down to the loin.
            Grizz thinks it a waste however you can use those trimmings to make a lamb sauce.

          10. Hmm… I’ll ask the family. All three of them know about food, I just consume.

          11. ‘French trimming’, Paul, is where they scrape ALL the fat, and meat, off the ribs leaving bare bones. That meat and fat, on lamb chops, untouched, is the tastiest part of the chop. Removing it is simply a lunatic thing to do.

          12. NZ lamb always seems to be frozen, and less expensive than GB lamb. Local, well known butcher best. Used to have our own, plus slaughter house, no longer.

          13. As far as I know, halal meat (like kosher meats) can only be bought at speciality stores here in the US, regular supermarkets do not carry it.

          14. I won’t touch halal for welfare reasons but all animals slaughtered in NZ must, by law, be electrically stunned so they are not conscious at the time of slaughter. In my book, this is no different to UK slaughter so I will eat NZ meat.

  35. Two Navy Commanders. One Chief Petty Officer. Two ex RSM’s. I think it’s going to be a heavy drinking weekend.

      1. Mess dinners used to be held on HMS Victory until they put a stop to it. Now they are held on the Lightship in the harbour.

  36. ” kind hearted woman nurses what she thinks is a baby hedgehog ” Daily Mail .

    This woman finds what she thinks is a baby hedgehog, takes it home nurses it all night, she takes it to a animal hospital the following only to be told that it was a bobble of a woollen hat . For God’s sake ! Baby hedgehogs are not grey blue in colour, they don’t feel like wool and they have faces . They did show pictures in the article but the laptop is slow this morning. How utterly stupid was that woman – she even put cat food out .

    1. On the plus side, the bobble has now been released back into the wild and is doing well.

    2. I could not decide if that was a joke or if the woman was really that dim.
      If it is the second reason, it’s sobering to remember she has a vote.

      1. Perhaps she has poor eyesight.
        One would think when she picked it up she would notice it was wool. Perhaps she was wearing gloves too.

      1. None silly. It’s a bobble !

        Besides. You shouldn’t give bread and milk to hedgehogs.

  37. Yeah, that was fair.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-13244359/Transgender-row-erupts-womens-football-tournament.html

    Parents’ fury as girls’ soccer team featuring FIVE trans players destroys opposition 10-0 on way to winning grand final – with one biological male scoring SIX goals in one game

    Even it up a bit.

    Every player possessing a penis and / or testicles should be kicked in the crotch at the start, at half time and after every goal their team scores.

    1. Threatened with legal action if they complain or don’t play.

      I would tell them where to shove it.

    2. Boycott any female sports competition which includes men pretending to be women. The organising bodies will have to change their rules if nobody apart from these cheats takes part in the competition.

    3. Such things herald the death knell of ladies’ sport.
      Parents should withdraw their children from such insane competitions – the organisers would have little to organise and soon get the message.

    4. Such things herald the death knell of ladies’ sport.
      Parents should withdraw their children from such insane competitions – the organisers would have little to organise and soon get the message.

      1. Naked team photos for the over 16s claiming to be transexual should be compulsory, so that everyone can see what the women are actually competing against.
        I suspect the number of female to male competing in male sport is infinitesimal compared with the other way around.

        1. There are few sports in which physique differentials do not play some part. Some equestrian sports are not sex-segregated, but even those sports/games which superficially do not offer the average male a physical edge, such as darts and snooker, are dominated by men, with women usually competing in their own tournaments. Some of this is convention and a recognition that women have not always been made welcome in darts and snooker environments. Even so, the average male is taller and, therefore, has greater reach. In darts, he will release the dart closer to the board; in snooker he can reach an awkwardly positioned cue ball with less frequent need for rests, cue extensions and long cues.

          1. And even in some equestrian events the additional male strength can afford an advantage.

          2. Horses tend not to react kindly to strength. Women often give them a better, because more sympathetic, ride.

          3. The women’s game in curling is actually better to watch than the men’s. With the men’s game, it’s easy enough to cannon away everything so the advantage of being the last to play is overwhelming. Women don’t have the physical strength to knock out more than a couple of stones, so their game relies a lot more on drawing skill and little battles over millimetres as the stones pile in.

          4. Thank you, Jeremy. I hadn’t given any thought to curling. I suppose bowls also highlights the differences between the sexes of power and finesse.

            Now I come to think if it, the physical differences between men and women ought to play little part in shooting and archery.

      1. I always assumed the sisters were drugged rather than male.

        Similar to Marita Koch, who went on to have at least one child.

  38. Afternoon all,

    I was asked a few days ago by British Gas to send in my gas reading within three days.
    I did this through my BG internet account yesterday and was informed by email today that my latest payment status waa now viewable on my account.

    This arrangement prevents BG estimating stupid consumption estimates and billing direct debits willy nilly.
    They do of course keep plugging smart meters on my web account which they say saves me having to read the meter, get special rate offers and have consumption monitoring that would display E = mc2 when the gas boiler was running.

    However, I get my hair cut more regularly than Einstein so I don’t need an Oppenheim smart meter that well blow up.

    1. This arrangement prevents BG estimating stupid consumption estimates and billing direct debits willy nilly.

      Exactly. I don’t why some people object to being asked to provide a meter reading. I take one every week to keep an eye on my own consumption and how it varies throughout the year.

        1. At one time, with the rotating disk meter, you could see how fast you were using electricity by observing how fast the disk was spinning. That was better than a smart meter.

          You know of course that if you get a pipe burst there’s going to be an expensive bill not only from your metered supply water company.

    2. I’ve not been able to access my BG account since they made it app access only. I pay them my £15 a month and if they want more they can send me a bill I can read.

      1. I still use my old desktop PC for accessing utilities. I do have an early Android smartphone but I’ve found it useless for app based interfaces because the unsupportability of my browser. I still maintain paper as a permanent record of bills and payments as I don’t see any signs of that being on the Horizon 😉.

  39. “Remember the days when our TV screens were full of men cracking jokes about ‘giving the missus a backhander’ if she complained about him coming home drunk? That was back when rank misogyny dominated police forces, and domestic violence was described as a private matter ‘between a man and his wife’.”
    (Julie Bindel article in Coffee House.)

    I’m nine years older than Bindel and I most certainly don’t remember that. I remember jokes about guys getting into trouble with their wives for coming home late or inebriated or both.
    Dishonest about the simplest of things be they Italian restaurants or the history of TV.
    Not a person to be taken seriously

    1. What does Ms Bindel think about ‘Last of the Summer Wine’. the world’s longest running sitcom, in which the dominant theme was domineering and aggressive wives terrorising their husbands?
      She really is awful, comparable with Sam Leith and Matthew Parris.

      1. In all fairness to Messers Leith and Parris (I’m not a fan of either) Ms Bindel is fueled by paranoid fantasy which in turn drives her resentful Marxism. At least Leith and Parris sometimes reference reality.

      2. Bindel and Parris are both awful, but the useless nepo baby is the worst by a considerable margin in my opinion.

    2. I do remember Andy Capp’s missus holding a rolling pin waiting for him to stagger back from the pub.

      Edit – the woes of having to keep scrolling down the screen. I see an identical remark only a few comments down!

  40. This thought crossed my mind yesterday as i cycled home in the rain. How long would mankind survive if it ceased to rain altogether forever? I assume some water could be generated from existing desalination plants and we could harvest some water from aquifers etc. But still an interesting thought experiment.

    1. The Arab states would be an attractive place as it already has mass desalination plants and the cheap fuel to power them. We have neither.
      There’s always the Thames.

      1. Rowers on the Thames have been told to cover any cuts and not swallow the water as it has high levels of ecoli.

    2. Apparently we could use the water in Lake Baikal, and it would supply the whole of mankind for 50 years!

    1. The trouble with tweets such as that is that the text is so histrionic, I cannot take it seriously.

  41. Russia ‘tortures’ more than five thousand Ukrainians. 27 March 2024.

    More than 10,000 Ukrainian civilians are being held by Russia, with more than 5,600 of them subjected to torture, Kyiv’s prosecutor general has said.

    “There are different figures. We estimate tens of thousands, more than 10,000 for sure,” Andrii Kostin told Interfax-Ukraine. “We are talking only about those who were forcibly relocated, not about those who made this decision at their own discretion.”

    Perceptive Nottlers will have noticed that “tortures” in the headline is in inverted comma’s which implies some deviation from the norm in the meaning. The meaning here, since it is not specified, means pretty much anything that you want. The claim itself is ludicrous. Large number of POW’s have been exchanged and there has been no sustained accusations of ill treatment of any kind.

    The civilians referred to are mostly children evacuated for their own safety from the Donbass. Approximateley 400 of these have been reclaimed by relatives and have been handed over with no difficulty on production of the required documentation. The rest are complained about by the Ukie Authorities but who make no attempt at their return. This is in other words just propaganda!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/03/27/ukraine-russia-war-news-latest-moscow-concert-attack-putin/

  42. Well, that’s Narridge out of the way for another year or two. Bought myself a pair of trousers at a “Gents’ Outfitters” – the kind of shop I did not believed still existed. And a jacket in an “outdoor activities” hangar – enormous place with millions of £££ of stock and three customers. How on earth do these places manage to exist? Then the MR picked out a very nice Edwardian gold chain. Then home to find cats exactly where we left them. Asleep.

    Narridge was grim, really. There is a pavement “renovation” scheme which has been going for over a year. I imagine the workers are, er, working from home. Streets full of fat, tattooed people eating and drinking as they waddled along.

    We were lucky in one respect. While in the gents’ shop – there was a sudden, very heavy, shower. By the time we left – it had stopped and was sunny again.

    Did I miss much in NoTTLand/

    1. We have a very good outfitters here in Shaftesbury – Squires. Its a pleasure to go there and be served by courteous staff who realise customers are important rather than the more usual approach where customers are regarded as an interruption on the staff gossipping amongst themselves!

      1. They must be twinned with Chadds in Norwich. Old fashioned service, courtesy and very good stock. NO music. Not cheap, mind.
        Never paid so much for a pair of casual trousers before!

        1. Last time i was in Norwich i navigated through the locks. Quite tight given the size of the barge i was Captaining. Went into town and noticed the thousands of colorful post-it notes festooning all the telephone boxes. Who would have thought one small town would have so many whores. Ho hum.

          1. Yes, last time i holidayed on the Broads. The price of the boats became too ridiculous to continue.

          2. Even in relatively small villages there would be at least one inn where the landlord was willing to lease out rooms for short periods.

  43. One would need a heart of stone…….

    “Steve E Jones
    3 HRS AGO
    I hope I am not being tedious about this but sometimes it’s worth following a story to the very end – to get the very best from it.
    I have mentioned a few times since November that the Sydney Theatre Company had a group of their players come on stage after a play dressed as Palestinians and belted the audience about how horrible those Israelis were/are.
    This group of brainless thespians evidentially had no idea that the STC was underwritten significantly by Sydney’s very influential and financial Jewish community – so here is the outcome [well thus far], as per a headline in this afternoons Australian newspaper on line:
    “Sydney Theatre Company cuts staff after Palestine protest
    The embattled Sydney Theatre Company has cut up to 20 staff as its balance sheets suffer from an exodus of donors”.

    Afternoon folks….

    1. The sacked staff will now have the opportunity to translate their words into deeds and go to Gaza to help free Palestine.

  44. I see the SNP are banning landlords from evicting tenants in the winter months and from increasing rents for up to five years at a time.
    That will help the renting crisis.

    1. Under a Labour government in Malta they introduced rent controls. The upshot was landlords stopped maintaining the properties and lots fell in to ruin.Then they were bulldozed and blocks of holiday apartments went up instead.

    2. The devolved nations continue their rapid descent into being third world, neo-marxist s***holes. Though after 14 years of fake Conservative rule, we’re not far behind

      1. Look at that face… who’d want to wake up with that on the pillow next to you?

      2. In future years they will use that photo of proof that HMQ E II kept slaves and demand reparations accordingly……

    1. It’s fun but nonsense of course.
      What worries me is the picture of Bill Gates in the middle.

    2. On Sky Business News President Biden spoke about “crossing the Francis Scott Key bridge many times by train”

      We haven’t seen any other mention of a railway track or tracks across the bridge, have you?

    1. We didn’t have a phone in 1965! When I needed to make a call I had to walk nearly a mile to the nearest phone box and use the “Press button A” machine.

      1. We finally got a home phone installed (after a six month waiting list) in 1973, shortly before my younger son was born.

      2. And press Button B, unless you were calling a local number and were able to “tap out” the number you wanted.

      3. And press Button B, unless you were calling a local number and were able to “tap out” the number you wanted.

      4. We moved house that year and had a telephone installed in our new home. It was a party line with the immediate neighbour, however, and I remember my parents’ occasional irritation when wanting to make a call only to find the neighbour already had a conversation in progress, sometimes a rather long one.

      5. When I was a child in St Mawes our telephone number was St Mawes 210 and when my parents moved to Milford-on-Sea in 1959 our number was Milford-on-Sea 35.

        1. One of the first things I was told to learn off by heart was “Teddington Lock 4702”. It was also painted on our pet tortoise.

        2. Ha! I’m told that my one of my grandfathers’ telephone numbers was Brownhills 6.

    2. Our first phone in the sticks in Rhodesia in 1961 was a party line. Everyone had a different ring. In theory, you only picked up on your ring (ours was three long rings) but there were no secrets 🤣I think there were seven other people on it.

      1. My family was on a party line in the fifties. As a very little kid I used to get up early in the morning and entertain myself listening to conversations. I was so small I didn’t even know where they were coming from.

    3. But kids had other things. I got a record player when I was five in 1959 where I listened to Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Pigs. Going back my dad at one point had a crystal radio set when he was small.

  45. Scotland is to face a far larger deficit than the rest of the UK amid a slump in oil prices, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has warned.

    The shortfall between revenues and spending will be around £2,450 greater per person in Scotland than the rest of the UK in 2023-2024, the IFS said. The analysis found that Scotland’s deficit will be £23bn in 2023-2024, equivalent to around £4,100 per person. In the rest of the UK, the shortfall between revenues and expenditure is around £1,650 per person.

    Yeah,,, but… Braveheartt…

    1. How much did Wallace actually achieve before his entrails were grilled and his head met London Bridge? The memorial at Smithfield is sentimental twaddle about the poor Scot abused by the English.

  46. https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/march-2024/dumbing-down-the-priesthood/

    I very much like reading the critic, this is one of my favourite columists ( Marcus Walker )The dumbing down of the priesthood . ‘ the crisis of Christianity is a crisis of belief’ fewer and fewer believe in the God whom we worship.
    Antiintellectualism and the study of the scriptures has crept into the church ( says Marcus ). Most certainly there is a lack of faith and understanding of the scriptures within the hierachy of the CofE amongst Welby and his ilk. Whereas wokiest priests see their job as not a vocation and more of a career move .

    1. A very good magazine. Makes a change to read something “normal” these days. I am a particular fan of Michael Henderson – my recollection of life at the BBC between 1973 and 2002 resembles his…..

      1. I’m sure they were…..but can you imagine the answers were that paper to appear for Common Entrance today?!

    2. The wrecktorette used to say the words of the liturgy as though she had no idea what they meant.

          1. The sort of customer that upmarket boutiques love as they can unload all their failed lines on her at full price.

    1. Perhaps some Albanian/Bulgarian “dealers” might be interested….larger than a rubber boat.

  47. The smart meters scandal is about to explode in our faces. 27 March 2024.

    The technology doesn’t work as planned. The numbers don’t add up. And ordinary people may have their lives ruined by a system that barely even recognises they exist. If ITV is looking for a follow-up to it’s hit drama about the Post Office scandal its producers and script writers do not have to look very far. It is playing out in real-time right now. In reality, the smart meter fiasco risks turning into the next Horizon scandal.

    Our? I don’t doubt that we are getting perilously near the collapse of the entire system but it is nothing to do with me except in the sense that I will be one of millions of victims. This is all the doing of the Political Elites and their half-baked Cultural Marxist theories.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/27/the-smart-meters-scandal-is-about-to-explode-in-our-faces/

    1. Boodles is a West End Gentlemens’ club and I doubt it does a loan service, Philip.

  48. North Sea oil rigs threatened with shutdown unless they start running on green electricity

    Changes could force operators to build wind farms close to each platform

    Jonathan Leake
    27 March 2024 • 5:00am

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/business/2024/03/26/TELEMMGLPICT000310333994_17114834085910_trans_NvBQzQNjv4Bq2xH_am5qyIBBe32ZCWDxVA4aJIKKWYzUbf9YapsEEWY.jpeg?imwidth=680
    *
    *
    *******************************

    Colin Smith
    9 HRS AGO
    The national suicide transition authority.

    Pete Porton
    8 HRS AGO
    Is there any country more daft than here? National suicide by unelected quango.

    1. Those are the flares, getting rid of unwanted gas. Nowt to do with electricity. Old platforms, too. Flares rarely burn now, and are much cleaner than that.
      Looking at the platforms, they look like Shell Brent field, decommissioned in 2014.

    1. I agree that there are some excellent articles; my enjoyment and interest would be much increased if they allowed comments on them.

    1. “Scolding of the type commonly reserved for children” comes under the banner of erotic humiliation.

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

      The Greta Thunberg doll serves as a “humiliatrix”.

      If the top is regarded as a female, they are sometimes called the humiliatrix. Other common names include Master/Dom (male top), and Mistress/Domme (female top).

      1. Yeah yeah. Been under the arches on the South Bank. They have them all. And people pay to be humiliated.

      1. Epi. The only fitting in she could manage would be a party where all the guests were hat stands.

  49. She was sold through a brokers’ agency to a Turkish man in Turkey. We hope she is being well looked after but we don’t know.

  50. They’re surprisingly literate for Scousers…
    ‘On Old Hall Street they take your food from you as soon as they see the Greggs bag. They come from nowhere, swoop and it’s gone,’ Debbie O’Reilly told the Liverpool Echo.

  51. In town earlier today I walked past one not more that 12 inches away perched on top of a litter bin. Completely unfazed by my presence….

      1. I did observe it staring intently at the shiny alloy wheels on the car parked close by…..

    1. My other half showed me a clip from FB yesterday of a seagull going through a shop’s automatic door, grabbing a pack of sandwiches from the nearest display then going back out through the door with it. They underestimate the humble seagull at their peril. I reckon they’ve evolved further than some humans tbh.

        1. Yes, from someone I’m sure I’ll get flak.

          I’m not changing what I’ve always done just because Chris Packham says they’re too ubiquitous to be known as “sea” gulls. Neither do I use the term common blackbird to distinguish it from a Eurasian blackbird every time turdus merula strays into my garden. Which he often does in order to complain about the cat and push all the other birds out of the way in order to get at the mealworms we leave out. For goodness sake, I still refer to hedge sparrows in my off guard moments.

          It’s all water off anas platyrhynchos’ back to me.

          1. I remember ‘Gatehouse’, the compelling and scary character brilliantly played by Stephen Rea (the very same as in your avatar), from The Shadow Line. I have it on DVD and it is beyond time I enjoyed it again.

          2. Hugo Blick’s stuff is generally good. I liked his series “The English” too.

          3. 2022 I think, some of the gang from The Shadow Line. A western with an unusual ending, at first it looks like a straightforward revenge story but isn’t. Amazon / BBC collaboration, a six part series.

      1. You’d better believe it. It was that seagull’s other half who organised and filmed the heist and later their little gull edited and posted the video. Why am I so shore? Be-caws I looked on Googull.

    1. The Clapham chemical attacker was given a Muslim funeral and burial despite converting to Christianity to claim UK asylum.

      Abdul Ezedi, an Afghan national, had been at the centre of a manhunt after attacking a 31-year-old mother and her two daughters with a corrosive substance in south London in January.

      Immigration files published on Tuesday showed the convicted sex offender had twice been refused asylum by the Home Office.
      But, when he later insisted he had converted to Christianity and obtained the endorsement of a Baptist priest, he was granted leave to remain.
      The dossier showed he had repeatedly failed to answer basic questions about Christianity, lied about his past and was deemed such a sexual threat that a special worshipping agreement was put in place for him to attend a church in Jarrow, South Tyneside.

      Churches risk undermining asylum system after Clapham attacker’s conversion, says Home Office

      It is now understood that Ezedi’s family and friends requested that he should be given a Muslim funeral and burial after his body was found in the Thames in February. It raises the prospect that those closest to him did not believe he had abandoned his Muslim faith.

      The Telegraph revealed in February that he was known in Newcastle, where he lived, to be a devout Muslim who observed Ramadan and only ate Halal food.

      Apparently we have idiots in charge…..

      1. I wonder if the Archpillock of Canterbury has been circumcised?

        If not he should have the snip in public and have the process filmed and projected onto the minarets of several mosques to show how much he empathises with Islam.

      2. If he’d abandoned his Moslem faith his friends and family would have killed him themselves.

        1. They could then get off for murdering a muzzie rather than raping underage white girls.

    1. I liked It where they write:

      “It is not, evidently, the deep state which is undermining Sunak himself. That task has been undertaken by a shadowy group of Conservative rebels, few of whom care to identify themselves.”

      I rather think Sunak has been doing a perfectly sound job of it himself, without having to rely on any shadowy groups.

    1. I thought synagogue. They separate the sexes too and those guys don’t look muzzie.

        1. Ah, that’s a point. On reflection, they’re supposed to cover their shoulders too.

  52. Again, good morrow. Gentlefolk. I’ve been sleeping off and on up until 16:00 so now I have to play catch-up.

    1. Hope you had a good zed, Tom. Just had a good zed myself, after exercise and a beer. Now awaiting dinner.

      1. Ha, I have to cook my own dinner – Lamb Shank, 46 mins @ 200°c. will reduce to 150 °C after 20 mins.

        1. Far be it for me to interfere with anyone’s kitchen preferences, but I have been pleasantly surprised by results from a miniature fan oven, marketed as an ‘air fryer’.

          1. I also have an air fryer, a microwave and a multicooker. I try to avoid using the ‘normal’ cooker and hob. Uses too much electricity.

    1. Her work is very important. She cannot be at her best and serve her constituents properly if she’s made cramped and tired by travelling in cattle class.

      1. Added to which if the taxpayer refused to pay the big bucks then they wouldn’t be able to get the sort of quality she brings to Parliament.

      2. If so, why doesn’t she stand up proudly for that point. But no, she opts for deception and opacity. BTW WE pay for HER ticket.

    2. They are all ‘working very hard’, as they repeatedly like to inform us.
      So hard as my own MP is, he can’t even find time to reply to my enquiry on the 9th of March. Nor reply to my reminder last week.
      Is there a parliamentary
      ombudsman ?

      1. There is. Fat lot of use.

        https://www.ombudsman.org.uk/

        “By law, we can only look at complaints about UK government departments and other UK public organisations if a Member of Parliament (MP) refers the complaint to us. You can complete our complaint form and ask an your constituency MP or their office to sign it.

        MPs will consider all complaints, no matter how big or small – from problems with a benefit or tax office to concerns you have about the DVLA or an immigration issue.”

    3. I suspect she was booked into economy, or business class at best, and was upgraded.
      Most of these turds expect upgrades as of right, and usually seem to get them.

      When I was flying very frequently with BA my boarding pass registered not as “Gold” but as “VIP.”
      Business class was the best available on short haul and that’s what my company bought me, so I was never upgraded. It did give me priority boarding and if travelling with someone on economy they were often upgraded, I suspect because of my “VIP”

      I have never been upgraded when using my own money to buy tickets, even though I remained a “Gold” member.

  53. Unless it’s something like a Cadbury’s Creme Egg, my mouth will not open wide enough.

    1. I made the wrong guess

      Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

      1. Seems to be a bit of a theme today…
        Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

      2. Seems to be a bit of a theme today…
        Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

    2. A nippy Par Four!
      I made the wrong guess!

      Wordle 1,012 4/6
      ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜
      ⬜⬜🟩⬜🟨
      🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      1. Hah, your third and fourth tries were not the same and correct with just the end letter out, like my “wrong guess”! ;o)

    3. Well done. Par four for me.

      Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

    4. Par here.

      Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

    5. Par Here

      Wordle 1,012 4/6

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

  54. More on the Baltimore bridge incident. It appears that both the Port of Baltimore, now closed, and the destroyed bridge were strategic entities for the US.

    Best let investigative reporter Lara Logan explain what she has uncovered. Dave Walsh former President and Chief Executive Officer of Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems Americas, Inc. has also weighed in with just how important this bridge and the Port of Baltimore are to the US.

    War Room – Lara Logan Discusses the Baltimore Bridge Catastrophe

    1. Here’s her post on Twitt:

      Lara Logan
      @laralogan
      Multiple intel sources: Baltimore bridge collapse was an “absolutely brilliant strategic attack” on US critical infrastructure – most likely cyber – & our intel agencies know it. In information warfare terms, they just divided the US along the Mason Dixon line exactly like the Civil War.

      Second busiest strategic roadway in the nation for hazardous material now down for 4-5 years – which is how long they say it will take to recover. Bridge was built specifically to move hazardous material – fuel, diesel, propane gas, nitrogen, highly flammable materials, chemicals and oversized cargo that cannot fit in the tunnels – that supply chain now crippled.

      Make no mistake: this was an extraordinary attack in terms of planning, timing & execution.

      The two critical components on that bridge are the two load-bearing pylons on each end, closest to the shore. They are bigger, thicker and deeper than anything else. These are the anchor points and they knew that hitting either one one of them would be a fatal wound to the integrity of the bridge.

      Half a mile of bridge went in the river – likely you will have to build a new one. Also caused so much damage to the structural integrity of the bottom concrete part that you cannot see & won’t know until they take the wreckage apart. Structural destruction likely absolute.

      Attack perfectly targeted.

      “They have figured out how to bring us down. As long as you stay away from the teeth of the US military, you can pick the US apart. We are arrogant and ignorant – lethal combination. Obama said they would fundamentally change America and they did. We are in a free-fall ride on a roller coaster right now – no brakes – just picking up speed.”

      The footage shows the cargo ship never got in the approach lane in the channel. You have to be in the channel before you get into that turn. Location was precise/deliberate: chose a bend in the river where you have to slow down and commit yourself – once you are committed in that area there is not enough room to maneuver.

      Should have had a harbor pilot to pilot the boat. You are not supposed to traverse any obstacles without the harbor pilot.

      They chose a full moon so they would have maximum tidal shift – rise and fall. Brisk flow in that river on a normal day & have had a lot of rain recently so water was already moving along at a good pace.

      Hit it with enough kinetic energy to knock the load-bearing pylon out from under the highway – which fatally weakens the span and then 50 percent of the bridge fell into the water.

      All these factors when you look at it – this is how you teach people how to do this type of attack and there are so few people left in the system who know this. We have a Junior varsity team on the field.

      Tremendous navigational obstruction. Huge logistical nightmare to clean this up. Number of dead is tragic but not the whole measure of the attack.

      That kind-of bridge constantly under repair – always at night because there is so much traffic and they cannot obstruct that during the day. So concern is for repair guys who were on foot (out of their vehicles) working who may now be in the water – 48 degrees at most at this time of year.

      When you choke off Baltimore you have cut the main north-south hazardous corridor (I95) in half. Now has to go around the city – or go somewhere else.

      To move some of that cargo through the tunnel you may be able to get a permit but those are slow to get and require an escort system that is expensive and has to be done at night.

      For every $100 dollars that goes into the city, $12 comes from shipping. Believe this will cripple the city of Baltimore at a time when they do not have the resources to recover.

      1. There were two pilots on board. Suggested causes include dirty (i.e. contaminated) fuel oil which led to engine failure and then a power cut.

        1. The implications of that happening in a supposedly first world country are as bad as the sabotage theories.

        2. Having at the moment a bit to do with cyber security, my mind tends to run naturally on the engines failing due to a hacked computer system….

        1. Agreed. I understand there was a pilot on board, leaving the port, but a power failure left the steering powerless. I don’t know who Lara Logan is, but I know Baltimore well and I have seen nothing here in the US press suggesting any kind of deliberate action.

          1. Two pilots, jilltl!

            Lara Logan (born 29 March 1971)[1] is a South African television and radio journalist and war correspondent. Logan’s career began in South Africa with various news organizations in the 1990s. Her profile rose due to reporting around the American invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. She was hired as a correspondent for CBS News in 2002, eventually becoming Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent.

            In 2013, a story of Logan’s on the 2012 Benghazi attack caused significant controversy due to factual errors and was retracted, resulting in a leave of absence …

            Logan left CBS in 2018. After her departure from CBS, Logan began to make wide-ranging claims on a variety of conspiracy theories regarding topics such as the AIDS virus or the Rothschild family. In 2019, she joined the Sinclair Broadcast Group, a conservative media company.[2] In January 2020, she joined Fox Nation, a subscription streaming service run by Fox News.[3] In March 2022, she said she had been “dumped” by the network …

          2. Thanks for the info, don’t think I have missed much!! Incidentally, they have retrieved the ‘black box’ from the container ship so hopefully, we shall learn more.
            Have you any news from Plum Tart lately? I do miss her fun, especially “happy hour” do give her best wishes if you are in touch.

          3. Classic hit piece. That text, though couched in very negative terms, actually describes a pretty successful career. And gosh, there are controversial things to say about AIDS and the Rothschilds, who’d a thunk it?

            I am not saying that I agree with every word she writes, just that she has clearly got on the wrong side of the corporate media owned by the parasite class and therefore must be made to look worthless.

          4. Classic hit piece. That text, though couched in very negative terms, actually describes a pretty successful career. And gosh, there are controversial things to say about AIDS and the Rothschilds, who’d a thunk it?

            I am not saying that I agree with every word she writes, just that she has clearly got on the wrong side of the corporate media owned by the parasite class and therefore must be made to look worthless.

          5. Two pilots, jilltl!

            Lara Logan (born 29 March 1971)[1] is a South African television and radio journalist and war correspondent. Logan’s career began in South Africa with various news organizations in the 1990s. Her profile rose due to reporting around the American invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. She was hired as a correspondent for CBS News in 2002, eventually becoming Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent.

            In 2013, a story of Logan’s on the 2012 Benghazi attack caused significant controversy due to factual errors and was retracted, resulting in a leave of absence …

            Logan left CBS in 2018. After her departure from CBS, Logan began to make wide-ranging claims on a variety of conspiracy theories regarding topics such as the AIDS virus or the Rothschild family. In 2019, she joined the Sinclair Broadcast Group, a conservative media company.[2] In January 2020, she joined Fox Nation, a subscription streaming service run by Fox News.[3] In March 2022, she said she had been “dumped” by the network …

    2. And here’s part of Parallel Mike’s take

      “I call what happened in Baltimore an attack because a ship sailing into the bridge in such an abstract manner was no accident IMO. Having lived aboard a boat in a commercial shipyard for four years and seen megatankers routinely dock and depart…I known enough to say that this incident is almost impossible to occur by accident.

      There are so many safeguards in place to ensure ships remain on course when departing that this one is almost certainly foul play. To list but a few, ships have GPS and chart plotters that guide them on a clear course. There are numerous alarms warning them if they stray off their coordinates. They have pilot boats to guide them. They have constant gps surveillance and contact with harbor master. They follow lighted buoys to ensure they stay in the correct channel. Collectively, this is all working to ensure a ship sails safely in and out of port.

      On top of this you have the captain and crew looking out ahead of course. In this instance, the ship was sailing on the correct path right up until the last moment before it arrived at the bridge and then inexplicably it banks hard to Starboard, ensuring it sails straight into the support column of the bridge, which then leads to its devastating collapse.”

      1. In the Telegraph, former Royal Navy captain Tom Sharpe provides an analysis of what is known to have happened.

        1. Nothing that appears in the media is automatically “known.” If one wants to have an opinion about something these days, one must root around for all the evidence oneself and make up one’s own mind.
          I don’t have an opinion about the ship yet.

    3. Catturd ™
      @catturd2
      The bridge collapsed at 1.30 am – by 8 am the next morning, all officials had done an “investigation” and determined it was just an incident.

      4 hours later, Biden hit the mic and said tax payers would pay for the full rebuild.

      Nothing to see here – pull my finger.
      —–

      It is being said that if the government takes over the cost, then the insurance company investigation won’t take place.

    4. They picked up Biden on claiming he had travelled by train across it, but trains go around not across the bridge.
      Surely trains can pick up a significant proportion of the road freight?

      1. I don’t recall either Walsh or Logan mentioning that idea. Walsh mentions heavy goods, perhaps the railway isn’t capable of handling those products e.g. tunnels, bridges.

        1. It’s to do with dangerous or heavy loads apparently, that they don’t want to send through tunnels.

        2. Who knows?
          But I’m getting the impression that there is an awful lot of picking and choosing over what is published, admitted, and discussed.

          If I have one real gripe with the narrative, it is how quickly the PTB have come to a conclusion as to what has happened.

          1. That is the only reason it’s suspicious!
            A bare few hours after it happens, Biden announces that it was an accident and the government will cover the costs, thus scuppering any investigation by the insurance! Don’t they wait for any kind of investigation before making up their minds?
            Of course, the Biden administration is stupid enough to do that, and greedy enough to give the contract for re-building to one of their buddies….

          2. Trump asked whether it was terrorism (a legitimate question) and is being slated for that. Apparently nobody should ever question anything.

    5. Which makes the lack of protection for the bridge piers totally incomprehensible.

  55. You have to remember that some time ago there was a lady called Elizabeth Filkin. Her job in Parliament was to keep an eye on the amounts of expenses claimed. They soon got rid of her, she’s a dame now, HOL.
    I think it was around 3 years ago when the ‘They’ took home around 300 million in expenses. It might have included the Lords.

    1. Brilliant woman. I knew her and she was a great help to me when I did a similar job for a government agency.
      She was stitched up and brought down because she TOLD THE TRUTH about the scum who fill the Palace of Westminster. Her removal was a wicked scandal.

      1. Thank you for standing up for Mrs Filkin CBE. I know of a lady in the USA who was chosen for a supervisory role at an international agency. When the blob discovered that she was honest and incorruptible (shock horror) she was removed.

      2. I think it showed the British public that Wastemonster and Whitehall is filled with worthless scum.
        And still is.

  56. It would require considerable skill for a remote operator to disable the steering of the container ship just at the right moment. It would be a masterpiece of sabotage if if indeed it was a smart ship. All the years I was taking narrowboats over the canals, I never managed to bring down a bridge.

    1. Because canal bridges are – relatively speaking – very sturdily built?

      There is an interesting article in The Grimes today by an “expert” who said that it was madness (my word, not his) to build a bridge on very thin pillars – which were unprotected by barriers to absorb a collision from a massive ship.

      1. A bridge is only as strong as its abutments. The Baltimore bridge appears to have collapsed not only in its high central span but either side of both of the principal pillars (abutments).

        That is to say the collapse was progressive. No modern bridge design should be designed such as to collapse in its entirety when one support component is missing. The principal supports should also have been of very robust construction possibly with heavy steel caging to absorb initial impact of a collision.

        I agree with those who realised immediately that the government agencies were lying to them. This was a deliberate attack on vital US infrastructure, just as the hazardous materials spillage in Amish country and utter failure to clean up the mess to this day.

      2. A bridge is only as strong as its abutments. The Baltimore bridge appears to have collapsed not only in its high central span but either side of both of the principal pillars (abutments).

        That is to say the collapse was progressive. No modern bridge design should be designed such as to collapse in its entirety when one support component is missing. The principal supports should also have been of very robust construction possibly with heavy steel caging to absorb initial impact of a collision.

        I agree with those who realised immediately that the government agencies were lying to them. This was a deliberate attack on vital US infrastructure, just as the hazardous materials spillage in Amish country and utter failure to clean up the mess to this day.

      3. When I saw the video, I too was astonished how very flimsy those supports were. Questions should have been asked about why they allowed a ship of that size into Baltimore Harbor, given the risk to the bridge.

        Consider London. The old port was just downstream of the old London Bridge. Whilst the building of Tower Bridge allowed some ships to pass, most went into new docks downstream of there on the Isle of Dogs. When the M25 Dartford bridge was completed, most if not all container shipping went to Felixstowe, and the 20th century docks redeveloped.

      1. You’d need a big saw to get through one of those girders…oh – THAT sort of hacked!!

    2. If the control systems are computerised and go through satellites all it takes is a Nintendo joystick.

    3. Would a narrowboat have the kinetic energy to bring down a substantial bridge?

      This ship was doing a reported 8 knots/a little over 9mph, however, its mass gave the ship sufficient kinetic energy to destroy the bridge.

  57. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2e8da8f43dac672c3b0ba072a26ed10d1d3c61e005b1b7eb58a2f2352f840bba.jpg Allison Pearson was throwing a huge wobbly in the Features section of the DT this morning, about the modern trend for Hot Cross Buns to have a multitude of flavours, not to mention new designs apart from a “hot cross” on them.

    I wonder how she would react to my “hot crossless buns” that also do not have a flavour-free flour and water paste cross on them?

        1. I followed your recipe to the letter. Result – a brick roughly 2 inches high! Good flavour but, er, dense!

          Then went back to my own recipe – and made an excellent almost fully risen loaf.

          I am sure that wholemeal flour makes a difference. I also added 3 tbls of mixed seeds (at the MR’s suggestion). Very good texture and flavour loaf. The variable is the liquid. Tiny plus/minus can make or break it.

          I’ll stick with my mixed outcome tried and tested! But thanks for the advice and tips.

          1. Nah. Grizz wouldn’t have arrested me even when he was a Copper. Nods and winks to the lawyer.

          2. No. I use a multitude of different flours for different loaves: strong white, spelt, wholemeal, rye, oatmeal and various mixes.

            I still recommend the spelt flour from Leatheringsett. You can buy it fresh from the watermill and it hasn’t been lying in a bag in a shop for months.

          1. My dear old granny, rest her soul, made the best hot cross buns, but sadly I will not taste them again in this life.

          2. I only had one dear old granny. The other was a toothless, bearded hag: the crone to end all crones!

          3. My granny on my fathers side wasn’t actually my granny. She had died and so he moved her sister in. Then his mistress. She then had a girl child who was my age and we went to the local primary school together. Country folk !

          4. One of mine died before I was born. The other was lovely and died about 25 years ago.

          5. Neither of mine seemed to have the power of speech. Total silence. Even when i beat one at Scrabble.

          6. One of mine died before I was born. The other was lovely and died about 25 years ago.

          7. I’ll try it next time, but they were still not burnt. They are certainly paler than the commercial ones in the other photos.

          8. You can’t beat a whole egg, Grizzly, you have to discard the shell first. Lol.

  58. OT – MUTTON – I have sent young Phil details of the woman in this village who breeds sheep to produce mutton. If anyone else is interested, let me know.

  59. Volvo has produced its last ever diesel car, ending an era spanning 45 years. The Swedish company’s final diesel-engine vehicle, an XC90 SUV, rolled off the production line on Tuesday at its plant near Gothenburg. The car will now be sent to a Volvo museum opening in the city next month.

    Volvo is thought to have been the first major manufacturer to completely end diesel production.

    Been nice knowing you Volvo. Cannot see the point in an electric one.

    1. Diesels have become too complex over the last decade, as a consequence of the whole eco scam. They cost a fortune to mend when they go wrong.

      1. Tell me about it.
        My current van, a 14 plate Vivaro has been playing up lately, suddenly going onto reduced power with simultaneous Check Injection and Check Emissions warnings. Still drivable, but you don’t want to be going up too many hills with it.
        Garage say the DPF (a source of problems in my old Vivaro) is clear, but it’s started over-fueling at about 2 to 2½ thousand RPM and letting a lot of smoke out.
        They are investigating further.

  60. “China creates implantable never-ending battery recharged by the body as boffins inch towards turning humans into CYBORGS”

    OK this is from that less than reliable source of information The Sun, but did anyone watch The Matrix?

      1. The whole plot was predicated on the idea that the robots were using humans as living batteries.

        1. Ahh, but that’s a bit different from humans being ‘enhanced’ by cyber tech.

  61. Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland given ‘white supremacy’ trigger warnings

    University library gives historical children’s stories disclaimers for ‘colonialist narratives’ that could be ‘offensive’ to modern readers

    Craig Simpson
    27 March 2024 • 3:45pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2024/03/27/TELEMMGLPICT000371956835_17115528050020_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqqVzuuqpFlyLIwiB6NTmJwfSVWeZ_vEN7c6bHu2jJnT8.jpeg?imwidth=680

    These two beloved children’s classics sit in the restricted-access Rees-Williams Collection of Children’s Literature at York St John University

    Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland are among a collection of children’s stories that have been given a university trigger warning for “white supremacy”.

    York St John University has added the disclaimer to a collection of historical children’s books, including works by JM Barrie, Lewis Carroll and Jules Verne.

    Readers are warned that classic tales for children may contain offensive examples of “white supremacy”. Adventure stories and well-known novels written in the 19th and early 20th centuries are likely to include “colonialist narratives”, the message adds.

    It warns that the vocabulary and illustrations in these works may appear “racist” and “upsetting and offensive” to modern audiences.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2024/03/27/TELEMMGLPICT000371947293_17115532990170_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqqVzuuqpFlyLIwiB6NTmJwfSVWeZ_vEN7c6bHu2jJnT8.jpeg?imwidth=960
    Some academics have suggested that the hookah-smoking caterpillar in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is an orientalist depiction CREDIT: The Print Collector/Getty Images
    *
    *
    ****************

    BS Whitworth
    1 HR AGO
    Does the Koran come with a “Muslim supremacy’ trigger warning?

    1. “My watermill business went down the drain – turday, my new one’s incomings keeps it bouyant!”

  62. Just been reading about Scotlands new pound shop stasi as the spectator puts it.
    Apart from the fact that it will soon no longer be safe to go there, I’m sure I read a report produced in England that recommended that all communications should be monitored to avoid misinformation and speech and writing that stirs up hate.
    Like Scotland, no proof will be needed except the opinion of the committee and the declared hurt feelings of the complainer.
    The misinformation bit is very sinister. How can we know if we don’t have access to all that is out there, but only that which other people want us to believe is true?
    I can’t believe how dictatorial the country has become since I was born.
    I may be no spring chicken but I’m not yet ancient.
    In the last forty years everything about this country that made it what it was has been chewed up and spat out, including free speech and the live and let live principle.
    The only way to stop this is to destroy the World Wide Web and go back to face to face communication.
    There will then be less people who have contact with you to complain.

    1. The problem is that far more people are dependent on the state and it has grown into a monster.

    2. The “complainer”? Mind your language Mrs C. I think they refer to that one as the “victim” don’t they?

    1. I think you meant Tallis’s “Gesture” music. You must move with the times.

      1. A muffled titter ran across the chapel before being arrested for spoiling the dick-tion?

      2. A muffled titter ran across the chapel before being arrested for spoiling the dick-tion?

  63. Right – that’s me for today. Norwich sorted. A gorgeous 1909 gold necklace for the MR. Quiet afternoon – now a nice, red sunset.

    Market tomorrow.

    Have a spiffing evening – last night we watched “Hotel du Lac” (BBC iplayer) – they don’t make films like that nowadays. Most enjoyable.

    A demain.

    1. What genuinely puzzles me is why they want so much more than they need or can enjoy. It is baffling.

      1. As John the Baptist and Judas were born into their role as pretold by the prophets that was also the case for Pilate, there was no free will .

        1. I’d say a great big hmmmmm to that. Lots of philosophical questions to address there Angelina.

      1. John the Baptist had his role, Judas had his role and so did Pilate,
        all of it predestined and written down as the prophets foretold .

        1. In which case, if predestined, it is hard to see how either is morally culpable. A dropped stone is not culpable for killing somebody on whose head it lands.

        2. In which case, if predestined, it is hard to see how either is morally culpable. A dropped stone is not culpable for killing somebody on whose head it lands.

        3. Yes, they had their roles but that doesn’t not absolve them of their moral responsibility as they still had a choice.

          1. Tomorrow on Good Friday keep Isaiah 53 : 3 – 7 In your mind
            And in your heart ‘ I am a stone and not a sheep that I can stand O Christ beneath the cross, seek thy sheep shepherd of the flock, greater then Moses, turn once more and smite the rock “.
            Think of your vicar as the rock if you wish.
            Prayers and my hand in thine .

      2. John the Baptist had his role, Judas had his role and so did Pilate,
        all of it predestined and written down as the prophets foretold .

    1. Cue: a prolonged discussion about how many Angels can dance on the head of a pin. I do know (to a certain extent) what I believe but would find it very hard to argue (in words) with someone who believes the opposite – or someone who believes in nothing.

      1. Most of it is not an argument, rather a debate trying to cast light on an ultimately unknowable subject.

        1. I agree, JD, but do think that words obscure rather than cast light on so many things. Have you read Ian Mc Gilcrist, as a matter of interest?

          1. No, never come across him. I dd write a long article reconciling free will and predestination for a blog site once but now is not the place or time to go over it all again.

          2. Ian McGilcrist (doesn’t look as if I’ve spelt it right) Is a most interesting deep thinker and I think you would enjoy reading him. ( actually it is Iain MacGilchrist) Try “The Master and His Emissary”. He really does explain what has gone so terribly wrong (but, as so often, does not provide an easy solution)

  64. Climate No Change Puzzle Update……..

    The chairman of Soros’ Energy Transition Commission is Soros’ accomplice Lord Adair Turner who was the first chairman of Soros’ (No) Climate Change Committee which exists thanks to the (No) Climate Change Act 2008 which Soros wanted. The groundwork for which was done in 2006/7 by Soros’ accomplice David Miliband who subsequently was given a highly paid Soros job. Just like Soros’ accomplice Lord Adair Turner who became chairman of Soros’ Institute for New Economic Thinking after he stepped down from Soros’ (No) Climate Change Committee and before he became chairman of Soros’ Energy Transition Commission.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/9963050/Lord-Turner-forms-unlikely-alliance-with-Soros.html

    In further news, Soros’ accomplice Tony Blair received at least $25million and probably much more from Soros in consultancy fees for always doing what his puppetmaster desired. Soros’ accomplice David Cameron wanted the (No) Climate Change Act because it was a Soros policy.. David Cameron appointed Soros’ friends to senior positions including Lord Kim Darroch as British Ambassador to Washington who later was appointed chairman of Soros’ Best for Britain. Cameron also promoted Soros’ opinions about Brexit on Twitter and Facebook and later received a Soros financed job eventually returning to power as Foreign Secretary because obviously that’s what Soros wanted.

    Meanwhile, Christopher Stark CEO of the (No) Climate Change Committee, which was started by Soros’ accomplice Gordon Brown, and who worked with Gordon Brown at HM Treasury, is leaving to become CEO of the Carbon Trust which was also started by Soros’ accomplice Gordon Brown!

    So as you can see, the pieces fit into the No Climate Change Puzzle exactly!

  65. Thunder and hail here, this climate change/global warming thing is becoming a nuisance.

    1. Skilful photoshopping to remove Gates’s hand from the Hi Risk Anus.

      Unfortunately it’s obvious Bill’s right arm has been amputated at the shoulder.

  66. Utterly off topic.
    Has anyone here had to attend cardiac rehab?

    I have just received my instructions.

    Bring trainers, shorts and a running vest for the inside work, plus walking boots, cold weather and wet weather gear for the outside activities.

    The sessions start at 9.30 and finish at 16.30 with a break for lunch.

    They will be daily from Monday to Friday for four weeks.

    Good grief, I’m trying to get better, not train for the Paris Olympics.

    Is this a normal regime?

    1. Blimey, no. I was asked to go for a 20 minute treadmill test at Derriford 3 months after the event. Got a green light for progress and that was it.
      It was 13 years ago though.

      1. My ghast was flabbered when the letter arrived.

        I wonder whether one gets a periodic (I’m not a tranny) assessment and they sign you off earlier, if fit.
        My joints won’t take kindly to running nor jumping around. I can hike quite happily.

        If they don’t believe I’m fit, I’ll suggest that they try to swim a few kilometres alongside me.

    2. Blimey, no. I was asked to go for a 20 minute treadmill test at Derriford 3 months after the event. Got a green light for progress and that was it.
      It was 13 years ago though.

    3. Are you sure that amongst all that they’re not going to issue you a Ukrainian uniform and ship you off to the front?

    4. Are you sure that amongst all that they’re not going to issue you a Ukrainian uniform and ship you off to the front?

      1. True.

        The system here is extremely proactive.
        I’m currently set up for three lots of blood tests, a shit test (they assume I am one, before Phizzee jumps in) prostate examination and yet another echocardiogram.

        AND because I’m now “at risk”, I don’t have to pay a brass farthing, even though I’m getting what amounts to private treatment.

        1. If you’re in the ‘at risk’ category, does that mean you will be honoured to be offered even more convid boosters?

      2. True.

        The system here is extremely proactive.
        I’m currently set up for three lots of blood tests, a shit test (they assume I am one, before Phizzee jumps in) prostate examination and yet another echocardiogram.

        AND because I’m now “at risk”, I don’t have to pay a brass farthing, even though I’m getting what amounts to private treatment.

    5. Doesn’t sound like much fun to me. The best cardiac rehab is surely to fall in love?

      1. Already there.
        HG was heaven sent.
        AND she’s a physio, so if necessary I’ll follow her instructions.

        As usual

    6. Doesn’t sound like much fun to me. The best cardiac rehab is surely to fall in love?

    7. I’m sorry to hear of your health problems.
      That sounds like a long, nightmare regime – are they trying to finish you off? One day of that would be enough to persuade many to not turn up for the remainder of the course. Would having no shorts & running vest, walking boots etc be a valid reason to not turn up?

      1. I’m looking forward to it.
        Many moons ago I was a reasonably competent sportsman, brute force rather than skills mainly, but good enough to have trained with and competed against Olympic athletes and international capped sportsmen .

    8. It Sounds quite scary Sos.
      I’ve never come across this in the UK, but let’s be honest, nobody in the UK really cares about those over 65 anymore.
      But keep in touchè and let us know how you get on.

      1. Scary?
        Only from the point of view that I’ve been hooked into the under 50 cohorts and can’t keep up!

  67. I was thinking of the ‘implantable never-ending battery’ bit. Coming from a fascist State like China it is a relatively small step to move to humans being kept in a coma and used as living batteries.

    1. I believe that certain individuals are already being kept alive purely to provide bits for organ transplants.

  68. No idea what you do with your van. Big mileages? That’s the sort of use that tends to avoid such problems. It’s the short runs that tend to trigger it, but there are so many devices on diesels to control emissions that it could be one of many things. I hope your mechanic’s first name is Sherlock…

    1. Half the mileage of my old van!
      After finally getting the DPF problems sorted, the bloody thing was written off (for the 2nd time!!) when I got sideswiped by an expended platform 14 wheel low-loader!

  69. From the DT Corrected:

    “A man has been attacked by a knife-wielding assailant of colour on a train in south-east London.”
    Serious life threatening injuries…

  70. That being the case, the odds are that:

    “A man of colour has been attacked by a knife-wielding assailant of colour on a train in south-east London.”

      1. And if the blicks are in Africa, wholesale rape and murder are acceptable with genocide as a speciality…

  71. That being the case, the odds are that:

    “A man of colour has been attacked by a knife-wielding assailant of colour on a train in south-east London.”

  72. In which case it was not ordained at all, merely knowledge in the mind of God. By definition, He knows all things. For actions to have moral agency there must be free will.

  73. In which case it was not ordained at all, merely knowledge in the mind of God. By definition, He knows all things. For actions to have moral agency there must be free will.

  74. When they were dealing with his son, and himself incarnate?

    Or don’t you accept the concept of the Trinity?

    1. Of course I accept it but no human knows how it works but Jesus Himself said that while in human form certain things known by the Father were unknown to Him but he knew of His fate, Judas’ betrayal etc.

      1. In other words, the whole was totally ordained, and the participants had no choice.

          1. I hope so, my Christian side says “yes” but my agnostic side still has doubts.

      2. In other words, the whole was totally ordained, and the participants had no choice.

  75. When they were dealing with his son, and himself incarnate?

    Or don’t you accept the concept of the Trinity?

      1. Oh come on, if you really want to offend:

        Wogs the matter? Feeling browned off? Nigger mind, go Black home and maybe you’ll feel all White.

  76. That’s very good . Do you remember when some comedian / impersonator called Tony Blair pretending to be William Hague saying ‘ hello Tony its William Hague. He got caught out as Tony Blair said William Hague always addressed him as ‘ prime minister ‘ .

  77. That’s very good . Do you remember when some comedian / impersonator called Tony Blair pretending to be William Hague saying ‘ hello Tony its William Hague. He got caught out as Tony Blair said William Hague always addressed him as ‘ prime minister ‘ .

  78. With regards to the telly tax I think all of you should contribute to my road tax, fuel bills, and insurance because even though you don’t drive my van, it’s the fairest way of doing it.

  79. Another day is done so, I wish you goodnight and may God bless you all, Gentlefolk. Bis morgen früh.

    1. I won’t be far behind you Tom, but of course many miles away.
      I within 25 minutes of getting through on the phone, I managed to speak with a doctor today about my blood pressure.
      Up the meds dosage he said. I had that in mind.
      But he’s a nice guy.

      1. I don’t suppose he deigned to see you (or get you in to see the nurse) to take your blood pressure with their own, presumably superior, equipment? Blindly prescribing higher meds dose on the patient’s word seems somewhat negligent.

        1. It’s all I have, he sent me to A&E back end of December 2022. All they did then after 15 hours in a chair and 6 hours in a bed. Is send me home with increased strength meds. One of the tablets made my legs swell. One he mentioned today.

          1. let’s hope the increased dose helps.
            I remember when MiL was still around, in and out of hospital. They changed her meds each time, she was then unwell when back home, GP (in the days when they were readily available, home visits to the very frail) altered dose/meds, MiL ok again for a few weeks then back into hospital, and repeat.
            Goodnight Eddy.

          2. I feel I need to get back to normal nobody has explained what is actually causing the problem. I need to stop taking the meds and try and live a normal life. I read that statins can cause an increase in BP.
            I’ll make further checks.
            Thanks for your concern Mum.

          3. You’re welcome.
            There are so many reports of statins causing/exacerbating other health issues. But, hey, GPs (that now rare hermit species that are rumoured to hang out in doctors surgeries……) get extra dosh for every patient they prescribe statins to.
            I believe ‘over- prescribing cause many problems. Drug A causes reaction/symptom B, so let’s prescribe drug C to alleviate B, and so on.

          4. Exactly the way I see it all.
            They should never have started taking chances with our health.
            It can lead to so many complications.
            I don’t remember anyone else in my family having such BP or indeed other health problems.
            I’m going to stop taking the statin for a week.

          5. Good luck, and let us know how you get on. have you been on them for long? An old neighbour managed to ‘normalise’ symptoms through exercise and altered diet.

  80. I’m not sure if anyone else has mentioned this.
    But WTF is going on now? Any old or young POS can arrive in France jump in a boat and arrive in our waters and be made welcome by our stupid government. But I’ve your passport is over ten years old with a month to go before it needs to be renewed. The effing French and other EU countries now have invented the right to refuse the owner entry. And even fine them.
    How on earth did this happen?….
    Oh yes, I forgot we have 650 idiots in the same room and who knows how many others who call themselves a civil service.

    1. Our younger son had six months left in his passport twenty years ago. He was setting off for a stag do in Prague and was prevented from leaving the country at Stansted because of this. He had left our home about 4.30 am with his friends and at 7.00 am we got the phone call, ‘Dad, can you come and pick me up?’ (We live just 40 mins from Stansted.) I can just about understand one month from the expiry date but 6 months…!

      1. Ha! It does seem that under “Internationsl Law” every country throughout the world except the UK is allowed to do this.

      2. My son’s (5) year passport runs out next January but I’ve had to renew it now for similar reasons…it’s just a racket

  81. It had been written off 18 months earlier when I got rammed up the back in a traffic queue by a Trannie. Not a lot on damage, but the repair cost was sufficient to have it written off.
    I bought it back as salvage, put it through an MOT as demanded by the insurance company, and had £650 knocked off the insurance payment and got £3700.
    2nd time I had a £900 reduction because of the 1st write off, £450 for the generally scruffy condition of the vehicle and £500 excess as I could not prove that the low loader had actually done the damage, but still got £3,200!!

  82. I’m also off to bed now. I shall be out all day tomorrow, so my next post may not possibly be until Friday. Good night, chums, I hope you all sleep well and awaken full of the joys of Spring.

    1. Good night, sleep well. I’m about finished (finished off, more like) for the day too.

          1. I wish! ( Already panicking about next year’s visit from the ‘appointment with fear’ (ie DiL – makes Meme Markle seem placid and reasonable)
            But thank you, you too.

          2. No! Be calm, I command you. It will be OK and thou shalt have a peaceful sleep. You are amongst people who care about you and those that don’t do not matter.

          3. Bless you, that’s cheered me up. Nottling is a great community.
            When I apologised for the mess to my community midwife on her 1st visit many moons ago, she told me just that.. ‘Those who matter, won’t mind; and those who mind, don’t matter.’
            She was so right, but when you have the dreaded person staying in your home for a couple of weeks (they live in Turdeauland), constantly undermining you, making you feel worthless and stupid etc, it’s not nice (understatement of the century). I was close to a nervous breakdown, and ‘under the doctor’ for a few months after their last visit, and similar after we were there 2 summers ago.
            And now, I really must get some zeds (after responding to a few other replies that just came in.)

          4. Bless you and another day i will share some horror stories of our Trudeauland relations : )

          5. If it really is a problem only use one word for everything she says or criticises:
            “Why”
            Then ask “What would you do?
            and then reply:
            “Why”
            It won’t get you very far, but sure as Hell it’ll annoy her beyond belief.

            In my experience most bullies eventually give up.

          6. Nevertheless, it is harrowing sos. I share MiB’s problems with imported relations.

          7. She’s an extremely clever but nasty piece of work. Twists everything to make me sound like the one in the wrong, puts words into my mouth. If I try to defend or justify myself, she always manages to further twist the knife, far too articulate and clever with words, frequently ends up shouting and screaming at me, but thinks I’m the one who needs therapy. She still bears grudges about perceived slights/events from 15 years ago! – and not just about things I have said/done. I can honestly say that I have never had any such problems with anyone else, ever.
            Apparently, screaming and shouting attacks are par for the course in her family, and she thinks it is normal and acceptable behaviour. My son cannot see a problem with her behaviour, and has joined in at times. A few years ago, both he and she were shouting/bellowing at me in my own home – I can’t even remember what triggered it, I just recall the noise, all while he was holding the baby, poor baby, no wonder the children have ‘issues’ . I actually felt scared for my safety, and would have run from the house if they hadn’t been between me and the door! A good friend had a bed made up ready for me.
            I am sorry for that rant, I am again reliving the feelings, and am shaking. I must go to bed!

          8. Don’t say anything beyond good morning, what would you like for breakfast/lunch/dinner/to drink? Turn your back and walk out if she starts screaming and shouting. You don’t deserve that so don’t put up with it.

          9. I’ve tried the minimal speaking plan, but then I am in the wrong for not speaking, or asking how her day has been etc. Can’t do right for doing wrong :).
            I know I don’t deserve the treatment, but if I did turn and walk away, experience has taught me that would simply trigger another attack.
            Unfortunately, she is won’t ever change, nor is my son likely to revert to the decent human he was before she got her hooks into him.

          10. Just say, I’m not feeling chatty today. I’ve got a headache, am not feeling well. You’re entitled to that.

          11. I will make a note of that too. (And keep a supply of chocolate in the bedroom!) Thank you.

          12. I like your thinking. I’ll take the sedative and give her/them the laxative :)) What does Aussie fungi do? Is it a permanent ‘solution’?

          13. She sounds like she has a narcissistic personality disorder or borderline personality disorder. She sounds very much like my mum but on reflection my mum was probably not quite as bad. I left home a year after my father died, I had to in order to survive without disintegrating as a person.. These people do not respond to reason and use it against you, everything is twisted and there is never, ever, any apology for anything, you are to blame for everything – ‘sorry’ is completely foreign to this type of person. Your son sounds as though he has become co-dependent (a disorder in itself). You have my every sympathy. The platform Quora provides a support/discussion group for those affected by relatives and partners with these disorders.

          14. From what you say, you must have felt a great weight lifted when you left home.
            Thank you for your words of wisdom.
            Your words, “These people do not respond to reason and use it against you, everything is twisted and there is never, ever, any apology” are 100% correct, including about my son.
            She’s definitely a dominating, controlling person.
            Once, I think it was when we were there for the wedding, somebody (her? her mother?) let slip that she’d been told if she ‘carried on like that’, she would lose my son! I got the impression that it was after one of her explosions, with my son being the target. As the saying goes, love is blind.

          15. It might cost visits from the grandchildren but confronting her the first time it starts and telling her and your son that it must stop or they can pack up and leave then and there may be the way forward.

            Either that or refuse to say a word, and walk away.

            I sympathise with your predicament.

          16. Will you come and visit next time they are here? I need somebody to help me speak up and stand my ground/ defend myself!

          17. I would if I could, but I suspect that you may have guessed, tact isn’t a strong point.

          18. Somehow, I don’t think tact would make any difference. I would love to speak freely to her (and him), but wouldn’t dare. Maybe I will develop dementia down the line, then I could get away with speaking freely.
            Last time we were there, she accused me (100% unjustified, as I had neither said a word nor given a ‘look’) of criticising the way she was bringing up her children. (one was, at that moment, having a big meltdown over something or other at the meal table, not that the child was even sitting down, just having a major tantrum) I racked my brains, but still have no idea what triggered her. A full-blown screaming session ensued, culminating in us leaving their home to go back to the hotel.

          19. Is she really worth the hassle?
            Assuming her parents are still around, have you considered speaking to them about it?

            ” I say old beans, do you find my son as difficult as I find your daughter?”
            You might just find that you have unlikely allies.

          20. Sounds terrible, family problems are difficult but it sounds like your ‘guest is somewhat rude. Offer your place to stay and thank them for looking after it whilst you go on holiday…

          21. What a plan! I’d go for that, except I wouldn’t then get to see the children. And the ‘guest’ would certainly not leave my house as she found it.

    1. Bl**dy hell. Talk about throwing (our) good money after bad. Bottomless pit comes to mind. That money would be better spent helping OUR country to be ‘strong, free and prosperous.’

        1. I actually lose sleep over the nightmare that is looming.
          Ah well, goodnight Poppiesmum.

          1. Night night, sleep well. I don’t lose sleep, strangely enough, but every morning I awaken in a torment of anxiety about What Is Going To Happen To Us All – the bed clothes all twisted around me. Every single morning. I never expected to spend what are probably my last years like this.

    2. Ukraine is a lost cause. It was never a country but a cast-off from the collapsed Soviet Union. Putin has successfully rebuilt Russia as a great power both militarily and economically.

      Ukraine meanwhile has become a vassal state of the US and a playground for its elites to both launder money and enrich its corporations such as Blackrock with promises of productive agricultural land acquisitions and the rest.

      The exploitation of Ukraine by the US has extended to fuelling the US military arms complex, the development of laboratory produced bio-weapons, the laundering of vast sums of US dollars back to US politicians including the Bidens and the futile attempts to dislodge Putin by funding a stupid proxy war at the cost of more than half a million young Ukrainian lives but still counting.

      They wonder why we consider Biden’s US the Evil Empire.

    3. Ukraine is a lost cause. It was never a country but a cast-off from the collapsed Soviet Union. Putin has successfully rebuilt Russia as a great power both militarily and economically.

      Ukraine meanwhile has become a vassal state of the US and a playground for its elites to both launder money and enrich its corporations such as Blackrock with promises of productive agricultural land acquisitions and the rest.

      The exploitation of Ukraine by the US has extended to fuelling the US military arms complex, the development of laboratory produced bio-weapons, the laundering of vast sums of US dollars back to US politicians including the Bidens and the futile attempts to dislodge Putin by funding a stupid proxy war at the cost of more than half a million young Ukrainian lives but still counting.

      They wonder why we consider Biden’s US the Evil Empire.

  83. I have decided to buy a new car. A week ago I was thinking of buying an electric one, but I’ve gone off that idea now. Current ideas are: Ineos Grenadier, Bentley Continental (please don’t support that as I’m sure the cost will quickly spoil the fun), another Morgan (but that would have to be accompanied by another car that can actually be used for normal activities) a Fiat Panda (nice and cheap, does most stuff) or ? (Your suggestions here). I like interesting cars.

    1. Well done for not going down the ev route.
      As to suggestions, it depends on what size car you need. I’ve been pleased with my self-charging hybrid Toyota Yaris (averages around 66mpg over the year), MH has self-charging hybrid Rav4 which does about 56 mpg, but it’s a big engine (I think it’s 2.5L). Both very reliable.

      1. I need something to take my dog, but could buy something specifically for that and have another for my own use. Maybe a Suzuki Jimny for dog and shooting purposes, but I can see my friends sniggering 😄

        1. Sounds like the sort of vehicle MH refers to as a ‘hairdresser’s car’ …….

          1. We had one of those some years ago (a Hyundai Coupe) which did lead to an extraordinary amount of rudeness and abuse from other road users just by its very existence.

          2. I can see I’m going to end up with one of the new Defenders. And that is a bit dull.

          3. Ooh! That was my turquoise RAV 4! Wonderful car it was, especially in the very snowy winter of 2009/10! It was as good off-road as our Discovery, and delivered shopping and meals on wheels to a lot of old and housebound people in this area!

          4. When he went to renew the road tax last year (done through the dealers when he bought it), MH discovered it was ridiculously high, much higher than his previous Rav4 which was a lower spec. Even though the current one is very low emissions (ulez compliant apparently) and far lower than many older, smaller cars that have cheaper tax, the road tax is based on price at first registration. Great way to encourage us to have ‘cleaner’ cars.

          1. I see you’ve driven one! Any thoughts about the Ineos Grenadier? I like the look of them but I’m a bit worried about the vague steering.

          2. I think it’s a very good take on a Defender, but whether it justifies the price is debatable. I don’t like the Defender, but think JLR should have fought a bit more for the classic shape! That may sound a bit girly!

          3. The new Defender is the Ineos Grenadier. Landrover took Jim Ratcliffe to court over it but lost. If you are unaware of the vehicle do look it up!

          4. I know! What was wrong with what I said? The LR Defender doesn’t look like it did, whilst the Grenadier looks like an old Defender!

        2. A dog cart or a shooting brake then – for when we can’t travel by normal transport. I hope you know how to harness up.

    2. What’s it for? Utility – a Japanese pick up truck.
      Fun but also long journeys – an M2.
      Poncing about in nice weather – Morgan.

        1. There’s no other possible use for them! I’d still like one but our house is like a car park already.

          1. I loved it, but it is, alas, just a toy. I told myself that 60 years ago this was everyday transportation for people lucky enough to be able to afford a car, but the reality is…..a toy.😂

          1. Oh yes. A friend of mine at university’s father had one. Beautiful machine, which was not improved by my friend backing it out of the garage and removing the front bumper as he did so!

      1. 😂 No thanks……we’ll all be driving something like that if the net zero loonies win the culture war!

    3. If you are good at mechanics and physically mobile. my suggestion would be a vintage jeep (one of those square, military ones). That would have been my choice if I weren’t so fucked over physically these days

      1. No current physical problems (thanks be) but whilst I admire mechanics I’m afraid their dark arts are a mystery to me.

      1. But the servicing cost😒. I’ve never owned one (yet) but I feel certain I’ll succumb one of these days.

    4. I bought a milk float once – a proper battery powered, 8mph top speed milk float.

      Fantastic vehicle. Huge capacity, easy to get in and out of, a doddle to drive. The tail backs it caused were legendary.

    5. Buy a German car. If the fools running the EU and by extension the German government continue with their disastrous economic policies the species will be extinct in a year or two, either that or manufacturing exported or bought by China.

    1. I don’t believe any of their propaganda – whatever happens with the climate is natural and driven by the sun and the tides.

  84. Gosh, people do pack up early around these ‘ere parts these days! The night is but yet young!

    1. I know – I’m toying with the idea. Trouble is, if you give in too early you are guaranteed a restless night with circular thoughts tormenting you.

    2. I’m here! We had our dinner – stuff from the fridge that needed using up. Washed up afterwards as dishwasher has gone on strike – might be permanent…….
      Now sitting here catching up with the chat. Husband and cats all peaceful.

        1. Not really – we’re just relaxing and listening to a You -tube performance of Chopin 1st piano concerto.

    3. Perhaps they are getting in practice for Sunday when it will be (ostensibly) an hour later than today.

    1. The gentle beauty of his choral music is totally at odds with the “being bashed round the head with a sockfull of wet sand” effect of his symphonies!

      1. There’s no bashing around the head in the slow movements of the 7th and 8th.

    1. What? Baths are for the morning or before changing in the evening, not for bedtime!

        1. Excellent. So turn the heating down in your bedroom. Sixteen degrees works for me.

  85. Evening, all. I managed to get some of the plants I bought yesterday into the garden before the heavens opened again. It rained so hard last night at least I didn’t have to worry about giving them a good watering before I put them in.

    Who in their right mind would have a smart meter when it’s known that it gives the electricity companies the ability to shut off your supply if you’re deemed to be using too much and charge you more if you happen to use it at the same time as everybody else?

    1. People just believe what they’re told – that it helps you regulate your usage. People will believe any bullshit.

      1. When my provider keeps asking me to fill in questionnaires about how it is helping me save power I keep telling them it’s up to me to switch the lights off, not use the oven, etc. They do sod all to help!

    2. I was warned off by a work colleague who was an early taker and became convinced that her usage was being falsified and she was being overcharged.

    3. And if they decide you owe them £20,000 you are first trying to talk to a computer and then end up in court like the unfortunate Post Office people.

      1. EDF Energy recently notified me that my Direct Debit would almost double from £193.00 pcm to £357.00 pcm. I engaged in email correspondence with EDF and when checking meter readings on my App noted that my monthly meter readings had been completely ignored in favour of vastly inflated estimated readings.

        After several exchanges my charges were revised and instead of being over £3.5k in Debit I am now in over £600.00 in Credit.

        Meanwhile I receive weekly letter communications from EDF imploring me to accept a Smart Meter.

        It is obvious that these companies are attempting to worry consumers into believing that Smart Meters would avoid such mistakes whereas in reality blatant overcharging with inflated estimated readings (whilst completely ignoring customer readings) is a deliberate ploy to coerce customers into accepting Smart Meters.

  86. I look at the moon as I sleep, always have since childhood.
    Good night sweet dreams .

  87. Another evening in church. Said Eucharist followed by a concert of music for the Wednesday in Holy Week performed by the Royal Holloway Choir, whose music director we share. The choir was founded in 1886 and now has 24 excellent choral scholars. Sadly they specialise in contemporary music but we had Allegri and JS Bach this evening as well as a London premiere.

    1. Sounds lovely; I’ve had two days off due to being busy during the day. Have earmarked going tomorrow night for the Washing of Feet Maundy service.

      1. As good as I’ve heard it done. The choir was split between the main body of the church and the Lady Chapel (behind the apse) with a soloist up in the organ loft, which is way up above the choir screen.

        1. The local choir which performed that near here last year split on those lines. The church was perishing but it was a good performance and the soprano was superb.

        2. Sounds excellent. At Canterbury the ripieno group are placed at the high altar whilst the rest of the choir are in the stalls. That makes a big gap which is very effective. I have conducted a choir at St Mark’s in Venice where the separation between the soloists and the choir would have been even more effective, but the Catholic authorities ruled it out. They are very sensitive about music in Latin.

    2. Sue, am I mistaken, but was Allegri’s Miserere Mei rediscovered by Alan Keith on “Your Hundred Best Tunes”? Prior to his airing of it, it was almost unknown.

      1. Our music director believes that this piece has evolved with ever more embellishment over the centuries and that the original was actually quite a simple setting. It is, as he says, subject to much speculation.

  88. Our grandson will be 10 in March. He became totally deaf at 4 and has had cochlear implants. This enabled him to hear enough for him to learn to speak and was doing really well at school in the circumstances. However in the last 6 months he has lost control of muscle power in his jaw and also the ability to control his hand movements. He is unable to get his words out or even use sign language and cannot write. Eating solid food is very hard for him. The school teachers and his friends can’t understand what he is trying to say and this state of affairs has meant that he takes his frustrations out on his mother violently. There are no speech therapists in the county and long waiting lists in neighbouring ones. He is being taken for an assessment today but I fear a very bleak future is in store.

    He was given an appointment in Cardiff to see a neurologist, the same one who saw him at the time he went deaf. She had recently been asked by the local team to arrange an MRI scan but she refused as it would have meant the cochlear implant team would have to be involved to avoid damage to his hearing.

    As his symptoms have suddenly worsened before Christmas, losing control of his legs at times he was in desperate need of a proper diagnosis. She cancelled the appointment this week at the last minute.

    He has been prescribed a sort of milkshake which contains nutriants so he can get something inside him as he is losing weight and energy to do anything that a lively 9 year old wants to do like playing football and doing gymnastics. The chemist can’t get sufficient quantities to keep up with the prescriptions however.
    A wheelchair will need to be ordered.

    Now waiting for another neurologist to call and arrange an urgent MRI in Wrexham.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/weatherwatchers/report/14ffdcf5-c4d7-427d-a886-a368415f38dd/

    What a week it has been. My daughter and I at last got an appointment for my grandson with Neurology in Cardiff. Suddenly they realised that further investigation was urgently needed and an MRI scan was to be done pronto ie this week. However it would involve removing the magnets in his head so they could get a clear brain image then the MRI and also a lumber puncture. It would require all teams to be available plus a free bed on the children’s ward. There was a junior doctors’ strike also on that week and being Easter holidays there would be fewer staff at work. By Sunday night nothing had been heard so we were feeling that nothing was going to happen.

    Late Monday afternoon she got a call from Cardiff. It was one of the surgeons who started by saying “just ringing about tomorrow”. It seems everything had been organised … apart from notifying the patient!

    Just back home now. Patient in bed fast asleep. All procedures done.

    He has to wait until Sunday to try his Cochlears so we won’t know if his hearing is affected. In the meantime communication is very difficult.

    1. What a difficult time for all concerned! NHS admin is appalling, isn’t it? Prayers for your grandson 🙏

    2. What a difficult time for all concerned! NHS admin is appalling, isn’t it? Prayers for your grandson 🙏

    3. What a difficult time for all concerned! NHS admin is appalling, isn’t it? Prayers for your grandson 🙏

    4. Poor, poor child. And poor poor you, Rusty, all of you. I am fighting a different but not unrelated battle for my adult son at the moment, having spent his entire childhood at loggerheads with those paid by the state to help people like him, but who actually act as highly paid gatekeepers to prevent access to services that hardly exist.

      I so wish you well. KBO x

    5. Poor, poor child. And poor poor you, Rusty, all of you. I am fighting a different but not unrelated battle for my adult son at the moment, having spent his entire childhood at loggerheads with those paid by the state to help people like him, but who actually act as highly paid gatekeepers to prevent access to services that hardly exist.

      I so wish you well. KBO x

    6. My grandson had similar problem when he was 4. Consultant said although he was in pain he couldn’t do the implant for another 6 weeks. However he went on to say he could do it privately the next day for £4000 (b*stard) so reluctantly his father coughed up.
      Hope the treatment is successful

    7. Oh goodness Rusty, what a terrible worry for you all, especially mum. Thank goodness the surgeon made the call otherwise … it would have been put down as a missed appointment. I really hope things went well and the implants work once he’s allowed to use them again. I wish you all strength to deal with everything. Poor lad.

    8. Wishing you every success with your battle against the system.
      What a wonderful family you are to carry on fighting. It’s dreadful that you have to do it as compassion is almost extinct in public services. You’re in my thoughts.

    9. You live in Wales so are instantly at a disadvantage. I cannot believe that in my region either Addenbrookes or Papworth will not have provided excellent care. I write from direct experience.

      That aside I pray for the best for your dear grandson and for your family.

      1. He was initially referred to Great Ormand Street but it is one hell of a round trip. It was tough having to get him up at 5am and try to explain what they were going to do plus leave him with no hearing afterwards.

        1. I am so sorry to hear that. My mother in law was profoundly deaf and had problems with treatment throughout her life. We took many specialist’s advice but surgery performed in the sixties was unable to be corrected.

        2. I am so sorry to hear that. My mother in law was profoundly deaf and had problems with treatment throughout her life. We took many specialist’s advice but surgery performed in the sixties was unable to be corrected.

    10. Evening RT,
      The little fella has one hell of a load to carry, to be coldly factual
      1.5 billion investment would surely
      aid his passage in the near future.
      Let us pray his load is lightened in the coming days.

    11. I’m sorry to read this, Rusty. His travails seem rather grim. The support of his family does you all proud in what seem to be very trying circumstances. Wishing you and him all the very best for a better post-Easter outcome.

      1. Thank you so much. Fingers are very much crossed that they will discover what is going on and find something that can reverse the current deterioration.

    12. I am sorry to read about your grandson, I do hope all is resolved and he is able to have his cochlear implants updated. So frustrating for all of you, all the best to you all.

    13. Oh, man. Poor wee lad. Thats awful, Rusty. He and family have all the sympathy and best wishes I can give. Hoping very much that something positive comes out of this.

    14. Oh, man. Poor wee lad. Thats awful, Rusty. He and family have all the sympathy and best wishes I can give. Hoping very much that something positive comes out of this.

    15. What a dreadful state of affairs, Rusty. I’m so sorry for your grandson and the family, and sent good wishes and thoughts to you all. He’s so young to have to deal with such life changing issues. Good luck!

  89. 385018+up ticks,

    I’ve no doubt the tribal majority voter will be in mass evidence to “see the lights” with me looking for the blade runners to make an an appearance.

    Ramadan lights on display in central London over Easter
    Islamic holy month celebrated in West End during Christian festival

    1. Remember that little poem found within a church wall, a prayer for strength, you still have it somewhere . Blessings and God’s love .

  90. I’m so pleased you did so, those words were believed to have been written by a Christian so many centuries ago and somehow survived within a hole in the church walls . Always keep those words , they are strength within the deepest of faiths.

  91. If they really wanted road tax to be fair, and ensure everybody paid, abolish road tax and add to fuel.

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