Wednesday 4 May: The NHS must spend less on executives and more on front-line care

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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536 thoughts on “Wednesday 4 May: The NHS must spend less on executives and more on front-line care”

    1. Good morning Korky. It has not yet reached south-west Cambs. Must take Poppie out before it does.

      1. Sunshine here at the moment, 11:30, but rain radar showing another band approaching from the NW. Mustn’t complain as ground was very dry and hard before the rainfall.

        1. It started to rain here about 11.00 am, just a well spaced very gentle pitter-pattering. That was it. The ground is rock hard. We are clay on chalk, possibly the worst combination.

    2. Speaking entirely selfishly, SWMBO and I start the South Downs Way from Winchester to Eastbourne this weekend and are hoping that the current dry spell continues for a bit.

  2. Ukraine war and China lockdowns drive fastest UK price rises in years. 4 may 2022.

    The cost of household goods such as toys, furniture and clothing is rising by the fastest rate in more than 15 years as the impact of the war in Ukraine combines with Covid lockdowns in China.

    We must get used to this over the next year or so. This is just the beginning of an attempt to lay the difficulties ahead at the door of Russia and China since the alternative is that western policies both in the past and present will take the blame; sanctions and their effects on the West being a particular bugbear. The War in Ukraine has nothing to do with the spike in prices. Ukraine does not export “toys, furniture or clothing” to us in any quantities that would affect inflation; nor has food been seriously affected as yet, because we are still living on last year’s harvests. The shortage of Sunflower Oil is more probably due to speculators buying it up and holding it back until the price rises sufficiently for them to make a killing than any natural constriction in supply. The real bite will be in the coming Autumn and Winter.

    Our present difficulties are all home-grown. The shutting down of the Western Economies and flooding them with cash over the last two years has generated our current difficulties.

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/04/ukraine-war-china-lockdowns-fastest-uk-price-rises-years

    1. Previously I’ve stated that Johnson’s words about the bright future for the UK and its people is nothing but lies delivered in his inimitable style i.e. empty rhetoric well seasoned with bullshit. An empty vessel living up to its reputation.

    2. 352400+ up ticks,

      Morning AS,
      Agreed with bells on, whistles blowing, sirens screeching.

    3. The guardian manages to completely ignore the things adding massive costs – taxation.

  3. Good morning all. A dull and wet start today with moderate rain and 6°C outside.

    On the bright side, ERNIE’s reinvested £75 for me.

    A post from Going Postal:-

    lizzydripping • 3 minutes ago
    Elsie, 77yrs old, born just after the war, the very year the war ended, and now she has a free bus pass to go wherever she wants and it doesn’t cost a penny. Ever since the free passes were introduced pensioners were given a freedom to get out and about. Does she not remember, as a child, the absolute poverty of families? Has she forgotten how to make do and mend?
    Can she not find other ways to keep warm other than pressing a switch for instant heat? Can she not trawl the charity shops for fleece blankets to wrap round her legs and round her shoulders while she sits watching the TV? They are effective in keeping one warm. I see her on TV wearing a thin cotton blouse, how the hell will that blouse keep her warm? No indication of a good vest that will last for years, a thick woollen jumper, a scarf round the neck…all available in charity shops at a fraction of the original cost. OK…I can afford to buy these things new, but they do and will last me years and if I couldn’t afford to buy them new I’d be in the charity shops looking for warm clothes and blankets. We are frugal with the heating, only because we’d rather have the money in our pockets rather than the electric or gas companies.
    That’s the trouble nowadays. People want to sit in their houses in thin clothing with the heat blaring. Well those days have gone. They have forgotten how to wrap up warm. They have gone soft and braindead.

      2. Actually, if the air is cold in your home, really cold, no amount of layering will make you feel warm and cosy. I have a thick fleece onesie that I can step into wearing fully layered clothing (a ‘body’, vest, T-shirt and jumper! – then tights, trousers and two pairs of socks) and I can still feel the cold.

        The library used to be the traditional retreat for heat-starved pensioners.

        1. The perception of comfort is felt through the feet. It is a signal to direct any available warmth to vital organs such as the heart and the head and sacrifice the feet doing so. If the feet are kept warm, then there is the spare capacity for the vital organs, and the result is comfort.

          The answer is therefore not air temperature. Even freezing air is tolerable if the feet are warm. Where feasible, underfloor heating of some sort is perhaps the best way to save money on fuel in winter. Failing that putting two pairs of socks in the microwave for ten minutes before putting them on and nice woolly slippers are an alternative. When this is done, the thermostat in winter can be turned down from 25ºC to 15ºC with no loss of comfort.

          Most body heat is lost through the head – the brain is a notorious consumer of energy – so a woolly hat is also handy to reduce the amount of warmth that is directed up there from the feet.

          1. Buy one of these, I have two of them and they are great. Energy consumption is minimal that I don’t notice any difference in running or not running one.
            https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/162433238017?_trkparms=ispr%3D1&hash=item25d1c68401:g:nY0AAOSwnHZYeLPh&amdata=enc%3AAQAGAAAA8AGset2Xmx2Y3lflZ82hR%2B3R1nTWofdUBH%2B4HgJVNLBDV%2BEbcYcZpFS8TEVuUABf6%2FSb0t%2Fqa%2Bz9YBRdqmYSlVeO%2BA4UO3fH%2FTEDKrV7UNvQqhfi8utSr4jh1gFm5b0%2Bmgjcwhz%2BLrlBLoRq%2BBz2HA7dVThCiDDDRP5YC7LEBRYSkfC6O3VO3V1nvD4KraX%2Bh2hvUN11np4UdRFPQx38cvFWZnuoevD%2FPEVBOU3UCyY27da1vV7YkbR8ZR%2FIZIpmmPXufJc6vS0gQeD1RjQp%2FSp0AKzXNverdT5xCCviGCMuebpQOpEZBqTfDxLM6wZFZg%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABFBM1JfI5ZFg

          2. I have two. One for Dolly and the other for my feet. 75 watts to run each one.
            Good morning.

          3. Good morning Pip. Are you happy using them? The one currently under my feet has been going for three years and is still working perfectly. I actually brought the other one for the cat, who predictably, when it comes to cats, rejected it for the carpet.

          4. Yes i’m happy with them. They don’t cost much to run and it means toasty feet and a snoring dog. Try rubbing some catnip on it.

        2. Reading rooms were all closed sometime ago. Libraries have become free of charge computer terminals.

      3. Buses should have some sort of beacon to tell people where they are. That way you don’t spend half an hour waiting for them to turn up.

        Why half an hour? Ah, well, first to get somewhere by 2 you can’t get the bus that would get there for 2, you have to get the one before, that gets you there at half 1. Because the 2 will be late. Now, to get the 1:30 you can’t arrive on time… don’t be daft. You have to arrive early – as the bus won’t be on time and cannot be predicted. Now you’re standing outside from 1:15 to get to an appointment at 2 in a vehicle journey that would take – door to door – less than 20 minutes.

        Oh, and it’s not especially cheap, either. This is why buses are rubbish.

        1. #2 son is Switzerland has programmed a Raspberry Pi to download the bus arrival times that are displayed at his local bus stop. He has a countdown timer on his kitchen top so he minimises the time outside – important in winter.

        2. Very few buses here. The only time I use my bus pass is if I meet friends in town having driven there.

  4. I should have added a Happy Starwars day to one and all!
    May the 4th be with you!

    1. It’ll take twenty years for that to disappear given the British sense of humour.

      There is a strong whiff of stitchery-uppery about the whole thing though. At any given time, half the MPs in the HoC are on the internet on their phones, and he’s the only one to get pushed into resigning?
      Pull the other one!

  7. Today’s leading letter:

    SIR – The letter (May 2) from Chris Hopson (chief executive, NHS Providers), Professor Martin Marshall (chairman, Royal College of General Practitioners) and Matthew Taylor (chief executive, NHS Confederation) on NHS performance exemplifies the problem with the NHS: only one of the signatories is involved in clinical care.

    You report that half a million pounds a day is being spent on storing personal protective equipment; this comes after numerous reports of the waste and unlawful activity involved in purchasing PPE that was subsequently found to be unfit for purpose. There was also the fiasco of the Test and Trace initiative, which the Public Accounts Committee described as an “eye-watering” waste of taxpayers’ money.

    During the Second World War, Churchill railed against the vast administrative tail of the deployed forces, referring to them as “useless mouths”. Rather than getting rid of the useless mouths, the NHS continues to find them ever more outlandish roles that have nothing to do with the delivery of clinical care.

    Dr J P G Bolton
    Bishops Lydeard, Somerset

    Well said, Dr Bolton, but I fear nothing will change because the political will to do so simply isn’t there.

  8. SIR – NHS leaders and senior GP representatives persistently present a false narrative, while attempting to invoke sympathy for their efforts in working within a failing health service.

    Britain’s hospitals are overwhelmed because “full-time” GPs work an average of 3.5 days a week, and even then employ telephone and video links before agreeing to see a patient in person. Rather than manage acute situations, they now advise sufferers to dial for an ambulance. This results in dissatisfied patients, resentful hospital staff and a quiet life for well-remunerated GPs. Most are far from overstretched, and the Royal College of GPs should not claim that they are.

    Matters need to be resolved, and GPs fulfilling their contractual commitments would be a good start.

    Dr A C E Stacey MRCGP
    Rustington, West Sussex

    SIR – The NHS has decided that painkillers will no longer be prescribed for patients with osteoarthritis. Instead, we are being told to exercise.

    I finally received a physiotherapy appointment after a five-month wait, hoping to be instructed on suitable exercises. I have now been told the physiotherapist will be working from home and will telephone me. I am at a loss to know how physical therapy can be delivered over the phone.

    Lynne R Wells
    Hednesford, Staffordshire

    Let’s face it; the NHS is well and truly broken. And our government couldn’t care less.

    1. Dr Stacey hits nail on head. Back in Blair’s days DHSS decided GP’s should take the lead in providing more local services in their practices (because hospital care is very expensive). Like Mr Blair that turned out very well!

      1. Bliar promised: “An NHS dentist on every high street”. Have you recently tried registering with such a practice – assuming you can find one?? We have remained with our previous practice some 30 miles away.

    2. No, the government thinks the NHS is amazing because all the endless reports and statistics it produces says it is. That’s what the majority of the administrators actually spend their time doing – working to tell the government what it wants to hear.

      The NHS fails because it is a whipping post for the Left who see it as a bastion of unionisation. The Right want to make it work, but can’t because the NHS is A. Probably sick and tired of ‘initiatives’ B. Any changes mean risk to jobs the state would really like, and they close ranks.

      It’s also really difficult to see improvements over anything that isn’t a glacial time period and trust managers, hospital managers all like the status quo of six figure salaries.

  9. SIR – Your report about the Government’s drive to recruit magistrates seems to indicate that the fall in the number of JPs – from 30,000 in 2009 to 12,300 now – is due to the public’s lack of interest in joining their local bench.

    In fact, it is the closure of courts that is the real problem. When I started on the West Suffolk bench in 1982, there were six courts in this half of the county. When I retired from the bench in 2008, the only remaining court was Bury St Edmunds. This court closed in 2016 after dispensing justice for 440 years, and now the only court in the whole county is in Ipswich. Potential magistrates do not want to have to travel long distances to sit in courts away from their local area.

    Local justice has been the essence of the system since it began. Until the Courts Act in 2003, magistrates had to live within 15 minutes’ travel of their commission area.

    Opening more courts, as well as recruiting more magistrates, would go a long way towards reducing the national backlog of approximately 370,000 cases still waiting to be heard.

    Dr Richard Soper
    Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk

    Prior to my retirement some ten years ago I enquired about the possibility of becoming a magistrate. I was informed during a telephone conversation that ‘diversity is important’ and in my case any application by me was unlikely to succeed. This was despite having worked closely with some aspects of the criminal law for the previous 42 years and a reservist for 39 of them.

    1. Indeed. I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t want to recruit me either. We all know they only want people of colour.

    2. I imagine the intent is to bring Ukraine in to the EU and thus continue to promote Ukraine in that sense.

  10. SIR – Regarding Russia’s threat to withhold gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria, Tony Lowery (Letters, May 2) says: “If [Vladimir Putin] wishes to sell energy to the EU, he must trade equally with all or none.”

    Sadly, Russia has not been doing that for many years. Germany negotiated a separate pricing arrangement that gives it a sizeable discount on gas, meaning the German economy has had an unfair commercial advantage over its “friends and partners” in the EU for two decades.

    This rank hypocrisy is conveniently ignored by Lord Heseltine, Alastair Campbell and others who still want Britain to return to that illiberal and undemocratic Franco-German stitch-up.

    Steve Narancic
    Wantage, Oxfordshire

    With apologies for mentioning two of the names that are guaranteed in my case to provoke bad language. Nevertheless, surely discounts for large users of anything are not uncommon? In any event, the days of Germany’s industrial prowess seem likely to be dented for some time to come now, whereas our complete lack of a sensible energy policy looks set to keep us in the doldrums for the forseeable future.

    1. Trying to dictate to the owner of gas and oil to whom and under what terms he “must” sell it looks a little bit silly to me anyway!

  11. Down with Biden’s Ministry of Truth. Spiked 4 May 2022.

    All you need to know about Washington’s new Disinformation Governance Board is that it is headed by someone who has spread misinformation. That would be Nina Jankowicz, a researcher and author who, when she isn’t doing political parodies of songs from Mary Poppins that will give you a hernia from cringing so hard, is pumping out balderdash that any self-respecting disinformation unit would instantly flag as dodgy. Disinfo hunter, heal thyself!

    Ms Jankowicz has, in recent years, pushed the fact-lite claim that the Hunter Biden laptop story was a ‘Russian influence op’. It wasn’t, of course. Even the NYT, which notoriously downplayed the ‘laptop from hell’ for months, now admits that it’s legit. She has posited that the Kremlin ‘used proxies’ to try to make Hunter’s laptop into a story. Maybe those nameless, nefarious Ruskies led Hunter by the hand to drop off his sordid computer in that Delaware repair shop? And she has promoted a podcast featuring none other than Christopher Steele. He’s the analyst whose Trump-Russia dossier that so titillated America’s woke elites claimed, with not so much as a sliver of evidence, that Donald Trump once paid Russian hookers to take a leak for him. Among other things that subsequently turned out to be Grade A bunkum.

    Who else would you make the head of the Ministry of Truth but Big Sister? You cannot possibly promote someone of honesty and integrity to the post since they would rapidly become an embarrassment. You must choose an inveterate Liar and Dissembler like yourself. Only thus can the truth be suppressed. The UK has taken a different path in using the law to shut down Free Speech though it still acts behind the scenes with organisations like 77 Brigade to counteract online dissent and personally, though surreptitiously, against prominent individual opposition.

    We have fallen into the hands of a Great Evil manifested in Cultural Marxism, the belief system of the political elites.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2022/05/03/down-with-bidens-ministry-of-truth/

  12. SIR – How many of us of a certain age will admit to reading Lady Chatterley’s Lover on public transport after it was cleared for publication in 1960, disguised by a newspaper – possibly The Daily Telegraph?

    Mark Brazier
    Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

    As part of our English A level we studied some of the works of D H Lawrence. The controversy over Lady C’s Lover was still quite fresh at that time, and when our English teacher made a passing reference to it there followed a certain amount of sniggering at the back. Far from admonishing us, she explained that a wider reading of Lawrence would benefit our knowledge of him, and she was pleased to note that some of us had already done so. Quite an enlightened attitude for the late 1960s!

    1. Good morning Hugh

      I found a disintergrating copy of Lady C’s Lover in the top of MIL’s wardrobe when we were clearing her house .. it must have been up there for 60 years, it was hidden in a brown paper bag .

      DHL’s writing must have been similar to his voice , slow laborious and deliberate .. similar to an abstract piece of music with no crescendo or cadence.

    2. Didn’t he conquer Aquaba with Omar Sharif when he was in Arabia? Lol.

    3. I read it on the train going up to school, not sure of the year. I did conceal it in another book though. Never understood what all the fuss was about. It’s the most boring book supposedly about sex ever. The Virgin and The Gypsy has far more sexual tension and build up.

      1. I saw the film of TVATG that came out in 1970. The trouble was that I was living in South Africa at the time and the censors had reduced the film’s running time from 95 minutes to something just over 50 minutes. It was completely incomprehensible 🙁

  13. Boris Johnson: We will make Ukraine so strong that no country will attack it again. 4 May 2022.

    Britain and its allies will continue to arm Ukraine until it is so strong it can never be invaded again, Boris Johnson told the Ukrainian parliament on Tuesday.

    “Ukraine will win, Ukraine will be free,” he said in the first address to the Verkhovna Rada in Kyiv by a world leader since Russia’s invasion in February.

    The Prime Minister was given a standing ovation by Ukrainian MPs. Some brandished British flags and banners thanking the UK for weapons sent by London to help fight against Russia.

    Admirable sentiments. If only he and his pals in Westminster applied them to the UK!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/05/03/boris-johnson-will-make-ukraine-strong-no-country-will-attack/

    1. And who is paying for all this – ah, yes – the British taxpayer! After the horrific waste of the Covid era we need to recover economically, not support a corrupt regime who arguably caused their own problems, egged on by America and the EU.

    2. I think the waffling oaf should bugger off and leave Ukraine alone. All he’s doing is extending the war. He’d be better off turning this around and going to Russia to demand they ceasefire and meet with Ukraine to negotiate a peace settlement.

    1. Slightly lighter grey today.
      But we have been promised a power cut for most of the day.

  15. SIR – The Government is proposing a repeat of Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy scheme. However, getting a council or housing association rental property is hard enough as it is, due to their scarcity. A huge number of people who should be eligible cannot get anywhere near one.

    To make any sort of comparison to the original right-to-buy scheme is flawed, as the number of council properties available at that time far outstripped what is available now.

    Moreover, how would this proposal help the huge number of middle-income earners who cannot afford to buy and are trapped in the private rental market, due to an over-inflated housing market?

    Thomas Le Cocq
    Batcombe, Somerset

    Presumably someone has pointed out to Johnson that this policy was pursued by probably the greatest Conservative in our lifetime and is worth repeating. However, I suspect that, in Johnson’s case, this so-called policy is just mere words for the local elections tomorrow and is most unlikely to see the light of day again.

    1. The Government is proposing a repeat of Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy scheme.

      This like the Rwanda deportations, levelling up etc. is just another publicity gimmick!

      1. Government chucks out initiatives for headlines. When they’re actually implemented they’re hideously over complicated, awkward, time consuming and work on glacial timescales.

        Government is incompetent and useless. It thinks it is better placed to spend private money. It isn’t.

    2. Shove theirs. It’s clutching at straws to find something, anything that might get a good headline *without* actually having to do anything productive and effective that the public need.

      We applied for the green thing for insulation on the roof. You couldn’t have it unless you also had wall insulation as well. Then you had to pay for it, arrange the supplier from an approved list and they had a backlog. Once you’d paid, the government might – upon filling in another form – 6 months later – keep it’s word.

    3. When Maggie did it, there wasn’t the “housing crisis” we are currently experiencing due to unlimited imports.

  16. What a remarkable record of service to his country…

    General Sir Geoffrey Howlett, veteran of 40 years with the Paras and Commander-in-Chief of Allied Forces Northern Europe – obituary

    Howlett was credited with ‘great presence and authority combined with natural humility and a strong sense of the ridiculous’

    By
    Telegraph Obituaries
    3 May 2022 • 5:13pm

    General Sir Geoffrey Howlett, who has died aged 92, won an MC in the jungles of Malaya; parachuted into Egypt during the Suez Crisis; and rose to become Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces Northern Europe, based in Norway during the Cold War.

    In August 1971 he was leading paratroopers in west Belfast when 10 civilians, including a priest and a mother of eight, died after being shot during an operation, and in 2019 he gave forthright evidence at the inquest into the deaths, bravely declining the protection of anonymity.

    The events which led to the award of his MC occurred in February 1952 in the Malay state of Selangor at the height of the Malayan Emergency. Howlett was commanding an ambush party which killed one Communist terrorist (CT), and wounded another, and the following day he led his platoon through thick swamp and jungle to attack a reported CT encampment.

    The place turned out to be deserted, but on withdrawal they encountered a group of heavily armed CTs.

    In the subsequent fighting the enemy were all killed and Howlett was awarded an Immediate MC, his aggressive and skilful leadership having proved a decisive factor.

    A fellow officer credited Howlett with “great presence and authority combined with natural humility and a strong sense of the ridiculous, which gave him a singular capacity for right judgments and fair decisions”.

    Geoffrey Hugh Whitby Howlett was born in India on February 5 1930. His father, Brigadier Bernard Howlett, DSO and Bar, was killed in Italy in 1943 when a long-range artillery shell landed exactly on target.

    Young Geoffrey was educated at Wellington College and Sandhurst, and in 1950 he was commissioned into his father’s regiment, The Queen’s Own Royal West Kents. The following year, his first overseas posting was the operational tour to Malaya.

    Howlett then enjoyed an interesting tour as ADC to the British Commandant in Berlin. Mid-1950s Berlin was at the forefront of the Cold War, with tension and intrigue never far from the surface, and Howlett’s time there would serve him well when he was promoted to senior rank.

    In 1955 he transferred to The Parachute Regiment, joining the Third Battalion, and at the time of the Suez Crisis in late 1956 he was their Air Adjutant.

    On November 5 1956, 3 Para were chosen for a parachute assault to capture El Gamil airfield (now Port Said International Airport). Howlett was responsible for ensuring that the aircraft were correctly loaded with troops from different companies, so that they arrived properly grouped together when they hit the ground.

    He jumped on the second lift, and the airfield and its surroundings were secured for the loss of four dead and 32 wounded.

    Next, Howlett took part in anti-terrorist operations in Cyprus against the Greek-Cypriot group Eoka, before returning to Britain to become an instructor at Eaton Hall and Mons officer cadet schools. He then joined 2 Para, becoming adjutant and then a company commander, serving operational tours in Kuwait and Bahrain before being selected to attend the RAF Staff College at Bracknell.

    In 1964 he served on the staff of 16 Parachute Brigade Headquarters during an emergency UN peacekeeping tour of Cyprus. His diplomatic skills and straight talking were used to full effect when he became liaison officer between headquarters and the Turkish Cypriot leader Dr Fazil Kucuk.

    Howlett then became training major of 15 Para – the Paras’ Scottish territorial battalion – before returning to 2 Para as second in command, with postings in the UK, Malaya and Hong Kong.

    He attended the Combined Staff College at Latimer, Buckinghamshire, followed, in 1969, by appointment as military assistant to the Commander in Chief Allied Forces Northern Europe, based near Oslo.

    In 1971 he assumed command of 2 Para and oversaw four operational tours in Northern Ireland. He himself was under fire on a number of occasions and in 1972 he was appointed OBE for gallantry.

    It was during that period that Howlett was travelling in a small group of vehicles which came under intense fire, several rounds hitting his Land Rover. The paratroopers, officers and men left the vehicles and mounted an immediate counter-attack on IRA gunmen, who fled the scene.

    Returning to the vehicles, which had been guarded by the drivers, Howlett, seeing that his driver was profoundly shocked, put his arm around the young Para and told him: “Take it easy, take my seat and I’ll drive back.” Which he did.

    Nearly 50 years later, in 2019, aged 89, Howlett found himself back in Belfast, summonsed to give evidence at the Ballymurphy inquests into deaths which occurred during “internment week”, August 1971 – Operation Demetrius, which entailed the sweeping up and detention of scores of men and women. Internment was intended to neutralise the threat from the IRA, but many of those detained had no links to the terrorists.

    Because of his age, Howlett was told, he could avoid attending, but he explained that he felt a moral imperative to attend – even though it would mean that he would be aggressively interrogated by lawyers.

    He also declined the protection of anonymity, and after giving evidence at the hearing in Belfast, he asked the coroner’s permission to address the assembled relations of the dead. “I have enormous sympathy with you all,” he said, “…as relatives of those who were killed in this case on the ninth of August 1971.

    “I know something about bereavement, because my father was killed in Italy in the war, when I was 13, and I wanted to know everything about how it happened as well.”

    He described that day in 1971 as “the busiest” of his life, with internment having unexpected catastrophic results. “None of us realised,” he recalled, “that the day of internment and the next day or two would turn out to be such a rebellious period with as much rioting, shooting, petrol and nail bombing as it was. I don’t think any of us were quite prepared for the big change.”

    He added: “The situation was never the same again… Following internment there had become an enemy out there who were definitely armed and firing at us.”

    A regimental note from the time said soldiers viewed the incident in August as “inflicting severe casualties on the IRA”, but at the inquest Howlett conceded that “most if not all [the civilian victims] were not IRA”.

    One of those who died from the shootings on August 9 1971 was a Catholic priest, Father Hugh Mullan.

    Howlett said it was “quite obvious that Fr Mullan was not part of the IRA” and that he was almost certainly giving someone the last rites.

    Howlett would later support calls for a statute of limitations on prosecutions of soldiers accused of offences during the Troubles, saying in 2022: “It has been more than 50 years. It is starting to become absurd.”

    Between 1973 and 1975 he was an instructor at the Royal College of Defence Studies in London, after which he was appointed brigade commander of 16 Parachute Brigade based in Aldershot. In 1977 he became Director of Army Recruiting, and two years later he was promoted Major General to command 1st Armoured Division in Germany, a key component of the British Army of the Rhine.

    In 1981 he was appointed Colonel Commandant of the Army Catering Corps, a position he held until 1989, and between 1983 and 1990 he was Colonel Commandant of the Parachute Regiment. A fellow Para officer described Howlett as a “great, wise and unflappable” figure, who at the time of his death was considered the “Father of the Regiment”.

    From 1982 to 1983 he was commandant of RMA Sandhurst, where he was a fine role model for aspiring young leaders.

    In September 1983 he was promoted Lieutenant General as General Officer Commanding South East District headquartered in Aldershot. Shortly afterwards he was appointed KBE.

    In February 1986 Howlett was promoted General and returned to Oslo as Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces Northern Europe, and he finally retired from the Army in April 1989.

    Howlett played cricket for the Army, the Combined Services and, in his youth, for Kent Second XI. He was president of Army and Combined Services Cricket and was a stalwart of the Stragglers of Asia Cricket Club, also its president 1989-93. He much enjoyed his membership of MCC.

    During a busy retirement Howlett served as chairman of the Leonard Cheshire Foundation (1990-95) and chairman and president of the Regular Forces Employment Association (1989-1997). He also chaired the Services Sound and Vision Corporation and the Governors of Milton Abbey School in Dorset as well as being a Commissioner of the Royal Hospital Chelsea.

    He was also vice chairman of the Naval & Military Club, a Freeman of the City of London and a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Cooks.

    Howlett and his wife Elizabeth bred Labradors and prize bantams and, although he described himself as a “very small” racehorse owner, he had a passion for the turf; he shot, and was a regular attender at regimental dinners, reunions and charity events.

    Lt General Sir Hew Pike, who commanded 3 Para during the Falklands War, said: “I have never met anyone who did not want to explain how much they liked and admired this remarkable man.”

    Geoffrey Howlett married, in 1955, Elizabeth, née Aspinal; she died in 2006 and he is survived by his son and two daughters.

    General Sir Geoffrey Howlett, born February 5 1930, died April 21 2022

    1. I do wish the DT hadn’t banned me , it is so frustrating not being able to comment , especially on the obits .

      I was a child in Egypt during the Suez crisis, and was evacuated with my sister mother and many other expat women and children , then the Egyptians imprisoned nearly 400 British expat men including my father, men who were engineers, surveyors , ships pilots , admin staff, padres, teachers, doctors , dentists who worked out there , and they were interned for 3 months ..

      I was 9 years old , and remember the noise from the airfield we lived next to , and the remnants of the British army who protected us and saw us out safely , to board a flying boat from the Bitter lakes .. and the rest I cannot really remember .

        1. Probably for the crime of veracity. (She is not True Belle for nothing!)

          She must try and remember the words of Shakespeare’s Enobarbus: “That the truth should be silent I had almost forgot“

        2. Probably for the crime of veracity. (She is not True Belle for nothing!)

          She must try and remember the words of Shakespeare’s Enobarbus: “That the truth should be silent I had almost forgot“

  17. 352400+up ticks,

    Morning Each,
    The thin end of the wedge was inserted by
    ted heath then lay dormant,waiting to be activated, major done the honours and the
    journey along the road to reset had begun as I see it.

    Seven thousand future potential voters have gained illegal entry this year already joining those in the system & voting.

    Keep in mind the fat yank / turkish chap is very pro amnesty for illegals, one days intake at Dover housed in a small town will, in a short space of time, completely change the character of that town, then it is only a matter of time as is being witnessed currently.

    1. They’re criminal illegal migrants who should be immediately returned to France. That should have happened from the day the first squawked.

    2. I must have missed the story. What is the reason for them ditching their phones?

      1. Morning Phizz. So the calls cannot be traced back to the smugglers and relatives! They get a new one anyway when they land!

        1. Good morning. Were officials looking at their phones then? I’m surprised their lawyers weren’t screaming about their right to privacy.

      2. Lefties got terribly upset and said that Farage was making up stories about the poor refugees.
        It is particularly worrying, because if you are just coming from rural morocco, and want to try your luck in the UK, you’ll have some BS story ready about how you were persecuted by the government, and that’s it.
        But if you’ve got stuff on your phone that needs to be destroyed, it’s much more likely that you’ve got a criminal or terrorist background.

  19. Good morning everyone ,

    Fine day, 11c … might rain later , but the perrenials , azaleas, and other shrbs are blossoming nicely since we had rain last week .

    1. Thank goodness. The mob will go beserk. She’s a black woman, so the usual slurs they churn out just won’t work. It’ll cause their pathetic, empty brains to explode!

    2. She’ll have to learn to speak more slowly for when she’s President 🙂
      Seriously, I hope she goes all the way. It’s not just one person who will save us, it’s the momentum of a lot of angry citizens together.

        2. “While Owens is well-known for her political activism in the US — stirring controversy by calling on black Americans to abandon the ‘Democratic plantation’ and attracting the attention of President Trump — her newly-wed husband is also no stranger to the world of politics. Aside from being the chairman of Turning Point UK, Farmer is a former Brexit party candidate and the son of Michael Farmer, former Conservative party treasurer and member of the House of Lords.”
          Spectator USA

    4. I am a great admirer of this clear-headed and positive woman.

      If more black people were like Candace Owens and Calvin Robinson then there would be far less racism. The likes of Diana Abbott and David Lammy seem to enjoy stirring up inter-racial tensions.

  21. Nottlrs will recall recent disclosures about the French Exocet missiles in the Falklands war…the story continues in today’s DT:

    France urged to come clean on Exocet ‘kill switches’ that could have saved British sailors’ lives

    MPs call for inquiry into claims secrets about anti-ship missiles that killed 46 servicemen in Falklands were deliberately withheld

    Senior MPs have called for an inquiry into claims that France deliberately withheld secrets about missiles that killed 46 British sailors in the 1982 Falklands War.

    The Telegraph has been told that French-made Exocet guided missiles contained a “kill switch” that could have disarmed them, but that France denied such a device existed.

    Ahead of Wednesday’s 40th anniversary of an Exocet attack on HMS Sheffield – which caused the first British fatalities of the conflict – France has been urged to come clean about what it did and did not share with Margaret Thatcher’s government.

    Tobias Ellwood, the chairman of Parliament’s defence select committee, said the matter “warrants further investigation”, while Liam Fox, a former defence secretary, said France – a vital defence partner of the UK – should be “open and honest” about what happened.

    Three Royal Navy ships were hit by Exocets during the Falklands conflict, two of which – HMS Sheffield and the merchant vessel Atlantic Conveyor – sank. Sailors died on all three ships.

    The missiles were made by the French firm Aerospatiale and, as the Royal Navy task force sailed south to retake the islands from their Argentinian occupiers, Britain appealed to its ally for information about how they worked and whether they could be disabled.

    British experts believed the Exocets contained a kill switch, which arms manufacturers sometimes secretly build into weapons so they can be disabled if they fall into the hands of a hostile state.

    According to a highly-placed source, France denied that the kill switches existed, but British officials became convinced it was not telling the truth, partly as a result of investigations carried out on an earlier variant of the missile that had been bought by the UK.

    On Tuesday night, Admiral Lord West, the former First Sea Lord who commanded the frigate HMS Ardent during the Falklands war, told The Telegraph he had heard of the alleged kill switch in Exocet missiles and had been told Britain was denied the technology.

    He said: “I was told that the French were very helpful in terms of letting us see the flying of Mirages and the Super Etendard [French-built fighter aircraft, used by Argentina] so we could get their flight profiles.

    “They did give us a certain amount of material about Exocet, but I was also told there was a mechanism within it so that foreign people couldn’t fire an Exocet at a French ship without them being able to do something to mean it wouldn’t be able to hit them.

    “They were making a lot of sales of Exocet, and if the people they were selling them to found out that there was a way of defeating it, they would not have been happy.”

    Aerospatiale, later broken up and taken over by other companies, was run at the time by Jacques Mitterrand, the brother of Francois Mitterrand, then the French president.

    The president was approached directly by Thatcher for information about the missiles and, according to one report, she threatened to launch a nuclear attack on Argentina if Mitterrand did not hand over the information needed to disable Exocets.

    Mr Ellwood said the suggestion France could have shared knowledge about the Exocet that could have saved British lives “warrants further investigation”.

    He added: “We don’t know the wider decision-making that surrounded this. Indeed, those responsible might not even be alive today.

    “As we look to future battles we must learn from past events, and that includes how we work with allies and how we share critical intelligence. It certainly would have been game-changing had France chosen to share this characteristic of the Exocet.”

    Dr Fox pointed out that in 2010, David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy, then the prime minister and French president, signed the bilateral Lancaster House treaties for defence and security cooperation.

    “I would have thought in the spirit of those treaties the French would want to be as open and honest as possible with us,” he said. “It would not change anything about that relationship, but it would set the historical record straight.”

    Bob Seely, a Tory MP and former Army captain who sits on the foreign affairs select committee, said: “If Exocets contained what was effectively an on/off switch, the French should have shared that with us.

    “If it turns out that information was withheld, that would be one of the most shameful episodes in Anglo-French relations. A lot of British sailors died because of those weapons, and we owe it to the families of those who died, and to history, to get to the truth.

    It may be that the French did tell us all there was to know, but we need them to be transparent.”

    A memorial to the 20 sailors who died aboard HMS Sheffield will be unveiled at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire on Wednesday after the HMS Sheffield Association raised funds for it to mark the 40th anniversary.

    Exocet missiles also killed 12 people aboard the Atlantic Conveyor and 14 on HMS Glamorgan before Argentinian forces in the Falklands surrendered in June 1982.

    Both the Ministry of Defence and Downing Street declined to comment.

    * * *

    Our “friends and partners” indeed! The BTL posters are not impressed either:

    Des Riley
    5 HRS AGO
    The French have never been true allies of Great Britain, they are allied to one country only – France. I was serving in the RAF in 1982, and remember the wriggling and evasion of the French authorities over their supplying of Exocet missiles to Argentina, which went on well into the conflict and there were even teams of French specialists in Buenos Aires helping the Argentinian Air Force adapt the missiles for use on other aircraft. The supply of missiles and physical support only stopped at the isistence of President Reagan in response to a direct appeal by Margaret Thatcher.
    The French political leadership class has never been Allies of GB since WWII, from De Gaulle right through to the current back-stabber.

    John Bull
    7 HRS AGO
    Not to mention the French instructor pilots who flew the actual missions. The planes didn’t fly themselves, the Argentine pilots hadn’t been trained.

    Andrew Marshall
    10 HRS AGO
    Never trust the French. Eminently possible that they would have withheld such information if it would have impaired their sales.
    Still bitter about Waterloo, Trafalgar, Blenheim, Crecy, Poitiers, Agincourt ….

    2. One of my later ‘pilots’ had just taken off to test fly a Wessex aircraft, when the missile struck.Atlantic Conveyor

      He had to find another ship to land on.
      PS. The Teat Flight result was “Serviceable”

    3. I would imagine Aerospatiale have a self-starting shredder; like the one in Blair’s office.

    1. Find those doing it, flog them, then hang them. That’ll make them poo themselves as their dying bodies muscles relax. It’s not complicated..

      For every one caught, flog Khan as well. Beat him until he cannot stand and all he knows is pain.

      1. Hang on, wibbling, don’t overdue it. Soon you’ll be losing total control and calling Khan a Very Silly Sausage. Lol.

          1. I see that the Ukrainian Ambassador in Berlin has called the new German Chancellor a Silly Sausage, Annie.

    2. Find those doing it, flog them, then hang them. That’ll make them poo themselves as their dying bodies muscles relax. It’s not complicated..

      For every one caught, flog Khan as well. Beat him until he cannot stand and all he knows is pain.

    4. Happens in lay-bys up here – in full view of passing (!) traffic

    7. I’m tempted to call the number and complain about all the MPs who are shitting on us.

      1. They don’t make films like that any more, absolutely brilliant. Peter Sellers’ classic lines ” ‘Ave you a licence for that minkey….” and many others.

      2. I doubt it Richard. In my head I am still a teenager or so my lovely wife of 40 years tells me.

  24. George Eustace on Toady programme: ‘Government can either raise taxes or borrow more.’

    No, you can cut taxes and spend less. You all keep ignoring this fact. As for Nick Robinson – an atrocious interview. Nothing but weak, Left wing questions about punishing energy companies and ‘windfall taxes’ – who pays those taxes, you bastard? Why are people complaining about energy prices you lackwit? It’s because 40% of it IS TAX and your suggestion to the cost of living is more tax? Stupid onanist.

    Stop pretending the problem is private industry and tell the country that the problem is government. Government green agenda, government waste, government taxes. Stop lying that industry should ‘pay more; because it is and it’s passinng those costs on to us. He knows this, so why is he perpetuating the fairy tale? Why is Robinson not forcing the state to accept that IT is the problem?

    Why are the media all forcing the country to look the other way when the problem is stark staring in front of them in government waste, regulation and taxation?

    I’m bally angry. More than half the cost of everything is cumulative stealth taxes – especially on farming, fuel and energy. Why does the media constantly let big fat bloated, corpulent state off the hook? I know the BBC is part of the blob and biased, but it hates the Tories – life knows why, as they’re enacting Labour policies – so why not punish them by pointing out the obvious that’s plain to see? Are people really so thick?

    4. 352400 + up ticks,

      Morning W,
      That’s the way to start the day W, well said.

      Answer, fraid they are, I have a orribal feeling tomorrow will prove it.

      1. People will still vote tribally, that’s inevitable.

        I’m going to spoil my ballot. Not one of them represents me. Not one does anything I want or need. They’re all greedy, useless thugs.

    8. We really need to get a joint letter together and send it to the BBC and the broadsheets. And Possibly the Mail They cannot be allowed to get away with all this garbage any longer. Signed the People of Britain.
      When a government allow hundreds of thousands of people to arrive unannounced on the shore of a relatively small and over populated island at tax payers expense this has to be stopped, address and reckoned with. Why should the existing mainly indigenous population of taxable working people have to fork out and cover up for all these the ongoing and continuous political errors.

      1. They want massive uncontrolled immigration though. It’s revenge for Brexit.

        Same as all the tax harmonisation, the nonsense green legislation, the green pensions bills – all to ensure we are aligned with the hated EU so the civil service can waltz us right back in.

        1. The EU mafia are complete and utter bastards right down to the last grubby millimetre of them all.
          And further more how can our useless government preach green when they are housing hundreds of thousands of people whose carbon footprints didn’t matter or register in the UK a few years ago. Chuck the lot of them out for the sake of the future of the UK we don’t need any of them here.

  25. ‘Morning All
    Once is happenstance
    Twice is coincidence
    Thrice is enemy action……….
    Gimmigration
    Convid
    Ukraine
    Actually Bond was wrong they’re all enemy action by the government on the people,so many other things could be added to the list……….

    2. I wont have Alexa on at home any more……..because since she must have heard me complaining that I never win anything on the lottery, I or should be we, have had three wins in a row 2.5 3.7 and 5.0 🤗

  33. OT – reading matter.

    “Traitor King: The Scandalous Exile of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor” by Andrew Lownie.

    We have the audio version read by the author. The odd solecism (he can’t pronounce “Pytchley”, for example!!)

    Fascinating insight into the very unpleasant people (and, of course, comparison with Brash and Trash).

      1. Pytchley – first two letters to rhyme with WHY (so, not Pitchley..)

      2. It’s an English name so, from the spelling, it’s clearly Pickly..That’s what my friend Mr Cholmondley-Warner tells me.

          2. Wonderful! Crammed with white colonists off to seek their fortune in our great Empire.

          3. My paternal grandfather, a doctor in Devon, had eleven children. Six of them made their lives in Africa.

          5. Looks very clean to me. I suppose your grandfather washed and polished it at the weekends.

          8. You missed out So did I. I never met either of my grandfathers. You kind of know something is missing – children’s books and stories are full of grandfathers.

          9. Dr Henry Eugene Tracey, died in 1911 having fathered eleven children so I never knew either of my grandfathers. My maternal grandmother died in 1945 a year before I was born so I only knew my paternal grandmother who died at the age of 89 but I can only remember meeting her once.

    2. What I can’t understand, Datz, is why Neil Parish was using his phone to look for “attractive women”. All he had to do was look across the the Opposition benches and watch a little bit of leg-crossing! Lol.

    1. Ukraine is one of the richest countries in the world, exploited by crooks and psychopaths since the middle ages.

  37. Morning, all! It’s raining, and I am looking out over an empty field, but it’s a new field – I hitched up my caravan and towed it (first time towing anything) across Yorkshire yesterday! Phew.

      1. Just north of York. Trying to get my head around orientation – everywhere else I’ve lived, the sun always came up in the same window 🤣

        1. The South Downs are nice as is the New Forest. If you come down South not only will it be warmer but you would also be near me. You could buy me a Gin or three. :@)

          1. My itinerary comprises vaguely heading south for the summer. You shall have your gins, my dear!

  38. Morning, all! It’s raining, and I am looking out over an empty field, but it’s a new field – I hitched up my caravan and towed it (first time towing anything) across Yorkshire yesterday! Phew.

    1. IMHO in western Europe, those women who actively breastfeed their babies 100% for six months or longer tend to be either well educated and informed ‘earth mothers’, or they are from an ethnic minority background. Both cohorts would be sceptical.

    2. And the Lord saith unto Moses
      “Come forth.”
      But he came fifth and lost his beer money.

  42. Good Moaning.
    Sonny Boy’s contribution raised a laugh from me – and a cringe from my mother’s ghost.
    My reply explains why:

    “You jest.

    Mim never recovered from my top of the voice comments about a hirsute lady on a London bus c. 1947.

    A horrible feeling of deep fear entered her soul when she realised I’d noticed something unusual about a female passenger.

    “Mumma, is that a lady? Or a man?”

    Very subdued …. “Ssshhhhh…” from Mim.

    “I think it’s lady … or ….”

    “Look, Anne, see that lovely doggy …”

    “No ….. I think it’s a lady-man … or a man-lady ….”

    Woman in seat opposite side of the aisle tried some desperate distraction techniques.

    They failed.”

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/035249ec0dec1377b2ef4296e3020f99737ed21faf8d208d6009efe2028d1fa5.jpg

    1. Oldest daughter when she was about two, sat on the side-seat on the bus and, noticing a black man on the opposite seat asked. “Mum, is that a golliwog?”

      1. I did something similar on a bus when I was four, “Look Mummy!” I cried, “a Real Golliwog!” I was pretty sure of myself then, I’d read books.

        1. Apparently in a Post Office queue, a toddler-aged me rushed up to a black American airman, hugged his legs and called him ‘daddy’.
          Thinking back, I was lucky my mother didn’t kill me very early on.

          1. I had a moustache at the time my son was learning talk. He called everyone with a moustache “Daddy”.

      2. I got into trouble when I complimented an elderly lady on how pretty her mustache looked when the sun shone on it. My mother was having tea with the women and I’d been taken along. I wasn’t taken again!

      3. Just to set thing on the right line ……..when our three boys were little, around 8 years old, Frank Bruno was often on TV sport and i once asked them what they noticed about him in particular. They said he’s got very curly hair,……… a recognition of Diversity in the early 90s.

    1. What better illustration of the pursuit of profit and the folly of misguided capitalism could one visualize?

      2. The Tesla, as Elon Musk never tires of pointing out is a robot in the form of a car. It is only one of his projects in terms of artificial intelligence. He has now turned his attention to building a real robot which he says will be cheaper than a car and which will transform the way we do things. Here is a brief story about it.
        https://screenrant.com/tesla-bot-optimus-production-next-year-elon-musk-robot/

        As for the above. Tesla Vs. World. I do not get the sub-title “Visualizing the insanity”. Insanity of what? Tesla’s competitors for trying to compete?

        1. Insanity of Tesla being so over-valued compared to its earnings. Opinions may vary, of course.

          1. People invest in Tesla for its ideas and innovations. In that sense it is far ahead of anyone else. Besides that it is dubious if you can call it capitalist in the conventional sense because anything they invent is open to being used by anyone that wants to, open source, no patents, so investing in Tesla is far more valuable than investing in a conventional company. And since Elon Musk, with that attitude, is well on his way to becoming the worlds first Trillionaire, he seems to have the right idea. Elon Musk is, as it were, todays technologies Leonardo da Vinci, but because of modern communications and scientific understanding, far more influential. Well within our life times he wants and will succeed, in having an anthropomorphic robot in every household, and also releasing people from mundane jobs that no one wants. freeing up people for more creative and useful things. Elon Musk is thinking in the 21 century and beyond, most people are still thinking in a 19 or 20 century paradigm.

            Elon Musk offers a seductive new ability, that could split humanity.
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyOtosgd-IQ

          1. But yours can’t dance. Apparently if you know the secret your Tesla will literally dance to certain pieces of music. Apparently Musk likes to put quirky things into his inventions for people to find.

          2. Easter eggs are a longstanding engineering tradition. My VW could have had such a one put in it, no doubt. It has computers for everything.
            In 1989, General motors was already the world’s biggest seller of computers.

          3. I’m aware that aster eggs are a long tradition. But not to the point of dancing cars.

          4. That is a very cool one! But most of us don’t have access to the controls for a car!

    3. One of our near neighbours has a Tesla …..but he’s King Gary. It had to be done.

      1. He would have done but he didn’t want the Bame to nick the sausage roll.

    2. Good. Let us hope he replaces that fellow’s ugly mug in the toothpaste advert…

    3. Good. Let us hope he replaces that ugly mug in the toothpaste advert…

    4. I’d suggest the BBC had a bit of a problem with that but depressingly for them had to show it.
      Still no cover age of the recent anti Micron Paris riots though !!

        1. A year or two ago Grizzly posted new avatars each day with a different hat each time. Now, will he be publishing avatars of helmets? The mind boggles at the thought of such an ambiguous project.

      2. It is quite ancient now, Rastus. 40 years ancient to be precise! ☹️

    6. Morning Grizzly

      When young Ellis pipped the 2 bames to the post , they were not exactly all over him with congratulations . Moh and I were rather shocked by their lack of warmth and back slapping .

  45. I wish my daughter would stop whining about finding Mr Right
    In our ‘Parenting Confessions’ column, anonymous mothers and fathers share the family secrets they would never talk about in public
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/family/parenting/wish-daughter-would-stop-whining-finding-mr-right/

    One of our sons who is 26 has been with his girlfriend/fiancée since he was 17 – we are fond of her, know her well and get on well with her – they are happy together, they have bought their own home together but they don’t want to get married just yet.

    The other one is 28 and is about to get married. He has been with his fiancée for a couple of years and they are a united couple. They have already bought a house together but we do not know her and have only met her once because we have not been able to travel because of Covid rules. We very much hope they will be happy and fulfilled and we hope that they will have as happy a marriage as Caroline and I have had.

    Until I met Caroline I was happy to have no strings to tie me down and the prospect of not ever finding a woman I wanted to marry did not worry me. However I was very happy that Caroline and I found each other.

    This poses the question of whether it is better to have an unsatisfactory relationship than not to have a relationship at all. Any Nottler views in this?

    BTL

    Two of my friends are very different. One is relaxed, talented, attractive, popular and charming – and not bothered about finding a girlfriend – at the age of 64 he is still single – his philosophy is that it is better to have no relationship than a bad one; the other is talented, clever but socially gauche and he is desperately over-eager to find women companions so he always had many short-lived relationships which fizzled out. He is now 70 and has finally hooked up with a catastrophically unattractive woman because his philosophy is: Anything is better than nothing

    The one who is not actively worried about whether or not he has a girlfriend is far the happier.

    1. As the clock ticks more strongly for women, from my point of view, it’s better to have a less than optimal relationship while there is still time (and do one’s best to make it work).

      I think a lot of people (men and women) are still living in 1980s – 2008 having-it-all cloud cuckoo land.
      Edit: it sounds to me as though the daughter is more realistic!

      1. I did not know what true happiness was until I got married.

        But by then it was too late.

        51 years and counting however!

      2. In my 20s I had a girlfriend I wanted to marry. She would have made me miserable.

        She did not want children and ended up marrying someone who went on to become the PDG of the European division of a very large International company. She and her husband live in a large house and have no children because they don’t want children. They have enough money to do what they like without ever worrying about money

        When Caroline met her at my mother’s funeral 20 years ago they chatted together for some time. Caroline was not sure that my former girlfriend was very happy and thought that she, the ex, was jealous of her, my wife, the mother of our children.

        1. Procreation does not necessarily bring happiness. Being child-free does not necessarily bring misery.

          I know lots of intensely miserable parents. I also know lots of very happy, satisfied and fulfilled child-free couples.

          1. If you don’t want children then you should not have them.

            Some people feel that their lives are empty and that procreation gives them a sort of immortality through their descendants.

            Not all people feel this way and indeed, I did not become a father until I was 47 years old and my childlessness child-freedom never bothered me. However having had our two sons brought Caroline and me great joy and fulfilment. I suppose it is like murder – don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it!

          2. Indeed.
            I didn’t want children, and am enormously grateful that SWMBO changed my mind for me. Two better lads you couldn’t hpe to find anywhere.
            Firstborn is unhappy that he doesn’t have a woman, as he wants children – he has the space for them to grow up in, and the last occupants of his house left a sandpit and children’s toys that are now looking sad, unused and unloved. I’d love grandchildren, but he’s not in a location (wild countryside) or the kind of work (motor technician) nor hobbies (dynamic shooting) where single women are in surplus. So, I am resigning myself to no grandchildren. Which makes me sad… 🙁

    2. Rather than let Russia become a vassel of the Khazarian mafia, I’d say probably yes.

    3. If it’s a choice between that and being a Globalist Slave yes!

    4. It’s the 21st century.
      The stupidity levels of the human species is at an all-time high and is accelerating out of control.
      Stupid humans are led by even more stupid leaders.
      Of course it is inevitable. Humans will, deservedly, self-destruct.
      The radiation levels will subside in a few millennia.
      A more intelligent species will then proliferate.
      Circularity, my dear, circularity.

  47. Morning all…………. Wednesday 4 May: The NHS must spend less on executives and more on front-line care

    Instead the government are spending millions on the salaries of the people who have been employed to diminish the NHS medical, as has happened to the NHS dental service. There are more an more private hospitals being built but if the patient has long term underlying health issues they can not operate because they have no emergency back up. Private medical insurance is being advertised all over the place now. The problem is if you don’t have it, it costs 250.00 just for a consultation.
    In the mean time the message for the uninsured elderly becomes clearer each day…….. FOAD.

    1. This is why they are so desperate to legalise euthanasia…got to protect the jobs of all those Die-versity officers somehow!

      1. Of course and this is also why recently a new care home has been opened at Knebworth Hertfordshire …..because it very close to the Crem.
        Just think of the green savings on fuel.

        1. Great, I suppose it will be known as the Crematorium Waiting Room locally then! 🙁

  48. Caroline has just returned from playing at a funeral. She is very depressed :

    The chap:

    Was a fisherman
    Was 59 years old,
    Was physically very fit,
    Was triple jabbed
    Had a heart attack
    Is dead.

    If this was a rare occurrence nobody would be commenting but the fact that deaths – all of whom were of the triple-jabbed – are up double to last year in our parish makes one pause for thought.

    I am nearly 76, I am overweight and not very fit, I have not been jabbed, I take Vitamin D, Vitamin C and zinc I had Covid recently, I was a bit off colour for a day and a half and that was it.

    1. Morning Richard. Those triple jabs; all other things being equal, will do for you everytime.

      1. Three times my question and suspensions regarding the jabs causing my ongoing heart problem were confirmed, two by medics in A&E, one by a nurse later.
        Even my GP suggested that I should not have the booster. Until around 3 months later when I asked him again and he told me it was up to me …what sort of medical advice was that ?

    2. That happened to a long term friend of ours early 70s Triple jabbed and heart attack taken to hospital and had a fatal stoke.
      My elder sister 80 and BiL 85 both very serious about covid face masks etc, almost treated it as a religious concept. 4 jabs and they both go down with covid together. But okay and over it now.

      1. Since last November , I have ached , hurt , itchy skin, bad IBS, eyes hurt , mind fog , hips knees and no energy , and just can’t be bothered to even think .. erratic sleep patterns , and I feel scared stiff.

        Moh and son are full of energy and happy.

        I haven’t talked myself into such negativity , and now I am full of sinusitis , headaches and feeling grotty since going down with Covid in March, and still no smell or taste .. which is sad because I am missing smelling my favourite blossoms .

        Moh is puzzled .. and annoyed that I haven’t got myself together . Impossible to see a doctor …

        As I said to a friend … Covid scare and lockdown scared us rigid .. and the indignity of being stopped by the cops when we took the dogs out in the car for a gallop on the heath , will remain with me forever.

        1. Sound like the sort of things I’ve been putting up with Maggie, as well as being fobbed off by the NHS especially our GP practice. I’m fed up to the eyeballs with it all. Although as far as i know i haven’t had covid.
          As my have noticed i had a severe reaction to the Jabs and even the flu jab last November. Today a faint glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel i have ben in touch with Pals Patient Administration Liaison Service. I had an email back today saying the letter i had after my recent consultation telling me i have a phone appointment in November was not the letter i was supposed to receive from the Cardiologist. Now i’m waiting for the more purposeful letter booking me in for treatment. I still think this whole covid experience has been set up and totally man made. And people should be hung drawn and quartered for the damage they have done to mankind.
          My worst fear now is my next appointment will be on the dates when we are on holiday. Denon and later Cornwall with the family, a second 40th. We had to go some where.

          1. So sorry RE,
            Apologies for moaning about myself when so many others have worse conditions and frustrations .

            Do hope the letter arrives soon and you are satisfied that some one is listening .

    3. This morning I finished watching Dr Richard Fleming, PhD, MD,JD giving a lecture re the ‘virus’ & the “vaccine”. I took several sittings to watch as the lecture is around four hours long. Anyone who has watched this lecture from Dr Fleming would not go anywhere near the serum.

      Back in the last week of October and first week of November I had some symptoms that matched those for the then current iteration of covid – the advertised symptoms were rather broad and could match other diseases – but I went with following a protocol laid down by a number of doctors; much like your protocol. I added pressed apple juice as I did not have quercetin, apples are a good source of that anti-oxidant, along with four inhalations from my asthma inhibitor spread over each day. The only symptom that irritated me was the niggling cough that kept me awake for one night. The cough aside, I thought that I had suffered a cold. The double jabbed person who infected me, and tested positive, was quite ill and had to spend a number of days in bed. Several other people at the party at which my friend was infected, where only fully jabbed people were allowed, caught the infection and were quite ill, others, not so much.

      1. To put the NHS situation back in context:

        Going back in time for a few hundred years England has had a “Royal” Navy and a Sovereign Army and latterly joined by the RAF.
        Thencame the NHS, a law unto itself.

        We have paid, clothed, fed, housed, trained and used those forces to protect us from external threats.

        That is roughly on par with the GPs.

        Now we have two parallel happenings Covid and Ukraine.

        If required and I pray to god it is not needed, we will deploy our Armed Forces, as ordered by the PTB and they will put their
        ‘lives on the line’ for their country

        With the GPs and Covid, they have withdrawn their services to their patients in a cowardly manner, over a pandemic that
        has less than a 1% mortality rate. Additionally, they should have the mediacl knowledge to see if the Pandemic is actaually as dangerous as we
        are forced to believe, or not

        I call on ‘Our Nation of Shopkeepers’ to withdraw their services from those in the NHS who will not do the jobs for which
        they are being paid.

    4. Had the usual cotton bud routine this morning when I visited elderly chum. I protested and told them it was unnecessary and a waste of their time and money.
      I gather I am now not the only visitor who is kicking up a stink about this nonsense. EC’s niece witnessed a refusenik on her visit last week.

  49. Why brisk walking is the secret to a long life. 4 may 2022.

    Can you walk and read at the same time? Great, up you get then – we’ll do this one on the move, and briskly. Quicker than that. Think: “West Wing corridor meetings.” Think: “Owner trying to keep up with Border Collie at Crufts without actually breaking into a run.”

    Good, now keep that up as if your life depends on it. Because, in a way, it does. A new study has found that having a “brisk gait” can dramatically slow down ageing, to the extent that by the time a fast walker reaches midlife, their body will be the equivalent of 16 years younger than that of a “plodder”.

    This must explain my attaining the age of 75 in the face of a family history of early deaths; excessive drinking and at one time smoking. I have never ridden when I could walk and have climbed all the Lakeland Peaks as well as 100 Scottish Munro’s; most of Derbyshire’s Footpaths and several thousand miles backpacking. I would do it all again if it hadn’t added one day to my life! I loved every minute of it! It is the curse of my age that it has rendered me unable to add to it!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health-fitness/body/brisk-walking-secret-long-life/

    1. I always have to slow down to adapt my walking speed to other peoples’! Very annoying it is too!
      The only person who walks as fast as I do, is my sister.

    2. Must have a word with Spartie.
      “If you want a long life, stop dawdling and sniffing blades of grass and …. W A L K!!!!!!!!

  51. 352400+ up ticks,

    breitbart,

    So Much for Deterrence: It Could be Months Before UK Starts Sending Illegal Migrants to Rwanda

    And so it came to pass that as the smoke via deliberate deceit cleared the five star Rwanda hotel appeared just outside Dover,
    no surprise if that was revealed.

    It being a vote magnet for idiots voting on the 5th.

    1. Every time they dangle this kind of idiot magnet, it loses a bit of its strength. Theresa May and her never-ending lies tried people’s patience severely.

  52. Allison Pearson on top form:

    Hell, I don’t even know any Tories who are bothering to vote Conservative tomorrow. Hang on, that’s not strictly true. My friend Rachel says she will be voting for her Tory councillor because “he looks a bit like Nigel Havers and sorted out my hedge problem”. Best not to ask if that’s a double-entendre. Angela Rayner might get a bit funny about Tories and bushes.

    Pollsters all agree the Government is going to get a kicking, the only question is: how big will the boot be? Could this be even more brutal than the Brexit-logjam wipe-out of May 2019 when Theresa May’s party lost over 1300 seats?

    Still obsessed with Partygate, much of the media will gleefully attribute any failure to public anger with a corrupt Government that didn’t live by its own rules. My strong sense now is that people have bigger things to worry about. They are fed up of trying to follow who did or didn’t enjoy a slice of Victoria Sandwich in the Cabinet Room, like some neverending game of Cluedo. No, if tribal Tories are inclined to sit on our hands and not bother going to the polling station, it is because of this niggling worry: why would you bother voting Conservative if you won’t get Conservatism?

    As many readers have pointed out, the Johnson they voted for was Boris not Carrie. Although Mrs Johnson has kept a low profile of late, and long may that happy state continue, it’s telling how many Conservatives still claim they are voting ABC (Anyone But Carrie). This Green Woke party with its rich person’s breeziness about National Insurance rises and electric bills is anathema to those who were once its most ardent supporters.

    I cannot believe the Prime Minister stubbornly sticks to his Net Zero goal at a time when even relatively comfortable families are dreading their doubling direct debits. A staggering 23 per cent of our energy bills basically goes towards subsidising windmills whose erratic puff provides a tiny percentage of our needs. In a bruising interview yesterday with Susanna Reid on Good Morning Britain, the PM insisted the Government was “doing everything we can to help households with soaring prices”.

    Sorry, that simply isn’t true. They could cut the 5% VAT on energy bills and slash the extortionate renewables levy at least until global prices start to come down. Is the PM really so busy burnishing his green legacy, to appease his wife and her posh eco-mates, that he cannot respond to people’s suffering?

    Boris has shown exemplary leadership over Putin’s wicked war. Yesterday, he became the first leader to give a speech to the Ukrainian Parliament and announced a further £300 million military support package. While the public has huge sympathy for Ukraine, there are growing questions about why the magic money tree suddenly becomes a denuded twiglet when it comes to bailing out our own struggling families. Churchill abroad, Boris looks like Scrooge at home.

    Meanwhile, the Conservatives’ traditional strengths turn to dust. According to the latest YouGov poll, only 20 per cent think the Tories are “best at managing the cost of living crisis”. Labour scored 38 per cent with the remaining 26 per cent saying neither.

    I reckon many lifelong Tories will be voting None of the Above tomorrow. We have had enough.

    “When a regime has been in power too long, when it has fatally exhausted the patience of the people, and when oblivion finally beckons, I am afraid that across the world you can rely on the leaders of that regime to act solely in the interests of self-preservation, and not in the interests of the electorate.”

    Wise words there from Boris writing in the Telegraph in 2011. Perhaps self-preservation and acting in the interests of the people who voted for you might, you know, be made to coincide? We don’t care if the PM doesn’t know who Lorraine Kelly is. We care very much that he’s forgotten who we are.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/05/04/will-anyone-backing-tories-week/

    1. “why would you bother voting Conservative if you won’t get Conservatism?”
      In a nutshell, that’s why I didn’t vote for Cameron, May or Johnson. Still waiting!

      It’s a bit worrying that 38% of people think that Starmer could manage the economy. Dear God!

    2. There is no interest in cutting the green levy because that rewards his chums. Chums who will give him a house on a Caribbean island after office. A non-job at the UN or EU for 2 days a week on a million a year. He couldn’t give a stuff about our costs. He’s just another steam bag of excrement.

      1. He’s had his orders from the WEF, net zero is non-negotiable. That’s what people don’t understand, they think it’s Carrie – it’s not.

        1. I’ve just read the comment and was about to type something similar. All this ‘Net Zero’ mismanagement is way above Mrs Johnson’s pay grade. Next up, food shortages: the US is suffering the coincidence of >20 food stores/processing plants burning down/blowing up in the last few weeks.
          A sausage manufacturing plant in Harlow Essex was destroyed by fire in the last couple of weeks: the start here?

    3. Conservative manifestos, and the promises and pledges of the PM and Cabinet Ministers have the same meaning, the same surety of fulfilment, and the same value as a guarantee on one of Arthur Daley’s second hand cars.

    4. I’m afraid the local issue ploy won’t work this time. A message has to be sent to CCHQ, Johnson and cronies, before it’s too late.

    5. “Boris has shown exemplary leadership over Putin’s wicked war. Yesterday, he became the first leader to give a speech to the Ukrainian Parliament and announced a further £300 million military support package.”

      Why did Boris Johnson do that? This is not our war. We should not be sending anything To Ukraine. It is not our problem.

      The USA is interfering, as usual and, as usual, the U.K. is its puppet. Why is nobody putting as much effort into mediation or peacemaking as stirring things up even more?

      The Cons are nothing of the sort (Conservative, I mean). They are the cause of the energy crisis and much more besides, too much to list here. I will never ever vote Conservative again. (If Lord Frost were to become PM by some miracle that would be different).

          2. It was Not The Nine O’Clock News’ take off of Jan Leeming.
            She always made a great fandango of the word ‘guerilla’.

      2. Point of objection…Lammy is not red-haired, and the Orang-outan is a vastly superior life form not to be compared to a Labour MP.

    1. The logos that I scratched over with the pen are those of CNBC. It appears that Disqus now won’t let you upload images with certain logos in.

  58. Anyone any experience of mail order meat suppliers please?. My local Tesco ‘Superstore” has decided to close its meat counter which means the excellent Welsh lamb chops and Cheshire whole fillet steaks I used to get there will no longer be available. Why they still call it a superstore now I don’t know…

      1. Probably. But parking and walking to any remaining shops would be really boring.

        1. I would rather be ‘bored’ than not have access to the superior and delicious fresh meat provided by a bona fide independent butcher (or fishmonger, grocer, greengrocer etc …).

        1. New Forest Stores do Pannage pork. The piggies wander around the forest rootling out acorns. The meat is the best pork and crackling i have ever tasted.

          2. But don’t try it in bars or bistros – they don’t know how to slice it, they just hack at it – great thick lumps.

          5. I notice M+S sell it but their version gets mixed reviews. It do say it is from Spain. Don’t know what to think given it is £17.80 per 100g. I think i will give it a swerve.

          6. I bought some from a stall in Borough Market a few years ago. Together with a nice fresh baton and a chunk of Comté cheese it made a delicious Thamesside picnic for half a dozen of us, washed down with a nice chilled Barsac.

  59. Blimey – a very slight almost drizzle of, er, rain. A few spots on the windows. Won’t last, of course, one can see the clear skies behind it. Dagnabbit.

    1. 5.5mm here in the last 24hours. I wish it was warm and sunny again… It’s crawled up to 11C, which is not much higher than last night’s minimum.

    1. Sent to my daughter in Taz – pity they cannot spell Australian – somewhat takes away from the message.

    2. She’s gone very quiet. Has she been sectioned or have Mummy and Daddy made enough money?

      1. The latter, I would guess. Hasn’t she got some contracts with corrupt media organisations?

      2. To think that mummy gave up a career as an opera singer to pamper the spoilt brat.

  63. Just had my second (lucky guess) two!
    Wordle 319 2/6

    ⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      1. Me Too.
        Wordle 319 3/6

        ⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
        ⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      1. And a good day for me too!
        Wordle 319 2/6

        🟩⬜⬜⬜🟨
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      2. How do you download the stats chart, Griz?
        I’ve tried and failed several times.

        1. I simply cut-and-paste it using the cursor and my trackpad, Lacoste, as a partial screenshot. I then drag it into a comment box.

          3. If you place the cursor on one corner of the graph, then hold down your mouse button whilst dragging the cursor to the diagonally opposite corner, the shaded area will appear on your desktop as soon as you let go of the mouse. All you then need to do is drag it and drop it into a comment.

    3. I used the slow route.
      Wordle 319 4/6

      🟩⬜🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. When I posted a few weeks ago that some pro-abortionists in the US advocate infanticide, this was met with disbelief on TCW.

      You are right, it is pure evil.

    2. I am waiting for the first Transwoman (who is really a man) to demand am abortion on the NHS and
      the court cases that follow their refusal

      1. Well, no, because the NHS will just keep spending the money – our money and the man pretending he’s a woman will get endless legal aid.

    3. Saw this last night on You Tube. That people can be this cold and without conscience is truly surreal. They have dehumanized themselves and thus regard children as so much trash to be disposed of as they see fit. And, I have no doubt, this sort of person, if you objected to their face, would call you a Nazi.

      1. If they want that kind of late abortion, make them kill the baby themselves.

        1. I had a termination well into my second trimester because the foetus was non- viable. In this current climate in US, they would have made me carry a dead baby and then give birth to a dead baby.
          Pro-life does not have anything to do with the woman’s health or well being.

          1. Obviously situations such as yours are very different from the idea of killing a baby after birth and pretending that is aborting a mere collection of cells. The Communist Chinese would inject Tibetan babies as they crowned, with air, to kill them, then throw them on the streets as a lesson to Tibetans not to breed. They obviously had a sense of morality in as much as they knew that Tibetans would look on this with horror. People like the woman above are worse, they clearly have no sense of morality or humanity. All they are interested in is convenience for themselves so that children are reduced to a mere commodity.

          2. I’m sorry for that, Ann.
            We had spontaneous abortions between Firstborn & Second Son, and they were equally heartrending.
            I avoided asking about the corpses. I don’t want to know.

          4. The wife of one of my teaching colleagues had to carry a still born child to term for some reason (lost the heart beat at some very late stage, perhaps?). It must have been heart-rending to know the child was dead, but still go through the birthing process. There are no words …

        2. These sort of people do not do that, they expect someone else to do it for them as they continue in their undisturbed plastic lives.
          Have you ever read Heidegger? He has a wonderful expression for this sort of dehumanization: “Thinging the World” you make distance from what is real and regard it as an object. It is, of course the depths of depravity and not really human.

      1. Opens for me and i don’t have a subscription. Nice pair of boobies you are missing.

    1. An alternative for the bit about the government

      Where did the money go

    2. If there’s anyone who doens’t know where the money government wastes comes from then they shouldn’t be allowed to vote.

    1. I was the one that posted the thing about steamers and boiling eggs. I have used the method twice more since then and it’s great. Not half as entertaining as this video, though.

      1. I liked the way she deftly slapped the white into position around the yolk.

    1. What else is the ‘nudge unit’ except minitrue? This is what we want you to do and believe. This is what we will tell you until you believe it. When you don’t believe it, we will remove any other choices you have.

  69. Aaargh! ( I am awaiting the results of an ECG although have been assured by the doc’s that all is well. ) The mailman just came and two letters were delivered, neither for us but for previous inmates.
    I joked to MH that it was probably my death warrant. Bugger me- one of the letters was from a cremation service. Am going out soon- will be very careful…

    1. 🙂 The only telly adverts that contain an all-white cast are for cheapo cremations or pre-paid funerals.

        1. I’m an absolute Pollyanna compared to Elderly Chum this morning.
          As the nurse manoeuvred her wheelchair through a door, she yelled at him “What the bloody hell are you doing to me NOW!!!!”
          Rather unnecessarily, he informed me she was having a bad day.

    2. Oh dear! I hope the black side to your sense of humour got you through that!

      1. My sense of humour is robust and very annoying to those who want to be serious.

    3. As a matter of interest will you ever get to see your ECG trace?
      Also will your results show machine derived values of your QT/QTc interval? – a critical measure of how you respond to various drugs (shown in attached ECG)

      2. No doubt Tinkerbell will deliver the results at some point;-)
        Also, the only drug I take is Pinot;-)

    5. I was told If there are obvious problems when an ECG examination is being conducted they wont let you go home.
      It seems people with certain medical problems have had their names and addresses poached by the log burners.
      If you get a reply envelope Lotle, do what i do shove it all back in the envelope and reposted back to them.

      1. I am not worried at all. Will be at El Quacko on Friday so will ask, again, then.

        1. This morning on the News they were suggesting that doctors came out of retirement to fil the gapping holes. I simply suspect that due to the rising demand for private medical treatment that a lot of GP have set up a private (as mine seems to have) business and are filling their wallets.
          If that is the case they need only be paid per patient visit instead of by how many patients they have registered in their NHS practices.

  70. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/84c7bbc21f0bb06a3bc91afa2b28aba5b2223e273a3a95d592f6f51807468132.jpg We all know that the invasion of Ukraine by the Russians caused fertiliser prices to rise, and will cause food shortages, because of sanctions, don’t we?
    I was just glancing back over a pop economics site and found this graph from November 2021:

    Yes, it seems that fertiliser prices were already rising. Ukraine really is just a false flag exercise, provoked by the 2000 attacks on the Donbass by Ukraine in the week before Putin decided enough was enough.

      1. I could never actually make out what he did, but i always liked him.

  75. Liz Truss, (portrayed in a black evening gown with black lace, by the BBC) has announced a ban on UK businesses providing financial services to Russia and Russians. Firstly, is she completely oblivious that governments are supposed to turn a blind eye to the activities of bankers? Is she unaware that the Rothschilds were a major provider of financial services, and money, to the German government through the 30s and 40s?
    Does she realise that the ban will result in quite a lot of income being lost to the UK? That it will confirm to foreigners that the UK, the London finance markets, banks and insurance companies are unsafe to deal with? that this will resonate for decades to come?
    Is she so obtuse that she cannot grasp the idea that the service providers can go away and set up shop on a territory that is pretty well independent of the USA, the UK and the EU?
    She would, in my opinion, be better spending her time to ensure that our imports and exports move into and out of this country with no delays whatsoever.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61321530

    1. She’s dangerous; she’s out of her depth; she should be sectioned ASAP …

  76. Afternoon all! Today we had a power cut (notified in advance) so we had to do other stuff, not involving electricity. It does make you realise how much we rely on it.

    This morning we did a talk to a playgroup (no masks required after all) which was fun – a couple of the children were very bright and attentive, the others managed to listen most of the time. Home for lunch, then we went for a walk up on the Common – the wild flowers are glorious at this time of year. Took some photos, of which I will post some when I’ve had a look at them.

    Spent the afternoon reading – waiting till I could have a cup of tea. Power came back on a couple of hours ago – they appeared to be replacing one of the telegraph poles just up the road.

    6. This sort of thing disgusts me. This country is, despite the machination of the Left, predominantly white. It’s white lads who go and fight for it, white lads who die for it.

      The 70% welfare dependent muslims certainly don’t care about it nor the black stabbers. I hate the Left. I hate this racism. The star of our armed forces should be a white lad. A representative of everything great about this country: patriotism, integrity and courage.

      The woke Left can go shove it.

    1. No other human, scientist, animal, robot or machine could ever possibly tell me if my preferred balance of flavours is “right”.

      Only I will ever determine that.

      2. But you could teach it. I think they mean balancing taste profiles. Do you ever add salt to a meal in a restaurant?

        1. Never. I don’t add salt at home either – only when cooking; never on the plate.

        2. No. I have an aversion to adding salt to a meal. My mother always used to correctly season food when it was being cooked. At school, however, they cooked unseasoned food then provided a cruet set on the table. It was simply inedible. Unseasoned potatoes with salt added at the table is an abomination.

  82. Night All

    Who let the dogs out……

    https://twitter.com/AgBioWorld/status/1521311320783605762?t=k8NfEomeGUDFl_HYArhngg&s=19

    https://twitter.com/GH_238_/status/1521563146892288001?s=20&t=KaTSaUmvx_p8kBFboUARkQ

    https://twitter.com/GH_238_/status/1521544365147148289

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/79013254067032c7dfc518a8f4ddb201985c04edafe62c2a303c6ab20d6eb40d.gif

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5f43699d0cbf172eab8293e8b043aa3194bf26954cd921b72936d04bd7f5428c.gif

  85. That’s me for today. A quiet one. It has been yer actual RAIN for the last hour – and a moment or two of thunder. Quite took me back..!!

    Have a jolly evening

    A demain.

      1. Lovely and warm here. It is very rare for rainy weather to be warm in Essex.

  86. A little anecdote from the barren wasteland known as Asda. As I was wending my way around and finally into the liquid refreshment aisle, I encountered a chap, young middle age I would guess, and in the seat of his cart was a rather battered toy bunny and a small penguin. I said that had I known it was bring Teddy to Asda day I would have joined in. He laughed and said there were his daughter’s toys. I told him that I sometimes identified as a penguin and explained why. Do you know, he completely understood. Went round into the aisle to get some Vermouth (yuk) for MH and some notebooks for me and there was his daughter. We chatted for a few minutes and went our separate ways. He said to me that we’ve got to laugh now or we’d cry!
    Not masked either and neither were most folk in Asda.

    1. I was in Colchester ASDA today. There was one masked elderly couple; otherwise normal.

  87. LambKidneyGate (cont). They bloody well were dark plums.
    Panic. Quick rethink; rifle through the fridge and an assortment of veggies and ham remains saved the day. Plus splash of marsala.
    Sour creme or grated cheese – add to taste.
    Phew.
    Note to self; label packets and do not sort out freezers in a hurry.

    1. Emergency soup, emergency soup…..;-)))
      We’ve all been there and done that.

      1. Plums have been blitzed in the microwave; tomorrow I’ll make a plum fool.
        I dread to think how long they’d been lurking.

        2. Rule of thumb re fridge- if it moves or seems to be glowing- ditch it.

    2. Sounds horrific. I can mentor you if you like… BTW…that face! ..and the silence ..No longer works on me. :@)

    4. A couple of weeks ago I felt adventurous and looked in the bottom of the freezer and there was a load of tupperware type boxes and a pile of labels that had come off them – I’ve no idea what’s in these boxes so I’m going to defrost one per day – which may be written on my gravestone

      1. Masking tape is good for labelling frozen stuff. Corner to corner on the lid and write description plus date.

        1. I’ve tried that in the past Tom, it was the same , maybe it was inferior tape. The whole idea of masking tape is that it doesn’t stick too much or a previously painted surface would come away with it.

  88. A few pics from our walk this afternoon.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images

    /1be70ba83f49d8b50109cbdbb7cb72c0da4cef32bae09452b073c32a59516625.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1be70ba83f49d8b50109cbdbb7cb72c0da4cef32bae09452b073c32a59516625.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4b5cc0c79d205bd77cd3ce7853a5c62aa1b5066f9a7977570616b91b4bbcaf0f.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/532236249541c0f84eeb37050b36acbe088f7ce2ff632464e884894ea74e8e4c.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f4d763db90effcd4ad5eaee7035b782c46146443f75ed18baa947bc9d483430c.jpg

    2. We have patches of lovely Blue bells in our garden, we live near woodland but can’t figure out how the bells have arrived in our borders.

      1. We have the Spanish bluebells in our garden, a lovely haze of blue against the green but not quite the same as our lovely indigenous bluebells.

        1. We have the Spanish ones too – a nice bit of colour but nothing like as good as the real thing.

        1. No, I let my neighbour use my croft for his sheep in return for the occasional meat

      1. Yep. We also saw a Green Hairstreak but I wasn’t quick enough with my little pocket camera. No Dukes to be seen.

  89. I do like this time of day on Nottle… people are happier, wonders why, but also their silly sides come out. Yes, we need to be serious at times but fun and humour are beneficial also.
    Keep smiling and laughing;-))

    1. Mornings for serious comments.

      Afternoon for memes and people who need a nap.

      Late afternoon for smooching and recipes.

      What would you add to that? :@)

          1. The bokshop that they were heading to said that they had no words…

          3. Even in the worst situations, maybe not in it, but after, I can see a funny side. If you cannot laugh, why bother?

          4. I’ll put money on me being dafter than you Obs. And both with the same name. Both Yorkshire heritage.

    3. How about this ……i tried opening a bottle of Ozzie red ! 9 Crimes Cab Sav southeastern part of the country.
      Normally they have screw tops, but this one has a cork and do you think it would come out in one piece ?? Nope it came apart. I had to bite the top off the bottle and spit the glass out before i could pour it.

      1. At least allow the shards of glass to settle to the bottom before you swig it !

        2. There were few shards of glass at Beergate with Sur Keir and Angela oop nawth in Durham …

          Beer and curry – on a grand scale – Eh?

      2. I do believe Johnny Norfolk saying once that was how he got corks out of bottles 😉

      3. Reminds me of a joke……….. A group of guys that had ben shearing sheep for weeks on out back sheep stations came into town.
        They walked into a bar and the barman said what can i get you chaps the overall majority said a bottle of cold beer mate and the then a few local loose women. before he had finished speaking three Sheila’s walked in and lifted their shirts offering their services. Blimey he said i thought we were going to have a beer first. Well the first sheila replied in her husky voice…Shirley youms wanna be able to open the bottles guys. don’t look if yer squeamish. I’ll get me Longhorn Hoodie, it’s a coat………

        1. Tie a knot at the end of a shoe lace, push what remains of the cork down below the neck of the bottle, put the shoe lace into the bottle and jiggle so that the knot is beneath the cork, yank the lace and the cork will come out.

          2. A bit like getting hard-boiled eggs out of their shells – experience comes down to the simple way.

      4. Strange, but I had a bottle of that from somewhere and the cork refused to be extracted. It broke and was extracted by pliers. It was very smooth though.

    4. I like jokes and puns, but sometimes my jokes are really corny. Do NoTTLers find my jokes produce a laugh or an exasperated groan?

      1. I always enjoy corny jokes….especially all the ones I see here, and the puns……ah I always wish I thought of some of the responses!!! Night Elsie!

    3. This must have been after her fall into the crocodile pool. Apparently she ate 4 or 5 of them before being dragged out.

      1. 352400+ up ticks,
        Evening M,
        You could make a lot of suitcases with dianne abbots hide.

  91. Evening, all. I think most people outside Westminster and the NHS know what the problem is and how to solve it. Unfortunately, those who could do something about it won’t.

  92. Goodnight, Gentlefolk until the morning’s light and may God bless you and your slumbers.

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