The Night Mail

[Happy Hippo]

I spoke to Biggles this morning. He asked me to pass on his best wishes to you all. 

[BoD]

26 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

I spoke to Biggles this morning. He asked me to pass on his best wishes to you all. 

Please send all our best wishes back to him too.

[Oldddudders]

28 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

I spoke to Biggles this morning. He asked me to pass on his best wishes to you all. 

Tell him if he wished to strap on his former wings and do something really quite nasty over Moscow right now, I think he might be quite popular.

[Happy Hippo]

Worse for him to strap on his wings and fly me over to do something nasty over Moscow

[Gwiwer]

23 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Worse for him to strap on his wings and fly me over to do something nasty over Moscow

Is that a cue to re-post (yet again) the well-known clip of Hippopotamus flatulus  

 

 

[PhilJ W]

7 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

Is that a cue to re-post (yet again) the well-known clip of Hippopotamus flatulus  

 

 

Bombs away!

[Winslow Boy]

My apologies il Dottore. I have amended it now.

[iL Dottore]

7 hours ago, Winslow Boy said:

 

So you could say that acquiring knowledge and in particular medical knowledge, has acquired us a new set of problems, as Mother Nature would have limited the the reproduction of the XO chromosome by reducing there lifespan.

Thanks for that clarification.

 

Indeed, although females with XO sex chromosomes (also known as Turner's syndrome) are viable, get born and usually survive, they usually can't reproduce without serious and sophisticated medical assistance (see the Wiki entry and here https://emedicine.medscape.com/article/949681-overview for further information). They also tend to have a shorter life expectancy, as you intuited.

 

Like or not, Nature has a way of burying (sometimes literally) her mistakes....

[BoD]

3 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

Is that a cue to re-post (yet again) the well-known clip of Hippopotamus flatulus  

 

 

Or for us all to join in …

 

Oh, for the wings, for the wings of a dove,

And the dirty great ……

 

Well, you know the rest.

Edited February 22, 2022 by BoD

[rockershovel]

10 minutes ago, BoD said:

Or for us all to join in …

 

Oh, for the wings, for the wings of a dove,

And the dirty great ……

 

Well, you know the rest.

I was thinking of "if I had the wings of a sparrer" but the sentiment is much the same. 

[SM42]

What an eventful day. 

 

First take FiL to hospital to sort out an appointment and while waiting try to sort our the chaos in the very small car park in Polish.

 

Next to Sister in Laws ( whose birthday was Friday) for cake. 

In fact  several cakes:

Birthday cake 

Chocolate sponge cheesecake 

Halva cheesecake 

Plum cheesecake 

And doughnuts 

 

All washed down with vodka 

 

Then it was dinner time

 

Finally when it came time to leave my shoes had disappeared. 

The FiL's were still there, but he wasn't 

His eyesight is not the best and he wondered why his shoes felt a bit loose ( mine are 3 sizes bigger)

 

Oh how we laughed 

 

Luckily his house in on the way back.

 

Yet again I am the subject of family hilarity for ever more. 

 

Andy

Edited February 22, 2022 by SM42
Vodka

[Gwiwer]

8 minutes ago, SM42 said:

while waiting try to sort our the chaos in the very small car park in Polish.

Swap you.  Our coffee establishment at work is run by Poles.  Good though most are with English, albeit heavily accented, anything beyond a fairly standard order defeats them.  "Soy decaf latte" being a case in point.  

[SM42]

Well latte and soya are the same in both languages.

 

Caffeine is similar so add "bez" in front ( for without)  and end Caffeine with an "a "then you should be ok.

 

Only problem then is if they answer in Polish 

 

Andy

Edited February 22, 2022 by SM42

[Northmoor]

13 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Unfortunately, we are not well designed and certainly not designed to last. I don’t know if this has been studied rigourously, but I get the impression that a lot of the problems that have come to be associated with aging start around 30 to 40 - exactly around the age evolving man’s offspring would have started having offspring of their own.

Hopefully those with medical qualifications would be able to confirm this; looking after yourself in the first half of your life certainly seems to help later.  Likewise abusing your body at a young age often does lasting damage.  I have my own theory, based on no medical knowledge but seeing relatives with health issues, about humans having a "design life" (of which your genes play a part) just like any piece of equipment.  If you have a DL of 85 years, look after yourself (sensibly) and you'll reach about that.  Abuse your body and you will expire well short of it, but no amount of morning runs, cold showers and a diet based on mung beans will get you to 100 if your major organs are lifed at 85 years.

 

17 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

Swap you.  Our coffee establishment at work is run by Poles.  Good though most are with English, albeit heavily accented, anything beyond a fairly standard order defeats them.  "Soy decaf latte" being a case in point.  

Our office coffee shop staff seem to be a mix of Polish, Hungarian, Lithuanian etc. and their English is excellent (it kind of has to be, in London there are so many speaking strongly-accented English as a second language.  They are without exception, friendly, courteous and polite; I always think, when I hear of people moaning about "too many Eastern Europeans", that "Thank God, otherwise I'd probably have to buy my coffee every day from you".

[SM42]

Even the drunks in the park here will rather have a conversation  than a confrontation. 

There are exceptions though. 

 

I hate to say it, but I do find my fellow countrymen objectionable and confrontational far more often than those from mainland Europe. 

 

Andy

[AndyID]

Let the Winter Games begin!

 

 

We had planned to ski today but it's extremely cold and windy. It's minus five Fahrenheit at the ski hill today so we decided to take advantage of the six inches of snow that fell on Monday. The snow is like powder because its so cold so I ran the tractor up and down a few time to compact it.

 

Grandson seemed to enjoy it but I think his mum and dad and I enjoyed it even more, particularly when I waxed the runners on the ancient Flexible Flyer.

 

 

 

[br2975]

13 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Finishing off my transformation into two legged stealth mode  prior to a walk around Earley. 

 

Why is Hippo posting his passport photo on RMweb ?

[iL Dottore]

8 hours ago, Northmoor said:

Hopefully those with medical qualifications would be able to confirm this; looking after yourself in the first half of your life certainly seems to help later.  Likewise abusing your body at a young age often does lasting damage. 

Most definitely, the overall better health and higher longevity of the “baby boomer” generation has - according to some - been due to the improved nutrition and access to medical care in the post war era (I’m old enough to remember “free” orange juice and milk at school [not to mention cod-liver oil]). But now, according to Imperial College London (amongst others studying this), we are seeing a decline in average life expectancy - in both the UK and the US (although this is not evenly spread across all social classes and geographical locations). The reasons are complex and multifactorial (and “fast food” doesn’t help).

 

Furthermore, and briefly returning to the topic of male vs female, a news report recently cited a study that showed that Boys and young men from the age of 10 to 24 accounted for around two-thirds (61%) of all global deaths in 2019. Unsurprisingly this was due to violence, trauma and substance misuse, which predominately affect young males. Females don’t show this (or perhaps more accurately, not so significantly).

[SM42]

There is also an imbalance in the priorities of health care for men vs women to consider.

 

Cancer screening for women has at least two national programs for female specific cancers, but for men it appears that the nation  relies on us rolling up at the doctors when it's too late.

 

Why is there no national prostate cancer screening program?

 

A colleague of mine was fortunate to get an early diagnosis and treatment simply because our employer organised something in a men's health campaign 4 years ago.

There has been nothing since.   

 

Should we really be relying on chance and charity?

 

Andy

 

[jamie92208]

It was interesting watching some of my former colleagues  after they retired.  Many have gone on to have long retirements but many others have not drawn theirvpensions for very long.  . The only trend that I ever noticed, though it was not a scientific study, was that a high proportion of those that actively sought medical retirements seemed to have very poor health when they retired.  

 

I'm now in my 20th year since I pulled the plug and hope to have many more.

 

Jamie

 

 

[iL Dottore]

50 minutes ago, SM42 said:

There is also an imbalance in the priorities of health care for men vs women to consider.

Very true.
 

The number one cancer in males is prostate cancer which, obviously, only men get (other cancers in the top five cancers in men include colon cancer and lung cancer - which are found in both sexes).  
 

I wonder if the greater emphasis on breast cancer (which, incidentally, men also get), is because untreated breast cancer is invariably fatal, whereas it is a generalisation (and somewhat of a truism) that most men with prostate cancer will die of something else - usually a disease or illness of old age (most prostate cancer patients are over 65, average age at diagnosis is 66) rather than from their prostate cancer. However, it is not uncommon for patients with prostate cancer to have an aggressive version which can be as every bit quickly fatal as breast cancer.

 

Nature has got it in for men, hasn’t she?

[AndyID]

8 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

Nature has got it in for men, hasn’t she?

 

She tried to get me with testicular cancer 38 years ago.

[Oldddudders]

24 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

Nature has got it in for men, hasn’t she?

Meanwhile, Man has it in for successful maternity.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-60434299

 

Hipposhire comes to notice again.

[iL Dottore]

16 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Meanwhile, Man has it in for successful maternity.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-60434299

 

Hipposhire comes to notice again.

A sad state affairs, though the BBC article did interview the consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist who tried to get senior management at the trust to do something.

 

Rather illuminating are the consultant's view of the senior management response and of the ongoing problems this case has highlighted.

[Oldddudders]

7 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

A sad state affairs, though the BBC article did interview the consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist who tried to get senior management at the trust to do something.

 

Rather illuminating are the consultant's view of the senior management response and of the ongoing problems this case has highlighted.

43 years ago, and in Staffs not Salop, Sherry eventually had a Caesar to deliver her first child. She is petite, and while scans were then still in the future, surely after trying forceps and what-not, it might have been obvious the baby was a bit big. Caroline emerged at 10lb 1oz. She would have made any woman's eyes water!