The Night Mail

[BoD]

1 hour ago, New Haven Neil said:

 

Before I came to the rock, I would have agreed - but I have to admit Deveraux or Moore's from PEEL 😉 kippers are better. .

Gosh, if that’s the case I had better make an effort to try some.

[AndyID]

1 hour ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

I was once travelling from UK to Washington DC with a colleague whose wife had made him a ham sandwich packed lunch that he hadn't finished. When we were going through immigration and he was asked if he had any foodstuffs he remembered the sandwich in his briefcase so he mentioned it. You'd have thought he'd just said that he was carrying an open phial of botulism toxin or sarin nerve agent and within minutes was taken away under escort to a room where the offending article, which was in a polythene bag, was removed with calipers and placed in a biohazard bag and taken away.

 

Dave  

 

Yes, they do tend to get slightly twitchy 😀

 

We had a similar problem coming back from Canada with our trailer (aka caravan). They impounded dry dog food we had brought with us from the US because it was not in the original plastic bag. Sheesh! The guy was being a complete duck-head. I suspect he detected my "foreign" accent and decided to give me a hard time.

[jamie92208]

1 hour ago, simontaylor484 said:

There are a few drumlins on the side of that road, drumlins are harder rock not eroded as the glacier passed over.

 

As to Kame I don't doubt the Geology Dr I had never heard it called that moraine yes glacial till yes. It could be a more precise term than used in at A level

That drumlin field stretches quite a long way down to Barlick (aka Barnoldswick)  the Leeds and Liverpool canal in that area wiggles round in all directions going round drumlins.

 

Jamie

[Happy Hippo]

Nyda's off to North Wales for a few days starting tomorrow.

 

Apart from some cleaning duties, I might have a clear field of play with some railway modelling.

[Tony_S]

5 hours ago, simontaylor484 said:

With regard to kame when I did geology it was called moraine and the moraine at where the glacier finished was called end moraine 

Now I have no idea but I did know that moraine was something to do with glaciers. Anyway I asked Aditi about kame and moraine and she got quite animated explaining the different. Then she got onto knobs and kettles. I was shown some photos. She didn’t know about the IoM kame as she hasn’t studied it but the place to go in England is Norfolk apparently. 
Aditi was pleased to know from Neil’s information that our lovely clay is very suitable for ground heat pumps. Not that we are planning one at the moment. 
We were once stuck in roadwork traffic in Denmark. Apparently this was in the zone where two distinct geological areas met. Aditi was sounding forth about this when Matthew clearly had enough of the Grand European geology lecture and said from the back of the car “MUM, please stop, it’s just mud from,a big ditch and we are in a traffic jam”. Although he studied geography, it was human geography not what he called “dirt studies”. 

[AndyID]

I'm glad I'm not camping. It's been chucking it down all day and last night and it's not forecast to stop any time soon. The good news is the lake is still a good bit below flood stage but that could change if it keeps this up.

[BR60103]

4 hours ago, AndyID said:

 

Yes, they do tend to get slightly twitchy 😀

 

We had a similar problem coming back from Canada with our trailer (aka caravan). They impounded dry dog food we had brought with us from the US because it was not in the original plastic bag. Sheesh! The guy was being a complete duck-head. I suspect he detected my "foreign" accent and decided to give me a hard time.

We have had that problem, too.  We now have a small dish of cat food for the journey and the big bag is kept sealed.  We also have to check that there is no lamb in it.

One time we were going across in the motor home and had to watch as our eggs were dropped, one at a time, into the guard's disposal.

You also have to be careful that your statements about what's in the fridge are accurate.

 

[pH]

6 hours ago, AndyID said:

I'm glad I'm not camping. It's been chucking it down all day and last night and it's not forecast to stop any time soon. The good news is the lake is still a good bit below flood stage but that could change if it keeps this up.

North of you, the snowpack is starting to melt more quickly, and there are flood watches and warnings on several rivers. There’s also up to 15 cm of snow forecast on roads through mountain passes in southern BC.

[jamie92208]

I tried something new yesterday. Penderyn was on sal in the duty free shop on the ferry. It would have been rude not to buy a sample for quality control.  I can now report that it has been sampled and was excellent. I now need to check the rest of the contents.

 

Jamie

Edited June 14, 2022 by jamie92208

[polybear]

8 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Nyda's off to North Wales for a few days starting tomorrow.

 

Apart from some cleaning duties, I might have a clear field of play with some railway modelling.

 

Bear detects a Hippo being lulled into a false sense of security........

 

10 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

I was once travelling from UK to Washington DC with a colleague whose wife had made him a ham sandwich packed lunch that he hadn't finished. When we were going through immigration and he was asked if he had any foodstuffs he remembered the sandwich in his briefcase so he mentioned it. You'd have thought he'd just said that he was carrying an open phial of botulism toxin or sarin nerve agent and within minutes was taken away under escort to a room where the offending article, which was in a polythene bag, was removed with calipers and placed in a biohazard bag and taken away.

 

Dave  

 

Is it Bear, or are they  just a tad, er, paranoid?  I wonder how long before they have all visitors dosed up with Moviprep for a good "clear out" into a biohaz tank before being allowed in?  

 

Not that long after 9/11 a workmate of Bear's boarded the Statten Island Ferry in New York; he walked past numerous armed soldiers plus another clutching a small device as he boarded.  When the Ferry sailed he noticed they'd followed him on board.  They then came up and started quizzing him about what he had in his bags - to cut a long story short they'd picked up a radiation source, which was due to the coating on one of his camera lens filters.  

Edited June 14, 2022 by polybear

[iL Dottore]

8 hours ago, AndyID said:

 

Yes, they do tend to get slightly twitchy 😀

 

We had a similar problem coming back from Canada with our trailer (aka caravan). They impounded dry dog food we had brought with us from the US because it was not in the original plastic bag. Sheesh! The guy was being a complete duck-head. I suspect he detected my "foreign" accent and decided to give me a hard time.

They do love to be petty and officious.
 

In regards to the importation of food stuff (and the potential diseases/parasites they could bring) I can understand being rather strict about things coming across the ocean (Pacific or Atlantic), but for foodstuffs coming in from either Canada or Mexico it seems rather pointless – given that the United States of America is geographically contiguous with both countries. Anything unpleasant (animal, vegetable or viral) will soon find itself in the US without any human assistance whatsoever.

 

I also find it ironic that they are so concerned about the importation of European foodstuffs when mass-market American food is full of chemicals and most supermarket food in the US contains that nastiest of nasties: high fructose corn syrup (Just check what’s on the labels, even for something like deli meats, you’ll be horrified).

[iL Dottore]

2 minutes ago, polybear said:

…Is it Bear, or are they  just a tad, er, paranoid? ..

No, it’s not you.

Yes they are.

 

I remember when I first started travelling regularly to the US on business in the late 80s (so way before ESTA) on the green US Visa waiver form that I had to complete for every flight to the US, there was the question (I forget the exact wording) which asked me whether or not I had ever been a member of the Nazi party.

 

Given that I was born in the mid 50s, I would say that it would be highly unlikely. So a bit of a pointless question for most passengers. Plus, given that the Americans masterminded “Operation Paperclip“ just after WWII to scoop up as many Nazi scientists as possible and send them to the US, also a tad hypocritical.

 

I think that the Americans are unduly worried that everyone in the world wants to move there. This might have been true in the 50s or 60s, but I would argue much less so nowadays. Quite frankly, at present, I can’t think of any parameter by which I would be better off in America than in Switzerland (I can even buy a semi automatic rifle here in Switzerland if I so desired – provided that my documentation is in order, my background check is clean, I register my weapon with the authorities and I keep my weapon in an officially approved safe place with the ammunition stored separately in another safe place).

[Winslow Boy]

2 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

No, it’s not you.

Yes they are.

 

I remember when I first started travelling regularly to the US on business in the late 80s (so way before ESTA) on the green US Visa waiver form that I had to complete for every flight to the US, there was the question (I forget the exact wording) which asked me whether or not I had ever been a member of the Nazi party.

 

Given that I was born in the mid 50s, I would say that it would be highly unlikely. So a bit of a pointless question for most passengers. Plus, given that the Americans masterminded “Operation Paperclip“ just after WWII to scoop up as many Nazi scientists as possible and send them to the US, also a tad hypocritical.

 

I think that the Americans are unduly worried that everyone in the world wants to move there. This might have been true in the 50s or 60s, but I would argue much less so nowadays. Quite frankly, at present, I can’t think of any parameter by which I would be better off in America than in Switzerland (I can even buy a semi automatic rifle here in Switzerland if I so desired – provided that my documentation is in order, my background check is clean, I register my weapon with the authorities and I keep my weapon in an officially approved safe place with the ammunition stored separately in another safe place).

 

One assumes that this is just in case you choose not to avail yourself of one from Captain C's armoury.

[polybear]

29 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

Given that I was born in the mid 50s, I would say that it would be highly unlikely. So a bit of a pointless question for most passengers. Plus, given that the Americans masterminded “Operation Paperclip“ just after WWII to scoop up as many Nazi scientists as possible and send them to the US, also a tad hypocritical.

 

 

Not to mention a small matter of conveniently "overlooking" the actions of a certain Japanese Unit in WW2 regarding medical experiments - so long as they shared their data:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731

[New Haven Neil]

9 hours ago, Tony_S said:

Now I have no idea but I did know that moraine was something to do with glaciers. Anyway I asked Aditi about kame and moraine and she got quite animated explaining the different. Then she got onto knobs and kettles. I was shown some photos. She didn’t know about the IoM kame as she hasn’t studied it but the place to go in England is Norfolk apparently. 
Aditi was pleased to know from Neil’s information that our lovely clay is very suitable for ground heat pumps. Not that we are planning one at the moment. 
We were once stuck in roadwork traffic in Denmark. Apparently this was in the zone where two distinct geological areas met. Aditi was sounding forth about this when Matthew clearly had enough of the Grand European geology lecture and said from the back of the car “MUM, please stop, it’s just mud from,a big ditch and we are in a traffic jam”. Although he studied geography, it was human geography not what he called “dirt studies”. 

 

Tony, I think Aditi and my friend would get on like a house on fire, L-A is an animated lady with a passion for her subject seldom seen.  She also has a brain the size of a planet (Marvin, HHGTTG, the 80's) between the two of them they must be a couple with a tremendous combined IQ that is seldom matched.  And yes, their kids are the same.  They're also really unconventional as a family, making them interesting and fun to know.  Nice folk, they even put up with terribly average people like Mrs NHN and myself.

[rockershovel]

The American Nazi Party, or at least its successor organisations, are still active - they were sufficiently we known to form a running gag in The Blues Brothers, after all. 

 

There are also neo-Nazi organisations in a number of European countries. 

[rockershovel]

I'm not particularly surprised that India is developing  a taste for US style, no win no fee litigation. 

 

India and America have a lot in common - an adversarial legal system of British origin, unlimited medical costs, a proliferating legal profession of questionable integrity and a very large population who lack the means to resort to law by any other means. 

[iL Dottore]

2 hours ago, rockershovel said:

The American Nazi Party, or at least its successor organisations, are still active - they were sufficiently we known to form a running gag in The Blues Brothers, after all. 

 

There are also neo-Nazi organisations in a number of European countries. 

As the questions were on the Visa Waiver form - I don't think they had the American Nazi Party in mind. As for the extreme (neo-Nazi) right in Europe, some may have blatantly obvious proto-Nazi names, others are more sophisticated and subtle and at first glance look like a perfectly legal, right-wing, democratic parties.

Edited June 14, 2022 by iL Dottore

[Happy Hippo]

11 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

As the questions were on the Visa Waiver form - I don't think they had the American Nazi Party in mind. As for the extreme (neo-Nazi) right in Europe, some may have blatantly obvious proto-Nazi names, others are more sophisticated and subtle and at first glance look like a perfectly legal, right-wing, democratic parties.

There is also one about having worked for a foreign intelligence agency:

 

If I answered yes....one of yours, I do not think they would see the irony.

[Gwiwer]

19 hours ago, simontaylor484 said:

With regard to kame when I did geology it was called moraine and the moraine at where the glacier finished was called end moraine 

Terminal and lateral moraines when I studied. Nowhere near becoming a Doctor of Geology but I managed a BSc(Hons). Most glacial and periglacial deposits however came under the Department of Geography. So it was convenient that my degree was Geology with Geography 😉

 

I suffered the indignity of having to map drumlin fields and eskers. I made up for that by becoming unwell on some local brew or another which was very gassy and not at all aligned with my normal preference for a “real ale”. But when your senior lecturer is buying ….. 

 

And then there was the glacial erratic erotic event and a “Please Explain” for one of our staff. Wetting his finger and running it along the bared lower back of a conveniently-parked body to demonstrate “the ice came this way” he expected the owner of the back to be one of his group. 
 

A stunned, then angry, teenage female turned around with a scream and - as their eyes met and he realised the gross error of his ways - she screamed “**** off you p3rv!!!” so that everyone in the pub knew. 
 

I believe a word was had between lecturer and a local constable.  
 

The moral of that story being to always check whether or not the victim is equipped with drumlins before leaving an esker of saliva ……. 

[AndyID]

6 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Bear detects a Hippo being lulled into a false sense of security........

 

 

Is it Bear, or are they  just a tad, er, paranoid?  I wonder how long before they have all visitors dosed up with Moviprep for a good "clear out" into a biohaz tank before being allowed in?  

 

Not that long after 9/11 a workmate of Bear's boarded the Statten Island Ferry in New York; he walked past numerous armed soldiers plus another clutching a small device as he boarded.  When the Ferry sailed he noticed they'd followed him on board.  They then came up and started quizzing him about what he had in his bags - to cut a long story short they'd picked up a radiation source, which was due to the coating on one of his camera lens filters.  

 

Not the coating but according to this it's the glass itself. Certain lenses can actually be quite hazardous.

https://camerapedia.fandom.com/wiki/Radioactive_lenses

[polybear]

35 minutes ago, AndyID said:

 

Not the coating but according to this it's the glass itself. Certain lenses can actually be quite hazardous.

https://camerapedia.fandom.com/wiki/Radioactive_lenses

 

Pretty sure it was the filter rather than the actual lens itself - the full story involves one of the guys checking each part of the camera one-by-one which on the fone to some expert somewhere - eventually this involved removing the filter from the lens and that was found to be the source.  Buddy was a (white) Scottish ex-RN Submariner (Chief Eng) but had a big black bushy beard - which probably meant his card was well and truly marked as being "one of them lot".....

[AndyID]

1 hour ago, polybear said:

 

Pretty sure it was the filter rather than the actual lens itself - the full story involves one of the guys checking each part of the camera one-by-one which on the fone to some expert somewhere - eventually this involved removing the filter from the lens and that was found to be the source.  Buddy was a (white) Scottish ex-RN Submariner (Chief Eng) but had a big black bushy beard - which probably meant his card was well and truly marked as being "one of them lot".....

 

Can't find anything about radioactive coatings so I suppose it could have been the the glass the filter was made from. Their detection kit must have been very sensitive!

[AndyID]

9 hours ago, pH said:

North of you, the snowpack is starting to melt more quickly, and there are flood watches and warnings on several rivers. There’s also up to 15 cm of snow forecast on roads through mountain passes in southern BC.

 

Snow above 4,000ft here and distinctly chilly. It was 43f this morning.

[polybear]

51 minutes ago, AndyID said:

 

Can't find anything about radioactive coatings so I suppose it could have been the the glass the filter was made from. Their detection kit must have been very sensitive!

 

Yes - I was rather impressed with that thought too.

A guy I know got the chance to take a look around one of the big U.S. Carriers when it was moored off Gosport (I think his wife worked at the Naval Dockyard at Portsmouth and had an invite - IIRC they were using a chartered Portsmouth - Gosport foot ferry to shuttle passengers out to the Carrier.  All passengers had to go thru' security (including metal detectors/scanners etc.) before boarding the Ferry; when disembarking the ferry to board the carrier there were Military Security types in full face balaclavas holding some sort of monitor/scanner and were checking as well.