The Night Mail

[pH]

5 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Better still, get the bear to shoot him!

… using your right, under the second amendment to the constitution, to arm bears.

[Sasquatch]

1 minute ago, polybear said:

 

Bear has never met him and dislikes, sorry, hates him with a vengeance 🤬

 

 

Can't you shoot him instead?

Believe it or not Bear I'm the only guy around for miles that doesn't own a firearm! Much to the dismay of every dang-pootin-pussy I speak to. They reckon I'm the one who needs one the most because I go hiking all over the mountains on my own!

 

Found some of your North American cousins droppings on yesterday's walk BTW😝

 

Regards Shaun

[SM42]

8 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Better still, get the bear to shoot him!

 

My understanding is that bears are resentful souls. 

If you only wound them  they will come looking.

 

An ex colleague was into game hunting and went off after bears. 

 

I had visions of him wounding one and the bear buying a ticket to the UK ( business class) getting a taxi from the airport and knocking on his door. 

 

I always thought that the US constitution has lost its real meaning over time 

 

Many years ago when it was writ, dress was far more formal and I believe to alleviate the  effect of the summer heat, some leeway on dress was written in to the constitution allowing people to wear short sleeved attire  without fear of being ostracised by polite society. 

 

The right to bare arms has somehow come to mean something entirely different over the years 

 

Andy

[polybear]

1 hour ago, Sasquatch said:

Found some of your North American cousins droppings on yesterday's walk BTW😝

 

 

That'll be our @Grizz out on the prowl....

[Sasquatch]

10 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

That'll be our @Grizz out on the prowl....

He's actually from Sussex I believe like me, not that I've ever bumped into him! Not actually seen a bear yet, the dogs usually see them first!!

[Sasquatch]

Mrs. S. just messaged me having decided to come home early.🥴 Better get my arse into gear a bit sharpish!

[SM42]

16 minutes ago, Sasquatch said:

Mrs. S. just messaged me having decided to come home early.🥴 Better get my arse into gear a bit sharpish!

 

I feel your pain.

 

Andy

[coastalview]

Having survived the first meeting of the Hipposhire Collective I though I would try my luck at at getting some shots of the Welsh Marches Express (from Shrewsbury to Poole) it having failed the last time I tried

 

So I toddled off to Church Stretton as at least it has a bus shelter  on the platform to get out of the monsoon.

 

As luck would have it it was 70000 and it was running about 14 minutes late and working quite hard as it came through the station

 

 

Bringing up the rear was 47614

 

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by coastalview

[Oldddudders]

Ah, Church Stretton. Fond memories of crossing the Mynd to the Crown at Wentnor, the Horseshoe at Bridges (where Seamus, an Irish draught horse, had a bucket of best bitter in the bar and had to leave via the back door, as horses don't reverse too easily), the Bottle & Glass at Picklescott. All too long ago - and on one or two occasions I went on horseback! 

[Northmoor]

6 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

When I worked at sea there were only two washing machines my employers would buy, Maytag or Miele. At sea the things were basically running 24/7, and had to cope with rolling and pitching, dirty electric supply and all sorts of abuse. Even tight fisted shipping companies worked out paying more for machines that could take it made more sense than a never ending conveyor of replacements.

In my days of working in support of the Senior Service, they often mentioned that if you want a washing machine repaired in civvy street, get an ex-RN engineer to do it.  Standard washing machines don't fit through blast doors so have to be dismantled and re-assembled in place, while on any ship they must NOT vibrate and transmit noise through the hull*, so are balanced within an inch of their life.  The lack of vibration has the secondary benefit of stopping things fatiguing and breaking quite so often.

 

*Especially on submarines, for obvious reasons; you really don't want Yevgeny tracking HMS Tiresome halfway round the North Atlantic because the Captain was running critically short of pants.

Edited September 7, 2022 by Northmoor

[bbishop]

I shall be awol for a couple of weeks.  Nowt to worry about.

Edited September 7, 2022 by bbishop

[SM42]

15 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

In my days of working in support of the Senior Service, they often mentioned that if you want a washing machine repaired in civvy street, get an ex-RN engineer to do it.  Standard washing machines don't fit through blast doors so have to be dismantled and re-assembled in place, while on any ship they must NOT vibrate and transmit noise through the hull*, so are balanced within an inch of their life.  The lack of vibration has the secondary benefit of stopping things fatiguing and breaking quite so often.

 

*Especially on submarines, for obvious reasons; you really don't want Yevgeny tracking HMS Tiresome halfway round the North Atlantic because the Captain was running critically short of pants.

 

Would they have a washing machine on a sub?

Water is quite a scarce resource and a former submariner told me you could tell when one docked from the smell. 

 

Things could have changed though

 

Andy

[BoD]

Why would one need more than a single vacuum cleaner.

Ok then, perhaps two, one for each hand.

Alright, maybe a third to stick……

[simontaylor484]

24 minutes ago, SM42 said:

 

Would they have a washing machine on a sub?

Water is quite a scarce resource and a former submariner told me you could tell when one docked from the smell. 

 

Things could have changed though

 

Andy

I would have thought space was also at a premium.

 

[jamie92208]

31 minutes ago, SM42 said:

 

Would they have a washing machine on a sub?

Water is quite a scarce resource and a former submariner told me you could tell when one docked from the smell. 

 

Things could have changed though

 

Andy

I once heard crewmembers from a sub singing their song, "Nobody washes in a submarine".  It was well after midnight in a tin tabernacle north of Stornaway where their boat was berthed.  Drink had been taken.

 

Jamie

 

 

[simontaylor484]

22 minutes ago, BoD said:

Why would one need more than a single vacuum cleaner.

Ok then, perhaps two, one for each hand.

Alright, maybe a third to stick……

My Mrs won't let me use "her" Henry for cleaning up saw dust,wood shavings or drilling dust

[polybear]

48 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

In my days of working in support of the Senior Service, they often mentioned that if you want a washing machine repaired in civvy street, get an ex-RN engineer to do it.  Standard washing machines don't fit through blast doors so have to be dismantled and re-assembled in place,

 

Bear's Boss once attempted to, er, "relocate" a Lathe from the Engine Room(?) of a sub that was in for scrapping; the whole exercise was being carried out on the night shift and the plan was to strip it and take it out bit by bit.  They then discovered the biggest bit (the bed) was too big to get thru' the hatch, so they had to put the whole lot back together again before morning so they wouldn't get found out.

[Northmoor]

7 minutes ago, simontaylor484 said:

I would have thought space was also at a premium.

It is in some of the older subs, but in the "bombers", no, they displace 16,000t (a frigate is about half that).  Once inside, you have little sense of being in a sub rather than a surface vessel.

The smell is not from lack of clothes washing - it would make conditions unbearable if you or your clothes couldn't be washed properly for months - but because deodorants are not permitted as they affect the air filtration system.

[polybear]

3 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

I once heard crewmembers from a sub singing their song, "Nobody washes in a submarine".  It was well after midnight in a tin tabernacle north of Stornaway where their boat was berthed.  Drink had been taken.

 

Jamie

 

 

 

Bear's Boss said that when a sub came in from detachment (ISTR he was talking conventional boats here, not the nukes) the crew came out looking positively grey - and not from dirt, but from being aboard for so long - with much of it submerged.

[rockershovel]

Oh merciful Heavens, another series of Doc Martin. That's Wednesday evening conversation written off for the next three months...

 

I freely admit that Cornwall didn't work for me, I was happy to be gone after five years and have rarely returned... but every character in that programme appears to be an imbecile, way out along the autism spectrum or some combination of the two. 

 

Rural humour is difficult to get right. Dawn French absolutely nailed it in Vicar of Dibley, but didn't she have a thoroughly un-funny series on the Doc Martin style? 

Edited September 7, 2022 by rockershovel

[rockershovel]

10 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

It is in some of the older subs, but in the "bombers", no, they displace 16,000t (a frigate is about half that).  Once inside, you have little sense of being in a sub rather than a surface vessel.

The smell is not from lack of clothes washing - it would make conditions unbearable if you or your clothes couldn't be washed properly for months - but because deodorants are not permitted as they affect the air filtration system.

I have to say that it's one of the things I really don't care for about being back in a civil engineering environment - the noise, squalor and disorder of the typical site office compared to life offshore. 

[PhilJ W]

1 hour ago, SM42 said:

 

Would they have a washing machine on a sub?

Water is quite a scarce resource and a former submariner told me you could tell when one docked from the smell. 

 

Things could have changed though

 

Andy

 

41 minutes ago, simontaylor484 said:

I would have thought space was also at a premium.

 

Plenty of space on a modern nuclear submarine, and the water comes directly from the sea around the sub via microfilters that even filter out the salt.

[newbryford]

On 05/09/2022 at 16:07, Happy Hippo said:

I'm sure he wish he could.

 

I think Jamie has just about recovered.

 

Just feel sorry for SM42 and coastalview who have not yet had the pleasure.

 

The Welsh element who have met me in the past are not perturbed in the slightest, as they are all made of sterner stuff.

 

I have met HH on more than one occasion.

 

The moral of the story is:

Therapy is expensive,

[newbryford]

On 05/09/2022 at 21:36, simontaylor484 said:

I would love to go to Warley but its not possible this year

 

On 05/09/2022 at 21:47, New Haven Neil said:

 

Me too - the costs would be scary.  Of course when I'm in the UK (soon) there's never a show in the locality.

 

I'll be there with DL - with a sensible expenses claim!!

 

 

[J. S. Bach]

The early subs were not called "pigboats" for no reason. I can just barely imagine how those u-boat crews stank when they (those that survived their cruise, anyway) returned to Lorient (or wherever); Dönitz must have had a serious case of "loss of sense of smell", at least when he met the returning boats.

 

The US subs had some air conditioning, more for the equipment than the crew, but it help with the smells (feet, f@rts, and fannys) as described in several US WW2 sub histories that I have read.