The Night Mail

[Tony_S]

Today would have been Matthew’s 31st birthday. Fortunately we have lots of fun things to recall from our shared times. His sudden, unexpected death wasn’t one of them but so many people, officials and his friends & colleagues were so kind that helps too. 

[SM42]

Thank you for the messages of support and condolence. 

 

The news is starting to sink in slowly. 

 

Due to the connection between mine and Mrs SM42's family (English side) I've known her cousin for my whole life..  Literally. 

 

He was 8 years older than me and was one of the worlds gentle giants, and an all round nice guy. ( I wouldn't like to make him angry  though)

 

We didn't meet regularly, mainly family dos and Christmas but it was always a pleasure when we did. 

 

He is and will be sorely missed. 

 

Andy

[Oldddudders]

A lot of sadness on TNM this morning - my support to Andy, and to others who have had horrid memories rekindled. As it happens, this morning I passed the spot where I scattered - quite illegally in France - Deb's ashes a decade ago. As it is on the racing circuit, which is the other side of Le Mans, I seldom have cause to go there, but there has been some revision to the metal barriers, I noted in passing. 

 

In prep for my forthcoming thyroid op, I had had a blood-test on Monday, in the local village as usual. Tuesday, when the results came though online, it noted that one item had not been suitable for analysis, and I must go to the lab - 30 miles away, south of Le Mans - for a retest. I duly did that this morning, and the nurse explained that that particular aspect requires sample-testing within 4 hours, which isn't possible if the sample is taken remotely, and collected by van. It was after that that I drove down the Mulsanne Straight - having fruitlessly stopped at McDonalds, only to discover they don't sell burgers etc until 10 a.m.! Place was only offering sweet stuff - yuk!

[jamie92208]

My sympathy to Polish Andy in your situation. It's not nice.  There is one date for us that is both a wedding anniversary (not ours) and a death anniversary.  SDly they ever get forgotten but can get easier with time.  My thoughts are with you and Mrs SM42.

 

Here I've just hung the washing out and we:ve now got thunder and rain.  The washing will dry eventually. I will check the circuit breakers later. 

 

Jamie

[Tony_S]

2 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

In prep for my forthcoming thyroid op, I had had a blood-test on Monday, in the local village as usual. Tuesday, when the results came though online, it noted that one item had not been suitable for analysis, and I must go to the lab - 30 miles away, south of Le Mans - for a retest. I duly did that this morning, and the nurse explained that that particular aspect requires sample-testing within 4 hours, which isn't possible if the sample is taken remotely,

When I first had parathyroid hormone bloodtests they had to be taken at the hospital rather than at community clinics. Now they can be taken at clinics as the van courier service has been improved. Most of the regular samples go to a lab in Milton Keynes but others get done locally. All very efficient. At the time my samples were taken at the hospital, the vet was taking blood from Robbie the spaniel for the same PTH test. His sample had to be frozen and couriered to a laboratory. The vet rang me after a day and said Robbie’s test would need to be repeated as the courier had allowed the sample to thaw. Robbie  was so good at having blood tests during the treatment including surgery for his parathyroid condition, he presented his leg so the vet could insert the needle. 

[J. S. Bach]

3 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

...snip... having fruitlessly stopped at McDonalds, only to discover they don't sell burgers etc until 10 a.m.! Place was only offering sweet stuff - yuk!

Over here they have a full breakfast menu, the breakfast burrito is the best on that menu, at least to me.

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, J. S. Bach said:

breakfast burrito i

Always generates an image of a small donkey to me. 

[J. S. Bach]

3 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

Always generates an image of a small donkey to me. 

To me, it is an omelette wrapped in a tortilla.

[Tony_S]

21 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

To me, it is an omelette wrapped in a tortilla.

I haven’t had Mexican influenced food at breakfast, only later in the day, though I did have to explain to someone at a Mexican restaurant in London what exactly Chihuahua cheese was, or to be more precise, what it wasn’t. 

[Happy Hippo]

On a brighter note, Gordon was around again today, and we have just about finished off the scenery on Pantmawr North.

 

The only area left to do is around the signal box.

 

We would have finished that today, but the box roof is very flimsy being laser cut card, and I decided it better if I made a thin plastic underlay, which stiffened it up considerably.

 

I now have to paint in the gorse flowers!  (This will be an epic to rival Dave's fencing saga.)

[Happy Hippo]

I even managed to get the rodding run terminated at the signal box.

 

 

Especially for Sheepbloke:

 

Suitably grubby, but too well fed for my liking.

 

Overseeing events was one of my cousins:

 

 

 

 

[polybear]

Firstly, VVSBT's to Polish Andy and Family.....

 

A very good friend of mine flew to India with his Father & Brother to see family there; his Father in particular wanted to go "home" to see them.

On the flight back his Father stopped breathing and despite the actions of Doctors (two, IIRC) on board they couldn't revive him; my friend was very pleased that his Father had got home one last time, seen his family and was with his two sons when he "went" - he said it doesn't get much better than that.  As you can imagine there were quite a few passengers and crew that were very upset by the experience - the BA Captain came out to see them after the flight to offer his condolences etc. - he mentioned that it was very fortunate that there were Doctors on board, otherwise the aircraft would've had to divert and land en-route (Germany IIRC) with the same outcome, but a lot more problems for the family regarding repatriation etc.

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, polybear said:

he mentioned that it was very fortunate that there were Doctors on board, otherwise the aircraft would've had to divert and land en-route (Germany IIRC)

Aditi’s brother was flying back from New Zealand when there was “if there is a doctor on boards would they make themselves known please’. He and another doctor responded and were taken up to first class Raj was the more experienced so took charge. He was very impressed with the rather superior first aid kit. He and his new colleague decided that their patient wasn’t having a heart attack and there was no need to divert. The purser took Raj up to the flight deck so he could inform the captain. Where they were had a very limited number of alternative landing sites. 

[polybear]

16 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

Aditi’s brother was flying back from New Zealand when there was “if there is a doctor on boards would they make themselves known please’. He and another doctor responded and were taken up to first class Raj was the more experienced so took charge. He was very impressed with the rather superior first aid kit. He and his new colleague decided that their patient wasn’t having a heart attack and there was no need to divert. The purser took Raj up to the flight deck so he could inform the captain. Where they were had a very limited number of alternative landing sites. 

 

ISTR that BA carry defib's + kit for births etc. etc. so I guess that many others do too.  I suspect Sleazyjet & Buddy Holly Airways kit is limited to Elastoplast's & Strepsils though.......

 

 

Edited August 24, 2023 by polybear

[Dave Hunt]

2 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

 

Overseeing events was one of my cousins:

 

 

 

I've heard of the black sheep of the family but not the black hippo.

 

Dave

[Tony_S]

3 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

ISTR that BA carry defib's + kit for births etc. etc. so I guess that many others do too.  I suspect Sleazyjet & Buddy Holly Airways kit is limited to Elastoplast's & Strepsils though.......

 

 

It was Air New Zealand. 

[Tony_S]

Matthew was once on a flight from Lisbon to Schipol. He had been in hospital in Lisbon (fell out of a bunk, landed in his head) and we persuaded him not to fly back to the Netherlands in the budget flight he had booked that landed in a field somewhere near a bus stop (slight exaggeration). We really wanted him to fly home to the UK but he wasn’t having that at all, “too much work to do”. So I was tracking his TAP flight and it took off and spent ages circling the airport then, set off on the correct route, once over French airspace it started circling again and returned to somewhere in North Portugal. Eventually took off again, very late landing . It turned out someone had been ill shortly after take off and was then ok. Someone else was Ill causing the plane to turn round and land at a military base.  We were of course thinking was it Matthew who was ill. He said it was a pretty awful trip, he didn’t feel well and there were rail diversions etc to Utrecht. He did say it was better than his original plan though. 
 

Edited August 24, 2023 by Tony_S

[AndyID]

11 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

I think it was on here that I mentioned that a lightning strike appeared to have tripped a circuit breakers that fed the pool via an underground cable.  Two days ago it tripped again and I went into the pool shed to investigate.  There were signs of burning on the top of the little consumer unit and the ELCB would not reset till I isolated the pool circuit.  This is what I discovered.

The earth wire had welded itself to the short length of busbar above the two breakers.  I replaced the breakers yesterday. Not fun in a metal shed in 37 degrees, rerouted the earth wire and everything is working correctly now.  The pool was 37 degrees even without the pump.  I wonder if the initial damage was done by the lightning  strike and then the short occurred. It had worked for 2 weeks or more but I hadn'/t taken the cover off the breakers to check. Lessons learned. I'm going to reinstall the earth spike by the little shed.

 

Jamie

Hard to say for certain. Possibly the lightning strike elevated the ground enough to breakdown the insulation on the ground wire and the line started arcing to ground at that point. Then the heat softened the insulation and it got worse.

 

Definitely safer with a local ground stake. I'm not wild about the terminal block tying the two grounds together.

 

Am I correct in thinking there are breakers in both the line and neutral feeds to the pump?

 

[Hroth]

3 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

 

Overseeing events was one of my cousins:

 

 

 

 

39 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

I've heard of the black sheep of the family but not the black hippo.

 

Dave

 

Looks like hippo has come directly from the wallow, down by the hollow...

 

[New Haven Neil]

More commiserations and supportive thoughts from us for SM Andy, and to others with sad thoughts this day.

 

Another day watching motorbike race about the place, but house guest is approaching taking the veritable - not back yet....21.25. Promised back 1900 hrs - dinner ruined, etc etc. 

[J. S. Bach]

56 minutes ago, New Haven Neil said:

More commiserations and supportive thoughts from us for SM Andy, and to others with sad thoughts this day.

 

Another day watching motorbike race about the place, but house guest is approaching taking the veritable - not back yet....21.25. Promised back 1900 hrs - dinner ruined, etc etc. 

No, just more for the rest of you!

[jamie92208]

1 hour ago, AndyID said:

Hard to say for certain. Possibly the lightning strike elevated the ground enough to breakdown the insulation on the ground wire and the line started arcing to ground at that point. Then the heat softened the insulation and it got worse.

 

Definitely safer with a local ground stake. I'm not wild about the terminal block tying the two grounds together.

 

Am I correct in thinking there are breakers in both the line and neutral feeds to the pump?

 

Thanks for that Andy.  Yes the breaker cuts both feeds.  I wil replace the ground spike and bef up the connections.  Hopefully I'll get it done Saturday when the temp in the shed should be at least 10 or 12 degrees cooler than when I replaced the breakers.  I was melting in there yesterday. 

 

Thanks again

 

Jamie

[PhilJ W]

No excuse for not having a shed.

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

[AndyID]

1 hour ago, jamie92208 said:

Thanks for that Andy.  Yes the breaker cuts both feeds.  I wil replace the ground spike and bef up the connections.  Hopefully I'll get it done Saturday when the temp in the shed should be at least 10 or 12 degrees cooler than when I replaced the breakers.  I was melting in there yesterday. 

 

Thanks again

 

Jamie

 

Two breakers would be a bit belt and braces if the line is really line and the neutral is really neutral but if they happened to be swapped two is better definitely better than one.

 

Coincidentally our community well conked-out at some point last night. I was rudely awakened from slumber by an accusatorial  "There's no water!" (And I'm not even in charge of it nor have I been for a while 😆)

 

I was able to fix it. The breakers had both popped (the pump runs on 240V from two anti-phase 120V feeds so it really needs two breakers. It's a new pump and control system that was installed less than a year ago. The outfit that installed it thinks it was some sort of "surge" that caused the problem. I'm from Missouri* on that one.

 

*vehicle license plates in most US state have a slogan. Missouri plates say "Show-Me State"