The Night Mail

[iL Dottore]

18 hours ago, bbishop said:

Lunchtime at Lord's.  England, as usual, c0cking up Bazball.  Not that I have watched much cricket, too many patients. 

Wow!

I never imagined cricket as being so intensely, so nail-bitingly, so dangerously exciting as to cause spectators to keel over from the sheer adrenaline fueled exhilaration.

 

Is this one of those new fangled forms of cricket where you condense all the exciting bits of a Test Match into half-an-afternoon?

 

It seems all too rich for my blood, Bill. I’ll stick to something calmer - like paragliding…

 

Edited August 30 by iL Dottore

[TheQ]

I had a during  a degree course exam done at home, where the answer was yes...

Unfortunately they wanted 3000 words...

Luckily i was one of the first to use a computer to type the answers.

 

My first attempt was 300 words, then I used auto replace to change one or two words to longer statements.

So "national grid" became "central electricity board generating system network". Somehow I got up to just under 3000 words.

I was amazed when given very high marks...

[polybear]

9 hours ago, SM42 said:

Is money neutral?

 

 

Bear doesn't care either way - just so long as it gets Bear Cake, Pizza and Deltics.

 

8 hours ago, Mike Bellamy said:

All three then continued to circle around many times but every few circuits the jet, which had been going very slowly and flying nose up, shot off very high presumably to cool the engine before re-joining the formation. Perhaps @Dave Hunt could comment?

 

 

Perhaps Biggles was just bored stiff stoogin' about in 1st Gear for hours....

 

59 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

.......and his supporters will rally behind him, saying things like “we’ve never seen HH steal cake”

 

No-one's ever seen Big H steal cake....he's a true Master of the Art.....

[Mike Bellamy]

8 hours ago, SM42 said:

We were also buzzed by two 0lanes in close formation, one of which I suspect was a Spit, although hard to tell at distance side on. 

Another appeared ( probably the second one)  later on its own and was definitely the right wing shape and was doing a few rolls after it turned inland 

I doubt it was BBMF, possibly a two seater. 

 

As far as I know, the BBMF single engine planes with Merlin engines are still grounded after the tragic crash at Coningsby when Sqn Ldr Mark Long was killed soon after take off. It's only recently that the Lancaster has been allowed to fly again.

 

By coincidence, there was a BBC Lincolnshire news item yesterday asking for any photos or videos of MK356 taken on previous flights which perhaps indicates that they still haven't been able to establish the reason for the crash.

 

Another coincidence - on holiday last week, we were near to the De Havilland Museum where they have a Merlin engine that they can turn over to show visitors the numerous working parts - eight year old grandson was fascinated (and so was grandad} !  Nearby Whitewebbs Transport Museum was another very interesting experience.

.

[polybear]

8 hours ago, SM42 said:

We were also buzzed by two 0lanes in close formation, one of which I suspect was a Spit, although hard to tell at distance side on. 

 

Another appeared ( probably the second one)  later on its own and was definitely the right wing shape and was doing a few rolls after it turned inland 

 

I doubt it was BBMF, possibly a two seater. 

 

Typically I had forgotten to take the binocluars

 

Andy

 

If it's a twin seater Spit over the Cliffs then there's a fair chance it could be someone spending a Lifetime's Supply of Deltics on a Jolly with one of several companies who offer such rides.  Jealous?  Bear?

[SM42]

22 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

Bear doesn't care either way - just so long as it gets Bear Cake, Pizza and Deltics.

 

 

But it can affect the ability of bear to get those things depending on how much money might be sloshing about, or it won't, or it might

 

7 minutes ago, Mike Bellamy said:

 

As far as I know, the BBMF single engine planes with Merlin engines are still grounded after the tragic crash at Coningsby when Sqn Ldr Mark Long was killed soon after take off. It's only recently that the Lancaster has been allowed to fly again.

 

 

That's my understanding too. 

 

I got  the impression is was one of those 2 seaters on an experience flight. 

 

If only I'd had something more efective than  slightly  defective mk1 eyeballs to observe with. 

 

Andy

Edited August 30 by SM42

[SM42]

I've just told Mrs SM42 an unbroadcastable joke. 

 

She looked at me blankly. 

 

Outside a seagull laughed so it couldn't have been that bad.

 

Andy

Edited August 30 by SM42

[polybear]

3 minutes ago, SM42 said:

 

But it can affect the ability of bear to get those things depending on how much money might be sloshing about, or it won't, or it might

 

 

Do - or Do Not.  There is no in-between......

 

**Kinda ripped off (and tweaked slightly) from some little guy, somewhere.....

[SteveyDee68]

11 hours ago, SM42 said:

We were forced to do General Studies at A Level. 

I have mentioned elsewhere that my time doing A Levels was interspersed with attempts by two of my lecturers to get me thrown out - one loathed me (this was reciprocated) and the other simply didn’t fathom out he bored me absolutely sh*tless!

 

Luckily, my Music lecturer argued my case and I got to sit my A Levels … all except General Studies, which everyone had to take! Why? It was reasoned that by not doing that fourth subject that I would be able to focus and (maybe scrape a) pass (in) my three chosen subjects.

 

At the time (1986) the prep for this paper was attempting a couple of questions from past papers during registration time, so their logic in this was bizarre to say the least!

 

My college “crime” was simply not turning up for lessons; if my day was just English Lit and Geography, I had nothing to really look forward to (belittling in the former and boredom in the latter) so as my journey to college involved crossing a very busy main road to reach the necessary bus stop, I would chose to get a bus in the opposite direction if I couldn’t easily cross! The other end of the journey was a short walk to Manchester Central Library, where I would make my way to the non Fiction section and select a subject and book at random (except foreign languages - I learnt my ineptitude at those in O Level Spanish!). I’d spend a day reading whatever I had chosen, then go home.

 

To this day I am annoyed I wasn’t allowed to take the A Level General Studies paper - I lost count of how many times my friends would show me a question and I could either answer it or work out the answer from the random reading I had been doing when AWOL! The one I remember most clearly was the “silhouettes of famous buildings” question which I answered every single one correctly, whereas my friends managed a couple or so from the ten shown - maybe the fact I frequently visited the Architecture section in the Library helped (well, I did want to be an architect when I was at secondary school, until the careers teacher incorrectly advised me that I would need A Level mathematics and I realised my chances of doing that were approximately zero* - but that’s another story!!)

 

@iL Dottore says about “highly trained” rather than “highly educated” and I find myself agreeing, although at the same time I am not great in pub quizzes because although I have soaked up lots of (generally probably useless) knowledge about many things over the years, recalling them under pressure is an entirely different matter! 🤣

 

Steve S

 

* 67 consecutive un-attempted (not incomplete, not even started!) maths homeworks demonstrated I either didn’t understand what I had been “taught” (and therefore didn’t waste my time attempting as I knew I had no idea) or that I fully understood it (so why waste my time repeating the same activity with a bunch of different numbers?). Coupled with a belief I was useless at maths thanks to the poor teaching I received.

Ironic that when I stated teaching post 16 that my natural affinity and ability was to teach maths to young people and adults who struggled with the subject (usually due to poor prior teaching and a total lack of empathy from their teachers about how their struggles made them feel about the subject, which I knew about from experience. Might explain how I listed my O Level Maths a grade lower than I actually achieved for many years, because I thought I wasn’t any good at the subject!)

Edited August 30 by SteveyDee68
Removing random line breaks!

[polybear]

1 hour ago, SM42 said:

 

But it can affect the ability of bear to get those things depending on how much money might be sloshing about, or it won't, or it might

 

 

When Life gets that heavy I eat cake until it lightens up a little.....

[Northmoor]

1 hour ago, polybear said:

 

If it's a twin seater Spit over the Cliffs then there's a fair chance it could be someone spending a Lifetime's Supply of Deltics on a Jolly with one of several companies who offer such rides.  Jealous?  Bear?

A friend and colleague has done just that, selling off some of his life-long collection of WW2 memorabilia to pay for it.  

[Oldddudders]

I was a poor student. Having been "crammed" at my small village primary school - up to 90 mins homework a night at age 9 seems a bit harsh now - so I arrived at grammar school a year early, and found I was pretty ordinary. I didn't seem to get science at all, and opted for arts subjects to O Level. Failed Latin twice. "I see you distinguished yourself in latin again" said Mr Dryer. A couple of years later, his only daughter, who was at Oxford, took her own life. I left school at 17, with a couple of very ordinary A Levels - one a resit - and joined the railway, where I never looked back, having a good career with plenty of promotions. 

 

Anent Flavio and Test Cricket, let me tell you about Charlie Harrington. The denouement of the story has been told before. I first saw Charlie when he gave a lecture on the Controllers' Course at Beckenham in early 1969. He was, I think, Train Planning Officer for Southern Region, so pretty high-up. Among other cynical observations he said he did not want to see a Channel Tunnel, because he was convinced that during the first week "a 14-coach TEE set would be on the 18.04 London Bridge to Coulsdon North". Hmm. A couple of years later, the 10.00 Morning Ops Conference was in full swing, with Charlie as the HQ officer. Harold Roberts - a railway grandee of the highest quality, widely respected at all levels - was on for Central, when he said "You're not talking to me like that!" replaced the phone and instructed it was not to be answered. 

 

A few years later, and I am now a Management Trainee, and we have a formal session with Charlie. I reminded him of his TEE remark and asked if he had had any reason to reconsider. He hadn't. When we (the 1973 SR Trainees) met him again he recalled me - "You're the one who quotes my own words back to me!" A few years later (sorry, this really is the final lap) Charlie and a couple of colleagues had gone to 'a meeting at the Board', then located at 222 Marylebone Terrace. Sadly Charlie up and died at the meeting, which was not only sad but a mite awkward, because the 'meeting' was in the stands at Lords....

[DenysW]

10 hours ago, Mike Bellamy said:

Two years ago we walked up to the top of Seven Sisters from the Birling Gap

So not the Seven Sisters that is one stop from Tottenham Hale?

[iL Dottore]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Do - or Do Not.  There is no in-between......

 

**Kinda ripped off (and tweaked slightly) from some little guy, somewhere.....

Or perhaps.

 

"Spend, or Spend Not. There is no credit"

[monkeysarefun]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

When Life gets that heavy I eat cake until it lightens up a little.....

 

 

I usually watch the first minute of this video of Ann-Margret dancing. 

 

(Did she ever just walk anywhere?)

 

 

Edited August 30 by monkeysarefun

[J. S. Bach]

Well, another trip around the El Sol starts today.

[PhilJ W]

10 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

Well, another trip around the El Sol starts today.

Many happy returns.

[PhilJ W]

7 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Wow!
I never imagined cricket as being so intensely, so nail-bitingly, so dangerously exciting as to cause spectators to keel over from the sheer adrenaline fueled exhilaration.

Is this one of those new fangled forms of cricket where you condense all the exciting bits of a Test Match into half-an-afternoon?

It seems all too rich for my blood, Bill. I’ll stick to something calmer - like paragliding…

It is a test match. I did watch the 100 series, it degenerates into a run chase at the end of a match. A batsman hit a six into the crowd and a spectator caught it one handed. He had a pint of beer in his other hand and he didn't spill a drop.

[Oldddudders]

1 minute ago, PhilJ W said:

A batsman hit a six into the crowd and a spectator caught it one handed. He had a pint of beer in his other hand and he didn't spill a drop.

Has he been selected?

[Northmoor]

58 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

It is a test match. I did watch the 100 series, it degenerates into a run chase at the end of a match. A batsman hit a six into the crowd and a spectator caught it one handed. He had a pint of beer in his other hand and he didn't spill a drop.

The last cricket match I went to was over 30 years ago.  One of my last was a one-day game in Swansea; a group of young blokes (not that much older than me) behind us began singing at the beginning of the match and lubricated by more and more lager, sang more and more leerily for the next six hours.  From what I've heard of The Hundred, it's even worse than the 20/20 which is just a massive p1ss-up for most of the attendees but where there's a cricket match in the background*.  The idea seemed to be "to attract interest in the game from those who wouldn't normally attend cricket" or some such guff.  Quite honestly if your attention span couldn't last for a 20/20 match, you're probably a lost cause and should stay away.

 

* A former colleague who co-owned a racehorse, gave up attending evening race meetings (where his horse was running) at places like Wolverhampton because he couldn't stand the drunken atmosphere; it was more like a stag or hen-do than a sporting event.

[rockershovel]

On 27/08/2024 at 14:02, jjb1970 said:

If people want more rabbit food and vinegar in their diet and wonder whether it is possible to make cucumber a tasty treat I recommend acar. Splendid stuff, acar is Indonesian pickled cucumber, it's pickled with shallots and lots of birds eye or similar chilli. 

Sounds good. 

 

I've always felt cucumber was a much under-rated fruit. 

[rockershovel]

On 29/08/2024 at 08:28, iL Dottore said:

I am firmly of the opinion that acquiring an education is much, much more than just learning that “Tab A goes into Slot B” (that’s “training”).
 

I believe it’s about learning how and when to ask questions, about acquiring enough understanding of a variety of subjects to comprehend the answers to your questions, about developing a curious and questioning view of the world, about having one’s own “world view” challenged, about having a broad range of interests (where one’s knowledge can be merely superficial or can be considerable - depending on specific preference) and about being well read.

 

I have met a number of “educated” people who have had little in the way of “formal education” and, conversely, many with numerous diplomas who weren’t.

 

A number of years ago, I and a fellow senior colleague were discussing the young medics applying for positions with us and we concluded that far too many were “well trained but not educated” such was their paucity of knowledge (or even interest) of much of anything outside of what they had been formally taught.

The problem nowadays is that it is no longer thought desirable that graduates should be taught to think independently, and draw reasoned conclusions from the evidence available. 

 

Ideological indoctrination is the goal, along with the pursuit of obsessive, subjectively defined trains of thought which a more rational observer would recognise as incapable of being brought to any meaningful conclusion. 

 

[polybear]

1 hour ago, Northmoor said:

The last cricket match I went to was over 30 years ago. 

 

Bear has never been to a cricket match - the closest I've been is seeing one going on in a field as I drive by.  I reckon that's close enough....

[Compound2632]

20 minutes ago, rockershovel said:

The problem nowadays is that it is no longer thought desirable that graduates should be taught to think independently, and draw reasoned conclusions from the evidence available.

 

Indeed, because employers don't like employees capable of independent thought.

 

22 minutes ago, rockershovel said:

 

Ideological indoctrination is the goal, along with the pursuit of obsessive, subjectively defined trains of thought which a more rational observer would recognise as incapable of being brought to any meaningful conclusion. 

 

Likewise, this is what employers prefer - they do not like to have their absurd practices challenged.

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, rockershovel said:

The problem nowadays is that it is no longer thought desirable that graduates should be taught to think independently, and draw reasoned conclusions from the evidence available. 

I can think independently and think what you have stated is not true.

Even before higher education as one example, secondary school history is more about analysing sources than remembering dates and names of monarchs.