Early Risers.

[Barry O]

Not been 100% last night and today. Either I ate something dodgy or I am in receipt of a tummy bug. Never mind.

 

Sleep well everyone

 

Baz

 

Edited for spilchquer

Edited August 18, 2017 by Barry O

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[newbryford]

Sad news from the MR club. Our longest standing member of over 50 years - Colin Hey - passed away after a battle with the dreaded C. His funeral is on Monday. I always remember him greeting me at the club as Chairman at the time and offering his telephone number. He was ex-directory due to his job and he was a bit perplexed when I didn't write it down. His number was one less than Mrs NB's work number.

 

Tempered by a pleasant surprise this evening after NB Junior's text earlier today (now yesterday).

She turned up at home with a car full of the rest of her uni stuff. All that's left behind in her uni room is a pillow and blanket for her two night stopover at the end of next week for her group's end of course party, She will return there by train,

 

As Euston and the lower half of the WCML is closed for engineering works next weekend, she's travelling home from Colchester to Leeds via Kings Cross. Then onto Blackburn, where we will rendezvous to watch a pre-season friendly ice hockey game. The arena is a 90 second drive from the station.

Train fares: Colchester-Leeds £30-ish. Colchester-Blackburn £70, Leeds-Blackburn £4.50. No need for A-level maths to work that one out.

 

Downside to NB coming home at short notice. Aforementioned carload of stuff on the living room floor with the promise of "I'll sort it tomorrow....."

 

Upside to her arriving home. Plenty of cakes will be baked for consumption in the exhibitors restroom at Blackburn Exhibition.

 

It's raining outside, but the forecast is quite reasonable for hitting a little white ball around a field or two.

 

Have a good Friday and POETS if you can.

 

Cheers,

Mick

[pH]

The current year is now officially the most destructive on record for wildfires in BC - http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-surpasses-worst-wildfire-season-on-record-and-threat-is-far-from-over-1.4249435 . The previous 'record' stood for 59 years. 

[AndyID]

 

The sun is out, and the old tent is still distinctly smelly.

 

"Blacks of Greenock" perchance? We had a lot of them when I was a Boy Scout. They weren't half heavy, and if you touched the inside when it was raining you banjaxed the surface tension and they leaked.

 

 

Sign at an outdoor equipment store:

 

"Now is the Summer of our discount tents."

[chrisf]

Good morning one and all

 

For now, the ironing is up to date.  On a pile of its own is a blue crumpled sheet.  I do not iron sheets for I am not a contortionist.  It will be folded, placed in its drawer and in time see the light of day.  In a few days more laundry will have been generated but sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

 

Among the letters awaiting my return was one from HMRC inviting me to claim a tax refund.  It is genuine.  I have enough dealings with HMRC despite my uncomplicated finances to know this.  Entering the suggested link on Google produced a host of suggestions, many of which were to an outfit called taxrebates.co.uk or similar.  They look like people who would happily take a share of the modest sum on offer: no thanks.  Eventually I find something with gov.uk in it which invites me to set up a personal tax account, making sure that I have my P60 to hand.  Ah.  At times like this it is a handicap to be the untidiest man on the planet for said document is in too safe a place for me to find it.  Reading the letter again I see that in due course HMRC will send me a cheque anyway.  Better check this.  Ring, ring.  Recorded messages, music which, thank goodness, is not bloody Vivaldi and eventually a  soothing Scottish lady speaks.  After making sure that Chris really is Chris she confirms that a cheque will be sent soon.  Where did the last half hour go?  What a rigmarole for £35.

 

All that makes me look forward to the fodder run today.  It will be accomplished speedily and, I hope, efficiently.

 

Thoughts to all in distress and recovery and today to all in Barcelona

 

Chris

[Robert]

Morning All,

 

It is a reasonable morning here, with broken cloud.  Although I suspect that it will get fairly hot later on in the day.

 

I haven't been on parade the last couple of days, because we were rather busy with testing, and I didn't get a chance.  However, I am back in my office this morning.

 

Time for a coffee!

 

Have a good day everyone...

[BlackRat]

Morning campers!

 

Just made Mrs BR an early cuppa, as it is her birthday, and it's my turn anyway!

 

As an aside, 33 years ago today, she walked down the aisle with her farmer father, who was still slightly suspicious of this young dashing Marine, and she said I do.

 

Two houses, a mortgage, two children, 1 dog, several cars and numerous bikes later.......she is still my rock and my entire world.

 

The 4 dozen roses arrived a day early, and a posh restaurant has been booked, I'll try not to show her up, and she has done well to refine me but there's still a bit of Tiger Bay in me, Roots you see.

 

Have a great day one and all, and my very best wishes, wherever in the world you are, and whatever your outlook.

 

Neil.

[Barry O]

Didn't sleep very well which is unusual for me.

Lots of ball bashing at Headingley last night in the T20 and a nice century for Adam Lyth.

 

Some shopping to do at moreasons then the day is mine.

 

Enjoy your day everyone.

Baz

[Barry O]

Neil..Happy anniversary and a Happy Birthday to your good lady.

 

Baz

[Gwiwer]

Morning all.

 

Happy Birthday to Mrs and Happy Anniversary to Mr & Mrs BlackRat.

 

Overnight it has been wet.  Very wet.  Underfoot is crunchy account the snail population is out enjoying itself.  Not good for returning the bin from its collection point to its storage point barefoot.  Ah well.

 

Wishing a good day to all.

[BoD]

Good morning all.

 

Many happy returns, Brian W.

[roundhouse]

Good morning from a rather pleasant sunny morning and a forecast high of 19. Much more pleasant than Ian A's 212! Normally it's me making typo errors.

 

A restless night for me as I didn't nod off till some time after 01.30 and awoke about 05.00 so it's going to be a tiring day but at least he task that I need to have completed today should be ready for review then we see what happens from here on at work.

[jamie92208]

Morning all from a very sunny village, however it may not stay that way.

 

Congratulations to Neil and Mrs BR. Happy Birthday Brian and well done to Abbie.

 

Yesterday seemed to evaporate as I had to collect and then distribute quite a lot of books. Hopefully today will get the tidying o the modelling room completed and a workspace cleared.

 

Our remaining moggie, Minnie, is due to leave us this morning for a new home near Burton on Trent. The house will be strange without the patter of paws but there will be less hair on the carpets.

 

Regards to all.

 

Jamie

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl, Inner Temple Here,

A reasonable night sleep was had in 4 parts but I've not made up for yesterdays missing sleep.

 

212? it feels like that in here, after a couple of hours yesterday they fixed the Airconditioning, But at about 22:30 last night it failed again, so when I came in it was +30C, it's now down to 28.247C as I've switched off the major heat producing equipment in here.

This means I can't do any measuring today so it will be back to writting a computer programme to adjust the equipment that I wrote a measurement  only programme for earlier this year.

 

Gwiwer, your old UK licence, if you passed before 1st Jan 1997,, it would not have been for car only (plus your PSV) but would have included driving trucks up to 7.5 tons, and towing. These were on everyones licences, but now if you passed after that date they are separate tests. This is what you have to ensure is not removed with the new photo licence. You never know if you might need to hire a truck to take a layout to a show, or move house . I'd be stuffed without towing as I move sailing boats around a lot..

 

Post offices are useful for Photo driving licences and Passports, IF they have their own camera, no not the ones plonked in a box in a corner, but one by a counter controlled by a member of staff at a counter, you get a guaranteed photo taken and all the paperwork done for a fixed fee.

 

Well It's down to 27.648C.

 

Time to...get on with programming..

[grandadbob]

Good morning all,

Blue sky & sunshine at the moment but rain expected later.

Now if I've got this right it's Many Happy Returns to Brian and also Mrs BR together with Happy Anniversary to Neil & Mrs BR.

Many thanks for all the good wishes for Abbie. Amongst her 3 passes he has now got 2  "ologies" . As one of those was the one she failed in her mocks and has caused all the stress she is over the moon.

A celebration meal was had last night and as usual we had a great time.

Today we're all off to Bognor to see Nicki's MiL ie the kid's other Nan.

Have a great day,

Bob.

Edited August 18, 2017 by grandadbob

[The Lurker]

Congratulations to Mr & Mrs Black Rat, birthday congratulations too, and well done to Abbie. A levels seem such a long time ago. Being a July birthday, I can honestly claim I was only 17 when I took them. I don't particularly remember my results day - I was working in the back office of an FX traders on Bucklersbury, and I can't remember whether I waited for the post or whether the post came so early in those days that it made no odds. There must have been disappointment that I didn't get the A I had hoped for in history, but I did get the grades I needed to go up to Leeds, and I do remember some nerves about that. After all, the sign next to the station that said "Real Ale 52p a pint" and the prospect of a science fiction library had enticed me there.

 

Yesterday afternoon I sent an e-mail to a member of our team, knowing he was on holiday, but it was something I didn't want to forget to tell him when he got back after the bank holiday. I'd also forgotten that he was in Barcelona yesterday, fortunately not caught up on Las Ramblas - he and his family had been there earlier but his daughter was not well, so they had gone back to the hotel. .

 

On a nicer front, Mrs Lurker and I had a meal together in town, a very nice tapas selection, one advantage of the in laws being down in advance of the family party tomorrow.

 

The boss is out today but after a browse through some other parts of rmweb, I will be having the fun of doing his 360 appraisal ... yet another new initiative from HR, only about 10 years after everywhere else abandoned them. Still I expect they will have to take on a few extra people to deal with it. When I joined here 11 years ago, the HR team was 4 people. It's now 6 times as many!!

 

Have a good day all

[Tony_S]

Morning all.

Less overcast than it was earlier, which is nice.

Happy birthday to Brian.

Happy Anniversary to Mr and Mrs Black Rat.

 

My task today is to be at Southend Airport tonight to meet Matthew. The flight from Amsterdam is one of the last planes in and the airport is not exactly teeming with people at that time. Matthew won't be home long as he is flying to Dublin on Tuesday. He will be looking for somewhere to live in the Maynooth area.

Tony

[RhBBob]

Morning all !

 

Yesterday's other news was that house prices are rising the fastest on Orkney !  Am I the only one who doesn't see rising house prices as a positive ?  Cheapest area was £80K which sounds like a big mortgage commitment on minimum wage.

 

Steam cleaning the kitchen floor today as is my usual task on Fridays whilst the Boss is buying up Asda; actually my slightly wobbly mind called it 'steam cleaning the door' but I think I got away with it !  SWMBO and the younger version of her will be car-booting tomorrow from 6 am and then hopefully sorting the leftover junk first class merchandise for the Charity shop in Bostonia.

 

As Alan Bennett says, 'keep on, keeping on', and stay safe.  Our thoughts today are with our Spanish cousins; we were due at the Nou Camp back in February but the trip was cancelled.

[DDolfelin]

Going to Barcelona next month.

Will have to dust off my stab vest.

Unless I wear an imitation one.

 

A friend has just broken her elbow by slipping in a launderette (didn't know they still had them!).

I wonder if there are figures available for accidents tripping over 'Wet Floor' warning cones.

[Barry O]

Happy birthday Brian!

 

I took my A levels at 17 and left school on my 18th birthday. My A levels got me a place at Leeds to do an Engineering degree...the rest, as they say, is history.

 

Baz

[Horsetan]

Going to Barcelona next month.

Will have to dust off my stab vest.....

I'm just crossing Spain off my list of future holiday destinations, along with France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Greece....

 

At this rate, only Hungary and Poland will be safe enough to risk a visit.

[TheQ]

I'm just crossing Spain off my list of future holiday destinations, along with France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Greece....

 

At this rate, only Hungary and Poland will be safe enough to risk a visit.

Ireland?   I think you have dealings with the place...

Edited August 18, 2017 by TheQ

[AndyB]

Morning all and after a heavy rain shower at 05:00 it's now sunny.

 

Congrats to the birthday folk and particular congratulations for Mrs & Mrs BR. 

 

We're now half way through the school holiday and tomorrow I'll be picking the littleuns up from their gran's. The house will return to it's usual noisy self thereafter. Thankfully.

 

Following our trip to north of the border various reservation platforms have been seeking reviews of the hotels we stayed in.

One in particular, naming no names but it begins with Exp... totally ba$$sed up our hotel reservation, their IT system having allowed a double booking. An email was sent by them cancelling our reservation in plenty of time, allowing us to make a booking though a different agent in a different town... HOWEVER, ever since then they've been emailing reminding us about our trip, asking for feedback about the hotel, etc etc etc.

 

So. I wrote a review as requested. "Hotel lovely from what we saw, although we never stayed there....the booking platform on which you are reading this review is a pile of $h1te and we cannot urge the reader strongly enough to book in any other way possible." 

 

I'm not sure they'll publish it. But it might make them stop friggin' emailing me every other day. Actually they seem so useless that they may actually publish what I wrote! Think I'll go and check.....

 

Have a nice day everyone.   

[Horsetan]

Ireland? I think you have dealings with the place...

I think that's taken as read.