Early Risers.

[BoD]

I see there's a notification about slow performance.  

I clicked it but it took so long to load I gave up.

[bbishop]

5 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

What does a "Starwars moment" mean?

 

Not having seen Star Wars?

 

Affirmative.

Bill

[pH]

3 hours ago, roundhouse said:

Looks wet and cold in Kansas City as it is here today. My other half likes the Kansas City Southern livery of the 2nd loco

 

 

With the white patch on the side of the long hood, that looks more like a Ferromex engine than a KCS "Belle".

[tigerburnie]

GPS has it's uses, though I wouldn't go into the hills without a map and compass and I still practice on every hill walk, just in case the cloud comes down, never used a sat nav in a car, I could have had one for free in my latest car, but I declined the offer.

[roundhouse]

9 minutes ago, pH said:

 

With the white patch on the side of the long hood, that looks more like a Ferromex engine than a KCS "Belle".

You may well be right as seen a few through here recently. She has one in that livery aswell that she bought at the Kansas City train show.

 

Just seen a 10 loco train on here.

[Ozexpatriate]

I'm finding the observations on Satnavs interesting.

 

I don't have an opinion of Satnavs for applications over hill, dale, fen and moor, but they can be very useful in traffic. When I purchased my now 15 year-old car, I elected to include the Satnav. It works adequately but is now old technology and requires me to source an updated DVD which stores the maps.

 

What I am happy to say is that what is available on a smart 'phone can be indispensable. The level of accuracy is extremely high and the ability to automatically reroute around traffic can be very clever and sometimes surprising, choosing alternative routes that would never have occurred to me. It has made the difference between me catching flights easily versus panicking in stationary traffic and wondering if I will make it on time.

 

Of course they are not failsafe.  I can choose one of two basic routes to the airport (and have no need of a Satnav to find my way with the basic routing). Nevertheless I am in now the habit of letting my 'phone estimate the trip. A week ago the two basic routes showed the one with no bailout options as faster at 53 minutes, (versus 35 minutes in no traffic). I chose that. The traffic worsened and it took 80 minutes. (I had allowed myself 90.)  Had I chosen the route with more alternatives I know I would have made it much faster as the Satnav adapts to the changing conditions.

[Ozexpatriate]

4 hours ago, roundhouse said:

Booked our internal flight form Salt Lake City to Portland OR on our summer trip.

Ian, I suspect you already know this but we are mourning the recent complete closure of BridgePort Brewing after 35 years of operation - both the brewery and the restaurant. BridgePort was truly one of the original pioneers in the craft brewing revolution in the Northwest and are very much a part of reintroducing the world to the IPA style. Explosive growth of craft brewing crowded them out, and as much as I will miss them, I felt that they concentrated too much on very hoppy beers across their whole line.

 

Last year Pyramid closed the Portland Brewing Taproom. This had been a favourite spot of mine since it opened around 1994. Portland Brewing's original Flanders Street location is the Pearl District location for Rogue - which I know you are very familiar with. Across the street from them is the 10 Barrel brewpub. 10 Barrel (though it started as an independent in Central Oregon) is of course a small cog in the monstrous AB-InBev machine.

 

Additionally Widmer Brothers has closed their tap room after 22 years. I think you know that they already closed the restaurant. Their brewery operations continue apace as part of the Craft Brew Alliance. While sales of Widmer products continue to be strong, curiously Kona Brewing is now the largest contributor to CBA.

 

For me it's a shame that these landmarks (all pioneers of craft brewing) are no more - but it's not like the industry is shrinking - just moving on.

[roundhouse]

 

8 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Ian, I suspect you already know this but we are mourning the recent complete closure of BridgePort Brewing after 35 years of operation - both the brewery and the restaurant. BridgePort was truly one of the original pioneers in the craft brewing revolution in the Northwest and are very much a part of reintroducing the world to the IPA style. Explosive growth of craft brewing crowded them out, and as much as I will miss them, I felt that they concentrated too much on very hoppy beers across their whole line.

 

Last year Pyramid closed the Portland Brewing Taproom. This had been a favourite spot of mine since it opened around 1994. Portland Brewing's original Flanders Street location is the Pearl District location for Rogue - which I know you are very familiar with. Across the street from them is the 10 Barrel brewpub. 10 Barrel (though it started as an independent in Central Oregon) is of course a small cog in the monstrous AB-InBev machine.

 

Additionally Widmer Brothers has closed their tap room after 22 years. I think you know that they already closed the restaurant. Their brewery operations continue apace as part of the Craft Brew Alliance. While sales of Widmer products continue to be strong, curiously Kona Brewing is now the largest contributor to CBA.

 

For me it's a shame that these landmarks (all pioneers of craft brewing) are no more - but it's not like the industry is shrinking - just moving on.

Yes I heard about Bridgeport. Only found my T shirt this week in the huge pile of brewery ones! We went off Bridgeport when they changed the place in the Pearl district some years ago.  We visited 10 Barrel in Bend some years ago before they spread out (got short changed by the barman in there). Not surprised about Widmer as the bar was a shadow of its former glory after they closed the restaurant. Much the same over here with Beavertown now part of Heineken and Fourpure, Magic Rock plus other well known brewers bought up by others and a favourite the Bottleshop (under the railway arches in the Bermondsey beer mile) went under last month. Still plenty of new places for us in Portland to try along with some new ones over the Columbia in Vancouver WA.

[grandadbob]

Evening each,

Forgot to mention earlier (how could I forget?) that today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of my dear old dad. Sadly he died 15 years ago but I still miss our weekly chats putting the world to rights (and boy could he) I dread to think what he would say about the state of the country today.

 

 

 

 

Currently having a couple or three drinks in his memory. 

 

P.S. Blimey, that pic came out rather on the large side.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 4, 2019 by grandadbob

[JohnDMJ]

4 hours ago, roundhouse said:

I cant get on with Pockemags format hence I don't subscribe to any of the electronic mags that use that software  but Zinio is much better IMHO and you get to keep the mags if you stop your subscription. However that means I don't subscribe to BRM so no likelihood of me becoming a Gold badge member. The only hard copy mag I get these days is Todays railways Europe.

 

I only take TR:Europ and TR:UK these days! That's a severe cut down from the dozen or so I used to take, including 2 French and 3 Swiss ones!

 

2 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

Mrs NHN is now an advanced motorist.  No doubt my driving will be under some criticism from here on.....  Nothing new there.

 

Yup! I took my IAM test on another island just south of Portsmouth in 1987. Congrats to your other half, but don't forget that RoSPA also do a driving assessment scheme where you are re-tested either annually or biannually and you can be regraded each time between grades 1, 2 & 3; IAM is generally considered to be grade 4!

 

53 minutes ago, bbishop said:

I keep on getting letters, however, but deem it courteous to send back the reply paid envelope.  At least it helps Royal Mail.

 

I was in the CCF at school.  I was told by a regular on a camp that I was the worst shot and the untidiest cadet in the contingent, but I was the only one who could both read a map and "ground".  I always got the platoon back to camp on the evasion exercise without being caught; basically kept off main roads and avoided any "PH" on the map, because that's where the officers would be, looking out the window.

 

Bill

 

I adopt a similar process with most mailshots that provide pre-paid envelopes.

 

I too was in the CCF at school. They organised a night exercise on Longmoor, Hampshire. Teams were given a house brick to deliver without being ambushed by the 'opposition'. I had the task of carrying the brick! I knew to where I had to get and by when. There came a point when, for whatever reason back in 1975, I broke rank and (perhaps foolishly) took another route to the rest of the team. Having arrived at the destination safely and with brick in hand, I subsequently learned that my team-mates had been intercepted. Pre GPS, pre SatNav, pre Mobile Phones of any sense! If I'd failed, I knew where home was from there (the Sun can have its uses!)! Caution: won't always work if you don't know your surroundings!

 

My school had 5 types of 'CCF time' activities:

Army, Navy, Airforce cadets

Community Service

Police cadets.

 

After one year in the Naval cadets, I opted for the Police cadets. Had some wonderful insights into the workings of Winchester Crown Court and a couple of local (to the school) of police training colleges, as well as lectures from traffic cops and other branches of the force.

 

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. I don't have a Sat-nav and I don't want one. Many years ago when the Chatham show was held in the old dockyard another club member wanting to show off his brand new car offered to give us a lift. Said car was fitted with Sat-nav and he was using  that to navigate. As many of you will know the current entrance to the dockyard is near the exit to the Medway tunnel. However the (brand new) Sat-nav took us too the old long bricked up entrance. I like many others rely on the old paper maps or a road atlas, only problem is that as I get older they are more difficult to read.

[grandadbob]

I like Sat Navs, particularly those that offer alternative routes to avoid traffic problems/accidents etc. My old Readers Digest /AA Book of the Road or my London A-Z never managed that. 

[PhilJ W]

One thing I forgot to mention. I mentioned this morning that there was no Breakfast show or any other TV on Virgin this morning and nothing appeared until 9:15 when Murder, Mystery and my Family came on. I switched on at 6 this evening and watched the news until the local news came on when it just showed a sign saying it was not available on HD. I then noticed that it was on the HD channel though I hadn't touched the controls. Only a simple matter of switching back to the correct channel. Virgin must have switched to the HD channel due to a problem with the normal channel. 

[Tony_S]

The sat nav in my car combines the internet available information  like a phone and the usual built in updateable maps. It also monitors other vehicles with the same system.  I need to change a setting as it keeps asking permission to share traffic information instead of just doing it. 

Tony

[Ozexpatriate]

19 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

 I need to change a setting as it keeps asking permission to share traffic information instead of just doing it. 

With full autonomy, in addition to cars each providing data directly to cloud-based traffic analysis (rather than harvesting mobile 'phone data that is done today) cars will 'talk' to each other to negotiate space on the road.

[Coombe Barton]

2 hours ago, BoD said:

I see there's a notification about slow performance.  

I clicked it but it took so long to load I gave up.

That's from 25th February, says the date.

 

[BoD]

13 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

That's from 25th February, says the date.

 

 

I know.  That's when I clicked on it.

[Tony_S]

11 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

With full autonomy, in addition to cars each providing data directly to cloud-based traffic analysis (rather than harvesting mobile 'phone data that is done today) cars will 'talk' to each other to negotiate space on the road.

I think mine asks as it uses 3G/4G data. I have set a few yes/no options on what it can do without asking permission but mainly to do with data roaming.  Things like satellite view mapping (like Google Maps, not real time!) use a lot of data.

Tony

[BoD]

17 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

That's from 25th February, says the date.

 

 

4 minutes ago, BoD said:

 

I know.  That's when I clicked on it.

 

 

Seriously, there was, for a time, a coloured banner which explained that the site would be slow as the management were deleting caches.

[Barry O]

While I have a Garmon based sat navigation fitted in the civic I make use of a free to download app WAZE. Works in the UK and also in Australia  and New Zealand. Traffic information added by other users.

 

Baz

Edited April 4, 2019 by Barry O
Spulchicker

[Coombe Barton]

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2019/04/04/sandys-chemo-day-100-of-147/

[Gwiwer]

Evening all. 

 

I am unusually out at this hour having placed SWMBO aboard the lowland sleeper bound for Edinburgh. She appreciated the gesture having expected that I might declare it too late to be out on a school night. 

 

I have very little need of electronic navigation systems. Apart from being an excellent map reader I also possess the memory to see the map once and know every relevant detail almost instantly.  

 

I was once told to “get lost” by some irate oik or another in my younger days and rounded on him with the reply “I’m sorry, I don’t think I can”.  It was both true and a superb put-down.  Exit one non-plussed oik. 

 

This train will shortly arrive at the Hill of Strawberries. It is time to sign off, alight and sleep. 

 

G’night all 

[pH]

1 hour ago, Ozexpatriate said:

With full autonomy, in addition to cars each providing data directly to cloud-based traffic analysis (rather than harvesting mobile 'phone data that is done today) cars will 'talk' to each other to negotiate space on the road.

 

Will you be able to buy different personalities for your car e.g. "cockwomble", "boy racer" etc.?

Edited April 4, 2019 by pH

[Dave Hunt]

Today was a 'things come in threes' event. First of all thr cistern in the main bathroom wouldn't stop running so I had to turn off the water supply to it  then go and get a new outlet seal. I was part way through replacing the faulty one when a friend who is staying with us came to tell me that the cistern in the cloakroom was leaking. I lifted the lid off it and a fountain of water nearly hit the ceiling so it was off with the water (fortunately over the years we have has individual stop valves fitted to all our washbasins, toilets etc.) and back to the hardware shop for a new fitting while SWMBO and friend mopped up. Whilst there I decided to get a new cartridge for the kitchen mixer tap that has developed a slow leak but after changing it there was no improvement and it looks as though a whole new  unit is required. I have now decided not to become a professional plumber.

 

Tomorrow promises better things as SWMBO is hosting a bridge lunch/afternoon and I AM BEING BANISHED TO THE SHED FOR THE DURATION!!! Not only that but we are then having fish and chips for dinner. There is a God after all.....

 

Night night everyone. Pleasant dreams.

 

Dave

[Barry O]

Dave,don't mention 3. I have 3 funerals to go to...luckily one isn't mine.

 

Wall paper removed from bedroom 2. Plastering to start on Monday.

Once the two rooms are plastered we need to move into one of them to allow our bedroom to have its paper stripped before it too is replastered and painted.

 

Filled in various house selling forms. One left to sign then it's all off by special delivery.

 

Sleep well all, especially those who ail or are missing.

 

Baz