Early Risers.

[PhilJ W]

5 hours ago, Tony_S said:

According to Wikipedia he was sent away after collaborating closely with the lady who helped him with the tune. 

Was her name Matilda by any Chance?

[PhilJ W]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Bear concurs.

If someone is escaping a war zone/some form of persecution etc. via a ship or aircraft with no stops in a "safe" country before the UK then they can be considered (and not a certainty) for refugee status.  Wander across Europe to get to the UK and you're an illegal immigrant in Bear's Book.  Simples.

Nothing will stop them until they come down hard on the people smugglers.

[polybear]

2 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

So no zooming for me, Mrs H doesn't much like my doing them when she's around, gets too much of it at work.  Not for much longer though....  Two more weeks and she's out of there.

 

Make sure you give Mrs. NHN a long list of jobs to do

Good luck - it's been nice knowing you.....

[The White Rabbit]

Evenin' all,

 

Good to see & hear some of you on the virtual meet up earlier. I don't have a camera but got the microphone repaired earlier in the week and the online wisdom said audio-only calls could be made, so thought I'd have a bash at Zoom. My connection dropped a couple of times an hour or so in but it behaved at the beginning and end. The least said about the middle ... 

 

Weather is rather 'ugh' at the moment, most of the morning was spent chopping back vegetation at my mothers. It was looking more than a touch unkempt. 10% done, would have been more but it was blowing a serious hoolie and throwing raindrops into my face. I can still hear the wind howling round the chimneypots now. More cheerfully, I saw the first of our crocuses out earlier, together with some more snowdrops. And the winter heathers are flowering. 

 

The plan (stop laughing at the back there...) is to have a quiet day tomorrow. Minimum nursing and 'jobs'. Hopefully catch up on some sleep and some reading, my OO9 News popped through the letterbox earlier and I've a couple of Railway Heralds outstanding. I confess ERs has been skimmed for much of the last week, music's not my scene so some of the posts have passed me by. 

 

I may have a go at baking some pasties tomorrow, do some for the more hurried weekday lunches. A mix of what would be called Cornish if I were baking them west of the Tamar and cheese and onion. Probably. No cakes planned, so bears and hippos can save their legs. Of course I could be lying...

[Tony_S]

50 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Nothing will stop them until they come down hard on the people smugglers.

The dreadful state of accommodation for those serving in the armed forces and their families is disgraceful. Every now and then it appears on the media and nothing seems to happen. 
Mention was made of people travelling and not applying in the first safe country. Many of the Syrians who end up in resettlement accommodation in the UK have applied from their Middle East refugee camp. Many countries are taking displaced people. 

[simontaylor484]

Thank you all for the messages of support and good wishes during my recent health problems. I am quite staggered by it.

 

Happy birthday Chris f for what's left of the day

 

 

[BSW01]

6 minutes ago, simontaylor484 said:

Thank you all for the messages of support and good wishes during my recent health problems. I am quite staggered by it.

 

Happy birthday Chris f for what's left of the day

 

 

Simon, yes ER's is a great place for support when you need it. I know, as I've also been on the receiving end a number of times myself. 

[brianusa]

7 hours ago, Dagworth said:

All this talk of Banjo Patterson and Waltzing Matilda, but what was the name of the sheep station where he wrote it?

 

Andi 

The most evocative example of WM was used as background music was in the film "On the Beach" as the atomic cloud slowly reached the Southern Hemisphere and Gregory Peck and his sub crew sailed away!

    Brian.

[Dave Hunt]

A belated happy birthday to Chris. Good to see The Tie having an airing on Zoom today.

 

Info for Bear - Jill bought some lemon drizzle melts (biscuits) that are rather toothsome. The brand name is Border. 

 

G'night each.

 

Dave 

[The White Rabbit]

12 hours ago, polybear said:

...As an example, a friend set up his own company - one employee (him) and one shareholder (him) - and paid himself a meagre salary.  Every year he also received a huge bonus, which I believe was taxed at a much lower rate (Corporate Rate Tax?).  Not sure how it worked, but it saved him thousands. 

 

Usually by making dividend payments to employee shareholders rather than paying them via a salary. 

 

https://www.contractorcalculator.co.uk/salary_versus_dividends_limited_companies_advice.aspx is a bit out of date but half-way down the page it gives an example and quotes some figures. 

 

 

[simontaylor484]

7 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

A belated happy birthday to Chris. Good to see The Tie having an airing on Zoom today.

 

Info for Bear - Jill bought some lemon drizzle melts (biscuits) that are rather toothsome. The brand name is Border. 

 

G'night each.

 

Dave 

I used to.like their dark chocolate ginger biscuits till type 2 reared it's head

[brianusa]

8 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

Mention of palm oil made me check the contents of my cupboards. I found several items containing palm oil which once used will not be purchased again.

Sacrifice is admirable but not to the extent of denying ones little pleasures in life.  I am not a content reader; we buy what we like to eat irrespective of what's on the box.  No doubt if everybody thought as we do, all those resources would eventually disappear and I am as sorry as the next person when habitat is destroyed.  However, a little thought and consideration should be extended for the viewpoint of others as in many other cases.

      Brian.

[BoD]

23 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

Good to see The Tie having an airing on Zoom today.

Damn! I missed it.

Is there any photographic evidence?

I’m almost convinced that I need to buy a webcam ready for the next one.

I did say almost.

The boots would be a clincher.

 

[andyram]

Evening all. I hope today finds you well. It was good to put some faces to some of the names during the Zoom meeting earlier. I am sorry I had to disappear so suddenly. My dear daughter was demanding my time and was not prepared to wait!

 

Today has been mixed. This morning there was the drive up to the shop for the click and customer. This became two appointments thanks to a phone enquiry whilst I was still there. Amber enjoyed wielding the pricing gun and more stock is now on the shelves and out of the house. That should please Sarah who is getting more than a little frustrated by the stock boxes currently stored in the house. 

 

 Partly during the Zoom meeting, and then immediately after, there was some test running of the new layout project. This was one of the things Amber was pestering me about this afternoon. The basic idea for the model is coming together. I have put a couple of photos on my layout thread if anyone is interested. 

 

 Sarah may be feeling better but the lack of sleep in recent nights has had a negative impact and she is suffering her own low mood. Lockdown is definitely impacting us all at the moment. 

 

Stay safe all.

 

Andy

[tigerburnie]

G'night all

[Coombe Barton]

... wood ... and harps ...

 

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2021/02/20/not-the-time-for-re-opening/

[leopardml2341]

Good to meet people earlier, apologies for leaving early (due to anxiety - which probably cane across in my ramblings).

 

Goodnight folks.

[polybear]

1 hour ago, Dave Hunt said:

A belated happy birthday to Chris. Good to see The Tie having an airing on Zoom today.

 

Info for Bear - Jill bought some lemon drizzle melts (biscuits) that are rather toothsome. The brand name is Border. 

 

G'night each.

 

Dave 

 

Dribble Dribble.....

(MInd you, at thirty bob for 9 bikkies they'd wanna be good......)

A reasonably successful day for Bear today - the last of the coving has been fitted (with a couple of joints still to be sanded/filled/sanded/filled etc....), after first fitting the cooker hood chimney in order to determine where the gap in the coving should be; the hood itself was also fitted as a separate exercise and confirmed that it works.  All bits are now back in the box to remove any risk of damage, either to the hood itself or to Bear's head during other refurb tasks.

Bear had a bit of a result when doing the last bit of coving - I had two bits remaining that were just long enough to complete the job; this did mean an in-line joint (which appears to have come out very well) that Bear would have preferred not to have - however it's pretty well hidden (or will be) by being above wall units yet to be fitted.  This means not having to open a new pack of coving in order to cut a single piece only a couple of feet long, with the remaining 7+ metres ending up being stored in the loft; instead the pack can go back to Wickes for a twenty five quid refund

 

Bear has also had a quote for granite worktops from this company (no connection etc etc):

 

https://www.affordablegranite.co.uk/

 

They come in at a smooth £2K under the silly quote from a local firm, which is serious dosh in Bear's book (that's a lotta cake....).  On Checkatrade they have 731 reviews, with a score of 9.92, which is encouraging (though Bear is aware that reviews can be manipulated - Amazon is notorious for iffy reviews, for example).

 

Bear's last ever company bonus (for the first 1/3rd of last year) is also about to be paid; I'm not sure who did the sums but I'm not gonna argue with their calculations     Hopefully it'll cover a pretty good wedge of a new oven.

Today's cake was limited to an out-of date (though you'd never tell) Mr. K's lemon bakewell, though a couple of Jaffa Cakes might possibly have snuck into the equation   It is possible that a chippy day may also have featured too....

 

Tomorrow?  Sanding/filling/sanding.....  Also more planning, as well as getting lined up for painting the coving and ceiling (hopefully on Monday).  Plans could go to rat sh1t between now and then though....

[TheSignalEngineer]

Evening All.

Happy Birthday to Chrisf, hope you are OK.

Good to put a few names to faces today, although there were a few people I had seen at shows over the years. Unfortunately I had to dash off early as I was being summonsed for some advice on track layouts by my youngest grandson, still without his help on Zoom I would probably never have got on in the first place. 

A bit of muddling followed, the new beastie being the Green-nosed Diseasel. It has Bluetooth control from an ipad, which he mastered in two minutes flat. Last week we were discussing building a new inglenook layout so he has arranged his new track to suit in the yard.

[J. S. Bach]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Make sure you give Mrs. NHN a long list of jobs to do

Good luck - it's been nice knowing you.....

He can always come over here and play NY, NH & H RR again!

[laurenceb]

23 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

Dribble Dribble.....

(MInd you, at thirty bob for 9 bikkies they'd wanna be good......)

 

If someone told you that they wanted five bob each for a packet of biscuits you would have told them where to put them

Night awl

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. A very enjoyable Zoom meeting this evening and looking forward to the next one. Polybears mention of granite kitchen worktops reminded me of of a mate of mine who had kitchen worktops made of solid slate about two inches thick. And he didn't have to pay too much for them either, the slate came from a couple of old snooker tables. 

[Ozexpatriate]

28 minutes ago, TheSignalEngineer said:

I was being summonsed for some advice on track layouts by my youngest grandson

A priority interrupt. Have you added power functions to that latest interpretation of the Hogwarts Express?

 

(While quite visibly underscale it is at least, excepting the tender and the shorty four-wheeled coaches, a much better Hall interpretation than the original LEGO Hogwarts Express which had coach bogies under the footplate.)

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Ozexpatriate

[Erichill16]

Evening All,

I have a confession to make. 
On the zoom meeting some of you may have seen some odd facial expressions for no apparent reason, well the reason was I’d got my laptop computer on in the background and was half, no quarter watching the Bristol City v Barnsley match. About 20 minutes into the meeting Barnsley scored the only goal of the match so you may have seen a rye smile.

Unfortunately I had to leave before the end of the meeting  as my tea was getting past it’s best and as it was something I’d asked SWMBO to make I thought it would be rather rude to let it spoil.

Morning was a walk with Mil and after tea two films were watched. Both were a disappointment and it’s now four films in a row that have been a waste of time.

Managed to get a couple of coats of paint on another small project but even small progress is progress.

Once again I’d like to that the members of ER for the enjoyable meeting and at least I should be able to but some faces to the names I see on here.  Its been nearly a year since I first posted on here and I’ve been made to feel very welcome. 

So on that note I’ll bid you all Goodnight,

Robert

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone 

 

The weather has been a bit mixed here today, it’s been very windy and it was raining when I went to the workshop this morning. I needed to where a coat going to the workshop, just to keep the rain off, however, it was warm enough to be able to take it off once inside. The rain has been off and on all day, but thankfully mostly off, but the wind has slowly increased in strength as the day progressed. It seems to have quietened down now, but we still get the occasional gust. 

 

Now, back to the workshop, the turntable’s baseboard has now had its second coat of paint, a rather murky dark browny black colour, well the yards around steam locomotive sheds were not the cleanest of places. This coat is however a little different to the one applied last weekend, as it’s my home brew textured paint. It starts off as a normal coat of paint, (artist’s acrylic) and whilst the paint is still wet, I sprinkle very fine sawdust on top of the paint, this is then followed by a little more paint, which then gets mixed with the sawdust. When it’s dried it looks like bare earth that’s been well trodden. This could be used as a dirt track and vehicle tracks could be left if required. It’ll need a few more applications of slightly different shades of brown to break up the monotone look it has at the moment. Now, for those of you who are wondering where I got the fine sawdust, well, since you’ve asked, I’ll tell you. A good few years ago I sanded all the floors (with the exception of the stairs, landings, kitchen and bathroom) in the house. The sawdust from the final (extra fine sanding sheets) sanding was saved to make a filler for the gaps between the boards. I had loads of this, think 10-2 gallon buckets and that’ll give you some sort of idea of the amount. Some was used up, but I’ve still got about half of it left, so lots to play about with and it’s surprising how far a tea strainer full will go!

 

Once I’d finished in the workshop for the day, I came back inside and I got washed and changed, I then finished making the fruit tea loaf that I had left soaking overnight.