Early Risers.

[Andrew P]

5 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

I'm afraid that things are not all tickets-boo for Dad. Physically he is improving but we managed to have a FaceTime chat with him this morning courtesy of a very helpful ward clerk and he is in a bad place mentally. He said that the sense of isolation is getting to him and he's not sure how much he can stand. I think that problem is due to the fact that most of the time they are apparently having the screens around all the beds due to Covid and with Dad being somewhat hard of hearing plus his bed being a bit isolated in a corner he isn't really communicating with anyone most of the time. He has also developed a fear that he'll never get out of hospital and is becoming afraid of going to sleep. He has actually asked to see a psychologist and when I spoke to the ward manager a while ago he said that he is trying to arrange it. I also suggested that it may help if they move his bed to a more central location and the manager said he would look into that. Not being able to visit him is quite awful but we are hoping that we can talk to him on FaceTime each day.

 

Sometimes life can be a bummer.

 

Dave

Really sad to read that Dave. I hope they can sort out some communication to keep his mind occupied.  

[chrisf]

2 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

One for Chris.

 

Thanks for the kind thought, Phil.  As it happens, this clip is already a firm favourite!  At its best the koala must be one of the most endearing creatures on the planet.

 

Chris

[polybear]

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

I used the A303 last time I ventured down that way. The reason I chose that route was that it passed by the village of Podimore. Podimore is where some of my ancestors had lived two centuries ago so I wanted to stop off just to have a look. I went to the local church St. Peters, hoping to see if I recognised any names on the gravestones but regrettably most of the gravestones had been removed and placed against the churchyard wall. Most if not all of them were unreadable due to weathering and erosion anyway. As it was also midway through my journey I stopped off at the local hostelry https://www.podymore-inn.co.uk/ for lunch. Glad to see that it appears to have survived the lockdown.

 

Bear used to stay in a B&B Farmhouse at Cary Fitzpaine, a small Hamlet just a couple of miles north of the Podimore roundabout; that was back in the days when Bear was doing a lot of integration work on Lynx at WHL Yeovil.  We had the choice of staying in Hotels (fully receipted) or the Great Empire would give us the grand sum of £47-35 a night to do our own thing - so long as we turned up for work each day without stinkin' and looking like Worzel they didn't care where we stayed.  As we could get a B&B for eighteen quid a night (plus a cheapo evening meal in a pub somewhere) we were quids in.

 

1 hour ago, The Stationmaster said:

Years ago when we regularly rented a holiday flat in Falmouth I used to record all my journey times and sectional average speeds and always went west in the small hours of either Saturday or Sunday and could average only a little short of 50mph between Tilehurst and Saltash.  

 

Stevenage to Podimore Roundabout (mid 1990's) - 2hrs 10 on a Sunday evening.  All strictly IAW the Highway Code, naturally....

 

In other news:

Floor Grout now sealed - all 213ft of it with a Humbrol size 6 (or is it a size 9?) brush.  I know I've still got two legs cos' I can see them.....if only I could feel them too......

A bit more electrickery too - the GT-looking Finger Plate for the new light switch arrived, so that is now on the wall.

[Barry O]

How to cause constination on the A303 in August.

 

Take your Challenger tank sans gun for a drive down it every day as part of a Navigation Aid trial.. great stuff when in the dummy turret.. and the Police  loved it!!

Baz

[Coombe Barton]

There was a travel lodge or similar at Podimore (I think) alongside a Little Chef. Used this 1994-5 when setting up an Estate system in rural Dorset. Olympic breakfast, lunch at the site - they provided sandwiches - coffee all day and supper in Yeovil in a great restaurant I found. Found some interesting country tours between site and hotel in the evenings - very pleasant.

[Ian Abel]

Chewsday all quiet we hope!

 

Little to report from Monday, same likely today, awaiting word of month-end changes from client, that's about all.

Ran taxi service for Mrs to her 1-day a week work, as I'm charged with getting dinner supplies!

 

Zero first thing, some snow flurries around, 3 for the high, bit of a chill in the air.

 

Carry on.

[New Haven Neil]

Government (Fraggly type) update, all restrictions to be lifted on Monday, provided no more unexplained cases.  Only 21 live cases now, NHN preparing to go play motorbikes with his aged friends. Yippeee 

[Happy Hippo]

1 hour ago, Barry O said:

How to cause constination on the A303 in August.

 

Take your Challenger tank sans gun for a drive down it every day as part of a Navigation Aid trial.. great stuff when in the dummy turret.. and the Police  loved it!!

Baz

Well  now they've doubled the legal speed limit for military tracked vehicles, 40mph is better than the 20mph we used to do in Chieftain.

 

Anther good thing about tracked vehicles both current and ex military, is you are exempt any congestion charges, MOT tests and road tax!

 

One wonders if a parking attendant has ever successfully put a clamp on one for improper parking?

 

 

[polybear]

32 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

There was a travel lodge or similar at Podimore (I think) alongside a Little Chef. Used this 1994-5 when setting up an Estate system in rural Dorset. Olympic breakfast, lunch at the site - they provided sandwiches - coffee all day and supper in Yeovil in a great restaurant I found. Found some interesting country tours between site and hotel in the evenings - very pleasant.

 

The Travelodge is still there, but the LC is now long gone - now replaced with a Burger King , Greggs and Subway apparently.

 

Bear has discovered that the Grout Sealant seller offers 30-day returns, so 3-50 postage will get Bear his Gronkits back.  Beats leaving it in the cupboard until it's out of shelf life.

[BoD]

Further update re Gordon.

 

 

[pH]

On 12/04/2021 at 07:24, Tony_S said:

The new record deck doesn’t cause any hum. 

Any rattle?

[PhilJ W]

Afternoon all from Estuary-Land. Arthur Itis is back again so a couple of paracetamol have been taken. Its just been announced that students will be able to return to campus in the middle of next month.

1 hour ago, Coombe Barton said:

There was a travel lodge or similar at Podimore (I think) alongside a Little Chef. Used this 1994-5 when setting up an Estate system in rural Dorset. Olympic breakfast, lunch at the site - they provided sandwiches - coffee all day and supper in Yeovil in a great restaurant I found. Found some interesting country tours between site and hotel in the evenings - very pleasant.

 

25 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

The Travelodge is still there, but the LC is now long gone - now replaced with a Burger King , Greggs and Subway apparently.

 

Bear has discovered that the Grout Sealant seller offers 30-day returns, so 3-50 postage will get Bear his Gronkits back.  Beats leaving it in the cupboard until it's out of shelf life.

When I stopped at Podimore I was on my way to Newquay where I had booked a long weekends B&B. I try to avoid the restaurant chains on major roads if I can.

[polybear]

35 minutes ago, pH said:

Any rattle?

 

Ideally mixed in with some shake and roll?  (Can you see what Bear did there?)

[JohnDMJ]

Good Evening.

 

4 hours ago, Andrew P said:

Well that didn't last long, washed the Car and made it RAIN.

 

Sounds like an excellent way to save water, let the rain finish off the job! I tried that once; rain stayed away so I had to rinse it off.

[tigerburnie]

55 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Well  now they've doubled the legal speed limit for military tracked vehicles, 40mph is better than the 20mph we used to do in Chieftain.

 

Anther good thing about tracked vehicles both current and ex military, is you are exempt any congestion charges, MOT tests and road tax!

 

One wonders if a parking attendant has ever successfully put a clamp on one for improper parking?

 

 

Many moons ago(think drought summer of '75) and I am tootling along a road across Salisbury plain( no idea what the road was) and we spotted these pairs of huge wooden posts close to the road edge. Getting closer we saw they marked tracks onto the plains and we wondered what they were for, along we went, me doing around 50mph when we noticed a cloud of dust on our left. Now it soon became apparent this cloud of dust was moving............................fast and seemed to heading for a pair of the afore mentioned pairs of posts, what was also apparent was that I was likely to arrive next to said post at the same time as the cloud of dust. Now this is happening quite quickly and I thinking to my self, I'm on the road, I have right of way........................however as the cloud of dust gets closer it is obvious it is not going to stop, we also noticed that a large round tube looking thing was sticking out the front of said dust cloud. I think some utterances were made, but I had decided that although I was sure I did have the right of way, a meeting of a Ford Transit van with what turned out to be a Chieftain Tank hiding in the dust was not going to go well for us, so I leapt on the brakes . Now not only did the dust cloud not slow down, but the bloke driving it did not know his highway code as definitely did not look left or right................................. 

[TheQ]

2 hours ago, Barry O said:

How to cause constination on the A303 in August.

 

Take your Challenger tank sans gun for a drive down it every day as part of a Navigation Aid trial.. great stuff when in the dummy turret.. and the Police  loved it!!

Baz

Down from Bulford?

 

That section in and around Amesbury I knew best , Dad was most upset when the rebuilt the 303 there. The field he used to wild mushroom picking is now under tarmac.

 

Cycling to school with a tank catching up from behind( near Tidworth) was always worrying..

 

I remember a 18 Mile traffic jam on the 303 going into Basingstoke, luckily the school coach trip I was on, was going the other way. This was pre the M3 being built..

 

 

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, pH said:

Any rattle?

No rattle or hum. I don’t have the U2 album on vinyl just CD and it would appear I never copied it to iTunes. 

[Gwiwer]

12 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

I don’t have the U2 album on vinyl just CD

Known to us as "Rattle your Bum" and owned on both tape cassette and vinyl, plus electronic files of each track.  

 

A303

The last time we drove up from Cornwall, which was last October, we had a pre-packed picnic for consumption en route in order to avoid, so far as possible, mixing with other people and sharing facilities.  We had had enough of the A303 so we stopped a way short of Podimore.  And started.  And stopped.  And started.  And repeat ad infinitum for over 30 minute on the approach to the roundabout.  We both required the porcelain facilities so felt obliged to pull in; this then became our picnic-in-the-car stop and it took another 20 minutes to exit the car park to the road and negotiate the roundabout (again) to resume our journey.  The only other delay we encountered all the way from Pendeen to Strawberry Hill was the point at which the M3 / M25 intersect where the variable speed limit was down to 40mph and caused, rather than eased, congestion for no apparent reason.  

 

 

[Ozexpatriate]

4 hours ago, chrisf said:

At its best the koala must be one of the most endearing creatures on the planet.

Once upon a time an Australian Tourism Minister got into a flap for a commenting (on the koala) that it is:

Quote

... flea-ridden, it piddles on you, it stinks and it scratches

He's not wrong mind you, but it was considered a faux pas (and reasonably so) by a tourist minister. The whole fracas was very entertaining.

[Sir TophamHatt]

Right...

 

Still waiting!

 

New TV aerial arrived today.  It's really long - at least 150cm!  Got on the roof today (not the main roof) and worked out the ladder method clearly isn't going to work as the pitch of the roof I was on is too tilty-back.  Looks like it'll have to be mounted lower, although the neighbour was almost going to offer to help.  But I hate asking him.  He's done so much for us...  replaced a tile on the actual roof (with his scaffolding!), he put up a fence between us and the neighbour on the other side (although this was paid work), he's also helped us with other bits and bobs so I can't ask again!

I'll find a safe way.

 

Bought a DCC Decoder tester to...  well, test decoders and change things prior to fitting them into a loco.

 

Good fun for the next couple of days.

[Ozexpatriate]

2 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

... all restrictions to be lifted on Monday, provided no more unexplained cases ...

Terrific news. Not so here. In Oregon the seven day rolling average of daily new diagnoses has increased 92% in the last 23 days.

 

It correlates well with relaxing of guidelines, and some counties have restrictions reapplied.

 

Meanwhile my next door neighbour has hired a handyman with sundry compressors and power washers to remove any possibility of organics on the concrete paths. It sounds like a hovercraft proving ground out there.

 

At least it is sunny, even though very blustery.

 

Edited April 13, 2021 by Ozexpatriate

[Erichill16]

2 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Well  now they've doubled the legal speed limit for military tracked vehicles, 40mph is better than the 20mph we used to do in Chieftain.

 

Anther good thing about tracked vehicles both current and ex military, is you are exempt any congestion charges, MOT tests and road tax!

 

One wonders if a parking attendant has ever successfully put a clamp on one for improper parking?

 

 

Ask Kenny Everett,, he had ‘issues’ with parking his Sherman.

Or perhaps not.

[Happy Hippo]

1 hour ago, tigerburnie said:

Many moons ago(think drought summer of '75) and I am tootling along a road across Salisbury plain( no idea what the road was) and we spotted these pairs of huge wooden posts close to the road edge. Getting closer we saw they marked tracks onto the plains and we wondered what they were for, along we went, me doing around 50mph when we noticed a cloud of dust on our left. Now it soon became apparent this cloud of dust was moving............................fast and seemed to heading for a pair of the afore mentioned pairs of posts, what was also apparent was that I was likely to arrive next to said post at the same time as the cloud of dust. Now this is happening quite quickly and I thinking to my self, I'm on the road, I have right of way........................however as the cloud of dust gets closer it is obvious it is not going to stop, we also noticed that a large round tube looking thing was sticking out the front of said dust cloud. I think some utterances were made, but I had decided that although I was sure I did have the right of way, a meeting of a Ford Transit van with what turned out to be a Chieftain Tank hiding in the dust was not going to go well for us, so I leapt on the brakes . Now not only did the dust cloud not slow down, but the bloke driving it did not know his highway code as definitely did not look left or right................................. 

To be fair to the driver, even head up, the visibility of anything other than forward is very restricted.  It's the crew commander who is responsible for keeping up the all around visibility.  We were taught that it was a crew responsibility to keep a good look out.

 

Around here when they road test tracked vehicles, you'll often see the commander in the turret backing up the vehicles direction indicators with arm signals.

 

The spinning wheels and flailing tracks draw in the Telfs like moths to a flame.

 

[Barry O]

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

Down from Bulford?

 

That section in and around Amesbury I knew best , Dad was most upset when the rebuilt the 303 there. The field he used to wild mushroom picking is now under tarmac.

 

Cycling to school with a tank catching up from behind( near Tidworth) was always worrying..

 

I remember a 18 Mile traffic jam on the 303 going into Basingstoke, luckily the school coach trip I was on, was going the other way. This was pre the M3 being built..

 

 

We were using the Royal Artillery camp..complete with AS90 spgs. We also found their well hidden private racecourse 

 

Rules for driving across the plain..never stop at Tank Crossings on public roads. One "Tank Crossing Vector" was difficult...down a steep slope, sharp left, across the road then across a 50Tonbridge (with a 65t vehicle!)  Then across a dud practice high explosive round and.away...

 

Baz

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. Arthur Itis has gone quiet again hopefully he's gone to bed for the night. Time for a muggatee and then to tackle Farcebook.