Early Risers.

[New Haven Neil]

Morning world, from a rock that seems stuck at 7c, a decent day in store by the look of it.

 

Little of note to report, so I won't.

 

Take care.

[Barry O]

Ey up!

 

On line meeting held. Went OK apart from 3 questions received. These prove that umpires can't see and can't hear and definitely follow instructions!

 

Busy week coming up. I have a talk about how research into what vehicles we shouldnuse on the lines of parallel metal in a model of part of the Peak District has been undertaken.. a bit of work is required to finish the presentation.

 

I have to fill in some forms as we may be having a bit of time away soon. 

 

Today involves some blood letting to send off fornour volunteer antibodies tests. The box then has to be posted in the NHS special delivery post box. To do this means a walk which will also include a call at the bakery. Sheesh! No rest for the wicked!

 

I also need to organise a zoom meeting for some friends and prepare for a potential visit to London in mid February. Frabjoy! ( the visit to London that is!)

 

Time to drink my mugatea!

 

TTFN!

 

Stay safe!

 

Baz

[jamie92208]

Good moaning from the Charente.  I haven't looked outside so have no idea what the weather is doing yet.  The fire has been coaxed back into life and I am not having my breakfast.  Sister Drac is due to appear but I know not at what time. Something has been lost in translation  as to whether or not it is a starving one but as it includes HBA1C I am playing it safe.  

 

Not a lot to report. Preparations for our UK trip continie. My next task is to look at the two government  websites to see what the latest Covid advice is.  No doubt other tasks will be allocated during the day.

 

Regards to all.

 

Jamie

 

 

[AndrewC]

Greetings all from the boring borough. There is some bright thing to the east attempting to poke above the house tops. It's been a long time. 

A quiet puttering weekend was had. Don't tell anyone but I actually managed to get a fair amount of muddling done in the shed. about 16 months ago I bought a set of modules from a fellow Freemo enthusiast. Sadly he is a fan of control panels and I hate the things with a passion. With that in mind I'm having to do a full rewire of the 4 boards i've managed to finish off the rewiring of the first board. <<< now awaits the awl of justice to descent. 

 

Today will see more MS Teams meetings with an offshore client and a schlep on SouthEastern to have some spinal origami performed. Tonight the next phase of my first attempts at curing/smoking bacon will commence. 12 hours of cold smoking overnight tonight. If this works well I've got a 5kg brisket that is just begging to become pastrami, as well as a side of salmon to be cured and oak smoked. 

 

That's about it. Enjoy the day. 

[polybear]

9 hours ago, Erichill16 said:

Speaking (well writing I suppose) of tomorrow, I’ve got a big meeting at the building site to contemplate. Designer, builder and fitter going to be there so hopefully some dates may be banded about. 

 

9 hours ago, Winslow Boy said:

Just make sure you tell them that you're recording the conversation as last time you didn't and look what happened.

 

Just tell 'em you know a very vindictive Bear, a Hippo, CC, Donk, Puppers, an Archery Expert....

They'll get the message.

[polybear]

Bear here.  Again....

Well I could've got up at 6am, but didn't, but should of.....

Why?  Well lying there with the sort of very destructive thoughts which can revolve around what'll happen if I were to sorry, make that when I snuff it doesn't make for a bouncy Bear...

Must learn my lesson and get up when I wake up.....

 

Right, first job will be more listing of tooling, then I think I'll bench test the Hippo Detectors (very clever Hippo Detectors**) prior to commissioning them is A Good Idea.  All I need now is a Hippo.....

Better get washed and dressed first though....

 

** That's very clever at detecting Hippo's, rather than only detecting clever Hippo's....

[Mike Bellamy]

1 hour ago, jamie92208 said:

My next task is to look at the two government  websites to see what the latest Covid advice is.  

 

Australia and Serbia ??

[Winslow Boy]

4 minutes ago, polybear said:

Bear here.  Again....

Well I could've got up at 6am, but didn't, but should of.....

Why?  Well lying there with the sort of very destructive thoughts which can revolve around what'll happen if I were to sorry, make that when I snuff it doesn't make for a bouncy Bear...

Must learn my lesson and get up when I wake up.....

 

Right, first job will be more listing of tooling, then I think I'll bench test the Hippo Detectors (very clever Hippo Detectors**) prior to commissioning them is A Good Idea.  All I need now is a Hippo.....

Better get washed and dressed first though....

 

** That's very clever at detecting Hippo's, rather than only detecting clever Hippo's....

 

That can be arranged. Here at Hippos R Us we pride ourselves on providing the right hippo for the right job. Just a few questions please before you are assigned your hippo.

 

Firstly what size hippo would you like. We have pigmy, small, medium, large or extra large. Please note that if require extra large we will not held responsible for any 'sign effects' that occur.

 

Secondary how do you wish to pay. Please note that LDC will not be acceptable due to the possibility of it 'disappearing' during transit.

 

We look forwarding to receiving your enquiry. Yours Hippos R Us.

[grandadbob]

Good morning all,

Frosty here but we have blue sky and sunshine.  2°C and it should stay dry.

Not a bad day yesterday with more rugby watched but still more to come  recorded in the box.  

Steve visited and as I suspected within  seconds sorted my antivirus software out.  He then started on my photo problem. What's happened is that somehow * thousands of photos have got duplicated in different places on the laptop.  He has now put them all in one place so I can begin checking and deleting the duplications.  I got rid of about a thousand last night.  This could take some time.  Once that's done they will be rearranged into different categories etc which I suspect will take even more time.  Ah well, it gives me something to moan about do.

Time for breakfast and then we're going for a walk.

Have a good one,

Bob.

 

*We don't know how but the smart money says that it's something I've done wrong! 

Edited January 17, 2022 by grandadbob

[Andrew P]

2 hours ago, chrisf said:

What does the week ahead promise?  Not much, apart from the monthly Area Group meeting on Wednesday.  By rights it should have been at lunchtime in a pub that serves good food and is a 30 mile each way drive for yours truly.  Instead it will be in the evening and brought to us by Zoom.  This is principally because some of our number would still rather not go out.  Will we ever see the last of that ruddy virus?

 

Chris 

I fear its the New Way of Life Chris, one that we have to live with, adapt to, and accept as the new normal.

 

With Omicron and whatever comes next, I wont be venturing to any shows anytime soon either.

[Mike Bellamy]

4 minutes ago, grandadbob said:

He then started on my photo problem. What's happened is that somehow * thousands of photos have got duplicated in different places on the laptop.  He has now got put them all in one place so I can now begin checking and deleting the duplications.  I got rid of about a thousand last night.  This could take some time.  Once that's done they will be rearranged into different categories etc which I suspect will take even more time. 

 

I have the same problem - photos saved on laptop, PC, Hard Drive and also at work on their network. When I retired I copied all the work stuff and brought it home but then realised I had hundreds of duplicated photos and some had been saved with different titles so without viewing the actual picture I couldn't be sure if it was the same or not. I did wonder if there was some magical software that would do the job for me ??

.

[grandadbob]

Don’t know about magical software Mike but Steve’s fingers and brain work like magic.  He runs an IT dept for a large international business travel firm and specialises in developing software to suit new clients. He is so quick that I didn’t have a clue what he was doing which is par for the course. 

Edited January 17, 2022 by grandadbob

[Barry O]

Blood has been donated for clinical test purposes.. results should be here 9n Wednesday. 

 

I almost forgot that Sister Drac will be ringing tonight from the Marie Celeste.. a change in meds may just happen (fingers crossed it does as my present tablets are not really working)

 

@AndrewC we have some volunteers to try your cold smoked items if required.

 

Baz

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl Inner Temple Hare,

A surprisingly good nights sleep of 5 hours plus 2 hours.

 

Surprising because yesterday evening  I got a lot of pain from my right knee. It took two doses of pink pills at the minimum recommended interval before they had any effect..

 

Ben the happy Collie had a good snuffle around this morning, with a full moon it was light enough, he disappeared into normally dark parts of the garden... T'was clear skies and very frosty..

 

The seaweed inspectors say nothing above 7C for a week Oh joy..  hopefully the Pre-Kote will have set solid by then..

 Work here was delayed by an hour and 20 minutes by Microsoft, first a complete replacement of office, then updates to the new version of office, then updates to the updated version of office, then updates to the updated updated version of office. Then it came up saying this computer didn't have a licence.. So I shut the whole thing down and rebooted, and eventually after thinking about it for some time it let me in... it's reported one computer needed 12 updates...

 

I have yet another temperature meter arrived.. it's a gold Item.. Guaranteed turn round in 5 days...

Arrived Friday 13th afternoon.. 4 hour warm up time...

Today is Monday 17th..

The shipping date out is listed 19th..

It's two days work,

I have a major system in front of me..

That's 1.5 days work..

Nope it ain't going to happen..

 

I'm thinking that next weekend will be the adventure of moving the wood lathe into the garage workshop, first a bit of clearance will be needed as it's future position has been occupied by squatters, namely a bench saw and other assorted bits and pieces.. 

This is to make the top wheel for the mast, It would be better done on a metal Lathe, but since I ain't got one, It'll have to do..

 

Did you know there were pigmy Hippo (75cm tall) and pigmy Elephant on Cyprus? The elephant being smaller bigger than a donk(ey).. at 76cm tall..

That's within the last 10,000 years... so modern man met them....

 

Time to keep measuring

 

 

 

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. Didn't wake up this morning until gone eight. Rather unusually the bladder got me up a couple of times last night. I didn't change my practice of no tea after about seven but I did get off to sleep eventually.  Just watched the BBC Breakfast show  and the very last item was about dogs. A little snippet of information. Since the human/canine relationship began so many thousands of years ago dogs have developed a muscle in the eyebrow that gives them that wide eyed look that most humans cannot resist. The person who was being interviewed had a five month old puppy to demonstrate. Its on a program on ITV tomorrow at 8 pm called The secret life of pets. Time for breakfast, be back later.

[The Lurker]

Greetings all from a frosty but sunny Sidcup. Younger Lurker has been deposited at school and work has begun (well about 3 hours ago).

 

The boy that Mrs Lurker provides 1:1 support for has tested positive - not a great surprise as his older brother did too about a week ago. Mrs Lurker still testing negative but we feel it is only a matter of time.

 

One set of bin men have been and I can hear another lot moving close by. I imagine they will time it perfectly for my next call which is in about 5 minutes!

 

Have a good day all

[monkeysarefun]

3 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Nope, it’s here to stay. The only virus mankind has ever eradicated was smallpox (after many, many decades of research, vaccination and other effort).

What will change is (a) the virulence of the virus [generally they become less lethal over time) and (b) how humans respond to the virus.

I reckon that once the coronavirus has a similar lethality as yearly influenza and is pretty much ubiquitous, then life will return to normal. A “new” post-pandemic normal, true; but as “normal” as we’ll ever get…

If it gets boring we've got the Hendra virus we can send youse up there,  transmission is a bit convoluted, from Flying Foxes*  to humans via horses but once you get it it's 70% mortality rate.

 

*Yes our foxes fly which really annoys the local Tally Ho! dingbats.

Edited January 17, 2022 by monkeysarefun

[AndrewC]

1 minute ago, Barry O said:

@AndrewC we have some volunteers to try your cold smoked items if required.

 

I may have to start delivering. 

The big downside to my newish hobby of proper BBQ* is you have to cook a fairly large amount for it to be worthwhile and the cuts of meat have to be pretty big or they just dry out and turn to shoe leather. With just the 2 of us now, it means a lot less cooking but a lot more sealing & storage. For example doing a batch of pulled pork means cooking at least 5kg of shoulder. Even after trimming & shrinkage it leaves us with more than a dozen servings. We had 10 days of turkey leftovers from Christmas as well. Cooked the bird over chestnut wood. 

 

* as in wood fired and/or cold smoked. No schitty little single use bits of chemical laden briquets in a tin tray, or cremated sausages.

 

 

[grandadbob]

A walk has been walked but only managed just over a mile.

Got home to find that after speaking to the Doc last week I have got an appointment with the Musculoskeletal clinic next week.  Considering the way things are with medical matters at the moment I don't think that's too bad.  Thought I'd have to wait a lot longer than that.  Mind you that's just to have a look at the problem,  getting something done about it may be a whole different ball game.

Time for coffee and another delve into my photos.

[Coombe Barton]

Something even more annoying that when you can't find the end of the sellotape.

 

When you're sitting there and can't find the end of the overglued, refusing to budge, tearing longitudinally, layer separating, bits falling off, loo roll.

[simontaylor484]

Morning all

 

Not a lot to report 

Its a lovely day here but cold

[The Lurker]

24 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

Something even more annoying that when you can't find the end of the sellotape.

 

When you're sitting there and can't find the end of the overglued, refusing to budge, tearing longitudinally, layer separating, bits falling off, loo roll.

what a PITA

[PhilJ W]

27 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

Something even more annoying that when you can't find the end of the sellotape.

 

When you're sitting there and can't find the end of the overglued, refusing to budge, tearing longitudinally, layer separating, bits falling off, loo roll.

Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.

[BSW01]

Good morning everyone 

 

First of all, apologies for once again being absent over the last few days. This has been due to yet another sudden bout of ill health,which like the bout of ill health I had a few weeks ago, allowed the black dog to escape and this time he was more reluctant than last time to get back in his cage. As a consequence, I was very disinclined to logging in to this, or any other forum for that matter. Instead I concentrated all my efforts into getting the black dog back in his cage and locking the cage door. Thankfully, I now seem to be on the mend and hopefully the black dog will remain in his caged for good this time. Having any sort of illness is quite unusual for me, but having 2 bouts within a few weeks of each other is very unusual indeed. 

 

My recent illness may have partially been down to being prescribed some new medication during the post operation tests I had earlier this the month. It took a couple of days to get the prescription sorted and another few days for the medication to take effect. The medication was supposed to improve my ‘flow’ as it was deemed by the staff at the hospital to be a bit slow, although I was quite happy as it was much better than it was before my operation. However, after taking the pills for a few days, the flow did improve. However, a few days later, the flow was such that I could barely control it and consequently I ended up, once again spending a lot of time in the smallest room, but this time for an entirely different reason! So, once the side effects became intolerable, I stopped taking the meds and it’s taken well over a week to get back to some sort of normality (normality in ERs?), although I’m not quite where I was before I started taking them. At the moment, things have improved enough for me to be spending more time out of the smallest room, instead of inside it. So once again, I’ve decided to take things very easy for the next few days, to give myself a chance to recover fully. 

 

Last Friday, I managed my first walk outside, I went to the butchers, with no ill effects, but I’ve noticed that things seem much better in the mornings than they are in the afternoons, this is probably down to starting to eat and drinking after a night’s sleep. 

 

Consequently, for the next few weeks, any shopping trips  I need to make, will be carried out in the morning, straight after breakfast. So, for now it’s a case of fingers crossed (and legs when necessary), that things will get better sooner rather than later. 

 

Obviously, as I haven’t been on here for over a week, I haven’t read or rated any posts since I last visited, so I’ll pass on congratulations or commiserations as necessary and if there is anything important that I’ve missed, would someone kindly pm me so I can take note! 

[Gwiwer]

Good morning all,

 

A beautiful morning has arrived Upon the Hill of Strawberries and in the sun it's not too cold at all.  The grass in the shade remains crunchy and white however.  

 

Today marked my return to the House of Fun after a week of leave which felt like much longer.  A timely return too as we welcomed Not Captain Kernow of this parish on his travels and long-overdue catch-up chat was had in between supervising my trainee.  

 

Nota Good Night's sleep was had though and after lunch I fear the desire to snooze might outweigh the desire to sit outside in the sun or even indulge in the G-word.  

 

Let's see what happens eh?