Early Risers.

[TheQ]

That's annoying hit the wrong button and lost the below drivel.

 

Race one, 

At the two minutes to the start buzzer we unfurled the jib to find it wouldn't full open, it stayed furled at the bottom by about 2 turns distorting the sail....

Started in the right place , leeward end of the line, close to the river bank, out of the tide, with a wind from astern with a slight port bias.

 

Most boats popped their spinnakers as soon as the starting buzzer went, with my sailing compatriots dodgy leg,  we've decided to go for the non spinnaker trophy this year as he stands to handle the spinnaker..

 

The choice was right as the others didn't get that much in front.

At the first bend we transferred to the left hand side of the river as now the wind and a starboard bias.

On reaching buoy 4 we tacked round and sailed back.. Unfortunately with a twisted jib we just couldn't catch up.. and basically it was follow the leader for the rest of the race. We finished 5th but at least there were others behind us.

 

Race two, 

Jib sorted, we managed to be late for our preferred position at the start, we got trapped the wrong side of the river by other boats, very soon we were last...

It wasn't till the first bend we got to where we wanted, but we were then last..

 

In front of us, as we approached buoy 4, the outer boat at the buoy left one space inside.... Unfortunately there were two boats inside.! So all three got stuck on the buoy, only freeing themselves as we got close.

We were already inside one boat before the buoy,  one boat drifted up river with the wind, two managed to turn round the buoy but drifted wide..

 

We didn't need to be asked, we rounded the buoy on the inside at faster speed. Overtaking in all 4 boats..

 Tacking back the wind started getting up, requiring sitting out, unfortunately with him having a dodgy leg and me with a duff knee our tacking was not the best. We couldn't catch up with those ahead, and lost a place to one of the boats from behind.

Eventually we finished 4th...

 

Race 3 didn't happen, the evil easterly was very cold, and slowly it has been moving to an even colder northerly. We were left with no competition, in the dinghies, a fleet of 25 boats was down to 4 boats for the third race. We had an extended lunch with added extras left over from the summer clubs Christmas dinner last night. There was cake!! 

 

 

[Coombe Barton]

... Project Fear? No, it wasn’t, was it? ...

 

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2022/12/04/sounds-of-the-season-2022-23-08-second-sunday-of-advent/

[New Haven Neil]

A'noon, not much to report.  An evil Easterly wind is making life unpleasant outside, a very unusual direction here. It is Baltic.  Oh OK, not really, but 6c feels like 1c was the afternoon's high point according to the Manx seaweed twirlers, we were out in the car where it measured 2c.  Too cold down the garage for trains, or bikes for that matter.

[Winslow Boy]

58 minutes ago, New Haven Neil said:

A'noon, not much to report.  An evil Easterly wind is making life unpleasant outside, a very unusual direction here. It is Baltic.  Oh OK, not really, but 6c feels like 1c was the afternoon's high point according to the Manx seaweed twirlers, we were out in the car where it measured 2c.  Too cold down the garage for trains, or bikes for that matter.

 

Or Neil's by the sound of it.

[PupCam]

Evening All.

 

I had decided it was too cold, too damp and generally far to unpleasant for a ride  before I got to the start point on the A6 for the ride to Dunstable Gliding Club this morning.     I indicated to the chaps that I would not be joining them after all and beat a hasty retreat home and scoffed a big bowl of porridge.   Must have been better for me than a Full English anyway!

 

Mrs Puppers announced that there was a need to venture over to Woburn Sands to visit a jam-packed Garden Centre.    Nothing related to gardening was seen, as Christmas seems to have taken over.   Stopped off at a Tescos on the way home where a number of bottles of Baileys may have been removed from the shelf and placed in the basket.  Well, it's an easy Christmas present.

 

Further furtling in the garage resulted in four turned spacers to support the bearing plates for the focuser.   Easier to appreciate how it will operate now;  the focus tube sits in the four bearings and a sprung-loaded shaft will bear down on the top of the tube.  Rotation of the shaft will provide, backlash free, motion of the tube back and forth to provide very fine and precise control of the eyepiece position.  It's a lovely and smooth motion 😀  The tube shown is just a bit of scrap that happens to be the right diameter.  It is unfortunately much too short to be used.

 

 

 

TTFNQ

 

Alan

 

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by PupCam

[DaveF]

At the end of my post yesterday I mentioned watching German TV here in the UK and have been asked how.  I know lots of people learn German, I found the TV (and radio) helpful in improving my understanding of the spoken language.

 

So here are few things.

First my satellite dish still points at Astra 19.2E, not the Sky location at 28.2E.  When Sky moved many years I didn't alter mine so I can still receive free to air German language channels.  In recent years I had Sky online through Talktalk, if I want it at the present time I use NowTV.  I believe a dual LNB can get signals from more than one satellite location, but you would also probably ned a free to air receiver.

 

Secondly some channels (to be more exact some programmes on some channels) are available on the web in the same way as i player and ITV hub.  e.g. search for ARD and you will be able to play some programmes. Some won't as broadcasters only have rights for some countries so they may block people from UK etc.

 

Third there are sites which say they can show just about anything from anywhere.  Some are good but they may come up as "Unsafe" - not https so I won't say more, it's up to you to decide if you want to do this.

 

David

[Gwiwer]

48 minutes ago, PupCam said:

 

Evening All.

 

I had decided it was too cold, too damp and generally far to unpleasant for a ride

 

I had decided that it was too all of the above to do anything beyond the essentials outside. Through the week I get paid to stand around carry out safety-critical duties outdoors in all weathers. 
 

Feeling slightly under the weather today did not engender enthusiasm for being out  without benefits. 
 

The village planter was, as mentioned, unplanted of its geraniums and received daffodil bulbs instead. Since when I have warmed and dried out but continued to feel slightly below par. 

I shall take a passing interest in the result of tonight’s kick-balling festival if only to be informed rather than my preferred blissfully ignorant. Neighbours (Upstairs) have the tv on loud enough for me to hear everything. Including their own “comnentary”. 
 

All that remains is to wash up, press the uniform, shower and hop into bed. Hopefully to feel fit enough in the morning. I haven’t lost a day to sickness in two years and I’m not planning to start now. 

[monkeysarefun]

7 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

And linked to a line-breaker which would cut the power almost instantly if the circuit was compromised.  

A guy at work told me of his parents own version of this. He'd organised to go round to their place to help his dad install lighting in their swimming pool, he got there to find they'd begun without him.

They'd drained the pool to just below the level the lights were to be mounted and his dad was standing in the waist deep water with a 240 volt hammer drill drilling  out the side of the pool.

Meanwhile his  mum  was standing poolside holding the power cord where the drill cord joined the extension cord. In  the event of his dad  dropping the drill or similar and suddenly lighting up so you could see his skeleton like on the cartoons or saying "OK Janice, I'm being electrocuted can you pull the plugs apart please!" she would.

Edited December 4, 2022 by monkeysarefun

[Tony_S]

59 minutes ago, DaveF said:

but you would also probably ned a free to air receiver.

Our Sky Box is no longer installed but the dish points at the Astra satellite used for Sky and Freesat. It wouldn’t be a problem to point it at the old 19.2E direction. When I removed the Sky box I put the cables from the dish into the Satellite connectors on the tv. Quite a few tvs come with satellite/Freesat connections. Ours is a Samsung , about 3 years old. The tuner interface is quite versatile, you can choose other satellites not just the Astra one. Once you have chosen it searches for all the available channels. If it is something special you can set all the necessary parameters. It won’t of course show encrypted channels that need a card, though I believe the tv does have some sort of card interface fitted but have no idea what goes where. 
On other TV connection news,  we got a few months free from Apple TV recently so,I have been trying to remember how to watch it on our TV. Now done and Aditi will be pleased as I have found a Tom Hanks film for her to watch. 
Tony
 

[polybear]

7 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

A guy at work told me of his parents own version of this. He'd organised to go round to their place to help his dad install lighting in their swimming pool, he got there to find they'd begun without him.

They'd drained the pool to just below the level the lights were to be mounted and his dad was standing in the waist deep water with a 240 vault hammer drill drilling  out the side of the pool.

Meanwhile his  mum  was standing poolside holding the power cord where the drill cord joined the extension cord. In  the event of his dad  dropping the drill or similar and suddenly lighting up so you could see his skeleton like on the cartoons or saying "OK Janice, I'm being electrocuted can you pull the plugs apart please!" she would.

 

 

[Ozexpatriate]

I was very confused by the weather forecast on television last night. I'm sure I heard them forecast 1-3" of snow (it was probably at altitudes above 500') but they definitely forecast a 'wintry mix' with temperatures above freezing.

 

They appear to have been accurate. Right before I headed out for my walk it began to snow. The temperature was above 4°C. It was a light snow and the size of the flakes varied with time. By the time I was home, it felt like it was about to stop but the temperature was then below 2°C and it has now been snowing consistently for about 3 hours. With temperatures above freezing, very little of it is sticking though some patches of bare earth look white.

 

Hardly a winter wonderland but it was nice to be out walking with the snow falling.

[Ozexpatriate]

I remain bewildered* over television shows and retailers presently offering "twelve days of Christmas" themed activity**. Other than the use of the number 12 and "Twelve days of Christmas" phraseology this has nothing to do with Christmas traditions dating back at least to the Tudors (or the song) and is much more alike to an abridged Advent Calendar - particularly for the weekday/night television shows that don't have 24 shows in December before their holiday hiatus.

 

* That's facetious. It's more being mildly irritated over the intentional warping of (admittedly lost) traditions largely annihilated by the Puritan Commonwealth

 

** 12 days (actually nights) of ugly holiday pullovers

12 days of discounts, etc

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Ozexpatriate

[PhilJ W]

Hello again from Estuary-Land. Arthur Itis is in hiding at the moment and I hope he stays in hiding. Long range weather forecast is that we might have snow as far south as East Anglia on Wednesday. Recent winters have been mild  without even a hint of snow hereabouts. I'll get a couple of bags of rock salt in just in case.

[polybear]

Bear here........

Mortar mixed (in the Garden).  Tick

Paws thawed out.  Tick

Wall filled (big holes).  Tick

Bucket & tools cleaned up (in the Garden).  Tick

Paws thawed out....again. Tick

Din dins scoffed.  Tick

Ceiling Rose sanded.  Tick

Ceiling Rose painted.  Tick

Walls filled (small holes).  Tick

Ceiling Rose painted. Again.  Tick

Senegal slaughtered.  Tick

So OK on the grand scale of things.

Bear gone

 

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I was very confused by the weather forecast on television last night. I'm sure I heard them forecast 1-3" of snow (it was probably at altitudes above 500') but they definitely forecast a 'wintry mix' with temperatures above freezing.

 

They appear to have been accurate. Right before I headed out for my walk it began to snow. The temperature was above 4°C. It was a light snow and the size of the flakes varied with time. By the time I was home, it felt like it was about to stop but the temperature was then below 2°C and it has now been snowing consistently for about 3 hours. With temperatures above freezing, very little of it is sticking though some patches of bare earth look white.

 

Hardly a winter wonderland but it was nice to be out walking with the snow falling.

 

 

 

 31 today and not a cloud in the sky - summers finally arrived, bummer that it did it on a Monday but. Back to winter on Friday though, 21 or something.....

 

 

1 hour ago, polybear said:

 

 

 

 

I thought  you in the UK lacked powerpoints in bathrooms so you are  unable you to use toasters in the bath?

Edited December 4, 2022 by monkeysarefun

[polybear]

8 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

I thought  you in the UK lacked powerpoints in bathrooms so you are unable you to use toasters in the bath?

 

No worries - Bear just hooks his up to the extension lead......

[monkeysarefun]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

No worries - Bear just hooks his up to the extension lead......

Cordless toasters are available here for use in swimming pools and in the surf. Perhaps you should look into  getting one of  those?

Edited December 4, 2022 by monkeysarefun

[Tony_S]

5 minutes ago, polybear said:

No worries - Bear just hooks his up to the extension lead..

A very unpleasant person I had met previously had a sporting accident and allegedly had severe back pain. He apparently needed to live in a swimming pool and had a monitor suspended over the pool. The keyboard and mouse were on a little table. This person was a neighbour of a relative. Apparently his monitor wouldn’t stay in position and my relative asked me to have a look at it.  I was reluctant as the person had been pretty offensive to Aditi and me previously, but an appeal to my better nature was made.  I diagnosed the problem immediately (we had various suspended monitors and tvs at work). If it had been designed like that it was poor design or otherwise perhaps the installer had omitted some parts. The pool inhabitant said he had designed it, I was talking rubbish, he couldn’t possibly have made an error.  I went home and mentioned I wouldn’t be surprised one day if someone dropped a toaster in the pool. My relative made a prediction. The pool inhabitant would make a miraculous recovery when his income was able to become a normal pension instead of loss of earnings insurance. I did a bit unkindly comment many years later  that I had seen Flipper up on his roof.  My relative said it was amazing. 
 

[BoD]

Evening all.

 

Still alive. Tick

 

I have had a busy few days.

Thursday was shopping but we decided to make a day out of it venturing further afield to do the shop.  Clue: I could have used it as an excuse to test my eyesight.

 

Friday was what has now become an annual event, a day out with my daughter.  Ostensibly a Xmas shopping day but it has become more of an excuse to see Fenwick’s windows, the Christmas markets, have a meal together and generally start to get into the Christmas mood.  The fact that we had the grandson with us this time was an added bonus. 

Yesterday involved a trip to a garden centre with said grandson to feed the reindeer followed by his first ever visit to Father Christmas.

 

Today I was at the NT property where I volunteer, not running the usual layouts but a specially  built Xmas layout as the house is  decorated for the season.  The layout is a simple oval with Santa’s express running round  and round.  There is some simple scenery.  A tunnel in the corner, a church, Metcalfe kits, fir trees,  cotton wool … you get the picture. Boring?  No, not when you see the children’s delight and watch  them hunt for the reindeer and people sledging.  
 

Tomorrow I may have an easy day.  Oh,  hang on, Valerie is talking about the Christmas decorations. I remember when these sort of things didn’t happen until mid December, earliest.  
 

Time for a wee dram I think.

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. Ordered a couple of items on-line today, both promised delivery before Christmas, we'll wait and see. I've also put in a few internet bids on this auction.

 https://www.specialauctionservices.com/Auction-Calendar/2022/Trains-Galore?utm_campaign=564321_WoR SAS solus 3 Dec&utm_medium=email&utm_source=dotdigital&dm_i=73DL,C3FL,ZULM5,1GY09,1

Not too many though with a 20% buyers premium plus VAT.

[Ozexpatriate]

1 hour ago, monkeysarefun said:

Cordless toasters are available here for use in swimming pools and the surf.

There is an onslaught of advertising for the latest pointless gadget for people 'on the go' - a cordless blender*, so you can mix your smoothie at the beach or something.

 

* USB rechargeable. 

[Winslow Boy]

27 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

There is an onslaught of advertising for the latest pointless gadget for people 'on the go' - a cordless blender*, so you can mix your smoothie at the beach or something.

 

* USB rechargeable. 

 

Tis Christmas. Tis the season to sell pointless things. If you can't sell them at Christmas then you need to start looking for another job or more likely another product.

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone 

 

Well, considering we haven’t thrown a ‘Do’ for over 3 years now, it all went very well and we were left with only a small amount of food left over, despite thinking we hadn’t done enough! I suspect I’ve eaten far too much, but then, even if I do say so myself, it was a nice spread, I just had to try a bit of everything! In fact, we enjoyed it so much, that we’ve decided to do it again next year! We must be f@@cking mad! 

 

Later this evening, we filled in our voting papers for the up and coming by election that takes place on the 15th, I shall put them in the postbox tomorrow. 

[BSW01]

Goodnight all 

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.