Author Topic: what I have learned today.  (Read 847451 times)

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5025 on: 24 February, 2021, 03:40:41 pm »
That in 1940 HMG were offering a bounty of 2/6d for live hedgehogs.

What were they planning to do with them?  I'm imagining them being parachuted behind enemy lines to sabotage the Nazi slug effort...

No idea, and VW doesn't let on.  Can't find any reference to it on Google.  Could be that they wanted them to be preserved as a source of protein. 2/6d is a hell of a bounty, though - when I was a nipper the reward for a grey-squirrel tail was 1s.
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Pingu

  • Put away those fiery biscuits!
  • Mrs Pingu's domestique
    • the Igloo
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5026 on: 24 February, 2021, 03:59:03 pm »
Probably a cocktail stick shortage.

ElyDave

  • Royal and Ancient Polar Bear Society member 263583
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5027 on: 24 February, 2021, 04:18:26 pm »
perforating holes in camouflage nets
“Procrastination is the thief of time, collar him.” –Charles Dickens

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5028 on: 24 February, 2021, 04:18:34 pm »
Hedgehog parachuters is totally a thing.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5029 on: 25 February, 2021, 07:59:59 am »
The first thing sold on eBay was broken.
Move Faster and Bake Things

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5030 on: 25 February, 2021, 08:07:33 am »
Hedgehog parachuters is totally a thing.

Now I'm wondering if the WW2 Ministry of Crack-Brained Schemes didn't want to infect them with something narsty and drop them out of a Lanc over Germany.
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Snakehips

  • Twixt London and leafy Surrey
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5031 on: 25 February, 2021, 09:39:37 am »
Karachi has a special rollerblading police unit with 10 men and 10 women in it.
An nescis, mi fili, quantilla prudentia mundus regatur?

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5032 on: 25 February, 2021, 06:41:32 pm »
That Anusol has a very distinctive smell.

That Billy Bragg pilfered
Quote
I was twenty one years when I wrote this song
I'm twenty two now, but I won't be for long
from the opening lines of Simon and Garfunkel's The Leaves That Are Green.

Wowbagger

  • Former Sylph
    • Stuff mostly about weather
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5033 on: 02 March, 2021, 12:08:06 pm »
That in Mossley, not at all far from Stalybridge, there is a terrace of houses yclept "Bottom's Fold".

https://goo.gl/maps/1KemNBfsiuKprtiL9 refers.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5034 on: 02 March, 2021, 12:17:22 pm »
Sitting on a live horse is OK whether the horse likes it or not.

Sitting on a dead one that couldn't care less anymore is apparently a terrible thing.
“There is no point in using the word 'impossible' to describe something that has clearly happened.”
― Douglas Adams

barakta

  • Bastard lovechild of Yomiko Readman and Johnny 5
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5035 on: 02 March, 2021, 01:12:50 pm »
Sitting on a live horse is OK whether the horse likes it or not.

Sitting on a dead one that couldn't care less anymore is apparently a terrible thing.

I thought that. We ignore horse welfare when they're alive but if they're dead we care they're "sat on" as disrespectful, despite the way they're treated in life.

Manufactured outrage...

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5036 on: 02 March, 2021, 01:56:58 pm »
Yup, it's ok to stand in a dead animal's skin (on your feet), but not sit on a dead animal. Weird.
Rust never sleeps

citoyen

  • Occasionally rides a bike
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5037 on: 02 March, 2021, 02:21:50 pm »
A 'Frank Beard' is a little known fact that everyone knows.

This came up because Lauren Laverne played Labi Siffre's I Got The on the radio and afterwards mentioned the 'Frank Beard' about Chas & Dave playing as session musicians on that record. One of those bits of music trivia that people like to show off about knowing, but in fact everyone knows it already.

It's called a Frank Beard after the little known fact that everyone knows about Frank Beard being the only member of ZZ Top without a beard.

I knew both these facts already, which is kind of the point. But I don't think I've heard 'Frank Beard' being used in that way before though. I like it.
"The future's all yours, you lousy bicycles."

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5038 on: 02 March, 2021, 02:47:41 pm »
ZZ Top before the beards.

Today I learned that Mickey Mouse was once banned in Romania, though not for being a horrible twee product of a horrible twee organisation.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5039 on: 02 March, 2021, 03:47:03 pm »
What I learned today...

How to get what you want by offending your local MP.

Today I got my letter inviting me to visit the NHS website to book my Covid jab..... this means I am old :facepalm:
Per the website: nearest vaccination centre - a 45 minute drive (or 1h45min ride) away.
Must be some mistake shirley?   No, it is confirmed by a call to the 119 Covid helpline.

Further digging on NHS.gov.uk and I find a list of all vaccination centres, searchable by postcode, with no less than 17 closer locations and including one less than a mile away from home !

Cue email to said MP
Who responded very quickly taking exception to my use of the word "shambles" because he apparently spent a day recently working as a volunteer at that same local vaccination centre.
However he did forward my email to both the my local GP and to the vaccination centre and I was called minutes later to book my appointment ! 

Whilst he could work out which centre it was from my address which I provided (MPs generally don't respond without that) I have absolutely no idea how he came by the information as to which GP I am registered with.

robgul

  • Cycle:End-to-End webmaster
  • cyclist, Cytech accredited mechanic & woodworker
    • Cycle:End-to-End
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5040 on: 02 March, 2021, 04:26:52 pm »
What I learned today...

How to get what you want by offending your local MP.

Today I got my letter inviting me to visit the NHS website to book my Covid jab..... this means I am old :facepalm:
Per the website: nearest vaccination centre - a 45 minute drive (or 1h45min ride) away.
Must be some mistake shirley?   No, it is confirmed by a call to the 119 Covid helpline.

Further digging on NHS.gov.uk and I find a list of all vaccination centres, searchable by postcode, with no less than 17 closer locations and including one less than a mile away from home !

Cue email to said MP
Who responded very quickly taking exception to my use of the word "shambles" because he apparently spent a day recently working as a volunteer at that same local vaccination centre.
However he did forward my email to both the my local GP and to the vaccination centre and I was called minutes later to book my appointment ! 

Whilst he could work out which centre it was from my address which I provided (MPs generally don't respond without that) I have absolutely no idea how he came by the information as to which GP I am registered with.

The GP call was probably pure chance . . .

I got the NHS letter on a Saturday* - booked for the following Thursday at 1130 at a "mass centre" not that far away (nearest of 5 offered)

Tuesday morning a letter from the GP Surgery saying I could phone for an appt - did that 0900 Thursday so cancelled the first one

Thursday came and I went (walked!) to the small local hospital and with a very efficient process had my jab (Pfizer)

When I got back home I got a phone call from the hospital where I was a customer for some fairly major surgery and am still uner one the consultants - saying they had some spare jab capacity and would I like to go that day or the following.

It all sounds like confusion BUT in the circumstances I thought the whole thing was encouraging.    I can perhaps understand the GP being keen as I think they get paid £12.50 a go for the jabs.

* quite a few weeks ago so I'm REALLY OLD!


Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5041 on: 03 March, 2021, 01:21:37 pm »
Move Faster and Bake Things

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5042 on: 03 March, 2021, 06:24:16 pm »
Following the Daily Heil takeover that’ll be changed to read “HOW MEDIUM-SIZED IMMIGRANT DINOSAURS GAVE OUR CAVE PRICES CANCER”.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5043 on: 03 March, 2021, 06:52:42 pm »
"HARDWORKING FLINTSTONE DAD ESCAPES UNFAIR DRIVING BAN AFTER ACCIDENTALLY RUNNING OVER MEDIUM-SIZED IMMIGRANT DINOSAUR ON BENEFITS, DUE TO NEEDING CAR TO TAKE DIABETIC CHILD TO WITCH DOCTOR"
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Salvatore

  • Джон Спунър
    • Pics
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5044 on: 05 March, 2021, 09:18:42 am »
That there's an area of Stoke called Dresden.
Quote
et avec John, excellent lecteur de road-book, on s'en est sortis sans erreur

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5045 on: 05 March, 2021, 12:46:36 pm »
If there’s an area of Dresden called Stoke it’s probably one that was deliberately left as it was on February 14th 1945.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5046 on: 05 March, 2021, 12:49:23 pm »
That there's an area of Stoke called Dresden.
Makes sense. Maybe an area called Faenza would make sense too, but I dunno how you'd say that in Stoke!
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5047 on: 06 March, 2021, 11:51:54 am »
The Perseverance mars rover is designed to drive backwards much better than forwards*. They drive it forwards so that if it gets into trouble they have a better chance of reversing out of it. The kind of thought that is blindingly obvious once someone else has thought of it.

* In as much as forwards and backwards apply to the rover.
“There is no point in using the word 'impossible' to describe something that has clearly happened.”
― Douglas Adams

Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5048 on: 06 March, 2021, 12:03:06 pm »
Hmmm. Every car I've ever owned has a lower reverse gear than 1st. Is that the same principle I wonder ?
Rust never sleeps

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: what I have learned today.
« Reply #5049 on: 06 March, 2021, 12:07:15 pm »
I once drove a Volvo equipped with the DAF Variomatic transmission, on which the range of “gear” ratios was the same irrespective of direction of travel.  Those wacky Cloggies used to race DAFs backwards 4 teh LOLZ0RZ.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime