The Grumble Thread - No energy for a full on rant.

[ian]

I seem to have missed nearly every train (but the first one today). Arrived at Marylebone with 10 minutes to buy a ticket. But there were only two functioning machines and a big queue at the office. One minute before my train, a nice lady who had been standing there doing nothing suddenly decided that yes, she had the power to dispense a ticket from the machine she had hidden in her pocket. Which wouldn't have been more helpful a few minutes earlier. Then one way back, American colleague discovered that single tickets aren't returns as we tried to get through the gates. Then I got to Victoria just as my ultimate train left. Then I just missed the bus from the station (taunted me by sailing by as I turned the corner) and had to stand in the cold and rain for fifteen minutes. Scott of the Antarctic had nothing on this.

The bins didn't get emptied again because someone parked a scaffolding lorry at the end of the road (the bin men were standing around it when I left this morning, it didn't have any identifying details on it). That's what happens dear council when you have no parking enforcement.

And after just defeating the streptococcomus, I've come down the cold that my wife had been carefully curating in the meantime. Not entirely what I wanted for valentine's day, my dear.

I think I may break my midweek drinking rule and open the gin. It's medicinal and just what the doctor would recommend. This doctor would, anyway.

[nicknack]

midweek drinking rule

I have one of those. And I stick to it rigorously.

[Si S]

midweek drinking rule

I have one of those. And I stick to it rigorously.

Same here, I mean why would you want to be hungover in your own time?

[LittleWheelsandBig]

I'm working in Ecuador at the moment and the wet season started a week ago. Half of the company vehicles are 4x4s and the other half are 2 wheel drives that look like 4x4. One of our young engineers drove a 2WD along a soft road that requires using a 4x4. Unfortunately I was a passenger at the time and had to help dig it out and push it out ... in deep mud ... and the rain. Oh joy. The only upside was that the erstwhile driver stood in a drive wheel's line of fire, even after I warned him of such.

On a related note, car manufacturers who build dual cab utes that look like 4x4s but on a car chassis, so not much ground clearance. Also those who install pure road tyres on off-road-looking things.

[David Martin]

2x2 M&S top 4x4 road tyres every time except on rock.

[Mr Larrington]

A USAnian mate has a Toyota Tacoma pickup with big knobbly tyres, "TRO Off-Road" badges and a ground clearance measured in feet.  Once he managed to get it stuck in the brush alongside NV-305.  "Stick it in 4WD, Larry!" suggested the assembled multitude.

"Errrr..."

[TheLurker]

midweek drinking rule

I have one of those. And I stick to it rigorously.

Me too. "The weekend begins on Wednesday" and this weekend was inaugurated with a nice glass of ouzo*.



*Any snide comments decrying ouzo will be roundly ignored.

[Guy]

That's my Andover trip booked. Bloody HRG itinerary: Hitchin-Finsbury Park, UndergrounD to Victoria, hang around at Victoria, train to Clapham Jcn, hang around a bit more, train to Andover. Return journey tha same but in reverse. As my orange card is a standard return by any permitted route the Guy itinerary is: Hitchin-King's X, UndergrounD to Waterloo, train to Andover, arriving nearly an hour earlier! Returning the same but backwards. Why do HRG send you all around the houses? I know I like trains, but not so much I want to spend ages looking at them from drafty platforms in early March.

[Mr Larrington]

I once had cause to exchange a warrant, rail, HM Armed Forces for the use of for a ticket from Woking to York "via cheapest recognised route".  I do not know who recognised Woking-Guildford-Reading-Mordor-Sheffield-York as a "route", which is probably just as well for their continued existence and my not being the Snout King of B-Wing.

[Guy]

Mr L, you appear to have missed Morfa Mawddach, Wick and Bloemfontain from your list.

[hellymedic]

I suspect 'cheapest possible' meant Avoid That London At All Costs...

[Cudzoziemiec]

Can something ever be cheapest possible if it is at all costs?

[hellymedic]

...if cheap just refers to Money and time and (in)convenience are budgeted otherwise...

[jsabine]

I suspect 'cheapest possible' meant Avoid That London At All Costs...

Except that it is routed via Victoria which, as a London Terminal, is pretty much the epitome of something other than a Not London real routing ...

I reckon the Guy routing falls foul of official minimum change or transfer times, and that obeying them would leave him on a train that arrives in Andover a whole 93 seconds after the one suggested by the official routing engine.

[Beardy]

Why can’t the boffins sort out a cure for the 'common cold'. I mean it’s been around, like forever and being common there’s lots to practice on.

Feeling slightly like death warmed up as long as I sit still. Movement risks causing a coughing fit measured on the Richter scale and also suggests that my limbs are intact composed of lead. 🤧🤒

[T42]

There are over 200 viruses that cause the common cold.  I suppose that finding a vaccine would involve identifying surface proteins common to all of them but not to cells in the human body.  Difficult.

[ian]

Not just lots of virus (rhinovirus is the most common, but adenovirus, coronavirus, respiratory syncytial virus, and several others, some we've probably not yet identified, metapneumovirus came up in the 2000s). Mostly it's rhinovirus, but there's the better part of 175 different serotypes. That's a lot of targets for a conventional vaccine. Plus modern drug development is more than a bit broke.

As least mine is down to residual sniffles this morning. Thanks for hanging around all weekend.

[orienteer]

Much as I hate colds, I always regard them as fitness exercises for the immune system. I've never seen any scientific justification for this though.

[Beardy]

Much as I hate colds, I always regard them as fitness exercises for the immune system. I've never seen any scientific justification for this though.

Well my immune system doesn't seem to be doing much exercise as the moment. Unless, the reason I'm feeling so lethargic is because the immune system is using up all my energy. 

[Kim]

TBH, rather than a vaccine I think we'd be better off working on a way to manipulate our snot production at will.  Would solve all sorts of problems.

[ian]

Much as I hate colds, I always regard them as fitness exercises for the immune system. I've never seen any scientific justification for this though.

Not really, I think that only really matters when you are younger (leastways, that's the current consensus). Colds are just caused by an extraordinarily successful range of viruses. We're all pretty much guaranteed to get a couple every winter (and those that say they don't are just likely better at ignoring the symptoms).

While clearing the mucus (or preventing it) might seem like a good idea, it's probably not. It's a part of the response to the infection (ironically at the same being the main vector for spread).

[Beardy]

Much as I hate colds, I always regard them as fitness exercises for the immune system. I've never seen any scientific justification for this though.

Snot really, I think that only really matters when you are younger (leastways, that's the current consensus). Colds are just caused by an extraordinarily successful range of viruses. We're all pretty much guaranteed to get a couple every winter (and those that say they don't are just likely better at ignoring the symptoms).

While clearing the mucus (or preventing it) might seem like a good idea, it's probably not. It's a part of the response to the infection (ironically at the same being the main vector for spread).

FTFY 

[Kim]

While clearing the mucus (or preventing it) might seem like a good idea, it's probably not. It's a part of the response to the infection (ironically at the same being the main vector for spread).

Not a useful reaction when it serves to spread the infection to the lungs or ears, thobut.

And don't get me started on allergies...

[Beardy]

my current cold has, like most of the colds I get these days (though this is the first one this season!) has 'settled' on my chest and for the first couple of hours or so in a morning I have the 'marmalade' cough. The post nasal drip of the mucus formed during the day also causes me to cough, but much les productively.

Dr Beardy (Mrs) continues to threaten me with extreme violence whenever I get a cold/cough because she has delicate hearing and I have big lungs. Trying to suppress the coughing urge in a vain attempt to please her usually results in an explosion which she finds even less acceptable. Of course all this coughing irritates my throat, but complaints about that result in being told to stop coughing. Being married it a former nurse has it's trials.

I can't win.

[ian]

While clearing the mucus (or preventing it) might seem like a good idea, it's probably not. It's a part of the response to the infection (ironically at the same being the main vector for spread).

Not a useful reaction when it serves to spread the infection to the lungs or ears, thobut.

That's evolution (and why it's so successful). It's co-opted your own responses.

I'm looking forward to a night that doesn't involve snot pong – that delightful nocturnal game where you lie on one side and feel the snot flow through you sinuses to block and leak from one nostril, until you are forced to roll over and repeat the process with the other side of your head. Or you can lie on your back and let it drip down your throat.