[pen] only 13 years? Newbie! ;-)

[Rosie] My sense of humour is childish, absurdust and crude. Much like me really. I hope to meet a bunch of you when I am next back in the Old Country, depending on when that is. I tried to get to see Phil last time I was over but the god of the M6 is a cruel and jealous god and sent plagues of cones, jams and Eddie Stobart to confound me.

(nfras) Well, that's the M6 for you. The deity of the B269 is much more benign, and I live just off it.

[pen] It is rather daunting isn't it. I've been doing this online since 1995. It's strange that the number of contributors has stayed fairly stable over the years, as if the world of MC can only sustain a certain number of people. I was looking at the Yorkives the other day, trying to find my first contribution. Brought back many memories, many of which I can't even remember.

[Phil] Didn't you know there's a one-in, one-out policy? Now, if you could start to think about making a move now please, ...

... most of whom might discern the subtle difference between 'quite a lot of' [which I'd originally typed] and 'quite a few'.

[rab] There can't be a one-in, one-out policy. If the gestalt entity that is Uncle Korky/INJ/CdM/Dujon left, it would take time to invent new personae. Stevie would have a fit.

[rab] I think you've terrified everyone into silence, too afraid to stick their heads above the parapet and say anything in case anyone remembers how long they've been here, and 'isn't it time you made room for someone new?'.

I think I must be approaching my 10th anniversary, but I could be out by a couple of years either way.
Very little of the threatened snow in southern England - so no excuse for leaving early for my 4 hour drive home.

Threatened snow? Haven't seen/read/heard a forecast for two days. Must update myself.

An inch of snow here this morning. It settled on the grass and even on the side roads for a time.

Just wind, rain and 2.5C here in Rotterdam. And final day in the office before January - hurrah!

I cane to NZ for my daughter's wedding equipped for sun and sand, however I need an umbrella and gumboots.

Pleasant and sunny down here in Florida. And I've been here about 14 years I think.

Er, when I say "here" I don't mean Florida. I mean here.

(CdM) Could you move around a bit, preferably completely at random and as fast as possible. Then we will know your location to a greater degree of accuracy than currently specified.

[Rosie] I don't think that works for molecules of CdM. On the other hand, the speed of a flerdle is highly dependent on slope, being relatively speedy now along a flat, perfectly horizontal surface and very much slower on any inclination or declination, whereas say a rock or a basketball shows very different behaviour.

Oh, and *waves from sunny Brisbane*

(flerdle) Are you saying that cadmium-containg alloys are beyond the laws of physics? Outrageous! Don't tell Uri Geller, whatever you do. May your mobility on inclined planes rapidly approach the norm.

Uri Geller sat three seats in front of me and my mother on a flight from Venice to the UK. I watched the rivets and joins of the wings and fuselage very carefully during the entire flight. (Stranegly enough, Jude Law sat in front of us on the flight out. He's much smaller than you think.)

I flew with the late lamented Phil Linott on the little 40-seater from Dublin to Leeds once. He was very tall - pushing 2m, I reckon.

(pen) Stranegly sounds like a small village in Scotland. Hard luck. :-)
(INJ) Two miles? Yeah, that's big, too big, obviously.

[Rosie] I've just moved rapidly to Tennessee, if that helps. Drove up through an impressive storm, as well. Hearing the tornado sirens wailing as we were driving was a little unnerving.

It is pouring rain this evening here (in Brisbane still) but, unusually, there is no lightning/thunder at all.

(CdM) I thought you were somewhere round there. I'm envious of your vigorous local convective activity. All we get here is mist, drizzle and general gloom. It's mild (10°) much to the disgust of the snowfreaks, but they're either weird or bonkers.

[Rosie] Have you seen the W Yorkshire lenticular cloud photos doing the rounds today?

(Phil) I certainly have - brilliant. We don't get 'em round here because the hills aren't high enough. You should see the ones they get in New Zealand and in the USA in the lee of The Rockies. More envy. :-(

[Rosie] Sadly I have seen many of them though it is midsummer here. Oh, well, now it is Christmas.

(Softers) At least you can see the sides and ends.

What ends? We saw no ends on our Christmas eve and day. Very wet, windy, and uncomfortable.

I saw the clouds on Christmas day, their old familiar shades of gray, the raindrops fell and I could tell the weather was so dreary, hey.

[KS, G] Where was that?

I saw something approaching lenticular cloudage a couple of days after Christmas, over the Lincolnshire wolds - a splendid sight, but I don't think it would have lenticulated fully. Now, back in, the Netherlands, it's drizzling heavily, grey, it's already getting dark, and sounds like a war zone out there as the village boys have been setting off their Belgian firecrackers all day, and the farm boys have been filling old milk churns with carbide bomblets and shooting the lids off across the fields. One way of seeing out the old year, I suppose. The windy miller and I are planning a quiet night in with a couple of slow-cooked lamb shanks and a bottle of wine.

Cloudage?? Oh, pen, pleeeze! Even the most anorakky weather nut doesn't talk like that. Did it give rainage, which went down the drainage? Or was it snowage, so your car needed towage? <rapper>

Good to hear that Dutch boys are allowed out, unsupervised, to be a little naughty.

It was a totally clear night here after a hot and almost completely cloud-free day - something of a rarity here. I did not bother going in to town for the fireworks, but watched a very decent display from the back yard. They seemed to be coming from the general direction of a local school and went on for a very long time. A licence is needed to even obtain fireworks here, let alone let them off, though some people manage it anyway.

Apparently the Arts Centre spire caught fire. Whoops.

Happy New Year to the collective mc5ers.