arrow_circle_left arrow_circle_up arrow_circle_right
The Banter Page
help
If you're wanting to get something off your chest, make general comments about the server, or post lonely hearts ads, then this is the place for you.
arrow_circle_up
[rab] The word is "finance".
[Darren] financé surely?
Congrats
[Rab] Slightly slow off the mark, but all the very best to you and the future Mrs Rab.
[penelope] Now you mention it, since rab's finance is female, it should be financée.
If he's lucky, perhaps she is a financiée
[rab] Congrots.
As a French speaker, might I step in? As the word comes from French, I'm assuming that it follows French rules. Therefore Rab has a fiancée, whereas Rab himself is the fiancé, as French takes an extra 'e' to signify femininity. Of course, you might already know this, in which case my apologies. I'll keep my teaching to my job.
*gives nights a little three-legged wooden stool so the jokes no longer waft over his head*
[penelope] snnrk!!!:-)
Assume a spherical robin
The robin is limping a bit.
Rabiancé(e)
[rab] Congrats indeed. I actually think that getting engaged caused me a more dramatic change of lifestyle then either getting married or having children. Now whether that was a change for the better ....
[Rosie] Seems my outgoing won't connect with your incoming. It's taken a few days for me to find out .. I'll try sending from another address :-)
(Chalky) OK. Should I have another address for you?
Clunking Limericks
(Projoy) You're right. I misread Marc's 4th line due to mild inebriation. Can't post the fifth line because I did the first, hence this.
[Raak] After two weeks of non movement the robin continues to limp, my killer blow was not enough.
[Rosie] I have resent from a similar-looking email address [replace hotmaildotcom with gmaildotcom] :-)
emails
(Chalky) Got it. :-) Have stored new address.
[rab] Congratulations. =)
Squeak
Now, what with all the nerves leading up to the big moment it completely slipped my mind that that it would entail planning a wedding. I bought a book at the weekend to help me out, but the first thing I noticed is that most of the wedding literature is aimed pretty much exclusively at the bride. And it also seems there's a whole industry devoted to fleecing couples (or their parents) at the start of their life together. Particularly depressing so far have been some of the menus I've seen on the web, typically wanting to charge you 25quid a head for the most lacklustre three-course meal you've ever seen. To put this into perspective, our engagement meal was at a cosy local restaurant with a reasonably high standard of cuisine and imaginative menu, and with a nice bottle of wine and after-dinner port came to not much more than the above figure. Nice to see the economies of scale being passed on, there. I'm sure with enough perserverence we'll be able to find either a venue with a decent caterer, or one that will let us provide our own, but I can already see that's going to be a lot of work.
Limpin robin
It seems the win detection's a bit screwed. I thought I'd fixed it after Tuj had some trouble with it, but it seems still not to be working. I'll look into it tonight.
wedding
[rab] Given that this meal is traditionally called the "Wedding Breakfast", you could take it literally and get in a job lot of Coco Pops. Sophistication and economy all in one go.
oooh...wedding breaqkfast joke!!!
Sorry in advance...Three friends were all getting married on the same day, and they all decided to use the same hotel and church (staggered, of course). They were all 'innocent' in the way of love, and knew that on their wedding night they would all finally 'do-ooo-ooo it' (As Rik Mayal would say), but as the newly weds would all be having breakfast in the hotel with the families the next day, they knew it was going to be difficult to talk to each other about the experience.

"I know" Says one of them "We'll secretly tell each other over breakfast - by means of a code. Ordering a slice of toast means we did it!!!" They all agree.

Next morning at the table, the first guy orders his breakfast from the waitress...

"I'll have a glass of orange, some cereal and three slices of toast please" he says, winking to his friends.

"I'll have 5 slices of toast" says his smug friend. The last chap orders his...

I'll have a glass of orange, some grapefruite, and 7 slices of toast please..." he says....and then as the waitress walks away, he winks to his friends and calls out to the waitress again...

"Please can you make 3 of those Brown bread..."
Up the bum
(Pave) Shurely jokes like that are not still current? It has a nostalgic resonance for anyone over 60 (which I am) because I knew friends who were virgin bridegrooms, (at least I'd have put money on it). Seems incredible these days.
well....
[Rosie] I currently live in Portsmouth (not really by choice), and am in the process of moving. To give you an idea of what the place is like: Virgin = less than teen, Grandma = teen and over. My wife and I joke that we are getting kicked out of town because we waited until we were married before we started a family - and before that we weren't related (and she's way over 15...)...and to top it off...neither of us have ever claimed benefits for our 15 kids...which we don't have either...
In short...I guess not :-). Due date May 2nd for number one...dead excited ;-)
well....
[Rosie] I currently live in Portsmouth (not really by choice), and am in the process of moving. To give you an idea of what the place is like: Virgin = less than teen, Grandma = teen and over. My wife and I joke that we are getting kicked out of town because we waited until we were married before we started a family - and before that we weren't related (and she's way over 15...)...and to top it off...neither of us have ever claimed benefits for our 15 kids...which we don't have either...
In short...I guess not :-). Due date May 2nd for number one...dead excited ;-)
oops
Works PC glitch...sorry.
Pompey
[Pave] How far are you going? Just interested as (when not at university) I'm a Hampshire-dweller. Hope the moving process is improving for you, all the best.
15 kids etc....
Dublin woman goes into the social to claim child benfit for her 15 kids. When asked their names she replies "Micko". When pressed for more name she replies "Theyre all called Micko". Social officer then asks "So when you want them to go to bed, what do you say?" "Micko, get to yuz feckin' beds". Officer continues "And to call them all for dinner?" The reply comes "Micko, get yuz in here fer yuz dinner."
The officer thinks a moment, "But, if you just want one of them, what do you do?" Without hesitating, she replies "Janey Mack! That's easy - I just uses the surname"
Pompey again
(Pave) Yurss, I've heard that about Portsmouth over a long period and wondered if it were true. Maybe it is.
Tuj - Farnborough area still Hants...You?
What you have heard of Portsmouth, it is true. I can't hold my head up as I walk the streets for fear of what I may tread in. One day...on a side street directly off of the main drag, I had the misfortune to see a woman squating behind a car to relieve herself (lots of open shops and pubs....lots of pubs...many, many pubs ...and all crap, but still she chose a car). I felt safer walking around a rough area of Glasgow (Pollockshaw) at night on my own, than I do during the day in Portsmouth. It is only in existence to give the saying "arse hole end of the world" an actual grid reference...
[Tuj] À propos of current-ish thread in OrangeMC, how old are you?
Nights
Posted it up over there ;)
Mr Fixit
Right. I think I've finally fixed the win-detection bug.
*sigh* I'm bored. And hungry. And still have 2 hours to go before I get home and cook a piece of ham, which promises to be ultra-delicious as it's proper Lincolnshire ham. *sigh*
*Suddenly Hungry*
Hunger
Me three. Eating Dutch tonight, off to the Heineken Holland House which is the Winter Olympic base of one of the country teams, I forget which, but it'll all be orange. Tomorrow night off to the Sponsor Village, got a curling lesson booked.
Well, that was delicious.
Do tell!!! (Only had Pizza ;-( )
*BURP*
Repeating
(pen) You burped a full two hours after your ham. What will happen in another twenty-four God only knows. Keep us posted. :-)
Dutch Kwisine
Well what a gourmet delight that was (not!). I do like the way the Dutch get all exuberant when sporting occasions are involved. A big tent with an ice rink in the middle, bars and and hot dog stands round the outside, and the Winter Olympics AND Ajax-Inter on TV screens everywhere and a live band. Well, the Dutch have medals to celebrate. I wonder where the GB house is...
[IS,P] Look under the doormat. It's great fun being in Canada at the moment, my friends have decided I'm an honourary Canadian for the duration, "as Britian seem to be, well, shit" at the Winter Olympics business.

[Pen] Don't patronise me, I can do that all by myself...
[nights] Of course you can. You're a clever boy, aren't you? ;-)
[nights] I am sooo tempted to say: "Yes, dear."
[nights] I suppose you'll want congratulating for that narrow victory over the Finns in the curling final, then?
curling
Tried it last night in the Sponsor Village. Rather fun, actually.
curling?
One slipper, one trainer, a yardbrush and a doorstop? What's that all about then?
(nights) Canada? Where's that, then?
curling
[pen] Have a butchers at the hyperlink game over in Outer Space.
oi oi nights!!!
Hello nights - are you aware of the appeal lodged in your Lock match? Might still be able to fend them off if you're quick...
ice rocks
[IS,P!] Which one is you? ;o)
cakegeek
I have just baked the most blinding carrot-and-banana cake for my own pleasure. It was supposed to be banana and walnut, but I didn't have any walnuts and I was short of a banana so I substituted a carrot. I thought about taking it into work tomorrow, but I'm going to keep it for myself. I love Sunday morning baking.
[curling] Of course, certainly, go Newfoundland- uhm, Canada go.

[lock] Agh, forgotten all about that. I'll be straight over. Thanks for the notice.
[nights] Darn it.
now hear this... cross post, apols
Dear I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue Mailing List Member,
We should be in a position to email you details of the next three I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue recordings within the next few weeks. We are planning recordings in the North of England, the Midlands and the West Country.
However, there is still good news for those in the South East and the Greater London area, as we bring advance notice of two recordings of the hit Radio 4 series 'Hamish & Dougal : You'll Have Had Your Tea' which are to take place in London this March.
Hamish and Dougal (aka Barry Cryer and Graeme Garden) are the two Scottish gentlemen made internationally quite well known from their appearances in the 'Sound Charades' round on ISIHAC. They are accompanied in the series by Mrs Naughtie, a cleaning lady cum housekeeper played by Alison Steadman, a local laird played by Jeremy Hardy, and a 4 piece ceilidh band. The musical director is Graeme's son John, otherwise known as the keyboard player in the internationally renowned pop combo 'Scissor Sisters'. This is Hamish & Dougal's third Radio 4 series.
As usual you are advised to book soon for these recordings as they are extremely popular.
The first recording will take place at 7.30pm (doors open 7pm) on Monday 6th March at The Mermaid Conference & Events Centre (formerly The Mermaid Theatre), Puddle Dock, Blackfriars, London EC4V 3DB.
Tickets cost £6.50 each and are being sold by the Cochrane Theatre box office on 020 7269 1606 (which is open from 10am - 6pm, Monday to Friday). There is no booking fee. Where possible tickets will be sent to the purchaser, but they can be collected on the night if preferred.
The second recording will take place at 7.30pm (doors open 7pm) on Sunday 26th March at The Duchess Theatre, Catherine Street (off The Aldwych), London WC2B 5LA. Tickets cost £6.50 each and are obtainable by calling the box office on 0870 890 1103. (The theatre box office is run by a ticketing agency, and there will be will a handling charge of 60p on these ticket sales. The advantage is that they are open 24 hours a day).
Thanks Pen. Can you keep us posted re the midlands recordings please?
[Btd] Sure, I just post up the emails when I get them in :o)
feeding the troops
Banana & Carrot bread gone down well in the office. Troops all onside. Banana Dictatorship underway.
cake
Banana bread and carrot cake are two of the best things ever. Together, they will indeed conquer the planet.
bucket shop - today's left overs
Dear I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue Mailing List Member
This is to advise you that there are still some tickets left for our recording of Hamish & Dougal starring Barry Cryer and Graeme Garden on the evening of Monday 6th March at the Mermaid Theatre in London. They will be advertised to the general public from Friday so you'll need to book tomorrow if you don't wish to miss out.
This was in my inbox this morning - if you want tickets, hurry!
Full House!
Completed on the bungalow this morning. Going to spill champagne over the doorstep tonight :o)
Bungalow
Congrats, pen!
So that's why there will be no more Dick and Dom on a Saturday morning.
[Botherer] cheers :o)
[Inkspot] Can't afford to have all that creamy muckmuck cleaned off the carpets every weekend!! sorry...
<whisper>bogeys</whisper>
Bogeys? I thought pen was talking about something much worse.
[Darren] You've obviously never watched... recommended. BBC1 Saturday mornings, while stocks last.
Paws
Hello. Is anyone else finding these page taking a couple of seconds longer than normal to display?
[penelope] Worse than watched - I know one of the script editors. Yes, I know what you're thinking: they have scripts?!
wheeew Matron!
Fearne Cotton...Creamy muck muck....and this is kids TV...
[rab] Mine's quite zippy today actually.

[as for the rest of you ...] I haven't the foggiest what you're all on about.
[Chalky] Mine too. Maybe my previous visits happened to synchronise with one of Andy's ultra-paranoid (i.e., frequent) site backups.
Dick and Dom?
The name suggests an animated cartoon whose principal characters are a *cough* certain organ and a PVC-clad woman with a whip.
Wouldn't that be Dick and Domme? I think it suggests a slightly different relationship as is. :)
We're now well adrift of the weekend's discussion of Dick & Dom, so I shall start another topic. I'm having home-made spicy chickpea and cauliflower soup for lunch today. What's everyone else having?
Lunch
[pen] Probably nothing, but I might have something later.
An everything bagel, 2 kabanos, a large spring onion, half a head of chicory, a Russet apple, two fruit Shrewsbury biscuits, a bottle of water, and a couple of Sudoku.
...and a stick of celery.
Had mine at 11.30: All day breakfast sandwich, raspberries and a Cadbury's Twirl. Doing the healthy option today.
yum
Cottage pie and carrots - but I shan't be eating a main meal tonight because I hope to 'Walk The Line'.
I had a slice of flan, a cheese sandwich and a packet of Monster Munch.
...and the hunt continues for a ceremonial and celebratory venue that both happen to be free on the same day next spring. I'm amazed anyone ever manages to get married...
stress-free nuptuals
[rab] hey! Why not hire yourselves a ... Wedding Planner! [for the equivalent of two years'orth of joint salaries].
... should that be 'joint salary'?
ach whatever - I was only being facetious :-)

Seriously though, the wanting to do it and the asking if you can do it and the agreeing that you're going to do it and the telling evryone that you're going to do it - that's the easy part.
[rab] why not run off and do it? Or slip off and do it... or just do it now? My mum and dad did it, and returned to my home town to tell their parents after the fact. Both sets were fine about it. One of my sisters did it too, got married in the US as none of us could be there. I was never one for running though. Just have a big party when you come back, with none of the weighty responsibility that comes from having the ceremony and the party on the same day. I think I'm a proponent of avoiding unecessary hassles wherever they're avoidable, not buying or paying for stuff that you don't actually NEED to have a good time, and wary of pandering to everyone else's expectations with regard to weddings, whilst forgetting my own and those of my significant other (if ever there is one). I'd quite like to have a new frock to do it in though.
Lunch
Well I had risotto ai frutti di mare, and not very appetising either. I should point out that it was canteen risotto, but the other 'dishes' looked worse. [Raak] Those Sudoku sound tasty!
[Raak] I thought you'd written a program to do them for you, so that you didn'nt need to succumb to the temptation of actually doing the blasted things.
[SM] I did, but it didn't help. :-(
[Raak] Is that why you've started eating them instead?
Oooh!
Ooh no, you shouldn't eat a sudoku! If they're not properly prepared they could be contaminated with deadly toxins! Call me a coward, but I'd never risk trying a puzzle that could poison me if the person setting it made the tiniest mistake.
Sudoku
It's not really poisonous as such - more of a number.
*dons 2006-style F1 goggles*
Champs and Chumps
Bahrain tomorrow with a scarlet front row, with Alonso on the second row. It will be a good test and an exciting afternoon.

Which is more than can be said of the apalling display put on by the Steve Johnson renegades at the Millenium Stadium. Basic handling errors, Wales were lucky to come away with a draw (make that very, very lucky).

Yay! for Renault and Alonso. It was a good race which helped pass the time while doing the ironing.
I missed the GP - was out - and I still have all the ironing to do :o(
Watching things while ironing
[Inks] And can someone please get rid of Brian Moore from the BBC rugby commentating team. He adds nothing to the understanding of what's going on (other than occasionally in scrums) and is so blinkered in his pro-Englishness it's ridiculous. He is the rugby equivalent of Fred Trueman as a commentator. Also, to continue the cricketing thought, the current English rugby team makes me think of the cricketing expression 'flat-track bully' - they only look good against sides they can dominate physically.
[INJ]For a 6N before next years World Cup things are looking dire for the northern hemisphere, the teams of South Africa, Austrailia and New Zealand maintain a high level year on year the rest have occasional years of brilliance. Wales have shot their winning coach to appeal to "player power", they now enjoy the training sessions!!!! England have less of a hill to climb than Wales for the next game.
forward thinking
(INJ) Forward dominance is how England won the world cup, it is how Australia, and to a larger extent the All Blacks play their game. The major difference is, they also have devastating backs and centres. Rugby is played off a forward-dominated platform so to look good against teams you can dominate physically is a pre-requisite of winning rugby. England, at the moment, still have the forward power, but problems abound in the half-backs and particularly at centre. My humble opinion also is that Corry is not the right man as captain. The handling errors on Saturday were abysmal and New Zealand, in particular, will rip them apart. I would also wager that Ireland will beat England next week
sold! (not)
Just had a silly offer on my flat from a guy who has not yet sold his place. Refused it. He's the wrong end of a chain. Awaiting a better offer.
going...
And another offer, only marginally less silly, 20 minutes later. I've given them the lowest acceptable price, and with the condition of exchange of contracts within 4 weeks. Fingers crossed.
*crossing her fingers*
Gone!
Woo-hoo!! Have got the price I (eventually) wanted and the quick exchange :o) Deep joy. Now I can buy myself a pair of salsa shoes.
congrats!
[Phil] Thanks :o)
Hear ye!!!
The Lockisseum Seems a little quiet. We need a few more faces in there I feel. One on one (and the soon to be tried Doubles) is a very different style of play. Sorry if I am acting all unofficial spokesperson like, but I had to 'Big Up' the Lock as a great MC site.
Spring has sprung today here in sunny Rickmansworth. 10 degrees C. That means the grass will start growing - I need to get TWO lawnmowers fixed...
[pen] Ah, Spring. Like Summer, but without the essential quality of warmth. You get what look from indoors like beautiful bright sunny days, then step outside and the slightest puff of wind tells you the air is still coming in from northern Siberia and you have months yet of bundling up like the Michelin man.
[Raak] Don't be so grumpy! Whilst I'll give you that 'Ne'er cast a clout till May be out' (and that's May blossom not the onset of June) holds true, there's nothing to stop you enjoying the feeling of spring. You have to admit it gives your demeanour a filip, doesn't it? And I've noticed my thermals dry much quicker on the washing line in spring :o)
[Raak] Also, it's the traditional time to start reproducing.
[Darren] Well, you get home chilled to the bone and the only thing to do is burrow under a pile of duvets, preferably with a second body to warm each other.
More than "preferably", presumably? Unless there's something I've yet to learn about the progenitive effects of burrowing under duvets.
Vernality
The good thing about Spring is the light. Shedloads of half-micron wavelength photons. The air is slow to respond, but will eventually. (pen) Interesting, not to say revealing, observation. The air has been very dry in the last week or so but not every spring does that happen.
Bad Hair Days
[Rosie] Don't I just know it's been particularly dry - I've had hair problems for most of February and all through March. It goes dead straight when the air's dry - I need a little drizzle.
fortihacker
email:ca920105@gmail.com I just like spam! I'm collocting junk email...
Oooh!!!!!
fortihacker, send me pizza menus, double glazing letters, load applications, free newspapers....I love collecting that rubbish as well. Now make like a Nubbock so we can carry on.

These hackers are running out of ideas for getting our email addresses I reckon....
load?
Loan...sorry, I have a cold.
topless
I see Wembley Stadium has a new 'cabriolet' top-down look this morning.
hospital visiting
I've visited Salisbury District Hospital 3 times in 20 hours. The first time to install mother for her knee replacement op that was scheduled for this morning, then again to take some books in because the op had been 'postponed' for a day, and then AGAIN to uninstall her because the surgeon is now too ill to do the op. Now she's on 'standby'. Ironic phrasing, given the state of her knee.
What a pain
How frustrating, Chalks, for you and your mother, to endure the anticipation (which probably isn't too pleasant) all over again.
*inserts daily piece of banter*
Orange tea
Is anyone else having problem accessing Orange, I've been having error messages since just before midnight.
*Goes off to kitchen to put the kettle on for helpful cup of tea for Dunx*
Orange fleeeeee
I'm lost!!! Dunx is down...no Lock,no Orange!!! I'm going warm turkey (can't go cold...still have MCiOS and Mc5)....
oh bliey
I've just received notification that the flat I'm in the prcess of selling is now 'listed'... hehehe. Rather them than me, I'm pleased to be out of all the hassle that it entails. I'm not opposed to listing as such - architectural heritage is important - but I need something a bit more uncomplicated right now.
that would be 'oh blimey'
Orange
[Inkspot] Thank you for confirming the timing of the downage.

Orange is back now, though.

Very QUIET in here. You can almost hear Radio 3.
The clock in here is about 5 minutes fast. The sundial needs realigning.
Let's see
Should be fixed now.
hush up
Radio 3's getting good...
heavy breathing
The cold is getting better - I'm taking drugs for it.
I thought women were never the slightest bit affected by colds :)
correction
[rab] I have Man Flu. Lord knows how I caught that, haven't sniffed a man in months.
The essay I'm trying to write
AAAARRGGGHHHHHH!!!!
The essay I'm trying to write
I've just realised is pure shite...
Its utter frivolity
Its sheer lack of quality . . .
I think I'll just set it alight.
*sighs*
oh oh owww!!
As an MC player, I hang my head in shame to say up until recently I had hardly ever heard ISIHAC. To make up for it (because the couple of shows that I had caught were jolly good) I bought myself the anniversary edition. I'm shocked to find that it is one year older then me, but we share the same birthday....and that Dame Judi Dench wasn't the only one that had to pull the car over for fear of laughing into a collision!!! I feel like a man who has been blind for the last 33 years, only to find that I was just wearing a hat one size too big!!!
(Pave) A noble admission. Now, who else is going to "come out"?
my sides hurt!!!!
the reason ISIHAC is a half our show, is because anything over that hurts ones sides....I love the anniversary edition quote by Humph...."Nixon became the first US President to visit China in an attempt to repair a Presidential rift. Chairman Mao was thrilled at this, as he was getting fed up using the escerator..."
[pen] I must have a touch of Bird Flu then.
[Raak] I shudder to think how you got that ;o)
http://ravenblack1973.blogspot.com
My cat has just given me a great birthday present....the little bugger. Rather than write it all again, I have posted it on my baby blog. Enjoy.....I hope every one else had a great weekend too!!!
No cake.....no candles......no secret boxes......*sob*
Whilst I'm on missed birthdays: Happy 34th to ISIHAC.
[Pave] Oh! Was it your birthday then? :-)
[Chalky] yeah...but to be honest, I only mentioned it because the chat was very slow. Birthdays aren't a good thing for me.
I'M ON THE TRAIN
Cor. Finally got this wireless internet marlarky to work on the GNER line.
Grand National
The bet is down. In memory. Here we go.
woo-hoo! We have faster broadband in the office. Faster than what, I don't know.
The usual expression is 'faster than a speeding bullet'
[IS,P!] We're not allowed to bring guns into the office, so I can't say.
My news - cross-posted
From under the stairs
[rab]With the last true move in The Furcation Game being back in July 2004 is it worth gently putting it to rest and moving on?
Looking out the window this morning through the drizzle the garden is starting to pick up and look colourful again after the bleak winter. A fine show of daffodils and the Forsythia and spring Jasmin are a real delight. Last weekend over the Bank Holiday even managed to cut the grass.
But the highlight after coming back from Broad Haven was the start of the new series of Dr Who, with New Earth setting the scene and arc for the series. It was so good I forgot to drink my cup of tea brought in by Mrs Inks.
(Inkspot) Smug bastard. :-) I've got three daffs out of a potential two dozen or so, though the Forsythia has come out. It's the cool dry weather (official) that's made everything late. Life's Grim Up North Surrey.
DOWNTIME WARNING
There may be some downtime from about 7pm tonight while we reinstall the OS. Hopefully we'll be back in fine fettle by midnight. Apols for inconv etc.
Nearly working
It\'s nearly working again. Woo.
Yay!
[Inkspot] Yes, maybe it is due for retirement. Oh, and could someone please finish the Dutch game.
De gaam is eended.
Weather
It's reached 15°C for the first time this year at Maison Rosie, the second latest date for this since I started records in 1983. The average date is 22 March but is very variable, standard deviation 24 days. Earliest was 27 Jan 2003 and the latest 25 Apr 1986. Are we going to have a hot summer? HTFSIK.
Backslashes
Don't know where they came from; I didn't put them there, or here.
[Rosei] WTF is HTFSIK?
*gets it*
Better late than never
Unparliamentary Acronyms
(pen) I knew you would. :-) The backslashes seem to accompany apostrophes and increase by one each time you preview. Test: (lots of backslashes removed, rab) 6 previews.
Well, thats (sic) that theory down the pan.
Going Dutch
The game has nine lives, it seems.
Right - I'll investigate the slashing.
It's now "fixed" I believe. Let me know if you notice anything else that's a bit odd.
Do you want me to put the Dutch game out of its misery, or shall I just let you guess how many 'o's after the 'M' in Mornington are required. (It's not very many).
ooooooooooooooo
(rab) How many, FFS? I've tried up to twelve. Thanks for fixing the apostrophe problem, BTW.
[Rosie] It was three. You had a typo with "Crescent."
typooography
(Darren) I have a very red face. It's the monicker effect.
Three.
butterfiles in the Amazon
A story game has been created from the ashes of Dutch.
[Rosie] Today was a perfect day for the garden it was warm enough here in North Wilts to have lunch outside (south facing garden). If the sun shines tomorrow the curtains will be drawn to cut the glare on the tv while the Grand Prix is on.
(Inkspot) Not (gasp) Swindon? Nice here too, max 17.4°C.
raise the drawbidge
Near to Swindon, just south of J16 of the M4. Little old ladies would lie in front of bulldozers than see Wootton Bassett become part of Swindon, and the town of Swindon is never mentioned in polite company.
HTFSIK?
I haven't got it yet :(
Swindon, Profanity
(Inkspot) Swindon must have something going for it even though they don't build steam locos there anymore because my niece's finacé commutes there every day from Chepstow while she herself works in Cardiff. Mad! (Phil) You disappoint me, man. Why? How the fuck should I know?
Not that one should really moan about it, but the clock in here is over an hour fast. At least, I hope it is.
Timezone
The server thought we were in Berlin. I've now told it we're in London. (Although, as it happens, I'm in Croatia so I hadn't noticed the clock-skew).
Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to have fixed the problem. I'll look at this more closely when I return.
[Rosie] Ah, of course. I had the first two words as "Hope the" and couldn't get my head past that.
Ruggerpilg
[Rosie] Having lost your email address, you might want to look into the Pilgrim game... Likewise Simons, Botherer.
Pilgrimage
(Projoy) Just Been There, Done That. My email address is at http://www.geocities.com/pantsmcprofiles/profiles.html
Regarding Chaos on the Line
[CdM] You just had to insert economics, didn't you. *falling around giggling*
Tert
Tick tock
The clock seems to have corrected itself now - I think. I'm confused by being in a different timezone.
update
For those who have an interest...
News on RugbyPilgIII
[Néa, CdM] Seeing that post reminded me of a thought I had in Hong Kong, which is that it appears to be rapidly approaching a phenomenon closely related to the 'Shoe Event Horizon'.
Currently perfectly good 20 storey buildings are being torn down to make space for 40 storey ones. This demolition increases the pressure on commercial space, thus increasing the value of the space in those buildings. Before long, before a building is complete the most advantageous thing to do economically will be to pull it down again and start buiding an even taller one. This process then becomes a self-reinforcing spiral.
Orange pipped
Hope it is back up and running soon.

When the Beeb announced the other day that it was going to dipense with Grandstand on Saturdays, part of me jumped with joy at the ent of this leviathan. The coverage of sport on the BBC has gone downhill, it only covers what it feels comfortable with. Take snooker wall to wall at the moment completley at odds with the low viewing figures it achieves. How long does it give to Match of the Day to cover all the days football, they may only have the rights to the Premiership but why not cover the Chamionship as well. And as for the rugby... just don't get me started. Just to say it could be greatly improved, it is final whistle quick chat then stop for the footie results. Motor racing is on the website but nothing on the screen, there is a whole raft of racing outside F1. The propsal is to have specific programmes, on BBC1 to make way for other output mmmmmmmmm? More day time tv as if Mon-Fri was not enough!!

Personally, I like the snooker.
(Inkspot) These days if you want sport you pay for it, and a good deal more than the licence fee.
[Darren] Me too, which is rather a bad thing when one should be cramming all the maths one can into one's head, not wasting time watching things of that ilk...
(Tuj) While watching the snooker, work out in your head the angle of departure of the object ball as a function of the direction of the cue ball and the distance between them in ball radii. Differentiate it with respect to the cue-ball direction. Appreciate the skill of snooker players.
[Rosie] My forays as a very amateurish snooker player suggest to me there's more to be gained from experience and practice than maths skills! I'm told darts is good for one's counting skills also, though I've never found that much of a spectator sport...
angles
Croquet ruined my snooker. Not that either of them are/were much good, but there was a definite detrimental effect.
'Croquet Ruined My Snooker'. Now there's a title for some memoirs!
*snigger*
Apologies
Sorry for thr outburst in Limericks. Am I the only one who is offended by Marc's 'style' of play?
Stylistic boobs
(pen) No you are not. I tried a little irony but it zoomed over his head. Others have dropped hints recently but obviously to no effect.
Embonpoint and all that
(pen) I've had another go.
[pen & Rosie] Am totally with you on this one. I don't know if Marc even bothers to read this game [he certainly never contributes to it - or any other game that I've noted] but if you do [Marc] can we just request, because you seem to contribute so regularly, that you expand your mind a little to matters other than tits and sexist innuendo? Call me old-fashioned, but my humorous streak is more likely to be satisfied when a wider subject matter is brought to bear. Selfish? Maybe. But I have a hunch that others may agree. Thanks :-)
[Chalky] You can count on my support on that matter.
I've already indicated support. Although I disagree that he come across as a dirty old man; I think he comes across as an eleven-year old.
Marc certainly comes across as deeply immature. Personally, if I were rab, I'd consider blocking him because he just seems to annoy people, and appears to revel in doing so.
Well, frankly, I can't be arsed -- which is not to say I don't think the complaint is valid, just that blocking ain't really my style.
... now why doesn't that surprise me?
[Chalky] Is that some kind of complaint?
I assumed it was a comment on your somewhat cavalier approach to the Great Game.
Chalky can speak for herself, but my best guess is that it was a compliment. :-)

FWIW, I think that blocking should only be carried out in extreme circumstances, which are currently not met. Dan and Dunx can also speak for themselves, but I think their general view, suceessfully implemented on their servers, is that we should sort these things out among ourselves if at all possible.
However, I do suggest that we try to get rab banned on account of his somewhat cavalier approach to the Great Game.
If that last post doesn't get CdM banned, I don't know what will!
*is horribly inspired to start a banning game and becomes convinced that StDogmael is making voodoo spells at her expense*
[Blocking] The penny drops...

Sorry if you've found the server a bit up-and-downy the last couple of days. It should stay up longer now.

*reminds herself not to make ambiguous comments when she isn't going to be around for 12 hours*
[rabsweetums] What CdM said. Barring someone from the site should IMO only occur when threatening/stalking/pronographic activities take place on a regular basis. Marc is just a silly twit sometimes, harmless really; and anyway, WHO would pen and I and others have the opportunity to have a pop at now and then if he wasn't in the firing line ...? :-)
I was going to say
Hidden text[Chalky] Glad to see you and pen aren't getting your pretty little heads all worked up over this - now why don't you do some needlework or baking to relax.
, but I remembered, they know where I live. I vote against banning, and for bearing in mind other people's sensibilities.
My worthless 2 pence worth
Blocking's nasty - I'd go with Chalky's assessment. Also, CdM may be right above in his 11-year-old not dirty-old-man surmising - I certainly posted some horrible tosh when I debuted as a 14-y-o (albeit I empathise on bad scansion not lustful obsessions).
(Tuj) Use words like debuted and you really will be banned. No, you won't. :-) It reminds me of the sports commentator's medalled, i.e. won a medal. The Now ShowwwWWW had some fun with this last Friday. That's sport - it hollows out the head. It would be a ludicrous over-reaction to ban Marc. He will get the hang of this place eventually.
Well, at any rate, at least you can see why I still nurse this ambition to set up my own MC server.
*thwacks Phil around the head with her trusty rolling-pin*
*heats biscuit cutter to red-hot heat and leaves interesting corrugated circular imprints all over Phil's thighs*
Barring people
If anyone's going to be barred around here it should be William Shakespeare. ©2001 Peter Kay
(ISP) You're fired. Ed. ©Private Eye passim.
[Chalky & penelope] Thank you for not killing me outright.
Yeah, there's no case for a ban, unfortunately. :) I don't think he's gotten the hang of the place in the two years or so that he's been around, so I'm not sure I hold out a lot of hope that he eventually will, but that's not enough reason to exclude. [Rosie] What's wrong with debuted? What would you say?
[Tuj] You may have been 14 when you first posted, but you were amusing and you took on board people's feedback and adjusted your behaviour to fit in better with how the place worked, rather than assuming (as some others do) that you could do just as you wished, and that any criticism should be rejected out of hand. (Also your scansion wasn't really especially bad when you first showed up, although it certainly did improve).
[Projoy] Try debutted instead.
butt me no butts
Hm. "debutted" produces 10,600 hits on Google, with "debuted" providing 11,500,000...
[Projoy] I wasn't being serious.
(Projoy) There are some nouns that really ought not to be er, verbed. I'd say début is one of them. I'd have phrased it differently or said first started. (Darren) I like "debutted". It sounds like an American whose arse has fallen off.
[Darren] No, but I guess some other people use "debutted" in all seriousness. I guess it's because the 't' is silent, so it feels it needs a second, voiced 't' to enable the "ed" ending to click on. Same problem, of course, with past-tensing any noun or verb that ends on a vowel sound, such as "diminuendo'd" (but for some reason not "précised")
I don't like the word "verbing." I think we should call it "Rosieing" from now on.
I think debuted is singularly infelicitous, mostly because of the pronunciation issue – is it debutted, daybood, debood, daybutted? Made his début’ seems the best way out to me.
Day-byood seems the most obvious pron. to me.
These days, I have lost the "y" in daybyoo, and now pronounce it dayboo, as do the French who don't do that thing with the letter u. I'm sure someone has had a go at me for my resistance to verbing in the past (poss. CdM?) but I still resist it where possible.
Heavens to Murgatroyd, I've been Darrenned! (Phil) Nobody does a proper French 'u' in this country - eg déja vous.
[Rosie] Re: "u" - I quite agree. Re: "Darrenned" - On this occasion I prefer "Darrened" as the double "n" tends to shift stress towards the second syllable. I think Gyles Brandreth should be informed.
Hang on, on re-reading that my logic would make "traveled" more correct than "travelled", which, as every cricket-playing gentleman of Blighty knows, is simply wrong. Therefore I retract my double "n".
Doubling
(Phil) The single consonant is the American way but to my eyes it looks wrong, because it makes the previous vowel long, eg tra-veald, la-beald, unra-vealed, spaymd?, Dar-reaned etc.. How many customers have you bar(r)ed? Don't answer that. :-)
I prefer baning them :-)
Debuing (?)
Alas, whenever I go beyond a couple of sentences I always burst out in flowery essay words... Although in this case it must be from too much sport watching. Meanwhile...
[Projoy] Thank you, I'm very touched by your comments on the time I debuted (daybyooed, for my South UK Estuary tongue). I cringed many a time when I look back in the Yorkives at how I was. However, my scansion I regard as my strong point, and as far as limericks and the like go I more frequently stop myself on account of not enough good material.
YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY
My first Mornington Crescent book"

Baby Alexander Henry "Pave jnr" Black. Huzzah!
And.....
Marc....jeeeeeez! I remember early Tuj, and I remember what I thought of early Tuj...and I am glad Tuj is still here! Marc does seem to, how can I say this..."Lack the light touch required by the game..."
On that bombshell
Anyone for a new game?
After you
[Tuj]New game ... an old fav like When Hillocks Collide but I do like a bit of something different but have no idea what that may be.
[Inkspot] I didn't mean a whole new concept necessarily. I was just pointing out there's been a free game slot sitting there for a bit and it would be nice to create a popular and interesting game - but is anyone interested?
In the meanst...
Good old 11-MC can give us some time to think.
Speak of the Devil!
Hello Tuj! Yes, I am glad you are still round! I'd be up for a new game. I don't know why I remember you....maybe when I saw TUJ I thought of Taj as in Taj Mahal...the blues singer. I was listening to a lot of his stuff back then, so your moniker would have really stuck. Good times :) What was the MC group that had the games down the left, the game in play in the top right and the move/comment box in the bottom right? (I think I asked before..?)
When I was a lad...
[Pave] I'm guessing you're referring to Huxley's fairly short-lived YAMCS (Yet Another MC Server) - which is where I first remember making your MC acquaintance. I'm sure I'd been at !York for a year or two by then however.
Eeeeeee!
YAMSC hmmmm....I recall seeing you at !York, and this other server, so yes, I guess you are correct there - I also recall there was a one on one challenge tourney going on - and I think it was me and you as I vanished.... Who or what was a Huxley, and what happened?
Huxley was a player. Sort of like Stevie but... Hm. No, exactly like Stevie, now I come to think of it.
Old MC sites
Whatever happened to Wildpants MC? It seems that it upped and went, but this site looks very similar, with some very familiar (oo-er) names.
Whilst we are on this subject....
Whilst we are on about "What ever happened to...?" I'd like to know "what ever happened to retro conversations that started with "Whatever happened to white dog poop?""
Whatever happened to all the other people on this site?
Haha. Sorry.
[Pave] Erm... I think I must have missed those...
:)
Whatever happened to white dog shit
"The only white dog shit you get these days, Leeds United." I forget which comic it was...
[Bigsmith] Pants MC died and MWP (for whatever reason) decided not to bring it back up again, so we all migrated to the other MC sites.
Forgive me for being rude, but wtf is the point of finishing a game if you then just start another one that's exactly the same.

I'm starting to think that we've by now seen pretty much all permutations and combinations, and without sufficient influx of new blood there's a vast oversupply in the mc server market. With its being the newest, I propose we close this site.

Hmmmmm
Much that I would loathe to see it go, you do have a valid point. It is the slowest moving of the MC servers....Is there anything we can do to make it that bit different?
[rab] I did attempt to start something else, but it didn't work, so I sulked. I'm sure we can come up with more excitement to fuel the flow through the server... Kick something splendid and popular in place of the Furcation Game perhaps? However if it is proving to be a burden to you to keep it open, then sadly it would have to go.
[rab]There is obviously an issue with the fact that this server hasn't got many games which aren't found on others. I'm surethat, given time, it could build up it's own distinctive set for which it would be THE place to go (after all, AVMA is one of the fastest-moving games in the Morniverse). But, it's up to you, of course, though maybe we could have a deliberate effort to try a few games not found elsewhere first.
AVMA is one of the things that came to mind as something worth keeping. I'd be quite happy to kill off all the rest (yes, that includes the limericks) with space for about 4 others.
[rab] Sounds drastic but perhaps could lead to a great maelstrom of creativity and ideas and new games! Or calamity of course...
AVMA is one of the greatest games on any of the servers, as it is a genuine competition, and the human instinct is to try to win. Multi-line limericks are nice too. I have preferences for games (e.g. good news/bad news) that others find tiresome, and vice versa. Hence I think a variety of servers, each with a little tweak of individuality is good for the MC world. If I had a bit more about me, I might set up my own, but it would have to be Domino/Notes-driven, and I don't have a copy of Notes designer any more :-(
[Rab] well, personally, I'm gutted that you should even suggest such a thing - but that's your prerogative ....
[Phil] Seconded on the good news/bad news :P... perhaps if others don't want to play that game, for instance, we could try a rhyming version? I'm just thinking part in terms of new combinations of games, and part in terms of some of the game mashing-together encountered in the Furcation Game (qv).
The Morniverse seems to be going through a mid life crisis of its own with I think players dropping out and moving on and with the pool of active players reduced. When visiting the three servers it is noticeable how few play on all three, but concentrate on one either Orange or MCiOS. To me MC5 has been about the originality of the games, it is a challenge and I can safely put up my hand and say that I have created some real distasters, but that's life; kill the game and move on the next one may take off. I have said my piece about Furcation Game before and will say no more.
It is whether MC5 is to be a clone of MCiOS or have its own original flavour, I would go for the latter.
Orange is a useful isolation ward for certain types whose extensive and incomprehensible scribblings make me lose the will to live. For that reason, let's keep all three going.
Bacchal scene
When this place started I felt it had a somewhat distinctive feel, what with a few original games and quite a few people (immigrants from Pants, I think) who didn't contribute so much to MCiOS and Orange. As you're no doubt bored with me saying by now, I favour a fast turnover, and would much rather have a dozen try-outs that didn't go very far (don't regard them as disasters, Inkspot) on the offchance that you get the occasional gem (Woo-doo-doo-doo doo-doo-doo etc Hitler springs to mind) instead of yet another tired 'The Return of Boardmans Combined Bad-Tempered Cresso' hybrids. My feeling about classics (such as Good News/Bad News) is fine, but they're generally best - at least started - in unadulterated form, with variants just springing up during the game on an ad-hoc basis. I would have hoped that after 3-and-a-half years a distinctive set of games would have built up.

I've banished the Furcation Game to a Better Place; and think that they may be some scope at some point for a Lite version in which mash-ups of classic genres are played for a few rounds and continuously mutated, morphed, juxtaposed and hybridised but without the need to write a whole Shakespearian play cum Wagnerian opera every move. This could also be the proper place for hybrids of the type described above, rather than taking up a game slot to itself.

I would also propose killing the Long Game (on the grounds that, no, there doesn't "have to be one of these", does there?); the ordinary Limericks (but keep the multilines; or merge the two into a freeform jazz version); possibly the cheddars (except I like the concept of a game you can contribute really easily to).

I should say that this place takes almost zero maintenance effort from me nowadays, keeping the machine its hosted on up and running and un-hacked-into notwithstanding, so it's no effort to keep it up and running. But I would like to feel more minded to contribute.

All that said, I suppose I can't really complain about lack of originality given that the site itself is basically a knock-off of Dan's and Dunx's respective endeavors in the first place. I could add some features (like unplayed games automatically expiring, or maybe a death vote system) to encourage a faster turnover but I'm not sure how they would work.

*phew*
[rab] agree with most of what you said. This site has always been my first port of call, particularly because it does have games that are easy to contribute to without venturing into essay-land. Also, it seems to have been the place for guessing games, AVMA being a fine example, Who-Doo-Doo etc another - and who could forget the Cryptic Crossword game? I really enjoyed puzzling over those and learning from others' expertise.
Like Inks, I have noticed a drifting away of certain key and prolific players from say a year or so ago, but that's just human nature I s'pose. Also, I think this server took a bit of a bashing when the Orange 'create as many games as you can festival' occurred and a few of the MC5 favourites found their way over there and remained [OMC now has 21 games!]
Blooooooood
We need exciting games to attract new lood! BLOOOOOD yesssss....my precious! Bwahahahaha...erm... I'm not getting any younger, and some of this text speak confusses me - is there an idea of a game in there? I don't know!!!! BWahhahahaha blood etc ad lib and fade.
The Long Game
[rab] Very good points, and thanks for sharing your input - you may claim not to have to do much maintenance but we're still here and able to play thanks to you, so we really should be doing some more things you want to ;)
Personally I think you make a good point about long games - they seem to have passed out of fashion. Perhaps we could replace the long game with a series of "short games" - games of MC people aren't afraid to win after a week and could be encouraged to by experimenting with some lesser-known rulesets.
I wouldn't mind a cryptic game again, though Blob (its finest practitioner) isn't seen around so much these days
[All] Feel empowered: don't be afraid to go forth and cull. I've set the Long Game as winnable with the standard move for a bit; will reverse if people want to keep it.
[rab] Well, I got in first... Am I the first person to win a long game?
I have murdered the regular limericks game.
We demand a MONTY PYTHON game. Nee.
Googling my name
Tuj means "immediately" in Esperanto.

This page is the 69th brought up by Google (UK) if you search for "Tuj".
Can we please have a 100% ban on all Monty Python comments? The show finished decades ago and comedy has moved on. It's one of the few things that really boils my blood these days.
Hmmm
How about a Monty Python game that skirts around the sketches....but never quite mentions Monty Python....
Admin, spare this site
I think three servers is the right number. More is too many; two is too few. For myself, the orkplace firewall blocks both here and the Dunxatorium, but, curiously, lets Dan's place through. That certainly further distorts my own posting habits. I do visit here more assiduously than I did the WildPants server, and I was sorry to see that go.
Monty
[Pave]Several game slots have been created for player to start games, get in there and see what happens. MP is not for me but may excite others. Whether it fails or succeeds keep coming back with fresh ideas and grab that empty slot.
Seething
(Darren) Shall we also ban The Goon Show? Round the Horne? Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In? Not Only But Also? MPFS may not be your cup of tea but that's no reason to ban it. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
The only thing I'd like to ban is mention of bans. Unless that's some horrible contradiction that's going to cause the internet to implode.

Meanwhile, if there's anyone reading this who's been watching and not playing, and wishes to join in, now would be an excellent time to do so. A few new players would give the place a breath of fresh air methinks.

*walks in out of the rain with soaking wet hair, puts car keys, phone, stethescope and bleep down on the table and sits on the chair*. Aah, that's better.
[Lib] Here, have a mug of hot chocolate.
Sanguinary ebullition
I'm not seething (see above) but was wondering why Darren was. Here's something lighter. During tonight's big football match David 'Spooner' Pleat uttered these words: THE SIGHT IS IN END. It'll be in next week's Colemanballs section of Private Eye with the name of any one of a thousand people who spotted it, possibly mine.
*falls in water*
It is done...Bwaaaaahahahahahaahhcoff coff hack HURGH!!!
Holds up red card
They think its all over - and it is.
Hmmm
At least let it start!!!
Herehereherehere! What's going on here?
Personally I liked "Hampster" which is overdue a resurrection in a different form...
After all, it's seven years since 'One slice of Strawberry Tart'
Hamster
Actually that game died without filling a single page, so I take it all back. Screw the Hamster idea. Ermm. I mean...
is it wrong
To giggle at a mention of "sword" and "pork" in a game? If so, I am a wrong un! ...and I dreamt...
[Pave] I still haven't got over Wymo's move in that game...
{Tuj} I know!!! Fancy slipping like that! :)
Oh, don't go!
Just a quick note to say that although I don't post as much as I used to (due to work commitments, and more), I would be very sad to see you close down!
spring cleaning at mc5
I came for the limericks, but stayed for the Clerihews.
MC5 has a nice comfy feel for me. I like that it's not intimidatingly big. I don't much care for mcios or Orange. I think kill votes or timers would be a nice addition. If the games rotated more swiftly, us newcomers wouldn't feel as shy about trying to create them. *shy shy*
Proffer
As befits my profession, I shall have to do some statistical analysis on the corpus available to me to see if it's possible to devise a heuristic that identifies the 'running out of steam' point.
(rab) You could get a heuristic off an old steam engine but you'll need a big spanner.
sighing
I would post more. But I'm just not amusing enough. *sigh*
"I Woke Up From The Strangest Dream
Whence all but I had fled
When I woke up I found out why:
I was already dead."
Just something that came to me.
I woke up from the strangest dream
[Raak] Very nice!
The game in fact shares its title with a song by the band "Liam Frost and the Slowdown Family", who I saw earlier this year supporting the wonderful Elbow. It's not my favourite of their songs, but it inspired the recursive dream game.
And on that note
The next game to be started shall be Game 100 here at MC5! Any ideas how we should mark such an occasion?
[Tuj] Sorry, that's what happens when I browse but not visit the Chat Game.

< goes and sits on the norty step >

No worries
[Inkspot] Took me a while to figure out what you meant :P and there was I thinking I was being premature suggesting that!
Flat chested
It looks like we've just bought a flat. The much-vaunted Scottish system is enormously frustrating at the early stages, as each property is essentially sold via blind auction. But now we're in a good position because we can pull out if the survey reveals anything unpleasant, or we can reduce our offer, or whatever, but the seller can't sell to anyone else, or decide they're not selling after all. Whee!
[rab] How exactly does that system work from the seller's point of view, then? Is there something that could stop you from dropping your offer down to £10, for instance?
Yes, they could simply refuse.
...and then the seller has to weigh up the relative pros and cons of accepting a lower offer than the original one, or putting the place back on the market. In our case, I don't anticipate any problems with the survey - but it's nice to know that we can pull out if the surveyor says the place is about to fall down, but they can't suddenly decide they're not selling to us after all.
Missive Trellis
Actually, I now understand we haven't quite reached that stage yet. The seller now has to agree in writing, so until we get that it could all be orrf.
Restricted attendance
Just a (necessarily) brief note to inform that I have broken a couple of bones in my left hand, so I might find myself not posting very much for a few days. I'm always surprised at how typing one-handed reduces one's speed by so much more than 50%, and how sore a broken bone can be.
Eeek
Bad luck Phil. Won't ask how you got it, and hope it heals soon.
[Phil] You do seem to be 'going throught the wars' as we used to say. Poor you. So it's spaghetti for the next fortnight...
time!
Blimey o'trousers! I would never have thought that having a baby would take up quite as much time as it does! I mean yes - they need 24 hour care, but who would have thought that it actually ment 24 hours being awake to look after them!!! He's been a gem up until a couple of days ago when he decided to go on 1 hour gaps between feeds!!! They grow up so fast! Anyway - it's why I have been scarce recently!
All that stuff and everything
Been out of the morniverse for a while due to work commitments (setting up my own business) and generally being hectic, but getting back into it. Delighted to see MC5 overhauled with some fresh games. Yippee!
Oooff
Well, that was more complicated than anticipated. Looks like the surveyor actually did some surveying (contrary to horror stories I've heard elsewhere) and picked up on some things that warranted a closer look, and so we had to send someone up to clamber around on the roof (with most buildings here being three or four storeys, it's more of a skill than it sounds). Turns out it's nothing too serious, although we will need to do a bit of work when moving in. As it happens, the scope for downward offering was limited by virtue of the next offer down being quite close to ours - so we ran the risk of the seller saying "Well, in that case we'll offer it to the next bidder"; turns out that things aren't quite as simplistic as you might first imagine.

I do wonder how much loaves of bread would cost if they were sold by blind auction, though.

They'd go mouldy by the time the auction was completed.
(Darren) Hard, too. A week-old baguette is an effective lightweight version of a baseball bat.
Between teeth
Incidentally, I should probably mention that the place is on a Crescent in Morningside. But not, sadly, Morningside Crescent: you have to go to Aberdeen to find one of those.
Lack Lustre
The current games on mc5 seem a bit slow moving. Perhaps its time for a couple of new ones. Any ideas?
New game
Something easy to join in with please...
But no; no specific ideas. I am part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Incidentally, against all my expectations I just found out I passed all bar one module of the second year of my degree... I just feel like telling people that, 'cos I really wasn't expecting to.
end games
Yay, well done Knobbly
New games it would be nice to kill off another of the current games but have tried and failed. I do hope Pave has not set the killer move of Around the Python Laugh-in to something cryptic and unwinnable.
It would appear he did. Shall I set it to the normal, or just quietly shunt it below the line. Slow movement here I think is a side effect of Dunx's festival of crescent.
Not very happy vocabulary
I was trying to send it on its way as I had an idea for a guesssing game but would have a finite life. I can understand the need for a quick game for players to dip into when they are browsing and this game would not in all likelihod not be one of those.

The proposed game is a crossword where players can be either compiler or solver or even both. A 15x15 grid with 1A completed or blank with just the clue, solve the clue give the right answer, next player sets the next clue (cryptic or straightforward). After that the rules become "elusive". Does the crossword have to be symetrical? does it get filled in like a scrabble board with one clue leading off the next till all the blanks are symetrical and agreed upon? If the grid is blank how do we know whether it is 5A or 7A?

The would start something like this

A B C D E F G H I. J K L M N O
1 1C E L L
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
12
13
14
15

Would anyone be interested in this type of game and is it worth rab shunting off Around the Python Laugh-in to make room?

[Inkspot] Having to reproduce that grid each time kills the game instantly. It would be an utter pain in the arse to edit that each time a word was added (and when does it get updated? after every guess? each new word?), and the chance of screwing it up would be very high. (Note how many mistakes have been made just counting backwards in the Celerity CDs game! And note how hard it is to get certain participants to realise they've been getting the rules wrong.)

If you want a cryptic crossword clue guessing game, I'd strongly recommend doing it as was done before, with people submitting and guessing clues as they felt like it, with no grid.

I think, incidentally, activity on all three sites was waning even before the Orange festival, although that has made it more obvious. We're just not getting the same number of participants these days.
Apologies, incidentally, if there's an acerbic note in all that, I'm just generally pissed off about a lot of stuff today.
I agree with your points about the problems of updating and my greatest fear of solutions not fitting previuos moves and having to be redone. But I needed feedback like that so as not to make a complete prat of myself by just setting up the game with all of it's woolley thinking. There are other types of cryptic games already played on this server, but I wanted one that had a finite life span.
There is still an empty game slot.
Ooh. That's interesting. A new game has appeared in the wrong place...
Right, that's sorted; and the end-game trigger for the Python game has been set to the usual.
[Darren] Someone needs to do a good, solid corpus-based statistical study on activity rates in the Morniverse. I'm sure it would make a good PhD topic. My impression is also that activity has declined, but it was less busy than now when I first joined eight years ago (bloody hell, eight years). In those early days, fresh with the joy of discovery, i can remember having posted the last move in every game on York and MCiOS, and being quite at a loss for what to do next once I'd done it. Especially on weekends. In retrospect this was a bit rude, but I was immature and callow even in those days. :) I find that nowadays I tend only to post in a small subset of games and even when bored am unlikely to stray into the others. Maybe other people have gradually settled into a similar pattern.
[Projoy] I certainly have settled into a similar pattern, though I'd like to think that's because I'm less obnoxious now. I'd say the most concerning trend is the seeming lack of interest in the game of Mornington Crescent itself - our one token game here, for instance, is crawling along quite pitifully, and Long Games all over the Morniverse have slowed to the pace of Jeremiah Snail, the 1956 All-Dorking District Champion.
Mornington navel-gazing
I think that posting only to one's favourite games is quite normal; it's certainly my style, but it depends on how creative I'm feeling at the time, if at all. A good rule of thumb is that if you have nothing interesting, witty etc to add to a game then wait till something more promising turns up. There is increasing verbal incontinence and rule-bending simply for the sake of posting something. The whole thing is beginning to annoy me, and not just me, as I know privately. We could also do without those who post under more than one name, which is deceitful and sad. One has already been outed and I have a very beady pair of eyes on another one.
Meanwhile, I'm rather concerned that a bunch of people who are posting elsewhere seem to have stopped posting here. Was it something I said?
I'm here! I'm here!
Trouble is, the limerick games are no longer and during the short bursts of time that I actually enter these portals, there's nothing else that takes my fancy. Apart from AVMA. Sometimes.
*waves from Praha*
[CdM] Maybe a long verse game? Although admittedly the last few attempts at "hard poetry" didn't seem to attract very many of the current Mornipersons.
Where did pen go?
[Tuj] Maybe you drop it on floor?
Time, time
Lack of time is making me ration the games I follow. If the general turnover was higher, I'd be active in a greater number of games. As it is, I tend to monitor chat, limericks, haiku, glow worms and on the whole that's it. Because they are the games where you can just dip in, make a worthwhile contribution to, and then disappear back into the ether. But of course, if I never find time to visit other games, I don't feel I have the right to kill them even if they are getting long in the tooth, and that reduces game turnover . . .
[Proj] You know what I mean ;)
[SM] That's the vicious cycle, isn't it just? We never did quite foster the quick turnover as even after upheavals we're still too cautious of scrapping games... I'm wondering if Clerihews (and possibly Cheddars) have had their day...
Vicious cycle
[Tuj] Yes, indeed. In fact, I will bring up something I've advocated before and failed to convince people about; I think it's worth having a 'rapid turnover' section, a 'slow burner' section and an 'immortal' section. The immortal section would contain chat and possibly a long game. The rapid turnover would tend to be plain MC games, but with a smattering of other quicker-moving experiments. And the slow burners could have the game slots left over. I have long thought that the biggest problem is that the slow burners hog too many game slots. The shorter-lived games really do need their own section otherwise they keep getting crowded out.
[SM] Good, well-thought points. Would perhaps work better with games marked as to which they are rather than with separate sections though? And I'm sure having AVMA rather than a longer game would encourage some excellent short attacking MC games.
[SM] Hmmm... I'll think about this. I can forsee a difficulty in deciding which category things should fall into; though, of course, this can always be tweaked according to demand.

Anyway, just wanted to remark that it's only just got dark here.

It's been dark for about an hour here - I'm home now but have been in the pub with friends - watching the England Game. *sigh*
[Chalky] Dratted England. I spent the evening vociferously cheering Sweden, but sadly now England will be playing on my birthday :( roll on disappointment...
It's getting light here. Time for bed. The solstice will occur at 1226 GMT today after which it's all downhill.
The most wonderful day of the year *happy sigh*
Yeah, the flip-side is that it was fully light again at 4.30am, which woke me up...
I stayed up all night on Saturday night, chatting online... went to bed at 5am, by which time the sun was up and the birds were at full volume. The nights are soooo short in midsummer, it's quite eerie. I remeber camping in Perth (Scotland) reporting on a rally around this time of year, and it still being light at 11-ish, and then of course, there was the great trek north to the North Cape of Norway in midsummer 1995... magical. I always want to head north and be mostly outside every summer now. Instead, I sit behind this bloody desk staring at the screen - although I do have a nice pair of trendy geek-nerd specs now. They make me look like Nana Moouskouri. :o/
Longevity
[Rab] I'd would suggest that should be set up when the game is defined. If a game proves popular as an ephemeral it would have to be explictly killed off and reinstated in the slow burners section when next a slot appears. The important point is that the short-lived games section is explicitly flagged as such, and everyone knows that not only do we have have a licence to kill them off, but that we are expected to do so. Possibly even flag the game's creation date and give it a defined expiry date - three months or so tops, I'd say, pulling a figure out of my hat.
I still quite like the idea of doing it implicitly. If active games were sorted in order of sluggishness or otherwise (a bit like at Orange where you can sort them by most recent post, but based instead on the frequency of the last, say, five posts). Unloved games drop to the bottom, active games fizz to the top. Every week the least active game is automatically culled (unless, say, it started less than a week ago or it has been given some special protection like the Furcation game).

I make this suggestion in the secure knowledge that, as I can't code, I won't implement it, which is probably the worst kind of backseat driving. :)
time...
What SM said about time (though this is still my first port of call in the Morniverse, and for mostly the same reasons he gave). I don't agree about typing games in advance, though - how would you know in advance whether something is a quick turnover or a slow burner?

I quite like Projoy's idea about automatic culling. Or, and this is completely off the top of my head, how about turning the process on its head? The opportunity to start a new game is always open, but every time someone starts a new game, the least active one gets killed off?
Hmmm... I can see benefits to both the explicit and implicit approaches; the former is easier to code, but might be a bit onerous on (particularly) game creators. Furthermore, I've noted an increasing tendancy to be over-prescriptive in the game brief, and I think further prescription about how quickly moves are to be made might actually be counterproductive and cause all movement to cease completely. For this reason I think I prefer the implicit approach. As I mentioned before, I want to mine the data of all games played so far to see if I can devise some kind of estimate of a games "flagging" point, in which case it can be put on an endangered list and expire if no further moves are made. One problem with always having a slot open is that, as experience at the Lockisseum showed, you get passers-by just starting things for the hell of it.
[rab] Passers-by just starting things for the hell of it... is that necessarily a bad thing? Some of the most memorable games have started like that ("wigwam" on Orange springs to mind, but there are others). I'm starting to think we'd be better off it all games were treated as fast burners and we encouraged a much faster turnaround for games, to keep people interested and stop us all (me included) getting too caught up in only one or two games and ignoring all the rest. I've heard people say that years ago, the MC servers did have games which were much shorter, only lasting a day or so.
No time
Killing a game is easy creating a game that people want to play is more difficult, something different does not go down well, so players do not feel confident in filling a vacant slot. My worry over a timed game is once it has been timed out it will reappear as ...the Return Again of... which happened only recently. I would like to see more people prepared to start games and not stand on the side lines saying "what shall we do now, what shall we do now". With a regular turnover there will be flops and hits. The reason games hang around is the reluctance to replace them. I would not want to see time limits just more bravery with the sythe. Afterall what is the turnover of games on MCOiS where there are 18 active games.
[Darren] It's not a bad thing if it occurs only once in a while, but on the Lockisseum nuisance games were started on an almost daily basis until Dunx brought in the login system. I neither want the maintenance burden of cleaning up, nor to enforce logins for the starting of new games.

[Inkspot] Well, that would be all well and good if people actually killed games, but they don't so it seems that some form of encouragement is needed.

Kill! Kill! Kill!
There's a lot of it about!
But, but
Please don't kill the Shakespeare game. Yet, I mean, I'm sure it will need to go to its sweet, sweet rest eventually.
Quickfire or slow burner?
[Irouleguy] You don't try to make people predict the future; you have x quickfire slots and y slow burner slots. If a quickfire game ends you can only replace it with another quickfire game; if a slow burner ends, it can only be replaced with another slow burner. If one slot of each type chances to be available at the same time, then you get a choice. After all, an /unsuccessful/ slow burner will still face the chop relatively quickly; it's only the successful slow burners that will hang around.
Next up: the Dream Game...?
Dream Game?
What's a Dream Game then?

BTW I too have a game suggestion: Hide and Seek. This idea was inspired by listening to an old ISIHAC episode where the teams gave it ago. Seemed to work all right.

Nah, I was tongue-in-cheek suggesting the "I Woke Up..." game to be next for the axe! How would your Hide and Seek game go? Or would we work it out as it went along?
Incident room
Incidentally, factoids != lies; there needs to be an air of plausibility about them.
Not aimed at anyone in particular, btw, just covering my own back if someone claims it's a "Return of..." type game that I've been so vocal about in the past...
Simons] I see what you mean, though there also should be a way of converting a quick-fire if it gets really popular.

rab] I'm with Darren on drive-bys - if they're really naff they can be killed off just as quickly.
Game idea pitch
"Each move must consist of precisely eight words" - as it says on the tin. What happens in the game may be debated in the game: perhaps it'll be a conversation, perhaps a word-limited reprise of various games we play, or whatever.
Brain cell
[Iroul, Darren] Right, so if we have a slot permanently open which kills of the "least active" game, we can look forward to random passers-by, the generally click-happy and possibly not even real people starting carp like this and this on a daily basis, displacing things that you might actually want to play (actually, the latter example reveals a curious bug that I should look into, so it's not all bad news...). In order to deal with this I would need to write some additional code that would allow these effects to be reversed, ideally as though they had never happened. My time is quite precious these days, and I really don't think this is worth that investment. Sorry.
[Tuj] Sounds good. Who's going to start it?
rab] I enjoyed the second one... Point taken, though.
Hmmm, they looked different and more annoying from home. yes, the second one looks ok from here - very confused.
[Raak] More to the point, something would have to give way first.
There's about 3 million free slots at Orange.
pure class ...
.... the recent entries in Shakespeare.
[rab] But MC5 is home!
Friday....
There are 101 things to do, deadlines to meeet,check emails but I'd rather check the number of paper clips in my desk holder. Even wading through the mass of paperwork in tray for a couple hours seems appealing. Just so restless, put it down to being only days away from Goodwood and the Bugatti Veyron, another week less to being out sourced yet more bland statements from the employer this morning. Soon be lunchtime.
Monday ... oh, and Tuesday
I've actually got my main bit of work nicely rounded off, and am just picking at the edges of what's left while I wait for a major inventory investigation to start. 'Hurry up and wait' certainly isn't just a miltary weakness . . .
We have internal auditors who pop out of the woodwork every now and then. They tend to see everything in terms of black and white proceedures. To move things along in local government sometimes things become a bit fuzzy round the edges ;)

A big wave to all freinds in the colonies with their 4 July celebrations.

Hey Ho!
I'm still here!!! Hectic, new job....lacking sleep with Alex (who is now a big 9 weeks old), and not having a PC at work, or much time at home. Hence my infrequent "hereness". I hope you're all well.
Also still here
I'm getting a bit more connectivity and time. The netnanny at the new client allows MCiOS and here but not Orange. It also objects to some of the adverts carried by both Multimap & Streetmap, so I can get the map surrounded by bits of red threat screen. I feel like using the sites a lot in the hope of getting a call.
Rambling, and not even dressed for it
I just got a spam with the poetic subject heading: "Your money, pale-souled". It fired thoughts through my head, the image of money as a hollow souled entity... How do such poets reconcile their art with such a degrading way to earn a living? Does it give a spam composer a buzz just to know their words are read? Hmmm
Happy Birthday, pen!
[everyone else] There's a very large cake in the chatroom in MCIOS so please help yourselves ...
Wah
I think I killed Shakespeare.
Has Hide & Seek run its course now?
Dreams too?
And Factoids? Perhaps time for a clearout?
Cheddars too?
[Tuj] Why Cheddars? It seems quite active.
[Darren] It's just been fairly low-quality grammatically, bothers me *wink* Anyway, aren't we encouraged to do some purging rather than talking about it?
[Tuj] Well, I don't mind terminating games I've created myself, but I do like to ask first in the case of other people's games, especially where I haven't made many contributions! I've closed Hide and Seek. In the case of Dreams and Factoids, I don't really feel qualified to shut them down myself.
Shall I do the honours for Factoids?
I'm sure you would do so self-referentially, so I look forward to it.
confessional
[rab] I dreamt about you last night. Pen was also in the dream. I think we were in a sort-of Rugby Pilg scenario, only the hotel's layout was rather similar to the house in the current Big Brother. Weird. And a little disturbing.
More free game slots
Hmm... but what?
Erk
[Chalky] Hmmm... I have a vague feeling you were in my dreams too. Telepathy in action no doubt.

I wrote a Very Large Cheque today. It still makes me sweat thinking about it. Should be moving in next Friday, the existence of some building warrants permitting. Saw the deeds yesterday too; one of the clauses I am unable to parse, another one witters on about a "free ish". Hopefully the solicitor will explain to us what this actually means.

[rab] Good luck. Get used to writing big cheques... I'll be writing one next week, and I read through the deeds to the new bungalow this morning - fascinating set of records. Nice to know they've searched me for any record of bankruptcy and found nothing ... yet! :o)
I like the thought of being in someone else's dreams, it means I manage to get out a bit. I had a very weird one last night - dreamed I met a man who liked me (I mean really liked me, but I have no idea who he was) and we were riding polo ponies in South Africa.
Hey, MC dudes
I don't know why, but there is something ineffably funny about adding "dude" to a serious quotation. "If I should die, think only this of me, dudes, there is some corner....." etc. Is it worth a short game?
[Kim] Isn't that game already exhausted by the describing of it, dude?
[Raak] Wot, like the Pants game, you mean?
[Kim] I'm not so sure it's all that funny, anyway. It was kind of exhausted by Bill and Ted.
Dudes, Romans and Countrymen
Maybe it's me, but I don't think it's especially amusing.
Might work; after all: There is nothing like a dude
[INJ] I think yours works because of the gender-bending it implies about the rest of the song. I'm gonna wash that dude right outta my hair, not so good. (However, I'm gonna wash that man right outta my dude sounds a little better.)
Doesn't like crap games with barons or earls
Won't go to Harlem in ermine and pearls
Won't dish the dirt with the rest of the girls
That's why the lady is a dude
Dudes
Yeah, why not give it a shot? Even if it only makes for a short game. Incidentally, I have a Flash animation somewhere called Star Dudes, which is an accurate reenactment of the first Star Wars film, with 'Dude!' as the only dialogue, yet faithful to the original in every detail. And only about 3 minutes long in its entirety. Hopefully Googling should find it somewhere Out There, if anyone's interested.
begone bane of Beelzebub
Shakespeare has shuffled off to create a new game slot
Today's the big day! We hope... there's talk of retaining some money from the seller on account of missing paperwork, but we hope that won't screw things up too much. These solicitors really like to leave everything to the last minute, it seems.
Good luck with the solicitors and the move.
Well, in the last 24 hours the retention has gone down from 15k to 500quid as the bits of paperwork have mysteriously appeared. Should be getting the keys "in the next hour or so". We'll see about that.
thoughts.....
*hopes rab has got a shiny set of house keys by now*

*thinks Riddle-me-ree is a very satisfying game*
*agrees with both thoughts*
party poker
Any number of roulette party poker sports button joker game http://www.ambersells.com gross value bluff four?
party poker
I didn't follow any of that.
[p p] No, you took a wrong turning. Go back the way you came and follow the signs towards dev/null.
Argh! English!
You take a turn, don't you, not a turning. You'd think I might know those things by now.
Wrong turnings
[Nea] Relax. 'A wrong turning' is a commonly-used idiom.
No, changed my mind
It's not an idiom, it's correct. 'Turning' is perfectly OK as a gerund. 'ing' appears in three places in Engish - as a gerund, as a progressive tense - both of which involve adding 'ing' to a verb, and as a noun-forming modifier for which I cannot find the correct terminology. The latter case involves adding 'ling' to a non-verb to produce a commonly-diminutive noun. Examples include underling, sapling, darling, sidling (which produced the verb sidle as a back formation). It used to be side-ling - i.e. someone who stands at your side as opposed to a subordinate under-ling. But of course given a variety of words ending in 'ing' it isn't always apparent that some were fromed from the 'ling'-route rather than the verbal 'ing'-route. The 'l' is a useful indicator, but not 100% reliable.
Simons Mith
That was very interesting, and no sarcasm is intended although it's hard to prove that without the use of tone of voice or facial expression.
Wide aw-ache
Well, it's gone like clockwork so far - all bar the phone line (again) so I may not be able to post much for a bit. Keys arrived, then a van of stuff (including a sofa) which was brought up the stairs by two burly Mancunians. Then a couple of car loads of stuff, followed by a bed, which was brought up the stairs by a burly Edinburgher and further assembled by him. Which was just as well, cos it would have taken us about five hours and we'd have done a really rubbish job of it too. Boxes of stuff still arriving in dribs and drabs, and we're slowly finding places to put all their contents. Nothing's yet come off in our hand or fallen off the wall or ceiling. The heating and shower works, the loo flushes... so pretty smooth so far I would say. I have, however, discovered muscles I never knew I had. Living on the top floor of a tenement block must be good for you, surely.

Oh, and we can't find the stopcock...

hot flushes...
[rab] Good luck an' all in your new home. The loo *might* flush, but just check it. My mother discovered the loo in her new bungalow flushes with water from the hot water system. (Have I mentioned this before?)
(pen) Doesn't this tend to vapourise the ordures, the very thing one tries to avoid?
[Rosie] Quite. Bob the plumber is coming round to fix it.
Game Idea
We don't seem to have any team games on the go at the moment. Anyone up for a - let's say a three way split, he says, trying to second-guess the likely number of players. Puce - Green - Chartreuse are I believe the traditional colours for such a split.
I read the other day that "miniature" (and the "mini-" prefix) comes from "minium", Latin for red. This refers to the small red lettering on a miniature portrait or similar. I'm going to look this up now, just to check. Incidentally, that doesn't pardon 6 quiz teams of staff from our local primary school being unable to spell "minuscule", despite the fact that it was on my son's spelling list 2 years ago (aged 8). Not one team got "manoeuvre" right, either.
mini-
OK, I've looked it up, and: Yes, miniature does derive from miniare (to colour red), from minium (red lead). Mini- is listed, however, as deriving from miniature and minimum, from minimus (least).
I think I need to do more research to ease my troubled mind.
Dysorthography
WHAT? None of them could spell 'minuscule' or 'manoeuvre'? There a load of idiot's.
Have we ever played 'Shipping Crescent, To The Ends of The Earth', with a winning move, Dogger? Faster play during good visibility, obviously, and headwinds take the LV equivalent down a notch. And watch out for those South East Iceland loops. Shipping areas here.
Idiots
[Rosie] I think you mean 'lode'.
Spelling
[Rosie] Indeed, not one team got those words correct. They did marginally better with "accommodation", "Massachusetts" and "knowledgeable". However, I think only 1 team got "diarrhoea" right. I've done much harder spelling rounds in the past; admittedly that was for quiz addicts, and once was deliberately written to prevent a certain team winning, because I knew they would play their joker on a spelling round. I put in words like "eschscholtzia", "waqf" etc. just to screw them up :-)
(SM) I do. Your right.
[Rosie] Write, shurely?
(Chalky) Surely, surely?
Phil's diarrhoea
A mnemonic a teacher at school taught us several years ago:
Dashing In A Rush, Running Hard, Or Early Accident.
You'll never forget how to spell diarrhoea again!
Skwits
'Diarrhoea': S-K-W-I-T-S That's my mum's mneonic, bless her.
Flowthrough
My own Mum's prim version was "Air raid backwards". The opposite was "knobs". It was all "po". (SM) Yes, but what do S-K-W-I-T-S stand for? The SHITS, by the way, is a section of the band of the Irish Guards who call themselves the Society of Harmonious Irish Tunesmiths. This is true.
[Simons] I always thought it was "squits." That's how they spell it in Theme Hospital, too, so it must be right.
[Darren] That's what I thought too. But my mum does tend to take the path less travelled by, when it comes to spelling.
I defnatley have "squits" sometimes have "the trots" but mostly have diarrhoea
[Lib] You really need to see a doctor as soon as possible.
No mention yet of Montezuma's Revenge, The Bombay Trots or Delhi Belly?
*waves from Edinburgh airport*
Wow! rab's new flat is Edinburgh airport!
Waves from Edinburgh
[Darren] No, it's been raining as heavily up there as down south. Never mind a raincoat, yesterday afternoon I wished I'd brought a bucket and spade to work.
Waves from St Petersburg
I'm getting bored of saying this now. I have more free time than I know what to do with, but instead of doing something useful with it, like learn Russian, I'm going to play MC until I vomit. Hoorah!
*points at Shipping Forecast*
OOOOPS. Sorry.
I can say 'Here is my passport' in russian.
... and 'How are your parents' in portuguese.
I'd do well if I was dropped in the middle of Europe wouldn't I?
Eight Words game
Following on from the Eight Words Game, did anyone watch the '50 Greatest Comedy Sketches' programme a few days ago, and did it seem to anyone else that the funniest sketches were all 30 or 40 years old (Two Ronnies, Morecambe and Wise, Monty Python etc.)? I don't know who the public were that voted, but they didn't ask ME.
[Knobbly] Are you saying that the older sketches didn't deserve their place there, or not?
myself
Not at all - I'm saying that the older sketches were the funniest ones in it and that I don't think much of Little Britain, which won.
Despite not having seen the comedy sketches show in question, I'd like to back up Knobbly with my concordance of opinion.
Cancel Mansell
What about a game of rhyming or alliterative instructions for disposing of annoying celebrities and public figures?
I'd say by all means. I was also thinking of Cress but couldn't get the game started.
Team Game?
How about a two or three way team game? Puce v Chartreuse or Puce v Green v Chartreuse? I wouldn't advocate more than three teams - we don't really have enough players.
[pen] I was about to ask "How many of those do you think there'll be?" before scanning down see the game made and very well underway.
[SM] Sounds good - it seems like Crescent games aren't taking off at present and perhaps that would make it more interesting.
[nights] Did the Proposal Vetting Panel give you grief?
[rab] They did indeed. Damn bureaucracy. Seriously though, any reason why it didn't go through?
The Panel tends to get a bit shirty if it thinks you're starting a reheat of something old and tired. Placing old wine into new bottles sometimes helps.
Diarisation
I just received an email beginning "Do please diary this year's poster evening" and thought of, hmmm, almost everybody here.
Rab
(Not quite understanding...) Is it something to do with turning nouns into verbs? Or 'verbing' you might say.
who was it who said 'verbing weirds nouns'?
verbing
Are you willing to let me know who sent the email? I'd so love to reply :-)
[pen] It was Calvin (of Calvin & Hobbes)
[pen, Phil] Indeed, "verbing weirds language" - but a six-year-old or anyone else being silly should be allowed to. Serious usage of something like diary as a verb is definitely something we'll all get flighty about. We should be touched rab thought of us though.
Diarisation
(rab) Bin it.
[Rosie] We were waiting for you. Well said.
Meanwhile, what shall we do with that spare game slot?
[Tuj] Not all of us. :-)
*seconds what CdM said :-)*
mcios
I can't get to mcios this morning. Anyone else having any trouble? (More generally, the internets seem to be very slow here in France, but I can reach most sites.)
(just diaried something, and is proud of it so ner)
[CdM] MCiOS seems to be OK from here, as, indeed, does the net in general.
[CdM] Buy new internets.
Just noticed something about Calvin's quotation
In "verbing weirds language", it's not a noun that has been verbed (as a noun, "weird" means "fate"), but an adjective. Off the top of my head, I can't think of another example of this formation - but I'm sure I'll now be inundated with verbed adjectives that are unbelievably obvious.
I wonder if those arrested for attempting to bomb Lonodn-US flights this morning waited deliberately until Tony Blair was on holiday and John Prescott was in charge?
[pen] I doubt if one blithering idiot is more likely to be of use to the nation than another in an emergency. Thanks for bringing the news to my attention though - I didn't know anything about it till now.
How many boots could a black coot black if a black coot could black boots?
[Phil] One example in standard English occurs to me: to black (a pair of boots, or a place of work).
Similarly, "to right something" and perhaps also (less clear) "to wrong someone"?
[Raak/CdM] However, "black" is also a noun. So is "wrong" and "right." Can an example be found which verbs an adjective which is not also a noun?
I was going to point out that "to up prices" involves verbing a preposition, but "up" can yet again be used as a noun.
Of course, in programming you can talk about "anding" and "oring" two numbers, but that falls more into jargon than standard English.
Loose?
Isn't that just a contraction of 'let loose', in which case 'let' is the verb?
Turpentine can be used to thin oil paint.
The map is ornated with three cartouches.
When the ossibuchi have browned on one side, turn them to brown the other.
(Ok, "brown" can be a noun, but I just like saying "ossibuchi".)
Verbing
[challenge] I actually think instances of verbed nouns-not-usable-as-adjectives are even rarer than instances of verbed adjectives-not-usable-as-nouns. However, I did find an example of a verbing of a non-adjectival noun: You can tree a cat. BTW Calvin's only 12 years younger than I am. He'd be 26 sometime this year. Yeesh!
I like saying "Raak".
Ornate ?
[Raak] I've nevr come across "ornate" used as a verb, and it hurts just to look at your sentence. I like the "thin" example, though.
Tree a cat !
[SM] I live and learn - I'd never seen "tree" as a verb before, other than in the sense that "the copse was heavily treed", but have found now found it in the dictionary. I may have to try and get this sense into normal conversation tomorrow
Treed
(Phil) I hope it doesn't replace "woooded". I agree "ornate" as a verb is monstrous when "ornament" already exists as a verb. (SM) How do you tree a cat? Stick a twig up its bum? You'll be lucky. I can see how you can de-cat a tree, though, even if it might need the Fire Brigade.
[Phil] I never saw it before, until I googled it in a spirit of misunderestimation. The OED has it as an obsolete verb, which I suppose is why an antiquarian map dealer might use it to ornate his prose. But as Caxton writes, "Somtyme ornatynge of wordes maketh the proposycion to be withdrawen fro the trouthe."
It's usually mixed up in some way to even both sides out.
Things have quieted down.
Dual the A11!
So is it in fact the case that "ornament" as a verb was monstrous because "ornate" already existed as a verb?
Is the interesting thing about these words simply that they don't appear to have been verbed in the 'normal' way - i.e. by an apparent change in the spelling? After all, it presumably doesn't count in the noun-to-verb category to include the verb "to shelve" since it isn't "to shelf", whereas "to tree" involves no spelling change (although I think some linguists would argue there is a morphological change by virtue of the change of use). In these non-spelling-change cases, it's presumably for some other reason that they appear the same when verbed... You can verb "thick" by spelling it "thicken", whereas "thin" doesn't lend itself to being spelt "thinnen".
(That said, I don't think it would break any intuitive rules of morphology to have "righten" and "wrongen").
[Non-adjective verbings] Saki has an instance of the verb "to sky", meaning the practice of putting the paintings of lesser artists higher up on the gallery wall, above better-regarded work.
Nounish verbings: beach, ship, dog, horse, house, caravan, cup, motor, earwig. "Some to think of it," he umbrella'd, "there aren't many words you can't slip in as a substitute for 'said'."
S C
horse?
[pen] Ever horsed around?
[horsing] I know I have.
said
(Raak) Or omit it entirely, as in "So I'm like f*** off" and all that edifying stuff.
[Raak] Horse is a strange one... I dog you, you dog her, we dogged them, but do you ever say 'I horse, you horse'? It's usually linked to 'around'. I have no idea what this does to the classification of the nounage/verbage discussion. I'm almost out of my depth!
'Horsing'
Maybe it's like goosing, but on a larger scale. Oo-er.
Horsing
'Horsing' & 'Horsed' have been in common usage in the B&D world for years. So I'm told.
[TMITGS] Meaning what, exactly?
The only other usage than "horsing around" I can find on a (SafeSearch) Google, is the expression "to horse a gentlewoman", which I assume is an historical expression meaning the general assistance of a lady in enabling her to ride out. Then again, maybe I'm being naïve and it has a more Catherine the Great connotation.
Horsing around
I believe it involves a carpenter's sawhorse (suitably reinforced and stabilised), a willing 'victim', a quantity of rope and a good imagination. It might be a good idea to keep a chiropracter on the speed dialer too IMHO.
Earlier today something similar to Projoy's comment on "thicken" occurred to me, although I noted that "enlarge" seems to apply the suffix as a prefix. There are words such as "enliven" which seem to follow the same pattern, except "liven" isn't an adjective (at least now). Anyone know a reason why "enlarge" behaves like that?
[Darren] No idea, but it did make me think of the verb from "bold" is "to embolden", which has both suffix and prefix (though not necessarily in that order).
(Darren) "Enlarge" is from the French enlarger and may just be a copy, so to speak. A more regular formation, reading between the lines of my 1964 COD, would be "largen", (cf thicken) the prefix en- + adjective being rare. En- + noun or verb is common though and explains "enliven" either as "to give life to" or to (intensively) liven.
[Rosie] ...which has both prefix and suffix. As does embolden. But you can't ensticken the affixes on ad lib.
You people scare me a bit sometimes. I love you all, but you scare me mildly.
I am finding what I understand of this interesting, and I do enjoy a bit of linguistics, but perhaps I shouldn't have encouraged it a few pages ago. Carry on though.
(Raak) With "embolden" and "enliven" it would seem that in the past someone has done just that. I don't think the rules are particularly well-defined. (nights) Yep, we're a bunch of swivel-eyed fundamentalists. In the beginning was the Word. AND THE WORD SHALL BE SPELT PROPERLY. :-)
P - R - O - P - E - R - L - Y
Is there an opposite for "enlarge" which has the same pattern? There doesn't seem to be an "ensmall" or "enlittle" (although there is "belittle" but then where's the "belarge"?) - the closest in meaning is probably "shrink," which seems to have no connection with any words meaning "small" whatsoever.
Darren] Well, there's the Simpsons' 'debigulator' machine, which rather implies that there's a verb 'to debigulate'

More seriously, since the 'en-' prefix mostly seems to mean 'more of', or 'increase' you wouldn't really expect a word for making smaller to be made up in that way. There is 'decrease', which is a Latinate construction of 'de-' and crescere, to grow.
I dog you etc...
[penelope] which sense of "dogging" are you talking about?
he, she or it dogs
[Phil] Perhaps it's best we don't ask.
[Phil] In the 'following someone annoyingly' sense. Why, what other senses are there? ;o)
[Irouléguy] Doesn't the prefix 'en-' mean something closer to 'to make'? (Enlarge - to make sth large).
Actually, the example that made me think that was ennoble - to make noble.
What I just said
I have on my lap a big Chambers Dictionary:

en- prefix
1) in words derived from Latin through French (a)used to form verbs with the sense of in, into, upon; (b) used to form verbs with the sense cause to be; (c) used intensively or almost meaninglessly;
(2) in words derived from Greek used to form verbs with the sense of in.

I can't think of any for sense (c)...
(Knobbly) I think enliven could fall into your category (c). Liven would do on its own ( = to make lively).
The Simpsons also introduced "enbiggen", iirc.
[CdM] Wasn't that EMbiggen? As in, "A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man" or something to that effect?
dogging
[penelope] "To hold or fasten with a mechanical device", apparently. >-]
It's so nice to see grammaticalisation and form-function reanalysis in progress. Errr... I think.

House news - we now have a phone, the main delay caused by the engineer not knowing where a big pipe of wires came out. Broadband apparently appeared first thing this morning, but since I had to come into work to read my email I didn't know about it then. (Actually, given that we've just had a system "upgrade" here, it might have been better to have stayed at home in any case). First major disaster was the downstairs neighbour complaining of water coming through our ceiling. We had a plumber/odd-job-man come out Saturday morning and spend three hours under the bath fixing the makeshift repair that the previous owner must have done about, oh, three or four days before moving out. Nice welcome present for us, oh yes. Anyway, should be fixed now; no all we need is for someone to plumb the gap that subsequently appeared in my bank account.

+w
Knobbly] I must admit i didn't look it up - I just went off the sense of most of the 'en-' words I could think of. I still can't think of an example for making smaller, though.
Another contender for your sense c) is 'tangle' and 'entangle', though according to Webster-Merriam Online 'tangle' is an Anglo-Saxon shortening of an old French verb 'entangler'.

*waves red rag* Can I argue for 'to Google' as one useful example of verbification? I can't think of an alternative that isn't a clunky noun-phrase - to look up on Google, to research on Google, to scope (out) on Google, etc.
I think "to Google" as a verb for "to search on Google" is OK, but only informally. I use it myself. However, it has become synonymous with "to search on the Internet, regardless of search engine used" which plays into the hands of those evil corporate types.
It has, of course, an friend in "to hoover."
Right on cue, Slashdot reports that "Google Sends Legal Threats to Media Organizations" over the use of its name as a verb for internet searces. See here.
...and in case you didn't scroll all the way down, here for some wonderful derivations from the Japanese verb 'guguru'.

That story suggests that 'to Google' becoming a generic verb doesn't necessarily benefit them, though, because they lose their exclusivity.
To be more specific, potentially they could lose their trademark (at least in the US) if it becomes an ordinary word ("google" isn't an English word yet, although "googol" is), as once a word has become a generic term, it becomes impossible to enforce trademark rights on it.
to hoover
Ditto for "to Dyson", which used to be used in my household.
Darren] The OED listed it as a verb in June - see here - which surely counts as a word becoming 'officially' English.

Are there other brand-name verbs? I can only think of 'to Xerox' (American for photocopying), which I don't think is current any more.
[Irouléguy] It would only become a generic if "to google" meant "to search on the internet on any search engine." As long as it's defined to mean "to use Google" it shouldn't present them with any problems. There are plenty of brand names which have become generic nouns, applied regardless of brand (escalator, tannoy, biro, etc.) but not many verbs ("to rollerblade" is another, though).
[Darren] "Escalate" (he tannoyed, then biroed it in on his list of brandname verbs).
I don't think "escalate" quite counts as it predated "escalator." The thing which makes "escalator" a generic is the way it's use for any moving staircase, with no regard for whether it's an Otis "Escalator" model. If, however, you say, "I'm just going to escalate to the third floor, darling," then yes, "escalate" qualifies as a generic verb. Personally I've never heard it used that way.
"Escalate" no longer reads as a word to me, as a result of the previous paragraph. I just see a bunch of meaningless letters. It's annoying when that happens.
Talking of meaningless letters, I've developed this annoying habit of leaving letters out of my posts: "it's use for" indeed.
(Darren) Stare at any word long enough and it begins to look mis-spelt or foreign. Either way you think you're going slightly barmy. I can assure you you're not unless I am as well.
Excuse me for a second...
Dear I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue Mailing List Member,
We are now in a position to reveal the dates of the Autumn series of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue.
TICKETS WILL GO ON SALE FROM 10AM ON THE MORNING OF WEDNESDAY 16TH AUGUST.
Tickets to these recordings sell extremely quickly, so you are strongly advised to book early.
The first recording will take place on the evening of Sunday 22nd October 2006 at the Southport Theatre (capacity 1631). Tickets are priced at £10.50, £8.50 and £6.50, with a £2.25 transaction charge. There would normally be a £1.50 per ticket service charge as well, but we have absorbed this for you. You can either book tickets online at www.LiveNation.co.uk/southport , via the telephone by calling Ticketmaster on 0870 6077560, or in person at the theatre between the hours of 10am and 6pm, Monday to Saturday.
The second recording will take place on the evening of Sunday 12th November at the Victoria Palace Theatre (capacity 1525). This is the theatre showing the musical Billy Elliot. Tickets are priced at £11.50, £9.50 and £7.50, with a £2.50 transaction charge. We have absorbed a 6% per ticket service charge. You can book tickets online by calling 0207 834 1317 which will ring at the box office direct and if not answered (either due to being busy, ringing too many times or outside the hours of 10am to 8.30pm Monday to Saturday) it will trip through to Ticketmaster.
The third recording will take place on Sunday 26th November at the Sunderland Empire (capacity 1875). Tickets are priced at £10.50, £8.50 and £6.50, with a £2.25 transaction charge. There would normally be a £1.50 per ticket service charge as well, but we have absorbed this for you. You can either book tickets online at www.LiveNation.co.uk/Sunderland or via the telephone by calling the theatre's box office on 0870 602 1130 (phone trips to Ticketmaster either due to being busy, ringing too many times or outside of hours), or in person at the theatre box office between the hours of 10am and 7.45pm (6pm when there's not a show on), Monday - Saturday.
Doors open to each recording at 7pm, and the recordings will begin at 7.30pm. They are scheduled to finish between 10.15-10.30pm and include a twenty minute interval.
We are very concerned that tickets to these shows (which are already subsidised) are being touted for money, so in an attempt to remedy this, SALE OF TICKETS WILL BE LIMITED TO NO MORE THAN FOUR PER APPLICANT. Should you find yourself unable to use your tickets, please telephone the relevant theatre's box office. They will keep contact details for the first thirty applicants unable to get tickets, and will re-sell the tickets for you. Under no circumstances should you buy or sell tickets on eBay. If a recording has to be cancelled, anyone who has a ticket that has not be purchased legitimately will not get their money refunded, as Ticketmaster and the theatre box offices can only refund the original cardholder.
OK
So here's a question: how do you find out a ballpark figure for how much one should be expected to pay for replacement windows? There seems to be a pact between fitters to give no indication of costs whatsoever, presumably so you can be royally ripped off when it comes to ordering them.
[rab] Try calling fitters and replacement window companies in a completly different town to escape the geographical fixed-price cartel. And I'm sure some of the national companies (Everest, Staybrite, Penicuik) have websites that might calculate it for you, once you have the approximate measurements. There's a glaziers' regulatory body I think - is it Fensa? Maybe they have a list of reputable ones.
Thanks. No-one seems to offer an on-line quote; I'm not even after anything as scientific as that, just an estimate of how many thousands of pounds it's likely to be so we can budget for it. Very frustrating.
[Darren] According to the online dictionaries I just consulted, "escalate" is a back-formation from "escalator".
Refenestration
[rab] How many windows do you want replacing? I have a ballpark figure of £5K for my flat, which would be 4 windows replacing, including patio doors. But then I am in the London area.
[Projoy] By that token, anyone outside London should be able to have it done for £1.50, then.
[Raal] Nice to see a new face here. You look a bit like Raak, if I may say so. Anyway, that's interesting because the ones I checked showed the reverse!
Eeek...
[Projoy] We have seven windows in total: three of them quite large (about 2m2), two medium sized (1.25m2) and two wee ones (less than 1m2 apiece). We're not in a listed building, or a conservation area, thank goodness, so they can be made out of anything we like, as long as we respect the astragals etc. 5K was the kind of number that was floating around my mind, for some reason, but from what you say it might be a bit more than that.
D-G
I paid 3.5k a few years ago for a ground floor flat; four large windows (3+m2 and one medium (1.25m2) plus a front door and a back door. It's the doors that add a lot to the expense; several hundred pounds a pop. And of course small windows are disproportionately costly for their size. I'd hope your requirements would be cheaper than Projoy's - I bet patio doors incur a double expense, once for being doors, and once for being large windows. I admit, I'd still anticipate a cost of well over 4k.
dee gee
Do you have to do them all in one go? I know there are 'do the front, get the back for free' offers every now and again... but don't panic, that's the main thing.
All for one
I spose not - but all but two of them really need to be done if not by the winter then next summer at the latest, so we may as well have them all done in one go. We'll try not to panic - I'm just not keen on the whole "salesman" thing...
My regular customers include a window salesman, and a window surveyor (goes round after the salesman has done his bit and actually measure the windows etc). Unfortunately, the latter is on holiday this week, but I'll check with the former this evening if I remember. He's an ex-salesman as of last year, so should be honest about it. From conversations with him, I can advise you to beware of all the "pay for the front, get the back free" deals etc, as those sort of companies will be ripping you off anyway. The salesmen are amongst the most highly-trained, aggressive-style of any trade. You do not get a bargain from them, even though you will think you do. Some of the techniques he explained to me were quite scarily akin to military interrogation. I'll let you know what he says either tonight, or tomorrow morning.
There is another way, though. If they are standard sizes, the window units themselves do not cost much (think 10% od what you get charged) and a pair of competent builders/handymen should be able to fit them.
[rab] Everest claim to be the best, but are probably the most expensive. They did six floor-to-ceiling windows and a door for me years back for 4k. How long do you plan staying at the address? You don't want something that will need replacing again in less than 20 years.
Windows
I've spoken to my mate, who used to work for StayBrite. He says there's a huge window-making company in Edinburgh that the likes of Staybrite buy their windows from. He'll try and track down the name tonight. He also reckons that, if there are no complex openings required etc, that you "could" get it done for £2K-ish. His advice is find a reputable window-fitter, not a big national company - you get the same windows, a non sales-driven company, and half the price. More to follow when I get more info.
[Phil] I'll bet you 5p and a melon that it's Penicuik.
Gambling?
[pen] I don't accept bets that I might not win ...i.e. I think you're right.
Celebrity MC
Anyone seen Inkspot lately? He and I (as sigmundfreud) seem to be the only two left on Celebdaq. I'm really hanging on so he doesn't feel in solitary splendour. I suspect he's doing the same...
Alternatively, some of you deserters might re-join.
Celebdaq? Oh, puh-lease, that's so 2003. :)
[Phil] Thanks. Any ideas as to how one knows a fitter is reputable?
Isn't it marked on their bottoms?
[rab] Ask to see jobs they've done in the area, would be my best guess, other than local recommendation.
How's the weather?
>> Celebdaq? Oh, puh-lease, that's so 2003. :) Absolutely. For the last 3 years, I just buy Madonna - she's easy, cheap and she gets column inches.
Game slot
...just realised there's been one sitting blank for a while. Any innovative ideas?
digging the daq
[gil] Still doing pottering with the daq, member of Ultimates (MSN group) for investment tips and DDT also peek at http://www.redtide.co.uk/celebdaq/index.html?s=09000901
Every now again like today Mornington_Crescent appears on the front page, sadly I run more than one account. Still not made Top Trader.
An old standby from my days as a language assistant - "What will you do this weekend?" "Remember, we construct the future tense using the auxiliary 'will' - the clue's in the question!"
le weekend
I'm currently waiting for a friend to make his way out of Town to the boondocks of the tube system, from where we will embark on a voyage of historical discovery. We're going up the M40 to go and look at the paintings in a stately home. I have to choose the CDs for the trip, and he's going to choose the destination. We'll probably argue a bit.
Today I learned something new
I learned why the Knights say "Ni!". Néa must know this already. "Ni" is the Swedish for "you" in the plural, and used to also be the formal singular "you", like the French "vous". However, Swedish added a strange twist to this. If someone was eligible to be addressed as "ni" then, by definition, it was inappropriate to do so. Instead, one referred to them by their title, e.g. "would the professor like another cup of tea?" As the writer concludes, "the world really is coming to a sorry state when people are going about saying "ni" to old ladies."
       I suspected the story of being a wind-up, but I happened to have a copy of "Teach Yourself Swedish" dating from 1969, and it agrees. It also said that the awkwardness of having to address people in the third person, while also avoiding the words "he" and "she" (taboo in this situation), had led to efforts to persuade the Swedish public to use "ni" more widely, with some success. However, the success must have been limited, as I understand that the formal "ni" is now all but extinct.
       It is not know if the Knights who say "Ni!" are a deliberate reference to this quirk of Swedish grammar.
fun and games
This weekend, which is mostly gone now here? Watched a Hindi film, bought some plants and crushed my right index finger in a car door.
"In Soviet Union, Saturday is START of weekend."
Celebdaq
Ha! Despite the fact that I don't follow the trends in e.g. http://www.redtide.co.uk/celebdaq/index.html?s=09000901 I have been making a good living buying Madonna, which seems to be a profitable move.
Finger in car door
Wow! That hurts. My father-in-law shut the car door on my finger just before Beryl and I drove off on honeymoon... No remarks, please. My style was NOT cramped.
Knights, Madonna
*Delurking*
[Raak] But these knights you speak of are no longer the Knights Who Say 'Ni!' and annecdotal evidence would suggest they ceased to be so some time before 1000 AD, before the age of 'Professors'. Therefore, going by the rules of good Swedish, it would be inappropriate to refer them as 'Neow-wom-peng!' or something close to that. This story would appear to be another urban legend. :)
[gil] Your 'Celebdaq' posting had me in stitches when I read it. Then I looked up 'Celebdaq' and twigged I had the wrong end of the stick. Thanks for the laugh anyway.
[Sierra Mike] I prefer to interpret the film as a metaphorically expressed history of Swedish grammar.
Celebdaq
[Sierra Mike]re Madonna... I have to confess the wording was chosen with irony in mind.
Irony / Swedish Grammar
[gil] Ah, well, it worked then.
[Raak] You are undoubtedly right. Where do the dismemberment ad absurdum and cannibalism fit in?
[Sierra] I think it would take an expert in Scandinavian historical linguistics to fathom out the entirety of the Pythons' subtle code.
Pythons and The Swedish Language
[Raak] Now you come to mention it, there was that whole Scandinavian thread running through the opening credits, wasn't there? Jeepers, you may be onto somthing potentially very rewarding in the accademic sense and not to shabby in the next-year's-beach-book arena too if you can pull a "Dan Brown". The Python Codex is certain to be a blockbuster.
new game
It's ages since we had a Film Club or a Song Book...
[pen] And Sound Charades, as well. Something should really just get rushed thru'.
*stands back in anticipation of the rush*
Yep, I knew that
[Raak] That's it, in essentials, though not quite quite. Quoting my handbook in etiquette from 1933:

"Although the use of the address ni is more common today than ten or fifteen years ago, it is not accepted in ordinary social life. [...] it is however permitted to include a ni here and there in conversation, provided that one also includes the title. Thus, it is possible to say "Oh, so the countess was in Visby last summer, how did ni find it?" or "Is the consul going to Paris, weren't ni there last spring?" But you cannot be too young if you are to use ni to older people [etc etc for 30 more pages about use of titles I kid you not]"

It does say that using "ni" to colleagues is fine, though, as well as some other equal-status situations where it was OK. There's a whole chapter about when to stop using titles -- always a mutual process, you stopped using each other's titles and said du (sing. "you") instead of ni. A lot happened in the decades following with an increase in "ni" and decrease of titles, but the big big revolution was in the late 1960s, when the head of a government office declared that he would say "du" to all his employees and expected "du" back. (Well, that's it in a nutshell anyway -- it was more complicated of course.)
Anyway, the funny thing is that after all that, today Swedish uses virtually no titles at all. We have "Mr", Mrs", "Miss" and "Dr" and various old nobility and royal titles, but apart from royalty nobody uses any titles, ever. (Very young schoolkids tend to call their teacher "miss" or "teacher", but once they hit 10 or so it's strictly first names.) So when buying, say, plane tickets from British Airways, a Swede is struck by the necessity to put a title there -- which feels very very foreign.
Neow-wom-peng!
[Néa] Swedish schoolchildren are presumably too well brought up to say "Ni!" to a teacher. Would that our lot were as aware of the social graces.
My butcher calls me "Sir", and I love it. I'd be delighted to go back to using titles and surnames instead of all this pseudo-familiar first name tosh. If someone repeatedly uses my name, I instinctively remind myself not to buy anything, or co-operate for that matter. Still, it's better than being called "mate" by someone I'm trying to conduct some business with.
Surnames
(Phil) My Indian newsagent always greets me with a smile and "Ah, Mr Hughes" when I go in each week to pay for the papers. This is almost too formal even for someone of my age but charming nevertheless. What I really don't like is name-tags where the surname is omitted. It's either false familiarity or management's way of saying you're not very important.
I'm not keen on letters coming from people with gender-neutral names (like Chris) without a title as you then never know how to write back to them.
[rab] "Dear Chris"? Isn't the point that once they've introduced themselves by a particular name it's quite acceptable to address them by it...?
Chris
My nextdoor neighbours are Chris and Sam. Any guesses?
{Projoy] Actually, I was thinking of emails rather than letters where you have mail from "Chris Jones", and at the bottom a standard sig "Chris Jones, Gender Neutrality Officer". To me, it feels utterly wrong beginning a communication with "Dear Chris" when I've never met the person in question.
Mind you, I once had a letter from Scottish Gas, signed by hand as "Scottish Gas"...
[rab] Did you reply "Dear Scottish" or "Dear Mr Gas"?

I agree with rab about feeling uncomfortable replying to mails like that. I generally duck the issue and just start them with "Hi -" and in fact, I don't often use names at all unless there's ambiguity as I've never been comfortable with using people's names for any purpose whatsoever, even if I've known them for years. Dunno why.

[rab] "Dear Sir or Madam, as the case may be:" Although in email I never use any salutation at all.
OMG
[Raak] Why not? [All others] What about you? Do you use salutations in email?
[Néa] Just the custom I'm accustomed to (and therefore the One True Way).
I use 'Good morning [name] or sometimes just 'Good Morning' (or afternoon), or sometimes 'Dear [name] in an email; if it's a round-robin (which is often is) I just start with an attention-grabbing 'Ladies and Gentlemen' which seems to go down fairly well, apart from with one individual who has been making a fool of herself recently and is not much longer for this corporate world, I feel.
[Rosie] A gay couple. With stupid parents. :oP
[Néa, from whom all knowledge springs, from whose navel a lotus springs forth and who encompasses the oceans in three strides] I avoid salutations as unnecessary ornamentation.
[Salutations] For email, even formal email, I find that "Hello," is a perfectly good opening for almost every purpose. So much so that I now find it slightly quaint to receive an email that begins "Dear..." (particularly if the person uses my surname). And it's been many a year since I've seen a "yours faithfully". If forced into a formal signoff, I tend to stick to just "Yours," for fear of writing something I don't in the slightest bit mean, such as "sincerely".
[Dear Mr B-----,] While I am familiar with the feeling whereof you speak re: addressing someone by their first name prior to a formal introduction, which no doubt is deplored in Debrett, I can't say I've experienced a great deal of discomfort in discarding the convention.
Oh no, i fear I'm a fogey (yet again)...
In emails, I use "yours faithfully", "your sincerely", "regards" or "kind regards" depending on the context. I also use "cheers", which I use as a multi-purpose word in spoken coversation anyway. However, at the start of an email, I tend just to use the person's name (surname if we're not acquainted, forename if we are) or "Dear Sir or Madam" if it's to "complaints@????.com" or "service@????.com" (as many of my emails are).
re:
[Phil] Whats the difference between regards and kind regards? I've never really appreciated this subtlety.
Chris and Sam
(pen) Sorry, but it's Christopher and Samantha. 50 yrs ago it would have been Christine and Samuel.
Now I come to look at it, Christine seems such a silly name. It's like the brand name of a sort of mini-Messiah individually wrapped for your comfort and convenience.
"Vicar, do you sell small packs of Christines for the weekend?"
[Projoy] Most names start to look pretty silly if you look at them too closely, like most words.
Salutations
[Néa] I tend to use a first name and a colon. It's my style. For example:

Dear Samantha:

Isn't it about time you got off Humphrey's hand? I should think it was quite uncomfortable.

All the best,

Nights.

I think of an email as being a less formal letter - with an opening, closing and all the rest. Most of my peers think I'm bizarre for this.
hi nites i reckn your a yong fogy rosie
Hello, I must be going
In email I don't use valedictions either, just my name at the end or a .sig. Written letters go "Dear Sir/Yours faithfully" or "Dear [name]/Yours".
emailiquette
Hmm, well showing my old-foginess I start with a "signature" saying who I am, website details etc. (Though this is automatically included) Then I use Dear (name) <comma> Dear Humphrey, Then the text - all properly written out and hopefully correctly spelt and punctuated. And I tail it with Regards, Blob (or whatever soubriquet that person knows me by) ........ What's more, I write SMS texts in much the same way !!!
Formality
(Nights) Actually most of my emails are no different from letters except in the greeting if I'm familiar with the person. This means capitals, punctuation and paragraphs. Well, why not? At my age you simply don't give a toss if people think you're bizarre. It's great.
The thing is, I tend to see emails as more closely related to memos than letters. When I receive an email written like a formal letter, it comes across, frankly, as somewhat illiterate.
[darren] How would you receive a letter through your letterbox? Would you feel impatience that they didn't email you about it?
[Projoy] It's a gut feeling thing. Although, if I sit and think about it, my regards tend to be much kinder if I'm selling than buying.
[pen] I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at there.
[pen] Dunno about Darren, but I would feel exactly that (and frequently do). We've too few trees as it is, without wasting them on pointless letters, cards etc.
paper
(Projoy) You really can't be allowed to get away with that. The proportion of paper in actual letters compared with the total amount of paper (newspapers, junk mail etc) that comes through my letterbox is very small. In any case, we're not short of trees; there are many more than there were 40-50 years ago, everywhere. To be honest, I'm not that keen on trees, they spoil the view and at one time threatened to undermine my house. Rather overrated, I feel.
[Rosie] Who says my annoyance is confined to only legitimate letters? As to "more trees", I don't know if that's true, although I guess you're more likely to know than I am, But don't we need even more trees at the moment to do Carbon Dioxide conversion? This is the general impression I have gained.
Trees
I suspect Rosie is right that there are more trees now than in the 50's. I'm pretty sure, however, that there were many more in the 30's and more still before WW1. Also, the tree-planting boom of the 50's 60's & 70's was mostly conifer plantations. Planting more trees as mixed woodland must be a good thing both aesthetically and as carbon sinks.
IIRC, commercial forestry supplies most of the pulp for paper - and that's a planting-and-harvesting operation of fast-growing monoculture conifers; it doesn't use wood from mixed and deciduous woodland.
I'm still not sure what forest conservation and my opinion of email writing style have to do with each other.
Tree abundance
Which would explain the demise of resin/wood particle composite board and the resurgence of quality natural wood at the woodyards. Oh, hang on......
That's a matter of furniturenfashion and the health hazards of the resin fumes, innit?
[Rosie] Well I look forward to being 23 then. And I write text messages just the same way - the joy of predictive text. And a new phone!

In other news, I handed in my dissertation today!
[nights] Congratulations! Well done! I hate you. No, really, well done.
Trees
(Projoy) It's true that trees fix carbon rather than letting it float free as CO2 but the number needed to make any difference is impractically large particularly considering the rate the Amazon jungle and other areas are being chopped down. Trees are nice but have become sacred, which is just silly. They undermine buildings, obscure the sky and the view, drop leaves on the railway line and are even allowed to obscure signals. The biodiversity of tree-free railway cuttings was incredible. Down with trees! BTW I don't quite understand your aversion to printed paper. I get cards all the time from my nieces in addition to all the emails, which is nice, and far better than when they were young teenagers and sent me electronic Christmas cards. Sod that.
[Rosie] Well, I suppose it's a personal preference, but I just find dealing with paper irritating these days. It becomes clutter very quickly. You can't miniaturise it and file it conveniently in a sensible folder system on a HDD. Cards and the like seldom express sentiments profound enough to be worth keeping, and for the most part are ritualistic and purposeless. Almost anything that could be said in a conventional letter could be said in an email, which is far more keepable these days.
call me old-fashioned
[PJ, Rosie] Being a keen calligrapher - I mostly design and write greetings cards to close friends and family. They seem to appreciate the personal, snail-mail touch because it's evidence that one has made the effort. Far more 'keepable' I'd say.
I loathe "greetings cards", and I've just deleted my justification of that statement because I don't want to feel yet again that I'm the only one singing in tune :-)
[Phil] I'm only mentioning how much I despise commercial greetings cards so you know you're not alone. Under normal circumstances I wouldn't even have botherd to mention it. Profit margins of 60%+?? The sleazy slimeballs.
Me2, as mentioned (and justified) above.
[SM & PJ] I have an equal, but differently justified, loathing for hand-made ones too.
I love cards. I love writing letters. I love recieving post of any form. I send lots of postcards when I go on holiday. I particuarly like hand made cards. I do get a bit pissed off when I get a Christmas card from someone I rarely keep in touch with just signed with their name, as I'd like a little newsbite. I try to lead by example and put a little line or two in each card, something personal to who its addressed to. I also mostly try to make my own Christmas cards, although I was defeated on that one last year (I sent over 85, and recieved a similar number). So, why do I like them. I accept that I do mostly just throw them away (or try to recycle) and it is a fair economic cost, but I like to keep in touch with as many people as I can and I think its a good way to show that you're thinking of someone. Hurrah for cards. That's what I say!
[Lib] If I want to know what someone whom I am otherwise too feckless to stay properly in contact with is up to, I'll usually google them or take a look at their blog or something. If I instead sent a card for the sheer sake of "staying in touch" what pleasure would it afford them to know that I thought of them... but didn't think enough of them to do more than send a card? You might argue that I miss the point, and I suppose I probably do. Obviously, not attacking anyone else's way of staying in touch, but that's how it's always seemed to me.
Apologies if I come across as a crabby bastard, but, well, I am one. :)
[PJ] You didn't seem any more crabby that I am (revising never brings the nice side of me out)... I like to know that someone out there is thinking of me. That's probably something to do with the kind of high-maintainence-centre-of-attention person I am. Getting a card is something concrete that I can see that they've thought of me. Looking at my blog doesn't mean anything as I don't track all the hits. But, each to his own, hey? And I'll remember not to send you any cards a ProjoyTowers.
crabby old so-and-so
[Phil/PJ] Hmm - surely you have aunts, uncles, grandparents [even parents] that may not be quite as netsavvy as you? [or even own a PC]. How do you all stay in touch or send birthday/christmas-type greetings to them? Telephone?
[Chalky] Why stay in touch? Why send greetings? Unless you want to know them as friends, doing either of those two things seems completely pointless - maybe even slightly hypocritical - to me.
[Chalky] I didn't say that I prefer to use the net. I just don't really "stay in touch". I have one uncle, one aunt, one cousin, no grandparents. I do speak to my brothers and parents fairly frequently on the phone. I do send birthday and christmas cards to all family members (including in-laws and 2 nieces) - I also loathe buses, but use them when necessary.
On the other hand, we all use email too for quick messages, e.g. my sister-in-law invited us to her 50th birdthay party by email, and I was able to decline within 30 minutes - job done, no waiting; no having to find a "sorry we can't come" card, write it, find her address, buy a stamp, post it (all of which would take me a day or two).
[Projoy, Phil] Blimey, I'm now wary of having either of you two as friends... if I left it too long, the friendship lapses and you'd discontinue membership! I've got friends all over the place that I don't see for a couple of years at a time, but I'm extremely pleased that I *can* count them as friends, and still send xmas cards. I really can't see it the way you do.
Stands in the girls corner
Am I sensing a gender divide here?
[Lib] No, I like cards.
speaking literally
[Phil] I see. You seem to use different methods for different folks. Me too. I just prefer to make a greetings card than to buy one [for the reasons already stated by PJ and SM.

[PJ] Why stay in touch? The ones I stay in touch with are the ones I LIKE and respect.
Well, I know it means more to me when I send a card or letter than an email (partly because of the extra effort). So it means more to me to receive one as well. Also probably more than half the people I communicate with regularly are not regular e-mail users, even if they have an address. I just think it's for different purposes. Quick notes, information-based, SMS or email; communication - letters or cards.
[Proj] You don't think staying in touch with your aged relatives who are not on the Internets is worthwile in itself? Me, I like sending post cards, but not too many or too often. I defaulted out of Postcrossing recently.
In other news, I suck at lecturing. Really and truly.
[Néa] *thinks for a moment*. Mm. Not really - for them or me. [pen] I have friends whom I sometimes don't see for a couple of years, or more. It sounds like in your case it's necessary to send a card or something in order to maintain the friendship subscription (whether used or not). In my case I'm very happy for someone I like to show up again after a couple of years of not calling or writing. I don't require them to ping me in the interval, because it would be a waste of both of our time (at least until they or I are ready to re-engage - and also a waste if one of us is no longer really interested).
[Néa] PS. I bet you don't suck at it.
[Néa] I agree, I bet you don't suck.
[penelope] I wonder, do I really have friends, per se, or perhaps I just have pals? I think that could be an interesting bit of self-analysis, perhaps anyone who counts me as a "friend" could contribute. Oh I dunno, I'm just me, and I'm not great at communicating, so I don't bother :-)
for flerdle's eyes only
Here's something flerdle told me:
Hidden textonly kidding!
Phil:
Hidden text :-)
*comes back from Leamington Spa, joins the "I bet Néa doesn't suck brigade, and says
Hidden text"What?"
to flerdle and Phil*
That's the "I bet Néa doesn't suck" brigade.
[Tuj] Phew.
cards
I'm terrible at sending cards, and I find it a nuisance. What's worse though, is that my mum gets cards and she has NO idea who the people are. She may have met them once, or be related to them, but if they sign the card with their first names only it's hard to guess. She gets a few like that every year.
Cards
I go through the ritual, but only because it's generally done. But awkward situations sometimes come up. Should I send a Christmas or birthday card this year to my lately ex-sister-in-law? At what point should a Christmas card to my brother also be addressed to his new partner?
I donate, instead of sending cards. That, and I usually work extra shifts at Christmas so I don't really have the time.
cards
We did get one christmas card last year that said that they would not be sending cards this year, but would be making a donation to a charity (I think it was for MS) instead. Sounds good to me! We did that in work too - everyone gave a couple of pounds and we gave it all to a charity instead of giving out cards.
Which begs the question ... How does one let people know that one is donating to charity instead of sending them a card?
[Chalky] You send them a charity card.
Cards etc
Why do people have to know one is donating to charity except to inform them what a Wonderful Person one is? Why not send cards as usual and donate to charity? Or send "charity" cards? I normally send cards to people I don't see very often; it just means you've remembered them and value them. Some, but not all, of a group of pub mates have taken to sending (i.e. dishing out in the pub) Christmas cards to each other, which I think is barmy. I don't do it and it's done me no harm whatever.
Nothing in particular
Just thought I'd try and introduce a new subject, but I can't think of one. Anyone care to comment?
[Phil] I'd love to help, but I'm away to Bury to see IQ in concert.
New subject
I've been out all evening - has Blair gone/died/been arrested/resigned/emigrated yet? Can't wait.
I played all 7 of my tiles in one go in a game of Scrabble yesterday - the word was SLEETED.
Maybe changing the subject should be the new subject.
(Tuj) You could have had DELETES or STEELED.
[Rosie] I'd also spotted those (and the D was actually a blank!) but I picked SLEETED over STEELED (DELETES didn't fit on the board).
* waves from Ambleside *
Cards
I was firmly in the anti-card camp, but I've found things have changed since having a kid. Suddenly photos of the littleun are a commodity for relatives - especially the older and less internet savvy kind. So, I've been sending cards using pictures of my son to people where in the past I might have a) sent a crappy off the shelf card and hated the whole process and b) not bothered through apathy.

One thing that kick started it all was finding a program called Comic Life (Mac users - I recommend it heartily) which is great for knocking up comic strip style cards using my own photos. I've also been known to send an occasional e-card as a slightly more colourful way of marking an occasion than just sending email. I think cards for me inhabit a sort of middle zone of contact with someone, and I find it pleasing to think that I can send my offline relatives something tangible with a picture of their grandson/great grandson on it.
ego tripping
I've made a move in every game in here today, so I may as well mention it here :-)
[Chalky] You should win something... a sort of sedimentary layer award.
[rab] Do html tags work in the titles of games? Actually I was mainly thinking of the hiding tags - a game entirely consisting of hidden moves would be fun. I was also wondering if it might be time for another Lies game.
Tag
[Tuj] No.
Fresh morning
When bringing in the milk this morning at half six, there was a definite sense of the summer being over. A low haze of thick grey cloud, drizzle soaked grass and the street lights still on (not doing much but just quietly announcing that the mornings are getting darker). Inside the lights turned on for breakfast and side lights needed on the car driving in. At least one thing the heating is still off and will hopefully stay that way till October.

I don't want another Lies game.

Here in the deep south (Hants) it is doing the old cats and dogs routine (and to a strong degree at that). Certainly a change having been building sandcastles on Monday!
[Inkers] Well don't start one then.
I'm going to have to get my chimney swept, as it looks like I might be here till the end of October :-(
I can't wait for there to be a nip in the air - it's rainy here, but so warm and muggy. In preparation for autumn and winter, I ordered some new boots yesterday and tested the central heating. But I think the ancient boiler's pump has given up so the central heating doesn't work. I don't need it yet, but I'm hoping this'll prompt the landlords into renewing the boiler. They seem so proud of being to make it limp along for longer than is sensible, dammit. I just want a nice condensing boiler to make only as much hot water as I need, not a hot water tank - it's daft for just one person. In the meantime, I have a warm laptop for personal comfort :o)
We had British Gas round to do the annual service the boiler the other day, its a bit doom and gloom, it is old and parts are hard to replace. They have suggested a new combi boiler.
[pen] Sh. Don't wish it away. There'll be plenty of nip in good time. [Tuj] Lies games are really impossible to play, they're always the least popular games in the Morniverse and usually end up neglected.
[Inkers] Do it. It'll be quieter and more efficient.
Speaking of energy, having just discovered that I'm paying more than twice what I did for electricity a couple of years ago, I looked into other possibilities. Apparently, one can now change electricity suppliers with just a few clicks on a web page, and I stand to save 20%. Is it really that simple? Has anyone here done it? I'm looking at Powergen vs. Atlantic, and I wonder how Powergen can now stay in business except by relying on the inertia of their customers. (Yes, I know it's evil to heat a house with electricity, but I doubt if it's adaptable to gas.)
Electricity slags
Funny thing, electricity pricing - I was involved in the new trading arrangements which came into force in 1998. One of the effects of them is that it's cheaper to buy small quantities of electricity than large most of the time, so the big players like Powergen are somewhat handicapped. The difference is nothing like 20% though. Of course, lots of suppliers have short term or 'new customer only' promotions, hoping to get people in and then rely on inertia. The cheapest thing to do is therefore change often.
Do you have people going door-to-door trying to get people to change their gas/electricity company? For a few months here I was plagued by 'em. Started fantasizing about electricifying the doorbell to give them a shock... rude words were thought, but not said.
[flerdle] I did get a few a while back, very strange. The first one opened by saying "How would you like to save money on your electricity bill?", and wanted me to sign up there and then, without even saying what company he was representing. Then a few months later, two young women doing "a survey" asked if I had switched suppliers, "like most of your neighbours have". Nul points. Probably from the same company, whoever they were, and if I did, I'd make a point of never doing business wth them, ever. Then the first chap came back again and I just said "Not interested" and closed the door.
[INJ] Odd, I'm going by the companies' own published tariffs for an Economy 7 dual meter. All the companies seem to claim to be at least "part of one of the biggest suppliers", although that's rather an elastic expression.
Deregulating Utilities = cheaper phone/gas/'lectric
It has been my experience that deregulating state-owned utility services results in a welter of paperwork for the consumer who is bombarded by junk mail exhorting this or that 'cheaper' version of whatever it is. They invariably aren't cheaper in the long run, largely because of the increased costs associated with legislation, litigation and advertising. Service call-outs become a nightmare of humanless voice-mail mazes and all one really gets is a warm feeling when one thinks about the 'good old days'. My gas service was recently split from the monopolistic energy carrier from my area. Costs increased overnight by 10-15% and there are now three phone numbers to report a gas leak with no 24-hour call-out. The joke? that the billing departments, although ostensibly now separate for gas and electricity, still use the same style account numbers and go to the same building. Indeed, I can pay my electricity bill at a window in a gas-company cashier's office. I suspect the bills are made up on the same computer. It's all a game.
I've argued on the doorstep with an electricity account swapper guy before too. I told him I didn't want to discuss it there and then, and he kept asking me 'why not?'. so I shut the door on him. It was quite scary, to be honest, he was becoming vehement. Lord knows what it's like for little old ladies.
This is one of the benefits of having an entryphone system - with a bit of skill (and luck in having the topmost buzzer) you can generally fend these people off before they gain access to the stair.
Also, how do they tell whose electricity it is? It's all the same wires, and the electrons aren't labelled.
'leccy
[Raak] You could spin 'em up with a particular bias though. That way you could discriminate yours from the rest by having a filter installed at the customer's service entrance that let through electrons with a penchant for drinking only gravity fed beer or that preferred a lawn mowed in alternating stripes and kept the others out for example.
Don't you realise you're all geing ripped off. It's AC electricity - that means you're getting the same electrons going in and out of your meter day in day out, yet you get charged as if they were all brand spanking new...bloody nerve these leccy suppliers have got, I reckon.
Privatisation
(SM) Quite so. Competition in itself costs money and furthermore there has to be rake-off for the private company or they wouldn't be interested in the first place. So naturally it costs more, or the service is poorer. Another example is Directory Enquiries, privatised for no good reason whatever except to satisfy the current political dogma. Don't get me going about the railways, about which I know a bit. Truly the country is run by idiots.
(Phil) A very good point. The less fastidious among us would settle for AC/DC but that's up to them, naturally.
I'm glad someone mentioned Directory Enquiries... I remember that once upon a time it was operated by BT for free; then they charged about 10p which could be circumvented by using a phone box; looking at last month's phone bill, I notice that fierce competition has delivered the fantastic bargain of 60p per enquiry. Victory!
Since they started charging, I've not used directory enquiries once. I find 192.com to be very good.
Slightly tangentially, at work, I have had no end of incorrect reservations, e.g. someone books at this Bull's Head, then turns up for dinner at another, because 118118 or whoever has given them the wrong number. One night we had two bookings that didn't show, so I called them the next day saying "Hello, this is the Bull's Head at Ratby; you had a reservation with us last night..." Both people failed to notice the "Ratby" bit, even when I said it so clearly, and said "yes we were there". Then when asked where exactly, one said "Well, we booked at the Bull's Head in Newtown Linford, but when we got there we couldn't find it (I was able to tell them that it changed name 8 years ago), so we went to the Bull's Head at Woodhouse Eaves." The other said "You know, on the A47", which is about 6 miles away in Leicester Forest West. Unfortunately, I think there are 11 Bull's Heads in Leicestershire, and half of them are within a 12 mile radius
[Phil] Well, with a bit of creative yet inexpensive sign alterage you could easily become the Bull Shed. That should stop the problem. Alternatively, add a sauna at the back and call your place The Bull's Head of Steam.
[rab] Unfortunately, we were not internet enabled when our water was leaking into the flat below and we didn't know the number for a plumber that had been suggested to us...
Sorry, that should have been directed at [Phil]
Persistent Salesmen
[penelope] We need a new game where the object is to supply a witty, brief and above all final response to "Why not [discuss my proposal now]?"
[Sierra Mike] Perhaps with each person giving an answer to the previous person's salesman's line, then supplying a new salesman's line of their own?
[Raak] That would work too, though I was just thinking about supplying alternatives for penelope to use after the Why not? was delivered. Sort of along the lines of Mad Magazine's old Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions feature. One question, many one-liner responses.
[rab] Commiserations - it's a shame that necessity forces one to be ripped off :-(
end games
To make way for the new game I think it is time for Cancel Mansell to move along, ready for Why Not? or something new.

I dread to use the 'C' word in September but the school sent out the Christmas catalogue yesterday, and the milkman dropped off this morning a leaflet for spring and Christmas flowering bulbs.

Is it proper or just morbid bad taste omn my part for wanting to see how the hamster from Top Gear had a near fatal crash. Hopefully he will recover soon and take his revenge out on a few more caravans.

It's an 'x' word
[Inkers] I have already planted bulbs in pots for next spring and bought xmas cards (from the V&A, online, before they run out, which is what happened last year).
[pen] Very impressed and also quite jealous.

Can I also just say about the two people that heckled John Reid, it was a set up. A member of the cabinet going to an invited audience of muslims, security would have been tight. But two well known radicals simply walk in unnoticed!! pah!! It's a government conspiracy I tell you.

X marks late September
Today I saw a pub advertising Christmas meals today. That is, you could go in today and have a Christmas meal. WIth free bottle of champagne (which I think must mean a one-glass quarter bottle of white fizz).
I'm so happy to be moving to a pub that does not do food. Christmas will not be a word that makes me shake with fear this year :-)
[Phil] As I recall, you didn't do food when I came in anyway! :-)
[phil] A pub that has no food? Not even chicken in the basket! But I presume you will still be working on Christmas Day.
I stopped in at a pub at Kinlochleven that had two entrances; one for walkers and one for... I don't know, everyone else, I suppose. I arrived by car but I as was I scruffy and dressed for walking I went in the former as a courtesy to what I supposed was their intent. Inside I discovered that not only were the two parts of the pub completely separate, with the walker section gulag-spare, but they even served different food! I ordered some manner of pie and got some hideous little prepackaged thing that had been semithawed in the microwave, which I would have regarded as inedible even had it been warmed up properly. The thing is, it appeared to be quite a different thing from what they were serving in what I could see in the remainder of the place. I concluded that they absolutely despised walkers but couldn't exclude them, so they decided to quarantine them and make them miserable in the hopes of developing a reputation that would repel as many of them as possible.
[Inkspot] To take that suggestion perhaps more seriously than it was intended, if it was a setup, it seems to me a quite benign one. After all, it appears the two hecklers were real radical Islamists, not stooges, and if the authorities troubled themselves no further than making sure no bombs got in, well, freedom of speech and all that. It's hardly a dirty trick to let them condemn themselves out of their own mouths in front of the press. What are they going to do, complain that they weren't suppressed?
Come and see the tolerance inherent in the system! Help, help, I'm not bein' repressed!
In letting them in they were certain to go off at anytime, for the speaker it did not matter, he needed a headline otherwise it would have been just another day at the office. Suddenly a small paragraph inside became front page news. It was manipulation by of events for a desired outcome.
[Uncle K] That's just saturday lunchtime :-)
[Inky] Indeed, that is the current status of the place. No children permitted either, and the place is packed! If there is no tradition of that pub opening on Christmas Day, then this year I will have the day off. Next year wil be different. If it does currently open, I'll do it for 2 hours.
[Dan] Is that the pub that overlooks the water, with the Atlas brewery behind it? If so, I was there 2 and a bit years ago, and although we had to leave our packs in the lobby, or outside, they were perfectly welcoming, and had some wonderful beer from the aforementioned brewery. The toasties were smashing !
[Inkspot] I am, perhaps wrongly, getting the impression that you find something wrong with that. But everything people do is "manipulation of events for a desired outcome". Or in less tendentious language, acting to achieve their goals. Nothing dishonest happened: the hecklers hanged themselves with their own rope (I hope -- but I haven't followed subsequent reports to see what mainstream Muslim reaction has been). If indeed there was a nod and a wink to the security services to flagrantly let the opposition be heard, I don't have a problem with that.
[Phil] I dinna think so. They didn't have a lobby for one thing, and for another, like I said, walkers were shunted into a room that felt like a holding pen for undesirables (which on reflection is what it was), and there was no brewery attached. It was some time ago. In fairness it was one of only two less than delightful pub experiences I had in Scotland, and as for the other, well, I'll frame it in the form of retrospectively self-evident advice: If you're at the Fringe and you find a pub that miraculously isn't jammed with people, it is safe to assume that there's a good reason for it. My own fault in both cases, of course, as it's really not difficult to simply leave places that don't feel right.
[Dan] I have a wonderful memory of walking into Kinlochleven from Glencoe. It was not long after midday and there was only one "PH" marked on the map. As we rounded the corner, the pub hove into view. I believe it was called The Anchor, and a dingier, drabber looking place it would be hard to imagine in such a picturesque location. A youngish bloke (20 or thereabouts) was walking the other way, obviously a local (due to lack or rucksack etc), so I shouted across the street "Is that the only pub in town?". The look of horror on his face will stay with me for many years as he replied "Hell, no! No unless ye like trippin over pushchairs and shit! Carry on to the river, you'll be fine there."
In the phamaceutical product naming stakes I thought it was difficult for anusol to be trumped (so to speak), but it appears to have been done.
And on the topic in hand [Dan] Can you remember which pub in Edinburgh that was?
[rab] Slightly odd thing just now. The site displayed without any CSS (just a bulleted list of games). A reload got it back as normal. I don't know if this was just a momentary glitch or something you'd want to know about.
If it happens again, look at the page source and see if the css is actually being loaded in the html (by a LINK tag).
[rab] Unfortunately not. I'm certain it was in Rose Street, or just off, but that's about it. It had a "locals only" vibe which we were too oblivious to pick up on at first.
pharmaceutical names
[Rab]That stuff has been around for years! Which probably explains the name. Can you see a new product coming out with a name like that? At least you can't have any doubts about what it's for.
[snorgle] Although, oddly, its makers do, referring euphemistically to "feminine itching". That sounds to me like some sort of marital complaint.

[Dan] Oh well, it's probably been overhauled and turned into vertical drinking bar now. Not sure which I prefer really.

[feminine itch] What does this sentence mean: "Every woman shares in the dilemma of those nagging feminine problems."?
(Projoy) Quite. What dilemma? But I can't see much wrong with the product name. It's certainly not in the same league as Anusol. *(creases up)*
[Projoy] I don't care what the sentence means, but I loathe the use of those "those" words in advertising and journalism.
[Phil] You've got to admit, it would be worse with "them" instead.
[Darren] As a Geordie (originally), I think "them" would be much more fun.
Shouldn't it be 'they', to aim at the Glaswegian market?
Done that list yet?
Next from their range of products is Lipusol for "Every man shares in the dilema of those nagging feminine problems". *scarpers quickly to the shed*
*lays a trail of gunpowder from the back door to the shed and puts a match to it*
[INJ] Indeed, for the cowboy market, it should be "them thar"
If you wanted to be really misogynistic, how about "you" instead?
[Phil] Cowboys have nagging feminine problems?
You've not seen Brokeback Mountain? Actually, I haven't, so I've no idea if that joke works or not
[Nea] They became cowboys to escape problems with nagging females. (Mine's the storm cape and stetson hanging by the door, thanks.)
One cape required
[INJ]You'll be in trouble now, I hope you have better blast doors on your shed than I did.
Should you not be needing that cape later , if it could be passed over here with a pair of size wellies as the grey storm clouds in the sky over the Brunel Tower, the car park is already flooded.

Finally after all this time reached I have managed to become Top Trader at Celebdaq. The only thing being had to use my BBC login of Cleddau, it is on the banks of that fair waterway that I was raised.

[Inkspot] Ah - that's what you look like!
[Inkers] You credited evil_edna! I'm touched, and you have attained a higher ranking than I ever did - my best was No. 4, by accident, once. *Blushes* You have learned well, glasshopper.
Found out today that I didn't get the new job I'd gone for, but, hey - new car and new flat - two out of three's not bad!
Commiserations once, and congrats twice then, Uncle K.
[Phil] Ta! Of course, the new job would have helped to pay for the other two...
Hurrah for Uncle!
[UK] How did the play go? Bad luck about the job, sure there's another (and hopefully better) one waiting for you.
Reminder
Which reminds me - congrats to Nadia, and thanks for the cheque.
[Lib] Play went astonishingly well, as it happens... no major cock-ups anywhere, and I managed to learn all of my lines in time for the opening night (which helps)! Still a little puzzled about the job, as I felt I gave a cracking interview, I fulfilled the criteria, and I'm a redeployment case, so I get preferential treatment (supposedly). I'm going to take them up on their offer of a feedback interview - I'm hoping that it's because they decided to employ two people who were excellent, rather than not employing me because I was crap.
someone say something!
[UK] Congrats. And the right job will come up at the right time :o)
In other news, I have resumed salsa dancing after a 7 week break during the summer, and I'm pleased to report I haven't lost my mojo. The plan is to do it at least twice a week, sometimes three times a week over the winter. I may need encouragement. I most certainly will need new black leather dancing shoes, as my pale suede ones just look odd in the winter :o)
*is still trying to work out what rab meant in his last post - even tho' it's none of her business*
not saying nuthin'
I should not smile at the misfortune at others but the goings on between the England RFU and Saracens. You have the RFU trying to tell the team which position to play him so he is ready for the national side. Someone payed a kings ransom for Andy Farrell as an instant fix, but is quickly turning into a farce.
Good morning everyone. Good weekend?
[pen] Not bad, thanks, except my team lost twice, including a shut-out on Sunday. re - what you were saying about job prospects... I'm now following up an internal vacancy as a junior press officer.
[pen] Weekend was tolerable considering I had to work from 11am till midnight friday, saturday and sunday. Thankfully have today off to recover/revise. How was yours, pen?
[pen] Owwww, my head hurts - hence, yes I had a great weekend, thanks.
[Lib] Full, thanks! Thursday night = new salsa class (made my legs ache - a good thing); Friday night - party in a bar in Soho to celebrate west end transfer of a play directed by a 'friend' of mine (pay £6 on the door to buy expensive drinks in a room full of people all trying to work out who's famous); Saturday - Tennyson Society service in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, followed by lunch and a visit to the Dickens (yawn) museum on Doughty Street; then out for a chinese meal with the Bloke; Sunday - light shopping in Ealing, and my second parking ticket of the week :o(. I am not going out this week!
[pen] Going out just causes more problems than it solves, in my experience. And oddly, I've just remembered we have nothing defrosted for dinner. Curses.
[nights] I have a blog called : "So What Are you Having For Tea Tonight?" which is meant to address that problem, but I haven't written enough of it yet.
[nights] Can't you just stick something in the microwave? Or get a takeaway.
[penelope] Was the Ealing trip to seek out/purchase a light? Or do you have varying degrees of shopping gravitas? And you should avoid parking illegally, IMHO.
[Phil] We didn't KNOW we were parking illegally! The sign was tiny, high up and camouflaged against adjacent scaffolding. And I have various degrees of shopping gravitas. In fact, I bought a test-piece of cookware - a black Columbian earthenware pot that can be used on the hob or in the oven. I have to 'season' (or do I mean 'temper'?) it tonight by boiling water in it for half an hour in the oven, to stop it being so porous. Lord knows how that works.
[pen] I do sincerely hope you didn't get the two parking tickets at the same place ;-) Seriously though, aren't there yellow lines and so on in your area?
Phil, I'm not daft. I got one last weekend in Notting Hill due to lying naked on a couch still having a very expensive facial at the time the parking ticket ran out, and another in Ealing on Sunday due to parking on a single yellow line on a Sunday afternoon. Anywhere other than London, Sunday afternoons on a single yellow would be OK, wouldn't they?
four
Do I spy candles on the MC5 logo? *brings out a cake *

Since the parking came under the council here the interpretations have become very strict and a lucrative income stream. The FM manager of our office is going to bring in a clamping policy for unauthorised parking in allocated staff areas, I can see trouble ahead. Our council members tend to see themselves above such policies, no smoking in Civic Buildings inc meeting rooms and private offices seems not to apply to them only officers and members of the public.
Fork handles
The number of candles may be misleading - the site doesn't celebrate its 4th birthday until Jan 16th.

I, on the other hand, ...

Candles
I think someone has vandalised your menora rab. :o) MHROTD.
Happy Birthday rab
Drat - just missed saying it on the day itself
Unkempt
[Sierra, Chalky] Thanks.

More flat-based excitement this morning. The electricity went off during Mrs-rab-to-be's shower, which I thought was just a generic power cut since no fuses had tripped in our fusebox. A note of warning was sounded by the fact that our neighbour across the way wasn't experiencing any trouble, nor had anyone else called Scottish Power when I phoned them. The chap's been out and I'm told that the supply cable from the distribution box in the stairwell to our fuse box exploded as a result of too much load imposed on it by our shower (of all things - I would have thought the oven were more power-hungry). We were lucky it didn't cause a fire or disrupt the whole street's supply. Apparently it's all due to the fact that the previous owners (or their electrician) didn't inform Scottish Power that extra capacity would be needed when they did up the bathroom. There's quite a lot of things they didn't seem to do well, humph.

birthday shower
[Rab] Happy Belated Birthday... and commis for your water/electricity woes. You'll just have to boil up a few pans of water and take a bath together :o)
(rab) I think showers take 10 kW, or about 40 amps, which is a lot. With a 10-kW oven you could start a cottage indusry smelting iron ore.
Exploding Cables
[rab] They didn't find the homonculus you made from bits of dead bodies in the cellar or the high-voltage equipment needed to reanimate it then?
Good to see that the legendary Scottish parsimony extends to the current carrying capacity of domestic wiring. "Just enough and nae morrrrrrre, d'ye ken?".
[Rosie] Yes, 40A would cause quite a glow...

[SMike] Nice theory, but I suspect it has more to do with the fact that the electrics probably haven't been upgraded since they were installed. I estimate that this would have been around about the time that electricity was invented, given that the block was erected in 1897.

1897
Presumably the wiring spec was predicated on the widespread use of the household Wimshurst Machine to make up the difference for those high-current spinning wheels and so forth.
High amperage
In America the current per watt would be at least twice what it is here and the said shower would take nearly 90 amps. The wires would need to have four times the cross-sectional area. I suppose they know this. It does have the advantage of being safer, at least in one aspect.
Hi all (and everyone else)
Brief and forced hiatus there. Nothing to worry about, moving up to university for my second year. All very exciting. Now living in the delightful town of Royal Leamington Spa, and after around a month there's finally internet in our household.
[Tuj]Good to see you back, and good luck and enjoy your second year
Best bit of spam yet
I'm emailing you today to request a link exchange between our website and yours. I found your website by searching Google for Nail Fungus. I think our websites have a similar theme to your's, so I am interested in exchanging links.
If I wanted to find out about Nail Fungus, I can't think of a better place to go.
Tuj] Welcome back too. Whereabouts in Leam? I grew up in Warwick and went to school in Leam. One of the first places outside the big cities to have curry houses back in the early 70s, doncherknow.
Names
I hope this won't offend, but I would like to know how to pronounce the names "Tuj" and "Irouléguy" properly. Please excuse if this breaks etiquette in some way.
[Sierra] ih-RULE-eh-GEE (hard G, primary stress on RULE). I'm not sure about Tuj but most people at pilgs say "Tudge" (thus revealing that we talk about you non-attendees behind your backs).
[SM] Yes, I'd go "tudge", though oddly most people I'd talk to who've seen the name have the first instinct "toozh" (vowel like "smooth" consonant like "pleasure". Irouléguy's a good one to learn - daft as I am I initially thought it was a bizarre variation on naming himself "I rule" Guy.
[Darren] Oh dear oh dear. I'd hate to think what.
[Irouléguy] South Leam, Brunswick Street. Lovely part of the world, though I haven't tested any curries yet.
[Inkers] Thanks very much!
SM] Mine's from a French appelation controllée.
Tuj] It wasn't daft. A lot of people thought that until I got the chance to explain it at a pilg.
There's a number of decent pubs on the Radford Road, but I don't know south Leam otherwise - I did most of my drinking in town and north Leam. If you get over to Warwick, the Zetland in Church Street is a lovely boozer.
[Irouléguy] I may have been the only person to recognize the AC, and guess the pronunciation :-) I'd be interested to know if anyone else did.
BANG!
What I did at the weekend. Recording thanks to Pave's cameraphone.
[Phil, Irouléguy] I didn't spot the appelation controllée; I don't even know what one is.
[Knobbly] It's a system the French use for wines which ensures that only wine made in a particular place (or in a particular way) can bear a particular name. The most famous example is Champagne.
[Tuj] I would automatically say Toozh, although there's a vague sense in my head that it could be a to-eye (but not quite like that, sort of using the Russian "bI" sound, where the "j" implies palatisation.
Er, in fact like the second person in Russian.)
[Phil] I based an AVMA on I's AC quite a while ago. I'm quite sure INJ knows it as well.

[tuj] Toodge, in my head.
jiff
I read 'tuj' as tudge. But then again everyone knows I talk funny.
twee
Iroul's AC I vaguely recognised, though I don't think I've ever drunk it. 'Tuj' is 'tudge' for me (unless it's 'tüy')
I'm the funniest, sothere
[flerdle] You talk funny? This is how I pronounce "Tuj". (Sorry about the format. I tried converting it to mp3 but then it turned into scratchy silence.)
(Néa) Real Player comes up but just sits there, doing nothing. Any ideas? (flerdle) No funnier than me because that's how I say it.
Names
[Tuj, Irouléguy] Thanks. Sorry if that seemed dense. I had been hearing them as "Toy" and "I rule a gye". Thank Jod we didn't meet yet.
[Rosie] No, I don't know - I opened that file in Quicktime. Does this work?
[Néa] It works for me :-)
Crikey, three arbitrary letters and so many different pronunciations! And is it just me who thinks Néa's sounds like someone spitting?
(Néa) It does. I'm going to play it all night. You are the Scandinavian Charlotte Green. (I hope that means something to you). :-)
(Tuj) Arbitrary? You mean your real name is Herbert?
[Rosie] As in Spotty Herbert? Not Herbert but yes to the arbitrary. If you sift some of the conversations we've had about name anagramming I'm sure you could find what it is.
Charlotte Green is me!
[Rosie] It does, and I'm deeply touched :-)
Herbaceous
(Tuj) There's a difference between being a herbert and being a Herbert. Fain would I suggest you were the former, or now, the latter, even. Where are these conversations? Are they in Another Place, or Mc-Eye-oss, as I call it?
Nice to see MC5 back!
[Darren] Indeed!
[Rosie, belatedly] I believe somewhere far up this very page, though probably on the Scots Ios also.
Out(r)age
Sorry for the outages. The server suffers mysterious reboots, up to two a day, and for no reason we can discern. Usually it comes back up again automatically, but sometimes it doesn't - usually when the person with the reboot password is on holiday or something. That's what happened this weekend. We're trying to arrange a test of the hardware (which we don't physically have access to - in fact, I'm not even sure I know where it is) to see what's going on.
Rats!
That was me, by the way.
[rab] I think we knew that - and I had thought to myself rab wouldn't be so careless as to name himself 'rat' so it must be some sort of subtle post-modern ironic thingy equating to that saying 'the first rat to desert the sinking ship' - not that MC5 is, or even was, a sinking ship, I hasten to add, but it just might have seemed like that to you and others who expend their valuable time keeping it all afloat so when it went down, so to speak, you may have imagined that it looked as though you were sort of deserting it, in a manner of speaking ... Is that too too much? Perhaps I ought to shut up now ....
(Chalky) Do you realise that you have just posted the longest sentence in the Morniverse? Would it be indelicate to suggest a degree of insobriety?
[Rosie] I'd venture, before we make any such suggestion regarding Chalky, to suggest that we first need to establish beyond what I can only call a reasonable level of doubt that she has indeed posted what you have called the very longest sentence that has been seen in the Morniverse, or whether, by virtue of an insufficiency of time, you have been unable to research for yourself the quite startlingly good game we played quite some time ago now - but there it is: the history of the great game as played online becomes lengthier by the day - of a variant of MC, which is most commonly referred to as Long-Winded Crescent, having established which, and assuming our conclusion to be the latter, I could do no better, I feel, than to refer you to that most masterly achievement - in particular the contributions made by the much-missed Watty - and perhaps even, were it not for a want of time on my own part, suggest a new round of the same.
[Rosie] Not so m'dear - just a feeble attempt at stream-of-consciousness-posting. Silly stuff really :-)
[Projoy] Excellent idea
Prolixity
(Projoy) Brilliant Victoriana! L-WC must be before my timeI'll believe you.:-) here - I'll look it up. (Chalky) Mm, no spelling mistakes, so
What happened there? "I'll believe you. :-)" should be at the end, not stuck in the middle. Do you believe me?
Maybe it just jumpsTuj
Make ways
[Projoy]LWMC came to an end before I can across !York but was still much talked about, and would welcome a revival the only black cloud on the horizon is I feel that such a game that requires forethought and patience to create the moves I wonder whether todays players have the stamina. The games that appear to be popular are those that can be played with a quick visit play a short one liner or couple of games then off elsewhere. Games that require thought are few, I hazard the when AVMA clue disappears off the page and goes off the page into the second page involvement drops off to one or two plus the setter. I would very much like to be wrong and for LWMC to be a success played by more than three players after the first week. "MC Works on the Tracks" can be killed off to make way.
Anyone got a link into the archives for it, then?
here
Yes? Looking at it reminded me of the DaveK Massacre. Dark days.
You can post links on this site, you know.
let's see if this works...
You meant here and its continuation here, I think. Or go to the Yorkives from the front page of mc5, sort by game names, and go to L. They're the ones with the obvious titles. I think there were only the two bits, but am happy to be corrected on that.
How curious; Tuj's link didn't work and after I posted mine it did. Anyway, them's the ones.
Hmmm. Might I suggest this game be revived after NaNoWriMo finishes, since some of us will be directing our wordiness in that direction for the month of November?
[flerdle] You must have caught Tuj's link in the few seconds I was converting it from just being written as plain text to a proper link, and getting it wrong in the process...
[rab] ahhhhh, i see...
[rab] You mean you sit there behind my computer checking everything that everyone writes and mending it where necessary? How diligent!
[rab] Hmm, how I forgot to put that as a link I'm not sure. I think I was just excited about visiting the !Yorkives again. Thanks for the fix.
Anyway, I think I was thinking of flerdle's second link primarily. But I'd back Darren's suggestion, as we can also bring games to a more natural end.
I saw hundreds of real, live Greengrocer's Apostrophe's in the greengrocer's at lunch time today. There is no danger of extinction there.
Greengrocer's Apostrophe's
[penelope] I understand what you mean by the term, but how did the phenomenon come to be called that? Is it a British phrase?
British phrase's
(SM) As far as I know it is. Are you from the America's or possibly The Antipode's? It arose because greengrocers often advertise their wares with the extraneous apostrophe, thus: Tomato's, potato's, cabbage's etc etc. Simple as that.
Continuing my tour of traditional British establishments this evening, some colleagues and I ventured out to play Bingo at a big Bingo Hall in Slough (not far from Slough Bus Station which features in the opening credits of 'The Office'). We got hostile stares from the regulars... we played two games (£5 very quickly spent, in my opinion, but we could have picked up £15,000 on one national game) and left to go mand find something to eat. But I have to say, the staff who explained how to play before we went in were great, and gracefully accepted our apologies for calling out two false alarms when we thought we'd won, as we made out early exit. It's a bloody complicated game, Bingo. Next office outing is either horse racing, or to the dogs in Walthamstow ;o)
(pen) Bingo? The dogs? Can't fool me - you're posh, really, aren't you? :-)
[Rosie] Coming to that conclusion, yes :o(
Tuj, flerdle] There's also this .
Clocking in
Just posting this to see what time the server thinks it is.
mild gloat
I'm very happy and wanted a little gloat. Hope you'll excuse me! I was given a diamond this morning. Necklace, not ring (would be too soon I feel). Very small, but its a diamond! No one has ever given me one before! No occasion. Just cos he loves me. Its nice to be loved. I'll shut up now.
sparkling
How could you be so heartless to accept it, Lib? That's probably the poor bloke's drinking-money-for-a-week now suspended from your neck. Soppy blokes - honestly!
(Dujon) Maybe your drinking money for a week. I wouldn't presume to know. :-)
[Lib] I am not so chauvenistic. Congratulations, your first girl's best friend.
MCIOS down
Can't get anything to go in though Preview works. Anybody know what's happened?
It's down now. I'm not sure what the problem is. Disk error, perhaps. This may be serious. I'm connected but there's not much I can do. I'll let you know.
Curiouser-er
That was really odd. The disk was in a peculiar state and very few commands functioned. Notably, I couldn't reboot it using any of the usual commands. (It's in a locked machine room at a colocation facility three miles from here and it's after 11:00 at night so pushing the button was not an option.) I did manage to force it into a reboot state somewhat more directly, and it came back promptly with everything seemingly fine. I'm doing an unscheduled backup now since today's didn't have a chance to occur at its normal time.
MCIOS
(Dan) Working OK now. Thanks, as ever.
Blue skies
Cold snap this morning with ice on the car, cross my fingers that this will remind the grass to stop growing.
Brrrr
I'm glad there was a frost today too. I'm hoping it'll make the slugs that terrorise my rabbit and eat her food go away. I've tried beertraps but the rabbit knocks them over and drinks the beer!
Cold snap
It's distinctly cold here in sunny Bath too - but then, this is why November is my favourite month!
Dodgy climatology
(nights) Dec, Jan, Feb and March are all colder than Nov, the last two sunnier as well.
ah but ... those particular months aren't adorned with spectacular autumnal colours. I'm with nights on this one.
Early November is my M's birthday... and since my father died, she and I have celebrated it by taking a city holiday to do the galleries and museums - Venice, Florence, Rome - and this year, Paris. On Wednesday for five days. I like November too :oD
Ooh, Paris in November. Sounds amazing. Have a magnificent time. After my exam I'm going to a health spa with my Mum, and she's paying! Hurrah! Send a postcard to the crescent if you can!
Autumn leaves
(Chalky) Yeah, OK, but it's still pretty well all green here ATM. Most leaves have hardly changed colour let alone fallen off the trees, probably due to the very warm and rather wet Sept/Oct. Climatological analysis shows that we should start trying to get used to this sort of thing.
I'm really going to miss Autumn.
Don't worry, nights, you'll get over her. Change your working hours to something a little more sociable and you'll find someone else in no time.
Chortle, chortle.
* hibernates for the next 4 months *
*decides she's done the "I hate the darkness" spiel sufficiently often for people to be as tired of it as she is of the dark*
Darkness
Talking of darkness, there was apparently a major power blackout across Europe last night, centred on Cologne in Germany. Given that's precisely where I was at the time, and furthermore, that I returned on a 10am flight with only 30mins delay, and only found out about it once I'd got back to the UK suggests either that I am, truly, the least observant person the world has ever seen, that the Germans know how to handle a crisis, or that I'm actually going mad. I shudder to think what effect such an event would have had on British transportation.
oh to be migratory
I'd send you the extra daylight I've got from all this daylight saving thing down here, but I think you'd have to come and get it yourselves, as it sort of deteriorates in the post. Only nat has taken up the offer so far, but I'm sure I could find some extra hammocks somewhere if need be. And Pounds (Euros etc) can buy a lot of Ozzie Dollas.
(rab) The power cut was attributed in some places to the cold weather, which is nonsense, and people just jumping on the Global Warming bandwagon. Don't forget that all departures from average of more than one microkelvin are caused by Global Warming and on this account we should be Very Afraid. From what you say the power cut was not as widespread as media reports suggested. Well, I never!
Hot under the collar
[rab] Yes, it was even reported here in a few pars of my local paper. 30 minutes downtime - THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGH. Mind you I wouldn't like to have been stuck in a lift for that length of time. Kudos to the bloke/sheila who hit the button to get it all on line again.
[Rosie] I love it when journalist highlight the fact that something is the hottest/coldest since 1912 (or summat). I love it even more when they start averaging averages. Aargh.
(Dujon) Nothing average about November here so far; 6 consecutive sunny days, almost unheard of and well over half the month's normal meagre ration. It's all horizontal, of course, making driving impossible in certain directions and furthermore, shines in my window, waking me up far too early and showing up all the dust. But you can see the sky at night, which is great. Unbelievably (to most) there is still a Drought Order in East Surrey even though it's been pretty wet recently because the water has not yet replenished the aquifers. It won't have done, because the deficit was huge.
Hmmm....
According to the only report I can find that mentions it, the power cut was at about 10pm CET and lasted about half an hour. I think this would have been as I was walking back to my hotel from a concert - but even then I think I would have noticed an absence of street lighting... How very curious,
Greengrocer's Apostrophe's
Not exactly apropos but I thought you might be amused by a notice I saw in the window of my local Costcutters, thus:
"Get your freshly roasted chicken sold here".
Not quite what I meant
(Kim) Similarly, in Whitehorse Road, Croydon, there are notices informing us of the presence of "Traffic Enforcement Cameras" which seem to be saying "There WILL be traffic; we will enforce it; Don't you DARE not drive along this road. If you turn off down Gloucester Road we'll 'ave you." The funny thing is that there are no speed cameras, not that it makes much difference what with the parked cars, buses, traffic lights and pizza delivery boys with their blithe incompetence.
You could ask him over
Apologies
...for spurious entries - am sidegrading some stuff elsewhere on the server and want to make sure this site is unaffected.
Just out of interest, why is there a page that doesn't convey much information about the site on www.rab.org.uk? It's as if you don't want to let people in who don't think to add '/mc' on the end.
Front page
(i) Time; (ii) Googling my real name finds the front page and I'm not keen on advertising to my bosses how much time I spend on such frivolity.
Morning everyone. Lack of chat. What's the state of play?
"today we have stating of play .."
Hi pen :-)

OK here goes:

Banter Game - predict it will burst into activity now you've asked the question

Regurgitated Cheddars - disappearing up its own jacksy [as per usual] although Kim's recent contribution may spawn some interesting responses

AVMA Take 2 - Clever Raak has just slipped in there and beaten Irouléguy to the correct answer. Looks set for a new challenge so a possible frenzy of posting in the next 24 hours?

Cleri Who's Who - trundling along nicely. Time for someone to introduce a new one. That might be me if I get there in time.

Pea & Honey Recipes - is just awaiting a killer last line on the latest ditty.

Each Move Must Consist Of .. - zut alors!

AVMA PART 2 - has had a record number of entries since the First of November. That's because we all love telling lies.

MC Works On The Tracks - has gone very quiet. Perhaps there's a power failure.

The Obligatory Limericks - yay! Is about to launch into a classic cartoons fest. Hope everyone joins in. :-)

Concerning Torments - Pill Weng Lay
"Eleven and a half hours later"
Ah well - it seems that all the games are moving along nicely - except this one. Come on you lot! Talk to us.:-)
What do you want me to say?
(Chalky) You OK these days? I get the impression you are. :-)
[Rosie] H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y!
[and yes, thanks, I'm definitely on the mend]
[Chalky] Good to hear.
[Rosie] Happy Birthday, young man :o)
[Chalks] Pleased to hear it - and thank you for doing the run-down. What I actually meant was 'what's the state of play in everyone's lives?' Mine's OK, Paris was great but came back with a rotten cold which has made this week miserable. I'm looking forward to a weekend at home, most of it spent lounging in bed with my laptop, and the rest perhaps grappling with some severe pruning in the garden. I am going to roast a chicken too. All welcome.
[pen] Ouch. Hope you have a relaxing, restorative weekend. I'm still doing the study, not always successfully; saw the "Earth from the Air" exhibition last weekend (fabulous), as well as wandered around St Kilda (can anyone say "cake shops"?), bought a hat, looked at Luna Park but didn't go on any rides because it costs $7 a pop; and turned 30 for the sixth time. There were around 7 small hailstorms on Tuesday. I am growing peas, silverbeet and tomatoes. Apart from that, not much is happenning. OH, except that nat arrives on Monday, if she survives Syderney.
[flerdle and pen] Thanks. And sorry pen - I was being a bit facetious mainly because I had nothing of interest to say. Although .. I suppose I could have bored everyone rigid with tales of hospital procedures, ill-behaved sixteen year olds, cars that die on the dual carriageway because the alternator has packed in, etc etc. Am also looking forward to a stress-free weekend.
[Rosie] Happy Birthday! *raises glass*
[Chalks] Glad you're on the mend. Sixteen year olds are quite a handful so good luck with that!
As for me, well, I'm throughly fed up revising for an exam which costs seven hundred quid to take, only 30% of the people pass it, has more content than my finals did and I'm working junior doctor crazy hours. The exams in 18 days or something. And it doesn't get much better if I pass it, cos then the second part is at the end of Jan and is a day trip to London for personal humiliation. Sigh. But on the whole I'm quite happy!
Felicitations
(Ladies) Thank you all very much. I too raise a glass. It's embarrassing - I got presents from both my nieces. I hope they don't think I'm now some impoverished old dodderer because that's hardly the case. They're just v. nice and can say things to Uncle T that they couldn't say to Dad. (Lib) Why on earth does it cost £700 to sit an exam? Don't they want qualified people? *scratches head*.
Plonk
[Rosie] Many happies.

We had the window fitter come round to talk astragals and snib fasteners on Wednesday, should have nice new, thermally insulated and (hopefully) draught-free windows fitted at the beginning of December. We're currently trying not to get too carried away with booking our honeymoon, as it looks like it would be very easy to spend a lot of money that we won't have once the windows have been sorted, and we've got round to reversing the damage done to the flat by the previous occupants... But the boiler is fixed, at long last.

I'm also finally getting around to writing a lecture course I'm giving in January. Hopefully all this will still leave me time to do the work for and write and a paper for a suitably high-prestige journal (looking ahead to RAE next autumn). What fun.

Busy and expensive, rab. Good luck with all.

Is anyone able to explain to me why pizzas are so expensive? I've not partaken of one of these overpriced pieces of *&%^$ for years but it still puzzles me. Around my part of the woods a small pizza seems to average out around the AUD20 mark - sans delivery - (that's about £8 in UK money). Heaven only knows what a family size would be. For about AUD5 (£2) I can purchase a hearty steak sandwich including lettuce, beetroot, egg and tomato as a take-away. For the price of a pizza I could have a slap up meal and a schooner of beer at my local club.
(Dujon) Could be that they were once fashionable and originally the sellers could charge what they liked. They are maintaining the fiction that they cost a lot to make (simply can't be true) and people fall for it. It's distressing easy to relieve people of money - I've even seen people buying bottles of water but maybe their mains supply has been cut off and dehydration, especially in our climate, is an insidious and dangerous condition to be avoided at all costs.
pizza
They're about $7 or $8 down the road, for "large" (8 slices). Possibly $10 for maximum toppings. Sounds like it's your area, Dujon.
Forgetfulness
*happybirthdays to flerdle and Rosie and then to flerdle again*
The best pizza ever
Best pizza ever was 3 euros, from a scruffy cafe in Herculano, a suburb of Naples. My mother and I had thoroughly examined the Roman ruins in the old town of Herculaneum, which was destroyed by the same volcano that did for Pompeii. However, instead of being covered with hot ash, it was covered with a mudslide, which preserved the internal decorations of the villas - I have some fab photos of the murals and wall decorations, which are still very, very clear. Anyway, we passed this cafe on the way back to the train, argued with the patron to sit inside (I think he thought we looked like we could afford to sit outside, where they add a premium to the price of your meal)and had just the freshest, tastiest, thinnest crusty pizza ever. And paid less than 10 euros for two people, with drinks.
Oooh, flerdle, another gong! Happy Birthday :o)
(Néa) Don't quite follow that. Has flerdle had two birthdays in quick succession? Tempus fugit, certainly, but surely not that fast.
Don't laugh, these are famous last words
Is there anywhere in the Morniverse where we discuss current series of ISIHAC when they're on?
(Tuj) You naughty boy, you nicked that from Humph in tonight's show, where it had a certain resonance. It doesn't seem we actually discuss the show very much. Maybe it's just bad form to do so rather like middle-aged jazz fans not actually talking about (or even listening to) the music they're hearing but preferring to exchange jazz-related gossip, news, who's good, who's crap, who's playing where etc. The actual raison d'être for the yakking is taken for granted in both cases.
[Tuj] Some of us don't think the show is much good. The fact that I haven't actually listened to the show since before you were born is irrelevant to this observation.
There's a show?
[Rosie] Not stolen, quoted as a preface... Nice to see it wasn't just me listening! Your reasoning is pretty much what I expected... less so CdM, but then one can't argue with the old "before you were born" argument... Might as well start saying "things were better in my day" (which mind you gets by with less justification).
[SM] A popular outlet for the game of Mornington Crescent is the long-running BBC radio prgramme I'm Sorry, I Haven't A Clue. It's currently available through the BBC's listen again service, which is smashing.
(Tuj) Parts of the show don't always work but I suspend my critical faculties, remembering that the whole thing is a kind of in-joke, like Red Dwarf or Blake's Seven. But other parts have me creased with laughter. How does CdM know how old you are? Is he your Dad or sunnink?
Blimey!
It's 14.45 here, and it's dark already - due to very heavy rainclouds, I suspect, but it's very, very gloomy for this time of day. Incidentally, I drove around the Crescent at around midnight last night. I thought I saw the ghost of Willie Rushton crossing the road in front of me.
[Rosie] Probably working off the fact I mentioned starting my second year of university not long ago. Maybe? As far as I know CdM is not my father... but you never know...
(Tuj) Ah, so you're about 20. Such bliss! (pen) Same here. I put the light on at half two, expecting the end of the world meteorologically but no, bit of rain, bit breezy, mild, boring. It's about time we had an event which I can go on and on about.
[Rosie] A good 7 months 'til I'm that venerable ;)
Terribly gloomy weather today here in the Midlands. Sitting listening to Test Match Special, ah what bliss.
Wales Vs New Zealand
Good weather on the 5 day forecast for round here over the weekend, so will probably do a trip to Westonbirt. I'll be avoiding the Ashes and watching the second match between England and South Africa to see whether the win by England was a flash in the pan. World Cup next September and still rebuilding the team.
[Tuj] I knew your approximate age from long before that -- I think you identified yourself as 16 or 17 when you first started posting, didn't you? And I wasn't trying to make a serious "before you were born" argument. I used to listen to the show about 25 years ago, and thought it was only moderately funny. I haven't listened since, since I wasn't in radio range, and haven't bothered since these new-fangled internets came along. So my comment was supposed to be mainly tongue-in-cheek: that it is perhaps ridiculous of me to comment on the quality of the show when it is so long since I have heard it. On the other hand, nothing I have heard quoted at any of these sites actually makes me think it is any better than it used to be.
[CdM] I actually found it genuinely interesting to make such a "before you were born" statement. I have a feeling I identified myself as 14 the first time I posted... 5 years ago come April. How very very peculiar. Anyway... aren't you tempted to give it a listen from time to time?
[CdM] Odd question perhaps, but why did you get involved in the online MC sites if you don't like the show? (For what it's worth, I do like it and listen to it a lot.)
[Tuj] Genuinely interesting how? It was, as I said, meant tongue-in-cheek -- I thought it was pretty funny when I realized that it was indeed before you were born that I last listened to the show, and so I couldn't resist the chance to play the old fogey. And is it really five years since you started posting?? Wow. I definitely remember when you first showed up.

[Darren] I think we are funnier than they are. :-) (The one time I don't like these sites very much is when people simply use them as an excuse to recycle old jokes/monty python skits/etc. I think that the original humor that people create here is, at its best, really impressive.) Also, I prefer the active participation to passive listening.
Ageing
I'm not trying to think how long I've been pottering around the crescent. I think its about four years.... I don't really listen to the show as I forget its on, and I don't participate much as I'm really not that amusing. But I do appreciate other people's fine wit and wisdom.
[CdM] I don't know, I'm easily pleased I guess! And I apologise profusely for whatever you remember me for, as it's a fairly safe bet it wasn't anything amusing. I'd sum up myself the same way Lib does, except a bit longer time, listen a bit more and am much less amusing.
[Tuj] Gosh Tuj, you are having a bit of a crisis of confidence, with your comments elsewhere and here. Hope you're all right. *hug* I think you're very amusing and witty. But in my opinion that's why the crescent is great. There are a lot of witty people around who all appreciate the finer puns in life, some who realise how witty they are and others who do not. All together it makes a good mix.
Am I being over sentimental today? Hmmm.
[Néa] Thanks. :-)
Off to Sydney for a week. yay, I think.
[Lib] No, you're being a kind sweetie, as always!
[CdM] I tend to think that ISIHAC is funnier on average than these sites, but that these sites achieve far more impressive things (like Stratford-on-Crescent). [Tuj] I remember you as being nascently witty and very mature at fourteen. Certainly more so than I was at that age. I've always been rather grateful that there was no web until I was about nineteen. God knows what gaucheness I should have committed to amber otherwise. :)
Wibble
I always feel that my attitude to the Internet must be similar to that of my grandparents to, say, television, in that since it didn't exist until I was over the age of 18, that its somehow unsuitable for minors.
[Tuj] What Projoy said.
The er, internet thingy
(rab) I think a more prevalent attitude among older people is that the Internet, far from being unsuitable for minors, is in fact suitable only for these youngsters, who are suckers for any new technology. I don't agree with this view and think the Internet has now become something extremely useful for people of all ages and you all know how old I am. One less agreeable feature it has revealed is the large number of people who cannot marshal their thoughts into a coherent written form and are frankly a bit stupid. That's the price we pay for Extreme Democracy, but it's worth it.
ISIHAC
This site is an ISIHAC spin-off and is not meant to be the live show, which is both greater and lesser than the Morniverse, as Projoy implies. For instance, I think The Game Of Mornington Crescent only works live (like Pick-up Song) and attempts to reproduce it here lack the edge of ISIHAC. But other games (and the chat) are great and much more suited to the written word.
Today's news
Saw Casino Royale in Holloway last night. Pretty good - entertaining - which is the least I'd expect. Inexplicably dizzy this morning - I think this long running cold is affecting my ears. Also got an invitation to a N Yorks cocktail party (pint of bitter with a cherry in it) to be held just before Christmas from some friends I haven't seen for months, if not years, which was lovely. And there are still three unopened packets of biscuits in the office, which is good, because I'm flat out this week. :o)
Windows
We're getting our windows installed next week.
*Disdains weak joke about computer software.*
winders
[Rab] Wonderful. Have you thought about venetian blinds?
Just remember, if it wasn't for blinds, it'd be curtains for all of us.
*groans* so you don't have to
[Rosie] I considered asking them if they'd install MacOS instead...

[pen] We're not keen on venetian blinds - currently that's what we've got in the bedroom and it's horrible. Getting curtains made instead, whee.

Blinds
[rab] Did you consider vertical blinds with a pattern of ducks on them? Then you would have duck blinds.
New windows being fitted right now! At least, I hope the new ones fit in the hole that's just been opened...
Nice new windows, yay! More coming on Monday.
Hurrah!
Although I'm a bit concerned about the weather forecast...
Pardon me for barging in like this, but thought I'd mention that MCiOS is down and will remain down until at least midday today (Sunday 3 Dec). Apologies for the inconvenience.
It aten't dead yet...
Er, ignore that. Imagined this was MCiOS for some reason.
Okay, she ees back. Sorry and all that. Congratulations on the windows. Useful for defenestration purposes windows are, ye carn't defenestrate sans fenêtres y'know. By the way, given that I don't know what your place looks like, will a mental image of the flat from Shallow Grave serve? That's sort of my mental placeholder for Edinburgh dwellings.
(Oh, in case you haven't seen/can't remember it, the flat in that film was super awesome, like. Just in case it sounded like I was saying something negative because, like, I wasn't and stuff.) (Oh, and my wife made the curtains for the back of our house and they're really nice.)
Not quite as grand as the one on Shallow Grave - imagine one scaled down so as to be affordable by a junior academic and environmental consultant. I'll stick some pics up when the windows are done.
*tries the 'If it wasn't for venetian blinds, it'd be curtains for all of us' joke one more time.*
I'd don't get it. I mean, there's roller blinds as well, for one thing.
On the other hand, with a pencil and some paper you can simply draw your curtains.
Desperation
For the sake of keeping this going I hereby announce that I have had 68 mm rain this month, about three-quarters of the normal monthly total, and it's getting a bit squelchy. There's a lot more to come but fortunately up here we're unfloodable (almost).
merci buckets
Thanks Rosie. I *was* actually wondering if this December had been wetter than average or not. And I also wondered if the aquifers were filling up. If they're not, I'm going to give my hosepipe away.
new game?
Sometime just before November and NaNoWriMo, a game of Long Winded Crescent was suggested. There is a slot available ideal for the game and one which I never had the pleasure to play first time round.
The tornado in London shook people up, distance from the smoke being all, the 20 or so properties stuck in mid Wales last week did not register with the headline makers.
Wetter
We're having lots of rain. I haven't measured it, but we're not supposed to have *any* rain in December. :-(
Hmmm
Fairly dry here, though I note Sunday is supposed to be wet and windy. One weather site is suggesting winds of 21mph, another (the BBC) 35mph. I note that 35kph=21mph, so I'm hoping the BBC has made a metric-imperial error...
(pen) If it carries on like this it'll be an extraordinarily wet month, but extrapolation based merely on the first week is always a bit fanciful. It has been quite a bit wetter south of London than to the north this time. The aquifers take a long time to fill up and are still quite low, I believe. When there's a long wet spell our local Bourne flows, the last time being in December 2000 when it shut the A22 at Whyteleafe for 3 weeks. There was sewage in it as well. It's hardly the Mississippi but it seemed quite beyond the local council to do anything about it.
(rab) You're in Edinburgh, are you not? 35 mph (force 7) looks about right from a look at the forecast synoptic chart. (Néa) The latest from GFS (American computer model) suggests that the lowest temperature in Stockholm in the next week will be 3°C and you will have yet more molten snow. I know that this is most unusual. The info comes from a German weather site called wetter3, oxymoronic in English if said in German, if you see what I mean.
la la la
Lovely and warm and dry here. The fruit trees are laden with ripening fruit and the vege patch is loaded. The roma tomatoes look particularly fine. Will have to bribe someone to look after it all over the Christmas-NewYear break (we're heading north, unfortunately). Any takers? Must prepare to be seriously confused about the Orstrayan Chrissie (sunny, hot, lack of snow and log fires, sun in wrong place, moon upside down, etc).
Forecast here for today (Sat.) is warm - around the 30ºC mark. We even had some rain overnight, a whole 0.7mm. It's probably already evaporated. Good luck with the fires down south, flerdle, we had our turn a couple of weeks ago. Most of them were up the mountains from me - probably 20Km or so - but we did have the choppers water bombing an outbreak just a few hundred metres away for a while. Probably an arsonist or carelessness on someone's part as we haven't had any lightning. Sydney's water supply is getting perilously low; last figures I saw indicated around the 38% level. This is not good when 4 to 5 million people rely on it. The long term prognosis for decent rain is not good so I guess we'll have to move to even tighter water restrictions. My wife, who's the gardner in our family, will not be impressed.
s/gardner/gardener.
[Dujon] The fires are a long way from the city (over in the east and northeast of the state), but the smoke is here. The forecast temperature for today in some of those areas is 39°C.
What does she grow, Dujon? I do vegetables because they're interesting and edible, and the fruit trees are just part of the place; the fruit is a bonus. If we're serious about water conservation in Aus, all dwellings should have tanks (like they used to), water-efficient appliances and greywater recycling systems, and as little lawn as possible; until then, I have little patience for complaints about water restrictions. Some of the more basic water restrictions are just common sense, such as not watering in the heat of the day. Unfortunately, renters (about 1/3 of households here) have no say in what their dwelling has, as the owners usually couldn't give a
Hidden textfig
about it.
[flerdle] For ourselves, at least as far as vegetables go, not all that much. A few tomato plants, parsley, beans and the like; no spuds or other root stock (though she's been threatened with such - by me). The only fruit we have is one of each of Lemon, Orange and Grapefruit trees. When we bought the place a few years ago they were dreadful looking excuses for citrus trees but a little TLC and they are now bearing quite well. The rest is shared between her 'garden' stuff and her interest in rearing native plants. 'Tis not unusual to have a couple of thousand tube stock around the place. These vary from seedlings to 'ready to plant' stock. Oh joy, oh joy, carting around a watering can to keep them all satisfied and looking perky. I'd love a water tank, I really would, but cost and the lack of water makes it somewhat unlikely at the moment. Still 'n all I only have a shower once a week so that should make up for some of my infelicity. ;-(
*mutter, mutter* At least they're not going on about the bloody cricket.
What cricket? oh, THAT cricket...
[Rosie] Tough luck :-)
[Dujon] Commiserations. What does she do with it all? My vege patch is only about 3 sq m, possibly extendable by another 2 sq m if I ever get the time and energy (hah!). I'm still working out what grows here and what doesn't, and what the new pests are. Earwigs love silverbeet, it seems.
Howzat?
[flerdle] It's amazing what can be grown in a relatively small area of a garden so I reckon the extra couple of square metres would be worth cultivating. While a couple of thousand tube stock sounds a lot, they too don't take up all that much space. The tubes sit in trays each of which holds 40 tubes and are about 400mm x 250mm (approx.).
What she does with them is a long story but, in essence, she is custodian of some of the stock of a local (Katoomba) wildplant rescue service.
Earwigs and silverbeet? It sounds an unlikely combination - isn't Mother Nature wonderful?
There you go, Rosie, not a mention of our evening noise makers.
(Duj, flerdle) Very gentlemanly and ladylike respectively. In any case winning is rather vulgar, doncha think? (Duj) Iceland is running out of air - have a look at this.
Floating on air
937! Blimey, I see what you mean. I wonder if someone's making a killing shipping in oxygen tanks. Then again choppers may not stay afloat in that low a pressure.
Rosie, winning is only vulgar if you claim to have backed the victor with your local bookie and then refuse to buy a round. :-)
Suck
(Dujon) It's down to 932 now. Won't go any lower though. N. Atlantic record is 915 mb, UK 925. There's a piece about Bourke NSW in today's Observer which says the current drought is on its way to turning the place into a ghost town and it all looks a bit serious. I assume this is the same regional drought that is affecting your area. We have the opposite problem here, especially in Scotland and Wales but floods occur in most winters here somewhere or other.
Saunafridge
Am I right in saying that the correct technical term for "trying to get your living room the same temperature as the bedroom" is "balancing the central heating system"? If so, or indeed, if not, does anyone know how to go about it. (Probably never achieve this completely, as living room is 2x size of said bedroom, is furthest from the boiler, and north-facing, but currently the former is too cold, and the latter too hot...).
[rab] I'm not ignoring you, I don't know the answer.
[Rosie] Yes, Bourke is about 650Km northwest from me (as the crow flies). 93% of NSW is officially drought affected. The remaining 7% would be the northeast - coastal strip - of the state which is always much wetter than the rest (there are some beautiful rainforest areas in that region).
Bourke is a genuine outback town and within that classification is fairly big - pop. around 4500 (though this includes outlying residents in a 40-odd thousand square kilometre shire area). There's a bit about the place, and some very basic weather stats, here.
I have just successfully introduced two groups of friends to each other, both made initially through the net, and both based in Oxford. How satisfying :o)
(rab) If your radiators are individually thermostatically controlled then simply adjust them. If not, and this sounds more likely, they should have two valves, one at each end, one being a normal on-off valve, the other, hidden under a plastic cap, being a control or balancing valve. Prise off the plastic cap and adjust the control valve using a small adjustable spanner or some other tool. This will limit the flow through that radiator. If all this isn't possible simply turn off the rads in the bedroom until you need them. This will boost the flow through those in the living room. All this is based on my own system, which is steam age and installed in 1971. It still works very well.
(Dujon) Thanks for that. Bourke is not as dry as I would have thought, with 300 mm a year average though at those temperatures it would count as less than if the same amount fell in a cool climate. Parts of Essex have only about 520 mm a year but no-one would call it a desert, except culturally maybe. Woo! 'ark at 'im!
Rads
We have a rad that is temperamental and blackish water usually comes out when it is bled. To force the gunk out the whole system is having a power flush in the new year.
Has anyone else seen Casino Royale with Clive Owen? Took along my 12 year ld son and two of his mates last night. Really good (first "adult" film I've seen in ages) but one thing I did not understand was why the sea shell made him look at the messages on the mobile. Otherwise an enjoyable, very gritty, not indestructible bond.

Things that make me go GRRRRR! I put my hands up to having not to good grammar and punctuation but somethings even take the biscuit for me. There was a trailer far a new film with Will Smith The Pursuit of Happyness !!!Happyness!!! Happyness!! What the....?? perhaps it is a concept thing.

[Inkspot] "Happyness" sounds (or I should say reads) like what the inhabitants of Brave New World have, something you get from a pill. Does that fit with the trailer?
me, procrastinating? never...
[rab] Dunno, heating is ducted here. I kept the house at 18C through the winter; without heating it was usually around 12C inside during the day. You could try using fewer blankets (not trying to be facetious either: the tendency of some people here is to use a giant quilt whatever the weather, which I really don't get). Good luck.
[pen] Well done :)
[Rosie] For very thorough Aus. climate stats go to dubdubdub.bom.gov.au . Evaporation rates out at Burke are very high, though I don't know how they calculate it. It was 42° here yesterday and 22° today. This place is crazy.
[flerdle] Wrong bedroom - the boiler and first rad is in the room we use least, and in any case we don't have the heating on at night.

[Rosie] I'll take a look at the valves when the window people have done their last and I've moved all the clutter back from the rad end to the window end of the bedroom. There's no TRV (which I think makes sense, as the boiler thermostat's in the same room) but also no "on-off" tap either as far as I know. There does appear to be something that can be turned with a spanner, so maybe that's the one to look at...

TBH the quick fix is to sit in the spare room when we're feeling chilly, and the longer fix is to get TRVs fitted on the rads that don't have them, an external thermostat put in the hallway and a living flame fire in the hearth in the living room for the occasional extra blast the central heating isn't capable of delivering.

So while the new windows are great (or will be, once the final couple of panes are switched from single to double glazing), they have rather highlighted all the deficiencies in our central heating. Ho hum.

[rab]If there are just valves as described by Rosie our problem at the begining of winter was balancing the system. At the moment the heating is turned off each evening just after eight and an hour in the morning. After B Gas wanting to put up the direct debit again even that amout of heating is looking too much.
[Raak] It looks like the film about a single parent father down on his heels and homeless with a small son. The trailer shows him bumping into a Trader with a Ferrari, then his luck takes a turn for the worse. I have no idea how it ends but it is more than likely an unhealthy dose of Hollywood syrup. The possible moral being you can have hapiness and be poor, but for that extra happy factor ‘happyness’ you need to be successful,rich and fulfill the American dream.
the old more than one bedroom trick.
[rab] Ahh, ok.
Dryness
[Rosie] Yes, Bourke is after all an agricultural area of sorts and the average rainfall is around the 300mm mark. In the last 12 months (I just did a quick check with the local BOM) they have had roughly 107mm, twenty five of which landed on one day. Since the end of July they have received 11.2mm. That, I think, highlights the current problem - particularly when you relate it to flerdle's evaporation rate comment.
OZBOM
(flerdle, Duj) An excellent site which I have used for some time. I pop in most days to have a quick look at the S Hemisphere circulation and there is a lot else there too. Our own Drought Order has been rescinded at last not that it makes the slightest difference because I never water the garden or wash the car anyway, particularly in December of all months. I've had 86 mm so far this month, equal to my monthly average since I started in 1983.
Windows
They're done at last: see for yourself! (Pictures are clicky)
rab's views
Oooh - very swish. 'Though the pic of the window that swings open for cleaning made me recoil a little. Take care when weilding the Windolene!
Brighton Snibs
What a wonderful name for a gadget. And lovely windows :D
Incidentally, what is that Christmas ching song that goes "boo-doo-doo-doo-dum dum, boo-doo-doo-doo-dum dum, boo-doo-doo boo-doo-doo boo-di-doo-di-dooo" called? It's stuck in my head and I can't get rid of it.
Windows
[rab] View through: Somewhere in Scotland? Please excuse if you've said. Very nice job.
Who - do -do - doo -doo- doodoo- doodoo- Hitler
[rab] That rhythm brings to mind "Close Every Door To Me" from Joseph And The Amazing Technicolour Whatsit ... ... but I know it's not that really - 'cause it's not a Christmas song.
[rab] It's not In Dulci Jubilo, is it? As popularised by Mike Oldfield in the seventies.
[rab] Actually, on further inspection, it isn't.
Could you perhaps mark the barlines?
Irving Barlines
(Projoy) Must be at 1st and 2nd commas and just before first "di", assuming 4/4 swing, i.e. 12/8.
[Rosie, Projoy] 1st and 2nd commas, yes, and before the last "boo-di-dooo-di-dooo". There are some words that follow about "coming home for Christmas" and then "Ching ching ching ching ching | Ching ching chi-chi chung ching".

It's odd the Christmas songs that get played relentlessly in all pubs and shopping centres nationwide. None of them seem to be less than about 20 years old to achieve the right (or wrong) sort of Dickensian nostalgia - but what was in their place 20 years ago?

[SM] Oh yes, Edinburgh. The hills you can see are the Pentlands, and possibly the Braids.
Name That Tune
[rab] There's a Chris Rea song called "Driving Home For Christmas" which is played relentlessly around this time of year.
Stop!
I think that might be the bridge section in Jona Lewie's Stop the Cavalry. If played in C major, would it have this melody (where hyphens/equalses show beams on (semi)quavers): 2/4 | D=C=b=a g-g | D=C=b=a g-a=b | C D E=F-E | E=F=E=D E ?
s/Jona/Jonah
Bingo
That's it. Why on earth is it called "Stop the Cavalry"?
Halt!
Hey, Mr. Churchill comes over here
to say we're doing splendidly
But it's very cold out here in the snow,
marching to win from the enemy
Oh I say it's tough,I have had enough
Can you stop the cavalry?
I have had to fight, almost every night
down throughout these centuries
That is when I say, oh yes yet again
Can you stop the cavalry?
Mary Bradley waits at home
in the nuclear fall-out zone
Wish I could be dancing now
in the arms of the girl I love
s/Jonah/Jona
woohoo!!
I've just bought a pair of tickets to see Muse playing at the new Wembley Stadium in June :oD
Right
Well I'm off for few days tomorrow, and Andy's on his way to New Zealand so you can fully expect the site to fall over and not get rebooted until sometime next week. Take the opportunity to drink some more wine.

Happy.

Unknown hand
(rab) THe site did fall over last night but got up again. Hooray!
Back
Thanks for keeping an eye open. I guess Andy must have pressed the reset button in LA.
I like the idea of pressing the reset button in LA, turning it back into a civilised and agreeable small town.
Ctrl/Alt/Del
I have visited a number of places over the years where, failing friendly bombs, a Reset button would have been very appropriate. Brighton springs to mind....
Sussex reset
(Kim) On your way down there could you do Crawley? An amorphous blot. Is Brighton really all that bad? I haven't been there for a few years. The prime candidate must be Basingstoke, so they say.
Mornin' all
I have just made a new year resolution. Having just carted a 40Kg package of set-due-to-humidity-premixed-concrete from the workshop to the front of my premises (OK, it's a 1-in-4 slope about 50 or 60' long) and the concrete no doubt now includes a bit of water . . . yes, I'm rationalising . . . ) and dump it into a bin out the front, the lip of which is probablly 4'6" off the ground, I'm embarrassed. I needed the help of my super fit wife.
Exercise is what I need and will do. Probably, perhaps.
(Dujon) Forty kilos is a lot easier where you are than it is here because you're upside down, which must help.
Floating on air
[Rosie] You are, as usual, correct. That was the problem. I had to get the wife to hang off my ankles. Even though I've lived on the southern hemisphere for 50-odd years I still haven't got the hang of keeping my feet on the ground. Ah well, it's got to be better than living on the equator.
Australity and boreality
(Dujon) And the sun goes round the wrong way, and the weather charts are all arse-about-face and Christmas day's in the height of summer. If you came back here you'd be totally confused. Loads of rain here, BTW, 129 mm in December and some thunder earlier today, most unusual for this time of year here. I see that rather ominously your drought is set to continue due to El Niño.
Sounds like the cricketers can blame the whether, with no rain expected no chance of a draw in the last test, just a white wash.

First day back and up late after a half hour lie in. It all seems funny peculiar the roads in were as clear as a bell and the office is slightly muted.

[Duj] Apols for introducing a note of sense into the conversation, but fit or not, you should get help lifting something that heavy and that awkward to that height. If you got your muscles fit, then did your back in hefting something awkward, you'd really want to kick yourself. (Although again obviously it's better to get someone else to kick you instead.)
Sensibilites
[Rosie] How dare you! Australian bore indeed. ;-)
[SM] Yes, but too late. I did my back in years ago. The doctor's advice? "Give it some exercise". Hmmmm. Sounds like some sort of miracle cure for a broken arm: "Give it a bit of a bend each day". Of course he was right - as far as I know my problem is only muscular and not a spinal disc matter. Right, back to my sit-ups.
(Duj) Sorry, old bean, it was an occident.
Windows
[rab] Terrific pictures, and it looks like a nice place to... wait a minute... in the earlier picture that man across the road is arguing with his wife... then the sun is lower in the sky and you can see him carrying out a box... wait, he's looking up. He's seen me! He's coming across the road! Damn this wheelchair, if I try to get out he'll just catch me on the landing!
*Wonders if it's possible to go back in time and unkill the conversation*
*hears the conversation rustling a bit and realises it's not quite dead yet*
Just making sure it really is dead
<desperation>Whatever you've read in the papers no-one can possibly know whether 2007 will be the warmest year ever in the UK but globally it might well be so.</desperation>
B.S.F.
[rab] You'll be happy to know that your Windows page is already the number one Google result for a certain three word name for a thing what helps keep windows shut. (Don't want to name it here and skew the results the next time this page is spidered.)
Wow!
I hope that's what they are actually called - it's what it said on the quote, and the chap who measured up referred to them as such (I could hardly keep a straight face).

What on earth possessed you to look, anyway?

I guess I'm just kinky for ironmongery. Or brassmongery. Or whatever they monger to make these things. I thought it was an interesting fastener and I wondered if it was just a UK thing so I went looking around.
BSF
[Dan] Wouldn't it be more accurate to say this is the only site that calls them [the name that must not be mentioned]? Not trolling, but all the other hits I got in Google called them something slightly different (but with the same initials). By the way, I loved your "Rear Window" bit. It provided a moment of cheer in an otherwise lousy Friday.
[SM] It's possible that it's local dialect.
[rab] Good point. I am a long way from where I was brought up and occasionally, when I'm not concentrating or when I'm tired, say something "regional" that has people looking at me weirdly. I told some Canadians that I would "put the snack on" a Yale lock so they could come and go without a key. No-one understood what I was talking about.
I seem to have killed the conversation. Sorry rab.
Turning gently
Your mother is a big hippo.
Sierra Mike] It's always been a "sn*b" for me
Snacking on Snobs
I use 'sneck' or 'snyb'. Sneck is fairly normal Northern English as evidenced by this.
media frenzy
There has been a fair amount in the press and tv amout the goings on the the BB house. I feel part of the problem is that swathes society in Britain encouraged by the media has lost respect for itself and civility towards others. The mantra is ‘you are no better thatn me no matter who you are’ whether that is a doctor, priest, police, MP, prince or Queen. It is a matter of bringing everyone down to the tabloid level. Are those we are to look up to the highly paid footballer and their WAGs, the instant celeb or winning pop idol.Is it possible that headlines of cultural intolerance and ignorance really do reflect the essence large sections Britain today.
The behaviour in BB is what you'd expect from forcing pretty stupid, ignorant attention-seeking people together. Naturally they bring out the worst in each other. The racism, though we could certainly do without it, is fairly routine and widespread among certain types and makes one wonder what rarified parts of the atmosphere the media inhabit. There are pages about it today's Guardian, for instance. The more disturbing aspect of BB is that it is broadcast at all and is regarded as entertainment by large numbers. How edifying to watch dimwits getting on each others' tits! The participants abase themselves simply to be on TV but they shouldn't be exploited in this manner.
[Rosie] The first series of BB was interesting, IMHO, as the participants were derived of most luxuries. They never quite had enough alcohol to get drunk. They didn't have pencils or paper. They had no clocks. They really struggled to get by. Hence, it was fascinating to watch how people interacted when derived of so many things that they would normally use to pass the time. These days, it has become more of a circus, with the blame lying on the shoulders of the producers for promoting ratings-grabbers to enter the house, in the knowledge that their behaviour is likley to cause headline-making outrage.
The behaviour that I have (albeit very briefly) witnessed recently on BB is, as you say, the norm in a large sector of British society. That the media causes an outcry over it is utterly hypocritical (as ever); that people are shocked and outraged by it is merely bandwagon-jumping. What needs to be addressed is the fact that, presuming most people in the world are racist to an extent, placing remarkably dim people in an environment where they are going to expose their deepest "instincts" (not sure that's the right word) is irresponsible, particularly considering how sensitively balanced the world is at present with regard to extremism - on all sides. I'd love it if everyone just relaxed a bit, frankly.
(Phil) I'll go along with all of that except possibly your last sentence. If you mean we should stop pretending to be shocked by some of the behaviour then I agree wholeheartedly but I don't think we should be relaxed about allowing this stuff on TV, certainly in its present form. It's no better than bear-baiting or cock-fighting, i.e. a distasteful spectator sport. My own instinct is to say to the contestants "You're on telly. Stop behaving like a complete arse, even if you are one" but that's hopelessly old-fashioned.
For Jade Goody-Nude to get on Celebrity BB by having been on BB in the past says something about the show. Probably involving the words "vanishing" and "own *rsehole". How about Religious Big Brother, involving a Protestant, a Catholic, a Shia Moslem, a Sunni Moslem, an Orthodox Jew, a Reform Jew, a Dawkins-esque atheist, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Rastafarian, and a Bahai?
Relax!
[Rosie] No, that's not what I meant at all, although I see how it looks like that. And I agree wholeheartedly with your bear-baiting analogy. What I meant was that if people such as Jade Goody relaxed a bit, she'd probably enjoy her life a lot more, and this whole issue wouldn't have arisen.
[Raak] Throw in a satanist, and you might be onto something :-)
quoted from BBC News...
"Goody insisted on the show that she 'didn't say Shilpa Poppadom in a racial way'".

So that's all right, then.
(Phil) Jade Goody, despite her wealth, has little to be relaxed about. She's from the bottom of the pile and knows it and this is her chance to get back at the world in general. There are many like her and the problem is exacerbated by our class-consciousness though ironically India, with its caste system, is probably even worse.
Not Goody Two shoes
I actually don't think that Stupid Jade is racist. I think she's just ignorant and a bully. Remember the first time she was on she didn't even know where Cambridge was and thought East Anglia was another country. She's picked on Shilpa cos she's pretty and an unknown quantity. Jade's head got far too big with fame and she wasn't clever enough to cope with it, and when she was insecure she attacked those outside her comfort zone.
Where will they be?
I sometimes wonder, "where will this person be when they're 60?" Jade Goody at 60...
Thinking also of "where are they now?", today I chanced across this picture, which looks like a very ordinary businessman or politician. I was quite startled to realise who it was. The URL gives a small clue.
That is a bit of a surprise. I had to Google for the picture to find out who it was, though!
[Raak, Darren] Was just reading his "dangerous idea" at Edge. Profound knowledge of the philosophical implications of quantum mechanics or windy hallucinogenic rhetoric?
[Projoy] The dangerous idea was asking him the question in the first place.
Well, who is it then?
[Rosie] I'm sorry, but due to the indeterminacy principle it's not possible to know the URL of his picture and his identity simultaneously.
Yeah, that picture startled me when I saw it a few years ago. It's a portrait for a board he sat on. He's always been something of a hero of mine. He's the one who's not Zappa. Or IS HE??? You can see him a little better in this. There's a story about how he turned up for his audition carrying his laundry, the idea being that as long as he was going out he might as well get his laundry done so it wouldn't be a wasted trip either way. The pragmatic insouciance of this apparently impressed the casting director quite a bit.
Oh, just found the "dangerous idea" on Edge. I'm half inclined to believe he's having them on -- it would be very like him -- but there's just enough consistent substance peeking out of it to make me wonder. Which, again, may be the idea.
(Projoy) It is now. This is very disturbing.
[Projoy] I incline towards either "windy rhetoric" or "leg-pull", especially compared with the other contributions there.
In fairness to others, here it is. It made more sense the second time I read it; at least think I saw about two thirds of what he was driving at. Unfortunately he tries to distill it down a little too far and leaves out about 90% of the exposition it would need to lift it out of Time Cube territory, with the result that it does read a bit like somebody trying to drag some subjectively experienced great insight back from an altered mental state by scribbling the key concepts on a notepad on the nightstand before the memory fades. I can't even say he's wrong, just that he doesn't really give you anything to analyze or dispute; he's reduced it to an overly simple set of vague declaratives, so even if you want to give him a hearing you just end up going, "um. Okay."
Scrolling down, I see that Laurence Krauss has a project for Darren:
The ultimate goal of physics, as it is often described, is to have a "theory of everything", in which all the fundamental laws that describe nature can neatly be written down on the front of a T-shirt (even if the T-shirt can only exist in 10 dimensions!).
arrow_circle_down
Want to play? Online Crescenteering lives on at Discord