Re6/6

There are people in the world, mostly with a fairly predictable agenda, that are claiming that none of that ever happened.  Never forget; remembering is our only defence against it happening again, and it has, several times.

Seconded.  I watched an excellent documentary a few years ago about the liberation of one of the work camps in Eastern Germany, by the US Army in 1945.  Seeing the elderly veterans - most of them around 90 - revisiting the area and choked up in recounting what they witnessed at the site.  One particular veteran stuck in my mind, his voice breaking with fury but the energy of man fifty years younger, at the people who said this didn't happen and he hadn't seen what he had.

The Squeeze is Polish, and all Polish schoolchildren in her day, still under communism, were taken to Auchwitz.  She went when she was 14 and will never forget it. 

The problem is that people who say it never happened are completly convinced of the conspiracy, and governments/government agencies in general but in the US in particular have not always behaved since WW2 in a way that has discouraged them.  The conspiracy theorists are never going to be persuaded otherwise, and while it isn't about this particular matter, we have seen in the US and Brazil that some of them are armed to the teeth and prepared to act on their delusional beliefs, manipulated by those of their ilk who have borrowed the group's collective brain cell and can exploit the foot soldiers for their own ends.  There's a massive untapped reservoir of racism, anti-semitism, envy of the more intelligent, and immigrant fear for these nutters to exploit.  Even if you showed them around the camps, they'd tell you you'd built them post-war as a sort of sick theme park.  Liberal democratic opinion is that the answer is education, and it is, but you can't educate pork, ultimately you can only slaughter it, which brings us all down to their level and is self-defeating. 

I feel strongly about this and am greatly troubled by it.  I have mental health problems and would have most certainly have been for the gas chambers myself in that place and time, and memory of the horror is the only thing that keeps it from recurring, mostly (but there've been genocides and death camps since WW2).  The United Nations, a body whose general prinicples I have believed in all my life, is proving increasingly ineffective and it's main sponsor, the US, has effectively abandoned it.  Where do we go now?  Ok I'm gonna be brown bread soon and it doesn't affect me, but I don't want that sort of world; I have my principles, even as a burnt corpse!  Thinking it won't happen again because our systems are effective in preventing it sounds to me like the best possible way to ensure that it happens again.

I was up around midnight and popped the telly on to see what was happening. The midnight service from Blackburn Cathedral was just starting with bells and smells and I couldn't work out which Denomination it was for a moment....

Yes, the service from Kings (Cross) finished earlier than usual, so Christmas began a little sooner this year.

Congratulations John; that's lovely news.

Congratulations! New life, new day.

Many congratulations!

I must admit I don't know what you are on about as I stopped watching the telly years ago because I couldn't stand the "in your face" advertising. Where-ever the "in your face" advertising appears I leave.

I don't watch anywhere near as much telly as I used to (and I never exactly had "square eyes" in the first place).

As for that guy with his noisome: "Irritating ads - YOU BUY ONE - YOU GET ONE FREE! I SAID YOU BUY ONE YOU GET ONE FREE!!" Well, I'm sure he'll be back - unfortunately.

I suspect that some advertisers imagine nagging away with ads that drive people up the wall is going to "implant" certain brand names in viewers' minds. Well, it won't if we switch off. Also, if they annoy me, I'll just make a point of not doing business with the company being advertised - and I don't think I'm alone in this regard.

Its possible that one of the factors that drive more oppressive advertising is because people are making a point of not doing business with companies who's advertising campaigns annoy them.

Other factors are available, especially in the current economic climate.

Really sad to hear this news.  I always thought she was great even - dare I say it - when she was on the Cliff Richard Show on Saturday nights back in the early 70s!  RIP Olivia.

Those legs on the ELO Xanadu album cover were quite an influence to a young RedgateModels. RIP Olivia

Come on CK, we have heard about your antics at the SWAG .........life's too short to eat fully clothed or with just as shirt on.

What happens in Horrocksford stays in Horrocksford.

Ah, of course. My lipsincs are sealed.🤭

When we're further down the line with it all Ducky, we'll be in touch!

Your interest has been noted, Caller Duck.

"I'd love to have some sort of momento of dear BGM at Seaton Junction."

Likewise in Mid-Cornwall. G was always ready with some sound advice or, failing that, an awful pun.

It is, indeed, a timeless classic. And that speech still gets me.

I was going to watch it, and forgot...

B & W, simple and without huge noise and FX. Truly excellent. Those Sewers. I had forgotten.

P

Didn't the haggis mind that you had his supper?

Ewww. Give me Black Pudding any day....

Love haggis, goes very well on a pizza too. 

Not terribly fond of lobster, but I hope you enjoyed it!

I knew a fellow years ago who was a crab fisherman in Falmouth. He caught 'em, his wife dressed 'em. Delicious!

He also showed me how to hypnotise a lobster...

T'was delicious!

Just finished listening myself, very calming and relaxing, I hope that the congregation don't have to wear masks next year!

Have a good, safe and Happy Christmas chaps. As Tiny Tim said "God bless us, every one"

Merry Christmas to you and yours, John.

The live broadcast is in the middle of the night here, of course, but I hope to hear it on the ABC later today. Our school carol service followed the same order of service and a local church here does the same, so it has provided a thread of continuity through many a changing time.

We watched this too, for the umpteeth time! Always loved the shot at the start of what I think is an OeBB 12th class at Wien Westbahnhof, just gets better after that. Deffo the best thing on the telly for ages.

I had the great good fortune to be sent to Vienna by the Queen, in 1955, to help hold back the Red Hoard!

The city had been partly rebuilt but was still a little worn at the edges, and we actually used to go  past the doorway

from where Ha  rry Lime was {not} killed!  Lovely memories. National Service was not all bad!

Always wonderful.

Sat down to listen to it on the wireless with a glass of sherry and a mince pie!

Happy Christmas!

indeed sir...

Now I do feel old!  I loved this when I was at Southampton College of Art in 1968 and I still love it now.  Rest in peace Peter.

Oh ! I dunno, I've previously enjoyed some back seats in second hand cars !  

Not with someone you don't know I hope?

Might have been ! 

Caught up on iPlayer.  Well worth watching (and listening to).

I'm now going to start on my Easter eggs...

We had it on yesterday. Wonderful stuff!

At Christmas, that broadcast is Christmas for me really. All the glitter and crap that goes before is just bling and materialism. The sound of that Choir in that place is just amazing.

Hope you all OK chaps?

36E 14* and warmer tomorrow. Nice isn't it.

I was instructed to retrieve the rotary washing line from the shed this afternoon, so I dutifully obeyed and also re-instated the wooden garden bench, that also normally goes under cover for the winter, so that I don't have to re-varnish it so often.

That bench sounds a little like coaches of old that were only used in the Summer timetable peak times. Such fun.

 6 by 9

6x9 in base 13

Metric or Imperial ?

From an innocent note that the sun was out to flying sheep in 9 posts! Standards are slipping. Should have been done in 3, tops!

Ahem.........

Quote

From an innocent note that the sun was out to flying sheep in 9 posts! Standards are slipping. Should have been done in 3, tops!

But where would be the fun in that?  Its all about audience participation!

Oh well, batten down the hatches for Storm Jorge.....

'Man's' inhumanity towards their fellow 'man' has never failed to sadden me and it still continues.

Yes - unfortunately.

What always gets me is the fact that the individuals whose actions and decisions inflict this on everyone else are never the ones who end up facing all the horrors.

Unfortunately, humans are not a great species in the way they seem to behave a lot of the time. Strange when we actually have large brains.

Last night, I enjoyed a tomato and monkfish stew with the only chocolate habanero that I managed to grow this year. Fortunately, I made a triple batch, because of the chilli's reputation, so I have two more portions in the freezer!

Fortunately we have a load of summer fruits, in the freezer, from the allotment. These get brought out when the weather is dire and cold and wet and the sky grey....or worse. It brightens the heart (and tummy).