Jump to content
 

The non-railway and non-modelling social zone. Please ensure forum rules are adhered to in this area too!

Early Risers.


Mr.S.corn78
 Share

Recommended Posts

My experience with Homeland Security:

 

To set the scene:

Shannon airport has pre-screening and fast-track immigration for departing flights to USA. Effectively you are pre cleared before taking off. This involves a part of the airport locked down before a westbound departure.

 

We are on-site to rebrand some walls. Cue the following conversation with a Homeland Security person:

 

Him: what is the purpose of your visit to the USA today?

Us: to apply some stickers to a wall

Him: what is your final destination?

Us: (pointing) Over there (a wall 3 feet from where we are standing) cue sniggering from our official escort.

Him: thank you. Enjoy your visit to the United States.

 

You couldn't make it up.

  • Like 4
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

Relative to what?  It was 9C early this morning with the wind chill taking that back to a "feels like" temperature of just 5C.  On the plus side it warmed up to 13C by mid-afternoon.

 

This place might be famous for being hot but it's not at all hot all the time ;)

 

Well, the max here today was 9c, I thought that quite warm although there was a cold wind, so I went out on one of my bikes....it is all relative, honest!  we worked in the garden later, too.

  • Like 5
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

My experience with Homeland Security:

 

To set the scene:

Shannon airport has pre-screening and fast-track immigration for departing flights to USA. Effectively you are pre cleared before taking off. This involves a part of the airport locked down before a westbound departure.

 

We are on-site to rebrand some walls. Cue the following conversation with a Homeland Security person:

 

Him: what is the purpose of your visit to the USA today?

Us: to apply some stickers to a wall

Him: what is your final destination?

Us: (pointing) Over there (a wall 3 feet from where we are standing) cue sniggering from our official escort.

Him: thank you. Enjoy your visit to the United States.

 

You couldn't make it up.

And they say that Americans don't do irony?

Link to post
Share on other sites

My comment was mostly related to the fact that now I have a US passport I can get through MUCH FASTER simply because the US citizens lines always in my experience have processed quicker than the "other lot" :)

Works at both ends too - and the fact my wife can come through the UK/EU line with me at Heathrow, is faster/smoother generally too - win-win.

 

I presume you're presenting a UK passport at Heathrow, Ian. Can you still do that - exit one country on one passport and enter the next on a different one? I used to do that with Canadian and UK passports, but the Canadian authorities (at least) let it be known that they seriously didn't approve of that.

 

My/our "oddest" experience with customs/immigration was last time we came back from the UK after Christmas 2013.

There we are in the "hall" waiting for our bags, and the friendly little doggie - he was so cute - walked up and down the lines and BINGO sat down next to me <sigh>. Nicest guy with him asked if we were carrying anything we shouldn't <blah blah>, accepted the answer no and moved on.

Silly thing returned no more than THREE times and did the same thing. Whereupon we were "invited" to take all our bags (all FOUR of us travelling at the time) over to the "special" location to go through it all.

 

They'd gone through EVERY suitcase and final indications were it was my back-pack that was the culprit.

Open it up and SURE ENOUGH - there was the heroin APPLE that was triggering the dog!

 

We had something similar happen once. While waiting for our checked baggage, a sniffer dog showed great interest in my wife's carry-on bag, and his handler asked to see inside the bag. By presenting each item to the dog, it turned out that he was concerned about M&S crisps - in individual sealed foil bags, all inside a large sealed foil bag! I was so impressed that I thought of giving him a packet as a reward. (But you don't try humour with customs and immigration unless you're very sure of the likely response.)   

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites

You might like this then:

 

attachicon.gif1-IMG_4224.JPG

 

One of a pair made as his final apprenticeship test by my wife's uncle, in a Clyde shipyard in the 1920s. Four and a half inches tall, turned from a single piece of brass. .

 

Definitely "Clyde Built". Colonel Mustard would certainly appreciate that! (What on earth does it weigh?)

Link to post
Share on other sites

Most of my Senior golfing mates would happily accept some retention as it's not unusual for some to disappear into the bushes two or three times in a round......

 

Perhaps they could keep an eye out for your balls, Gordon.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

An early night for me ready for Ally Pally in the morning.

 

Night all

I think I am ready to go in the morning. C2C have buses replacing trains on the direct route to London but I will just go by the scenic route via Purfleet.

Tony

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

A few years back in a thread someone referred to you in less than complimentary terms as "the Yank with the guitar" reflecting your avatar of the era. I PM'ed him with a more accurate summary of your CV - to the extent that I know it, of course. He was suitably mollified. We can all come across as a particular sort of person in a thread, and newer members often get the wrong end of the stick, but some RMwebbers are just off-camber all the time. ERs is marvellously short of such idiots, though.

True, that, Ian.

 

And thanks... To be honest all my favorite guitarists are English - yes, I do mean English, actually most of them are from the Home Counties too. The only American guitarist I admire (and he lost the plot when he became popular) is Steve Miller of his eponymous Band.

 

If I ever meet you and Sherry for a glass of wine or beer I’ll explain everything to you.

 

Best, Pete.

 

Edit: I meant guitarists still living. I still miss Hendrix and his unfulfilled musical talent.

Edited by trisonic
  • Like 13
Link to post
Share on other sites

The humour of customs...

 

Many years ago we were driving down to Portsmouth to get a late ferry and a fox ran under the wheels of the car. Nasty for the fox. Little voice in the back says "What was the last thing to go through that fox's mind" followed by another little voice, "Its arse..."

 

Anyway, we get to Portsmouth and it's the first chance I get to look for any damage. A customs man comes up to me and asks if we've got any animals aboard, just as I'm leaning down to look under the car. "Hang on" I said, "I'm just checking".

 

Cue the car being taken apart by unsmiling customs officials,  much to the amusement of Little Voices 1, 2 and 3 in the back...

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Now he tells us!!

 

Hi Mike, 13mg of warfarin!  My dose at the moment is 5 per day dropping to 4 over the weekend to lower my INR from 3.1 down to between 2 and 2.5.

I've been fitted with an American heart valve which operates at those levels. The bugbear is that during my first week out of hospital I was sent to five different health centres across Hull in five days for testing. Now I'm at the most convenient one, once a week.  I have also discovered that there was a clinic at my own doctors which is a matter of yards from my home until very recently but their space was wanted by my doctor because of an increase in his patients .

 

My regular dose is 10mg and has been for some time, target INR is 2.0 - 3.0 and it's usually roughly in the middle of those two but this week's test it was down to 1.6 and they're no doubt a bit wary of clots (which is why I'm on it) hence they want to boost me back up and get an early check.  It's just the sheer inflexibility of the surgery which maddens me - what I've now got to do is cancel a day trip to Plymouth and go to the Royal Berks, assuming I can find a  parking space, to get the sample taken there when our surgery has 4 or 5 staff (not counting the Doctors) able to do blood tests, including a full time phlebotomist.

 

Anyway Ally Pally tomorrow which will be much more fun I'm sure.

 

G'night all.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Evening all,

Sorry to say that my early start this morning has taken its toll, the day culminating in the return of grandson and family from Spain this evening. I've been asleep already so I'm afraid I'll have to return in the morning to catch up and make the usual, sometimes inane comments. Apologies if I've missed anything of note before then. Hope you all have a good weekend,

Kind regards,

Jock.

G'night Pete! G'night everyone else I've missed today!

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

Goodnight all. Had a good day. It only took an hour at the hospital this morning for Beth to have a new pot fitted to her arm. I got the rest of the layout back home. I had a surprise operating session on a friends layout with lots of vintage Triang stuff this afternoon and then had a good evening at the club.

 

Jamie

  • Like 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

Bit of a "scorcher" here, or as they might say in Glasgow, "it's affy waarm." This was in the morning as the fog was burning off.

 

It got up to 71F. Now multiply by 5, divide by 9 and add 32. That makes it 71.4C. Huh! Must be one of those temperatures that's the same either way.

 

post-25691-0-93824400-1427510759_thumb.jpg

 

 

  • Like 9
Link to post
Share on other sites

To whom it may concern

Indeed you CAN keep both the passport AND more importantly attain dual-nationality. One reason I'd not done it until fairly recently (a few years ago now though) was that the US at one point did NOT recognize dual nationality therefore you surrendered your UK passport when you became a US citizen.

Pete - actually (for reasons I think I mentioned before though probably a year ago now!!) it does make some sense, especially as you get older. If EITHER you or your wife are non-US citizens, at the demise of one or the other of you, handling the estate is a complete cluster-fork apparently, with more red-tape and procedures to handle than getting the Affordable Care Act passed

 

Yes, if you plan to stay in the US for keeps, it's a very good idea to get naturalized as Ian says. The downside is you cannot escape from the IRS if you do.

 

The US seems to be a bit ambivalent about the dual nationality thing. First of all, if you are a UK citizen, it's extremely difficult to give up your citizenship. There's even some chat (or used to be anyway) in a UK passport that says the UK understands that you may be obliged get a passport from another country, and not to worry about it.

 

I think Ian is right that you used to have to surrender a UK passport to the US if you became a US citizen (that is no longer the case) but according to a bloke I knew who had been UK/US for a long time, as the UK passport was the property of HM's gov, the US had to return it to the UK, whereupon, the UK sent it back to the owner with a nice note that said "you appear to have lost this".

 

I've always been a bit nervous about travelling with two passports and switching back to UK half-way across the Atlantic. There could be some collusion between the US and the UK and it might set off a few alarms. Paranoia on my part though. I have no evidence that anything like that happens.

 

Last year we were coming back from the UK via Iceland, and the immigration officer made some flip comment that we didn't sound like Americans. The red mist was rising in my eyes, but I managed to retain my composure. Then he made some comment that we had dual nationality. When his supervisor heard him say that, he barked out, "There is no such thing as dual nationality!"

 

Now here's a question. I was born in Scotland and if Scotland had installed an electrified fence along the border with England, would I qualify for a UK passport, a Scottish passport, both, or none of the above?

Edited by AndyID
  • Like 5
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

A very early good morning from Leeds.

The birds are singing and, for reasons best known to my head, I am wide awake.

 

Hope you have a good Saturday!

 

Now, purchance a mug of tea or back to bed? Mug of tea wins!

 

Baz

 

PS as the passport is for the UK and if the Scots had devolved then the passport issue would have had to be solved. Not currently a concern but you never know...

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Morning.

 

No reported delays on Southern.

 

Sounds like a weekday!!!

 

However I need to be on a train just after 6am to get to Ally Pally. Just under two hours to get to North London from here just South of the M25. Its far quicker to drive but I want beer later!!

  • Like 4
Link to post
Share on other sites

Bit of a "scorcher" here, or as they might say in Glasgow, "it's affy waarm." This was in the morning as the fog was burning off.

 

It got up to 71F. Now multiply by 5, divide by 9 and add 32. That makes it 71.4C. Huh! Must be one of those temperatures that's the same either way.

 

attachicon.gifIMGP1262.JPG

 

Sorry to disappoint you Andy, but 71F= 21.6C.

 

You take off the 32 first and then divide by 9 and multiply by 5.

 

71c would equal 160F, so a wee bit hotter….:-)

Edited by gordon s
Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...