Early Risers.

[polybear]

Bear here......

Well a rather productive day today  - both door frames temporarily fitted, aligned, wall fixings drilled and holes plugged.  All I need now is some effin' hinges......

 

I also managed to sort the attendance of a new starter to the M.E. Course  - which is A Good Thing because numbers are a little low and that could put the course at risk;  it seems that trying to enrol thru' the normal ("correct") channels is no longer working cos' they apparently closed new admissions in December.  But a "back door" route now exists and things are looking good for people being able to join after all.  Result.

 

I heard earlier that last Thursday the Day Students were being taught how to remove and refit lathe chucks.  Fast forward to the Thursday evening M.E. class (i.e. "Us") and one of our less-experienced guys started up a lathe, only to discover that one of the Bozo's hadn't refitted the chuck correctly nor locked it off....... Fortunately the lathe speed was "only" 150rpm or so and the safety cover over the chuck did it's job.  Now if it had been at 800rpm...

They are also now being let loose on the (very new, very nice) Milling Machines.  I wonder how long they'll stay that way.....

 

Tomorrow sees work on the Conservatory Door - Buddy over the road has been booked to come over and assist with the 'umpin n' dumpin' bit - especially the fitting, which is a bit tricky for a Bear with only two Paws.

[monkeysarefun]

6 hours ago, zarniwhoop said:

For reasons I've never understood, 440ml is a common size for cans here.

 

 

Mustnt get thirsty there like you do in the Northern Territory then.

 

 

3 hours ago, The White Rabbit said:

If there's a 'slight' accident involving Grizz's des-res and a 1000lb aerial bomb, we'll know the Aussie embassy monitors ERs... 

 

 

 

Other Australians here will confirm that absolutely no one anywhere in Australia drinks Fosters.

 

https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.com/news/fosters-not-australian-beer-says-australians/

 

In fact, you only have yourselves to blame if it tastes rank, since it is brewed in Manchester!

 

(From an article on the internet!)

Let's be clear: Foster's lager, as we know it in Britain's pubs and supermarkets, ... is not an Australian beer. "Australian for lager" it may claim to be, but 1.2bn pints of the amber nectar a year are brewed in Manchester, not Melbourne. And almost all of them are drunk in Britain, making Foster's this country's second best-selling standard lager, behind Carling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 19, 2022 by monkeysarefun

[tigerburnie]

G'night all

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. Those pesky foxes are back again. Fortunately they weren't at it for long, I thought they were finished now I will have to put back the pee-line.

[Ozexpatriate]

2 hours ago, Tony_S said:

They probably meant bracken.

It's quite possible I conflated the two. But thank you, that helps.

 

I looked up bracken and while it seems to be informally used for many ferns it is more associated with the family Dennstaedtiaceae and likes moorland.

 

The more common ferns here like forested areas and some are from the family Dryopteridaceae. The Western Swordfern (Polystichum munitum) is a good example. There are commonly encountered ferns from many families found in this area.

 

Edited March 19, 2022 by Ozexpatriate

[Ozexpatriate]

36 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

Other Australians here will confirm that absolutely no one anywhere in Australia drinks Fosters.

Indeed so.

 

However, in a blind tasting between export Fosters and VB* (the domestic Asahi/Carlton & United Breweries equivalent) I wonder how much difference there would be.

 

* Victoria Bitter aka Vomit Beer et al.

 

According to the "internet" Fosters for the US market is brewed in Texas:

Quote

As a matter of fact, Foster’s Beer has been brewed in Fort Worth, Texas, since 2011 – the year the Australian beer brand was acquired by international SABMiller. Molson Coors, a joint venture between SABMiller and Molson Coors, operates SABMiller in the United States.

However, after SABMiller was acquired by AB-InBev in 2016, Carlton & United was sold to Asahi in 2019, with the deal completed in 2020.

[Ozexpatriate]

3 hours ago, tigerburnie said:

Access difficult on here today,

1 hour ago, Gwiwer said:

Same here.  Access attempts abandoned on numerous occasions.  Still unable to get in via the phone at all.  Is it the site or the event in north London which is causing the log-jam to the servers?  

1 hour ago, simontaylor484 said:

Like Rick I have had issues with access all day from my phone so it's not your phone or North London either. 

Working 'OK' around 19:00 GMT despite one weird wobble where it went all unformatted HTML1.0 on me.

 

Dreadful around 23:00 GMT. Very hit or miss. Lots of "trouble rating this post" messages, though many appear to have stuck.

 

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[BSW01]

Goodnight all 

[Barry O]

Ey up!

 

Very Early Riser (UK time) this morning.  Why?.... no idea  

 

I saw a Fosters tap in "British" pub in Sydney.. not sure it was linked to a canister though.

 

Camerons in Hartlepool used to brew Harp for the Irish Market. Not sure if chucking a sack or two of ingredients into a humongous water tank should really be called " brewing"?

 

Some garden work for me today, along with slow roasting some belly pork for tea. Not the most difficult of days to sort (I hope).

 

Time for my mugatea. 

 

Stay Safe!

 

Baz

[chrisf]

Many thanks to those who advised on the beers that I might find in Mallorca. I shall know soon enough!

 

Yesterdsy's trip to Ally Pally was not entirely trouble free.  I discovered that my senior railcard had expired so it was a case of first stop booking office when I reached St Pancras.  On return to Luton Airport Parkway I became disorientated and it took me a few moments to work out how to make my exit.  My back ached something rotten and would have done whether or not I had purchased two hefty books at the show.

 

Some gentle readers will recall several enquiries about a social gathering at Ally Pally.  Such was the pressure to have one thst I felt duty bound to arrange something and so I did.  At the appointed hour there were but four of us round the table - Grandadbob, Mike Stationmaster and son and yours truly.  S*d that for a game of soldiers!  Someone else can do it next year.

 

Chris

Edited March 20, 2022 by chrisf
left something out

[iL Dottore]

Morning All,

 

I trust the Ally Pally Campaign is going well/went well for “our boys over there”  I hope that not too many wallets “fell in action” 

 

Whilst I now know about (and have visited) more “prestigious” shows (ExpoEM, Warley, etc), I do have a soft spot for Ally Pally. For it was at Ally Pally in the early years of this century that I reacquired the Railway Modelling Virus and all down to having a Saturday afternoon to kill between a meeting in London and jetting off on Sunday to South America (both for work).

 

Interesting observations on the popular lagers. Presumably cheap to make (but not cheap to drink) and thus sold with a huge mark up. I wonder how much of the cost of each pint of “premium lager“ went on the advertising budget? (they do have some great ads). Although I am not a lager drinker by choice, I have drunk enough of the stuff to be able to contend that a proper German lager is much, much better than any of the so-called “premium lagers“ sold in the UK market. One of my serious-beer-drinking-acquaintances told me that real lager is essentially a winter beer as the yeast used to make a proper German lager thrives best in the winter.  This may also explain why lager drinkers drink the stuff ice cold (and I make no claims as to the veracity of the above).

 

Having said the above, I must confess that I made an interesting lager discovery just before the pandemic: I was having a light supper at a restaurant in Shoreditch (just awarded a Michelin star - very good it was too) when the waiter suggested I try an India Pale Lager (not IPA) from a local microbrewery - explaining that it’s a lager made the IPA way (presumably heavily hopped). Very good it was too - good enough for me to photograph the label in the hope of drinking more of the stuff upon my next trip to the UK.

 

And on that hopped and malty note a bid you a  CAMRA compliant Sunday!

[jamie92208]

9 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

I'll say good morning Owl from the Charente.  It looks as if our barn owls are back in the woodshed after a 2 year absence.  For the last two nights I have been entertained by one screeching whilst i have been working on an unmentionable object inside the main shed.   We ar looking forward to watching the magnificent birds as the evening get warmer.

 

Anyway good morning to all, and not to gorger Sundry of course.  The lawn tractor was serviced yesterday morning after our usual delightful hour chatting to Emily and her Mum's.  The sun shone most of the day with a high of 18 so the lawn mowers were in action in the afternoon.  Me doing the large weed patch on the tractor and Beth using the smaller mower, which is self powered, on the smaller weedpatch round the house.  things look a lot better.  Even better was the batch of fruit scones that Beth baked in the morning. the first of  these accompanied our afternoon beer whilst sat on the bench in the sun after our exertions with the mowers.

 

Today it is a trip to a broccante, sort of large car boot sale, then the Sunday market.  I might even be able to continue strangling wires under the layout later.  Hopefully accompanied by the barn owl.

 

Jamie

[polybear]

7 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Working 'OK' around 19:00 GMT despite one weird wobble where it went all unformatted HTML1.0 on me.

 

Dreadful around 23:00 GMT. Very hit or miss. Lots of "trouble rating this post" messages, though many appear to have stuck.

 

 

All very confusing this software lark and things going wrong.  How come all those 1's and 0's can stop being 1's and 0's all of a sudden?  I need a lie down just thinking about it. 

 

18 minutes ago, chrisf said:

Yesterday's trip to Ally Pally was not entirely trouble free.  I discovered that my senior railcard had expired so it was a case of first stop booking office when I reached St Pancras.  On return to Luton Airport Parkway I became disorientated and it took me a few moments to work out how to make my exit.  My back ached something rotten and would have done whether or not I had purchased two hefty books at the show.

 

 

How was AP?  The usual crowds and bundle at the Bachmann scrum?

 

Bear here....

Big Pink Pills on standby - it's door 'umpin day today, and being a "2XGG" door (that's some weird codeword given to doors with big lumps of double glazing at the top and bottom) puts it at the upper half of the bl00dy 'eavy scale.  An emergency lump of Salted Caramel Cake remains on standby.....

 

 

[TheSignalEngineer]

10 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

 Access attempts abandoned on numerous occasions.  Still unable to get in via the phone at all.  Is it the site or the event in north London which is causing the log-jam to the servers?  

It was bad here all day. Most other sites were working OK. I thought at first that the lack of postings was due to the number of people in transit said event but seems not.

Connection dumped me completely a couple of times and managed to lose one post. It reappeared in the editor went to post on something else.

10 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

The irony of having had two years when we were discouraged from being outside most of the time yet having not written more than a few words in that time is not lost on me!

Some of my activities have followed a strange pattern. Two years ago this week I got in materials for numerous house and garden jobs needing attention. I found the list last week and had actually managed all but two, both on the nice idea rather than essential column. Unmentionables work started well, numerous items coming off the workbench, but then I seemed to hit a wall. Hey Ho, testing positive has seemed to kick me into action. The 'playroom' is now tidy, tools, materials, reference books all in the correct places and production resumed. I wonder how long that will last when The Management decrees I am no longer a health hazard? 

[Gwiwer]

10 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

Other Australians here will confirm that absolutely no one anywhere in Australia drinks Fosters

Not if they want to retain their citizenship they don’t!

 

9 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Victoria Bitter aka Vomit Beer

Also known as Vile Brew. 
 

Neighbour Carlton United Breweries (CUB) is sometimes known as Chuck-Up Beer. 
 

I found some quite drinkable products at Grand Ridge Brewery in Mirboo North. But for everyday and widely-available beers the Coopers range is acceptable. 

[TheSignalEngineer]

 

In the days before craft beer popularity they test marketed VB at our then-local supermarket in Birmingham. They didn't make a repeat order.

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl, Inner Temple Hare,

A poor nights sleep, something to do with an excess of food, and having had that piece of contraband,  a bread roll.

 

Ben the I want out Collie dragged me out, and then didn't do much, just wandered around a bit before wanting back in.

 

The car has an odd problem, if you start it and then stop it as I did on Friday when I moved it to clear space. Come Saturday morning it refused to start, this has happened before. With a bit of persistence it started on Saturday evening, this again is something it's done before. Now having had a proper drive it will work normally..

 

A lot of new faces at the Sailing Club Dinner, many of the trophies won by newcomers. I noted that two guys sat across from me who hadn't sailed in 20 years, managed to win 5 trophies, me thinks if my sailing compatriot hadn't been injured nearly 3 years ago, we'd have been collecting lots of trophies.

 

One of the two guys was with his wife and bump. I remember him learning to sail at 8 years old... 

I feel old... Again.

 

Plans for today,

fix the brake lights, then prepare the light board for attachment to the trailer.

There's a brownie points earner required, to do some work on the warping mill, which requires a permanent string to be replaced.

 

Time for a muggacoffee before venturing out.

 

 

 

[chrisf]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Although I am not a lager drinker by choice, I have drunk enough of the stuff to be able to contend that a proper German lager is much, much better than any of the so-called “premium lagers“ sold in the UK market.

That is very true.  "Lager" implies that the brew has been stored, taking on flavour in the process.  I get the impression that if it were possible the stuff made in the UK would be sold within seconds of emerging from the chemistry set.

 

Chris

[PeterBB]

Access has been neigh impossible for some time now so how many posts missed have no idea as on a number of occasions have given up waiting.  Also noticed the some 'comments' did not. 

 

Cannot comment on the 'beer/lager' thing as teetotal  and having 'treated' a number of those who 'imbibed in excess'  in past times wouldn't touch with a barge-pole.

 

Was intending to go to Ally this year but taking the path of safety for op rather than it be cancelled again because of Covid and of course there is still a ton of soil waiting to be 'properly placed' and much construction work still waiting because of the ban on 'heavy things'.

 

Did see Andy P (GDB who was hoping to meet has recovered as indicated by ChrisF Ally pally feedback somewhere above) and other ERs at Basingstoke last week - a very good show and found that my wallet refused to stay closed!

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. I am not 100% teetotal but I drink very little. When it comes to beers my favourite is the Belgian Trappist beers. Of those my favourite is Chimay Blonde, I still have half a dozen bottles left from a trip to Belgium twelve years ago. I decided not to go to Ally Pally as my feet are playing up but I might next year. I weighed myself this morning and to my delight I found that I have lost twelve pounds since Christmas. Got to go now be back later.

[Tony_S]

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

The car has an odd problem, if you start it and then stop it as I did on Friday when I moved it to clear space. Come Saturday morning it refused to start, this has happened before.

The Renault Clio we had did this. When it finally did it away from home (Saturday lunchtime)  the AA came out to Aditi’s college car park and diagnosed a problem with the crankcase position sensor. The technician removed it and cleaned it and said it would probably be ok but suggested she had it replaced. The wait for the AA was going to be a while so I said I would drive over to keep her company. When I arrived, two huge chaps started to walk over from one of the college outbuildings. Aditi told them it was ok, I was her husband. Apparently they were the security for the church meeting in the building. I think they were Seventh Day Adventists or some similar group. They had seen Aditi alone in the car park and had told her not to worry they would look out for her until the AA arrived. I said her new friends looked far more capable of protecting her than I did.  
Tony

[Tony_S]

Another sensor that needed a clean in the Renault was the lambda O2 sensor. 

[Grizz]

14 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

Snip…..When I arrived, two huge chaps started to walk over from one of the college outbuildings. Aditi told them it was ok, I was her husband. Apparently they were the security for the church meeting in the building. I think they were Seventh Day Adventists or some similar group. They had seen Aditi alone in the car park and had told her not to worry they would look out for her until the AA arrived. ….snip

Blimey security at a church meeting??? What sort of congregation do they have? or is it a rough area? Or perhaps a rough meeting with a tough crowd? 
 

It was nevertheless great to see them offer their services, even if it wasn’t need in this instance.
 

Years ago Mrs Grizz offered my services as ‘Minder / Security’ to a lone lady who’s car broke down in the dark and the AA were going to be at least an hour. I’m sure that the lady in question would have been fine but it was the fact that Mrs Grizz assured her that my husband is here with me (pointing at me, the long haired, bearded, big lump, biker looking guy in our car) we will wait until the AA get here. Perhaps it just makes the situation a little more bearable, knowing people are there if you need them, particularly when you are alone in unfamiliar surroundings in the dark! 

[grandadbob]

Good morning all.

Lovely sunny day here and it should stay that way.

I must admit to being totally non teetotal!  As if you lot didn't realise that anyway.  

A great day out was had at Ally Pally yesterday and as mentioned by Chris four of us met at lunchtime for a convivial pint (or two in my case   see previous comment. )   Some very nice layouts on offer and although fairly crowded I don't think it was as packed as last time I went 4/5 years ago.  The only thing I bought was a decoder. Shock! Horror!  apart from food and drink that is but the less said about my bacon bap the better although I did comment to my compatriots at beer-time that I thought the bacon had possibly been manufactured on a 3D printer.   I also had a pasty which was at least edible.  Food and drink prices there are a rip off though.  Halfway through the day I was struggling as The Knee was playing up and Tramadol had to be deployed.  By the time I walked the last 3/4 mile home from the station I'd just about had it but a nice hot shower and some liquid anaesthetic did help.  According to my pedometer app I walked 12222 steps or about 5.6 miles which is the most I've done for a very long time.  Still feeling the pain now.

In the evening I watched the rugby and the result was as I expected although England were not as dire as I thought they'd be but it was a well deserved Grand Slam for the French.  

Not sure what the rest of the day will bring but suffice to say I will not be doing much walking.

Have a good one,

Hobbling Bob.

 

 

Edited March 20, 2022 by grandadbob