Early Risers.

[Claude_Dreyfus]

2 hours ago, Coombe Barton said:

... Today no Aurora Borealis sightings, merely the reflection of distant village streetlights on a low cloud base. That was to the north. To the south stars were out. ...

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2023/02/27/zoe-data-ups-and-downs-but-slight/

Rather crazily Mrs Dreyfus and I went out for a walk this evening (only got back about half an hour ago) to see if we could find a glimmer of the Aurora on the horizon. Only a faint hope in deepest darkest Sussex, but not out if the question. It helps that we're armed with various aps and things as a result of our Norway trip last November; which yielded a most spectacular display (the best for many months according to our guide).

 

According to the data, there is plenty of coronal activity over the next couple of weeks, so we may still get to see them down here...

 

In other news, I have finally got the bill from my mechanic for my wheel damaged back the pothole in early January. Now to put that claim in!

[jjb1970]

I just received some English Electric goodness from Australia, a VLine L class electric locomotive in the late orange/grey livery, it's an absolute beauty. Much to my embarrassment I'd never heard of Auscision before someone mentioned them in this thread, I had a look at their website out of interest and when I saw they did the L class I had to go for it. I'll take some pics later but it has that classic early 50's EE bull nose style, they look rather like a squared off equivalent of the 20 class diesels of Malaysia.

[polybear]

10 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I've been taken to one of them and encouraged to eat the bear.

 

I like Helsinki and Finns. 

 

 

Bear has suddenly taken a dislike to them.....

 

9 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

Work insists that I have one email address but then sends several hundred emails a day to it.  Very few - perhaps two or three a week - are actually of any interest or importance to me.  So I spend far too much time deleting the rest which are sent out to all company email addresses from the various information and head-office sources.   Surely troubling far too many electrons and wasting energy in transmission and the battery power required for hundreds of staff to delete thousands of useless emails.  

 

 

And no doubt such checking is for many employees done at home - so unpaid.....

 

Bear here......

Awake at 3am again.  Turdycurses.  Some snoozin' until 5, then gave up so Tigger-bounced crawled out of the Beary Pit for an early brekkies.

A bit of easy sorting on the cards for today - but definitely no H/S/L.  I've also got some homework to do, in the form of various "exercises".  Double Turdycurses.

Bear gone.

[TheQ]

The view to the north here, well slightly North North West is the permanent Aurora Bactonalis that is the orange glow of Bacton Gasworks several miles away, glow to the West, Norwich 20+ miles and to the South South West, Great Yarmouth also around 20 miles. I don't want a glow to the east, as that might be something poo tin is sending us.

 

Mooring Awl,

5.5 hours solid sleep, followed by intermittent dozing, and an hours sleep.

Left knee complaining a bit, and of course forepaws.

 

I've 3 email accounts, two are in use a BT internet and a Gmail, plus a disused Which.net account.

Work tried to get everyone to link up to their works accounts.

This I avoided as:

1, they didn't pay me to work outside work hours,

2, they put too many send all accounts rubbish out, often the same thing resent all the way down the management chain.

 

One thing I didn't mention yesterday was the slow trip to Norwich first was a slow ish ambulance, max speed 50 mph on a long good straight, but very slow on corners and bumpy bits. Suggesting a non urgent but fragile  occupant.

 

Then we got stopped by two police out riders, a police car, and.... A yacht 

Not this one but similar from the same yard.

It was just coming out of a side road, they stopped us at first to allow it to corner. Then stopped the yacht to let us, a group of 3 get past, but other cars further behind were diverted onto a cut off section of the road's old route.

Quite what they'd do at the road works, about half a mile behind us, I don't know, there were queues of cars in both directions.

 

Plans for today,

Muddling, at the radar museum, https://www.radarmuseum.co.uk/, 

First thing will be to reinforce a sagging base board on one display unit.

Then more cleaning of the big model.

Maybe a little repainting on both.

 

Time for breakfast.

Edited February 28, 2023 by TheQ

[polybear]

Bear back......

 

A Happy Bobby Badger story....

 

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/m5-closed-off-to-rescue-badger-teetering-on-the-edge-of-100-metre-drop/vi-AA17Zy2f?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=ed900c4add6f4d0abb0e53fafff56ef0&ei=36

 

In other news.....

Did it really take all this time for certain Big House people to discover the colours red & green that been in use in International Airports for, well, yonks?  FFS.  Yes, Rant.

I'll leave it at that as it could quite easily breach the P-Rule (Bear heard a whisper that Awl Trackers have acquired target.....)

[Barry O]

Ey up!

Cricket didn't go well.. but its part of a very steep learning curve.

 

Right ,time to get my mojo going and hit the walkabout.

 

Stay safe 

Baz

Edited February 28, 2023 by Barry O

[Hroth]

@TheQ Like the YachtShot!

 

"Steam gives way to sail", so to speak...

 

 

 

[TheQ]

There's an absolute classic shot taken for a newspaper, of a similar sized motorboat from the same yard about three miles further on. It being transported on a bridge over a river, with motorboats in the river..

[jjb1970]

The new English Electric goodness, I am very impressed with Auscision. Well done on the packaging too, stout with a quality feel and nice design but small, avoids the current obsession that biggest = bestest with packaging.

 

[jamie92208]

Good moaning from a volcanic rock.  It's sunny outside so I may go for a walk.

 

Jamie

[BSW01]

Good morning everyone 

 

Another good nights sleep was had last night, I’m liking this, I’m liking this a lot. It’s a sunny start to the day here in England’s northwest corner, where we’ve have a slight breeze and a temperature of 5C. This afternoon Sheila has her post op eye assessment, so we need to be at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital for 2 o’clock, which means we will need to have an early dinner. The plan was to have an early breakfast, one of us has managed that, can you guess who? 
 

So there no point in starting any big job before dinner, so this morning I’m just going to potter about.
 

Back later. 
 

Brian

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. No problems with the arthritis or sciatica recently but I had again the stabbing pain in my right femur but it lasted no more than a second or two. I will be contacting the physio-terrorist about it asap. This afternoon I will be going to my brothers bungalow to help sort out a few things where my knowledge might prove useful. Amongst the things my niece found was a solid brass model of a Lancaster bomber, about five or six inches long. I was able to explain to her how it came into my brothers possession and when. It is things like that that can be 'lost' when clearing a deceased home.

[Gwiwer]

4 hours ago, TheQ said:

a slow ish ambulance, max speed 50 mph on a long good straight, but very slow on corners and bumpy bits. Suggesting a non urgent but fragile  occupant.

Or a thrombosis. One bump and the clot can shift in a fatal direction. 

[iL Dottore]

Well, that was interesting - to say the least.

 

Today, I had an appointment with a podiatrist to sort out some foot problems secondary to (a) my osteoarthritis and (b) dropping a heavy “something” on my big toe sometime ago. As all the local podiatrist’s weren’t/aren’t taking on new patients, I had to travel further afield.

 

Anyway, it took me 30 minutes to drive to the podiatrist’s office where a very nice lady promptly took out scalpel, scissors, cutters and a drill with a BIG sanding head and set-to slicing, shaving, trimming, cutting, sanding and grinding. One hour (and 1.5 Deltics) later, I had a fully functional foot again (and two, nifty, silicone protective “toe caps” to put upon my vulnerable toes when out and about).
 

It was a basically painless procedure (one or two “that’s uncomfortable” moments), unlike trips to my physiotherapist - where the default setting is (according to physiotherapist) “it might be a bit disagreeable”* before moving on to “this will be a bit unpleasant”** and frequently straying in to “this will be a bit uncomfortable”*** territory.

 

As @polybear can attest.

 

translations:

* it’s gonna hurt

** it’s really, and I mean really, gonna hurt

*** you’re gonna beg for the sweet release of death

[iL Dottore]

4 hours ago, TheQ said:

There's an absolute classic shot taken for a newspaper, of a similar sized motorboat from the same yard about three miles further on. It being transported on a bridge over a river, with motorboats in the river..

I wonder if that is because the boat yard, in its contract of work for the new boat build, promised to deliver the motorboat  ex-works in pristine condition (and if you sail the boat to its owner’s mooring, it won’t arrive in absolutely pristine condition)?

I have absolutely no idea, I am just speculating on a potentially logical reason for what appears to be an illogical action.

[iL Dottore]

5 hours ago, TheQ said:

One thing I didn't mention yesterday was the slow trip to Norwich first was a slow ish ambulance, max speed 50 mph on a long good straight, but very slow on corners and bumpy bits. Suggesting a non urgent but fragile  occupant.

 

15 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

Or a thrombosis. One bump and the clot can shift in a fatal direction. 

Not every call out requires lights and siren (in the UK “blues and two”) from scene to hospital. In fact, most of the calls proceeded better (after stabilising the patient) without lights and siren. Being placed in an ambulance and careening along at 100mph with sirens blaring isn’t going to do an already stressed out and anxious patient much good. We’d often just run to the hospital on lights alone, “blipping” the siren when someone wouldn’t pull over (most of the time, other road users would pull over without prompting when seeing the flashing lights). And when we “blipped” the siren, we told the patient that we were “just clearing a path for the ambulance” (which was, I suppose, true).

 

Mind you, I’ve also had my share of going both ways “full-on”. One memorable time (memorable as what happened on that call happened so rarely) we got a call from a paediatrician for an emergency transport from his practice to the University Hospital - where a surgical team would be awaiting our arrival. As this call came from a practising physician, and thus considered ultra urgent, the central dispatcher – who also was the dispatcher for the police - arranged for police cruisers to go ahead of us to block all the intersections so we could go directly to the motorway toll booth entrance without any need to slow down or (God Forbid), take evasive action, from which it was a straight run in down to the University Hospital.
 

My driver at the time was a fellow nicknamed Smokey (as in “Smokey and the Bandit“) and he certainly lived up to his nickname. On that particular call, he was driving and I don’t think that on the run to the hospital we actually did anything less than 80 miles an hour – including when we went through the pay booth at the toll station.

 

This sort of call with a Police escort were few and far between – thank goodness.

[DaveF]

Today has started damp and drizzly.  I've no idea whether therewas  any possibility of seeing the aurora last night - it was cloudy and I went to sleep as soon as I went to bed.

 

Yesterday involved the usual house cleaning, washing, drying and ironing.  I once again dried the washing in the new washer dryer, this time trying a different combination of settings. It worked as expected.  It was a bit damp outside so it would have taken ages to dry on the clothes line.

 

I went to the beach and had a walk to the pier and back - on the way back to the car I noticed that the pedometer on my phone was not actually recording steps.  A good shake of the phone cured it but it did it again later.  Sometimes it is the app, other times I think the whole phone freezes - it is really time for a new one so there will be a visit to a phone shop quite soon.  By tea time it was working again.  If I am really honest I don't need to count steps, I know how long most of my walks are.  The only surprising bit is how much I seem to move around the house and garden on an average day.

 

I got a load of stuff ready to go to the tip, including dismantling the old TV stand which was too heavy for me to lift into the car any more.  I also dismantled the old obelisk.  Later on I went into the loft and brought some of the stuff down which I need, including a new expanding file for my personal documents and financial stuff.  Then if someone ever finds me dead all they need will be in one place - at least I hope so.  I also decided that various medical documents need to go in their own file so found a spare box file.

 

By then it was tea time after which the evening passed quickly with a crossword, TV and book.

 

David

[Tony_S]

36 minutes ago, DaveF said:

Sometimes it is the app

I have a message from an app this  morning informing me the fire alarm router was offline. This was important enough to get up and sort it out. Fortunately I didn’t need percussive maintenance, just removing the power supply, wait a minute and reconnect it. The router isn’t really essential to the fire alarm network, the alarms still connect and talk to each other. The router just lets me access them without standing on a step ladder and I suppose tell me the house is on fire when I am not there! We only put the linked alarm system in as we couldn’t hear the heat alarm we had placed in the garage. This was a recommendation following the fitting of battery storage for our solar panels, though they should shut down way before the temperature required to set off the heat alarm. No harm in being prepared though. Linked alarm systems are compulsory in Scotland but not England. 
 

[polybear]

55 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

As @polybear can attest.

 

translations:

* it’s gonna hurt

** it’s really, and I mean really, gonna hurt

*** you’re gonna beg for the sweet release of death

 

Bear really hopes that all of yesterday was ***.......otherwise I really am gonna cry....

 

52 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

I wonder if that is because the boat yard, in its contract of work for the new boat build, promised to deliver the motorboat  ex-works in pristine condition (and if you sail the boat to its owner’s mooring, it won’t arrive in absolutely pristine condition)?

I have absolutely no idea, I am just speculating on a potentially logical reason for what appears to be an illogical action.

 

If this Bear was spending the sort of vouchers one of those must cost (a large share in a 1:1 Deltic) I'd want it to have been sea tested at least (and then nicely polished before delivery) - I'd be fairly upset if I was to first to discover (for example) the prop shaft leaks water on it's maiden voyage.

 

In other news.....

Bear spent the morning sorting some tools; that concludes today's excitement so far....

Bear gone

 

 

[TheQ]

4 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

I wonder if that is because the boat yard, in its contract of work for the new boat build, promised to deliver the motorboat  ex-works in pristine condition (and if you sail the boat to its owner’s mooring, it won’t arrive in absolutely pristine condition)?

I have absolutely no idea, I am just speculating on a potentially logical reason for what appears to be an illogical action.

It's actually because they started just over 100 years ago building little boats like this,

,And will still build you something like this ,

But mostly they've moved up to the top end of the market like This.

An Oyster 72, a 15 year old one is about. £1,250,000...

But their boat yard is up river. The wrong side of Wroxham bridge, which has an air clearance of 6ft 6 in and a draft of 3ft.. it just won't fit...

YEAR 2008

LOA 22.77m / 74’9”

LWL  19.75m / 64’9”

BEAM  5.85m / 19’2”

DRAFT  2.90m / 9’6”

 

So they do the majority of the construction in Hoveton, then take the boat to Lowestoft or Southampton for rigging and fitting the keel.

 

 

Meanwhile at a somewhat smaller scale,

The 1 to 1000 model of RAF Neatishead, , I fitted a new brace to the base board so that's now flat.

I started repairing some of the scenics to find if I touched some of it with a paint brush it flaked off, I've tried to repair that but won't know if the repair is good till it's dried.

 

The 1 to 50 model of a bloodhound missile station, 

More roads cleaned,

Guardroom roof re painted as were on two other buildings, 

One building had its roof glued back on,

Some building insides were brushed out. The SWO would be happy.

Touched a bit of model, of a bloodhound booster rocket, with two attendant fitters and a wooden pair of trestles.... It fell apart.. on inspection I found it had been broken previously, it had evostick on it..

Some bits have been superglued together, the booster rocket cleaned of evostick and repainted.

 

 

[Barry O]

Lummt.. where did the day go?

 

Amazingly enough they move large ships and boats by road at some ship yards. The fit outs happen after they are in the water. It is easier to "launch" a lighter ship/boat. A lit of ship/boats now enter the water on a ship lift. Like a large elevator.. less splash than the old style slipway.

 

Baz

[Barry O]

@jjb1970 very pretty loco... very nice model but..

 

Get thee behind me Satan!!

 

Baz

[polybear]

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

And will still build you something like this ,

But mostly they've moved up to the top end of the market like This.

An Oyster 72, a 15 year old one is about. £1,250,000...

 

 

Jeez, so how much is a new one?  And how much for the one above?

[Gwiwer]

Dr. SWMBO is off to St. Andrews in the morning by way of an overnight stop in Edinburgh.  She gets to go to all the best places in the line of duty and on this occasion only has to listen and not deliver a paper herself.  

 

All worries and anxieties aside, which isn't easy for her, she took a call whilst we were driving home from her work tonight.  The hospital announced that she has no sign of the uterine cancer she had feared and was tested for recently.  

 

All she has to to do now is pack!  

 

And all I have to do is enjoy three Boy's Own nights.  I suspect a kebab, a bottle of merlot and a nocturnal jaunt out somewhere may well be on the cards.  

[The White Rabbit]

56 minutes ago, polybear said:

Jeez, so how much is a new one?  And how much for the one above?

 

Many, many LDCs. If you have to ask the price ... 

 

That's why there are jokes about sailing being akin to standing in a shower, clothed in oilskins, ripping up £20s. Or bundles of £20s.