Early Risers.

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, New Haven Neil said:

The Remembrance silence is well observed here, most - almost all really - traffic stops, public service vehicles stop even folk walking through town stop.  There are guns or maroons fired to mark the beginning and end in almost all towns and villages, even up here in sticks-land.

 

Apart from the minutes silence at 11AM, Armistice Day is not a big thing here, ANZAC Day in April however is a major event, and if anything it seems to be getting more notable as the years progress.

 

Crowds at the 5AM* dawn service (you need to get there by 4.30AM)  held in towns and cities around the country are getting huge to the point that special early morning trains etc are now  laid on. 

 

(Ediit, found this years stats!)

Canberra Australian War Memorial 120,000

Melbourne Shrine of Remembrance 80,000

Sydney's Cenotaph 30,000

Brisbane's Anzac Square 30,000

Darwin's cenotaph 10,000

Hobart's cenotaph 5000

Torquay Danger Point 15,000

Coogee Beach 20,000

Alice Springs Anzac Hill 5500

Albany 4000

 

 

*5AM commemorates the time that the first ANZACS landed at Gallipoli. 

Edited November 11, 2023 by monkeysarefun

[Ozexpatriate]

5 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

One northern NSW town, (it might be Taree but I'm not sure)  was wiped out

My maternal line is from Grafton - on the Clarence River in the Northern Rivers. If I recall correctly, Grafton had two devastating floods in early 2022.

 

The whole east coast from Gympie in Queensland to the Northern Rivers of NSW were impacted:

ABC: From Gympie to Grafton, see the floods devastation from the air

 

Anthropogenic climate change deniers can say whatever they want, but if you want to approach it from a "free market capitalism'' perspective, what is happening in the insurance industry is unprecedented. It's not the same level of 'normal' or 'routine' natural disasters.

[Ozexpatriate]

28 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

the whole town would have to be moved to higher ground

That sort of thing has been happening along the Mississippi River for some time. Valmeyer, Illinois is one such town.

 

There are historical Mississippi River towns (like Kaskakia, Illinois) that are now on the "opposite" side of the river than when first settled - Kaskakia was settled by the French in 1714. It was the capital of French, Upper Louisiana.

 

There is a notion called "flood amnesia" for many riverside towns. People are more than happy to repeat mistakes. The argument to rebuild on higher ground is very logical.

 

Edited November 11, 2023 by Ozexpatriate

[Coombe Barton]

21 hours ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

Or am I turning into a grumpy old g-t?

Join the club - always room for new members.

[Erichill16]

2 hours ago, grandadbob said:

Just been reading the renewal quote again.  As it's the AA the actual insurer is another company, last year it was LV.  This year's quote is via Aviva. 

I was with LV last year for one of the works vans. The broker said LV  had stopped the doing the type of insurance I needed ( any user for a limited company). Their next best first  offer was approximately 50% more but eventually got it ‘down’ to about 20% more than last year’s.

I have about six insurance policies that are due with a 4 week period and it’s a complete PIA chasing around for a competitive price.

 

[polybear]

3 hours ago, grandadbob said:

$##t!  B######s! £#####g thieving barstewards!!!   

Yep, it's happened.  I've just opened an email from the AA (same as PB @polybear did a few days ago) with my car insurance renewal quote.  They have more than doubled the premium!  I'm going away for a few minutes to swear some more until I get it out of my system.  A#s###les!

 

The AA do haggle when challenged, and without much effort.

Incidentally:

 

From the Go Compare Website:

Free excess cover

BUY CAR INSURANCE WITH US AND WE’LL REFUND YOUR EXCESS IF YOU MAKE A CLAIM[1]

[1]Up to £250 refunded after claim settled. Excludes breakdown and windscreen repair or replacement. Full T&Cs apply

 

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

Well that was a disappointing meet-up. The Brains Trust was not.....

> Detained

> Arrested

> Questioned

> Interrogated

>  Caught

 

There - corrected it for you.....

Edited November 11, 2023 by polybear

[PhilJ W]

 

Evening all from Estuary-Land. Dinner tonight was beef stew with dumplings followed by bread and butter pudding, very nice.

[PhilJ W]

We had never had a war like the Great War and when it started the UK had had a century of relative peace. Also it was the first time that people at home were directly affected by the war in suffering air raids and shelling of coastal towns. Trafalgar day was celebrated up until the Great War by which time there would have been very few if any who were alive at the time of Trafalgar. Following the carnage of the Great War it is no surprise that previous wars would be forgotten, well not forgotten but no longer in the public awareness. The Great War has almost slipped from the public awareness and time is taking its toll on those who survived WW2. We should remember the sacrifices made by those who fought (and those who supported them) in both wars but one day even those who remember them will be gone. 

[Tony_S]

We drove to Settle and then had a trip to Appleby by rail, walked down to the River Eden, had a snack , walked back up to the station (slowly) and caught the train back to Settle. The road from Settle to Malham is interesting. There are a few drivers around who don’t seem to fully understand the concept of single track and passing places or giving way but not too bad. I am glad it was still daylight when we came back, as we had a Highland cow ambling towards us very slowly. I am not sure  what the correct Highway Code procedure is but I decided stop and let her walk past at her own pace seemed sensible. A bit further on I was going over a bridge and the two chaps leaning on the bridge retrieved a drone and then turned and walked straight out in front of me. I stopped, Thr good thing was that the MINI tailgating me dropped right back. 
It was a very pleasant day.

 

Edited November 11, 2023 by Tony_S

[Gwiwer]

3 hours ago, grandadbob said:

P!ssed off of Sutton

I would be too if I had to pay anything like that. 
 

Premium is determined by many factors, not least the anticipated profit margin and allocation to reserves for the insurer. 
 

I too have a “nil event” history.  Not so much as a parking ticket to my name. And a former professional driver clocking up many more miles than most private motorists do. 
 

I renewed in July for just under £300 and got a further slight reduction in premium when we moved “to a lower-risk postcode”. 
 

That’s fully comprehensive, protected no-claims, zero excess, windscreen cover, hire car if required, two named drivers and under 3000 miles a year. I have excluded the  cost of RAC breakdown cover which comes with the policy as an extra but which means I don’t need to separately join one of the breakdown services. 
 

So we now pay £285 to insure plus £99 for the breakdown cover. Not sure I could beat them down much on that. 

[Gwiwer]

2 hours ago, grandadbob said:

Lots of fireworks around here tonight presumably for Diwali.

One small display here but that was due to the awful weather last week causing a postponement. 
 

On Remembrance it seems that some folk paused for a couple of minutes but far from all. 
 

At the House of Fun the instructions were that if (and only if) it was safe to do so staff were to observe a two-minute silence but trains were not to be delayed. A station-wide announcement was made at the start of a two-minute silence inviting passengers to join in. Announcements were turned off, radios were turned off, but had an emergency arisen it was to be dealt with immediately without waiting for two minutes to elapse. 

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[Ozexpatriate]

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

We had never had a war like the Great War and when it started the UK had had a century of relative peace.

Yes and no. The Great War was indeed a traumatic shock with the intense casualty rate*, but the notion of a "Pax Britannia" is nonsense - no differently than to say we've had 78 years of peace since the Second World War. 

 

* Easily predicted by the US Civil War, which took four years and cost perhaps a million lives (certainly well over 600,000 lives).

 

It was a century of colonial wars - like multiple Anglo-Afghan Wars, the Sudan, the Zulu War, the Opium Wars, and quite traumatically the Boer Wars which brought the Khaki Election to the Palace of Westminster in 1900. War and parliamentary politics were almost constantly entwined during the "Pax Britannica". The term doesn't even pass the sniff test in continental Europe with the Franco-Prussian wars.

 

It's fair to say there had not been a threat of foreign attack in the island of Britain between Trafalgar and the Great War.

 

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

Also it was the first time that people at home were directly affected by the war in suffering air raids and shelling of coastal towns.

While that is true, but I'm not sure it had the same impact as the casualty rate in the Western Front and Gallipoli. Besides things like rationing and travel restrictions, relatively few (numerically) were directly impacted (and I'm aware there was substantial bombing by Zeppelins and larger bombers like the Gotha GV of the Luftstreitkräfte).

 

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

Trafalgar day was celebrated up until the Great War by which time there would have been very few if any who were alive at the time of Trafalgar.

Agreed. Trafalgar Day was largely irrelevant after the Great War. France by then was an ally. A Jutland Day would not have had the same 'ring' to it and nor was that so convincing a victory.

 

Edited November 11, 2023 by Ozexpatriate

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, Ozexpatriate said:

was a century of colonial wars - like multiple Anglo-Afghan Wars, the Sudan, the Zulu War, the Opium Wars

..and the Crimean War, And the Maori Wars, And the Indian Rebellion, And the undeclared war/genocide  of the Tasmanian aboriginals... In fact it's hard to find a 19th century period when someone somewhere in the world WASNT copping a flogging from Britannias army!

Edited November 12, 2023 by monkeysarefun

[BSW01]

Goodnight all 

[Ozexpatriate]

2 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

..and the Crimean War, And the Maori Wars, And the Indian Rebellion, And the undeclared war/genocide  of the Tasmanian aboriginals...

Yeah, I just listed some from the top of my head. I wasn't trying to be exhaustive.

 

Tennyson's poem about a cavalry engagement in the hills above Balaclava and the impact of nursing in the form of Florence Nightingale is suggestive of just how shocking, people 'at home' found the Crimean War. Shortly afterwards, Clara Barton would have a similar impact as Nightingale, later founding the American Red Cross after her work in the Civil War.

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by Ozexpatriate

[Ozexpatriate]

Still very Autumnal here. 

 

We're past "peak colour" but there's still plenty of colour about. This is from my morning walk today - a bit 'blown out' due to dim, rainy conditions, but representative.

 

 

Happily we're now in a precipitation surplus of 40 mm for the rain year - starting October 1.

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by Ozexpatriate

[jjb1970]

When I was growing up remembrance day was one of those big calendar days and I think all the families I knew either went to a service or watched the London cenotaph service on BBC.  It was one of those national shared moments which have largely gone. 

 

Part of it is that the WW2 generation has largely gone and even their children are now old. The young don't have anything like the same connection to WW2 and the Korean war (a protracted and extremely intense war) is largely forgotten outside of Korea. Even the Falklands war is largely unknown by young British people. A second part is probably linked to more recent wars such as Iraq and Afghanistan having had mixed backing and with many having been resolutely opposed.  That shouldn't affect the respect and gratitude owed to those who fought on our behalf but unfortunately it can be hard to separate appreciation for veterans from opinions of war. Not helped by politicians and pundits on both sides of that discussion playing up the connection and appealing to emotion to influence view of contemporary affairs. 

[polybear]

8 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

I have excluded the  cost of RAC breakdown cover which comes with the policy as an extra but which means I don’t need to separately join one of the breakdown services. 
 

So we now pay £285 to insure plus £99 for the breakdown cover. Not sure I could beat them down much on that. 

 

On the subject of Breakdown Cover.....

I realised just before going to Missenden Abbey that it was several weeks after the yearly anniversary of Mickey having been last serviced (October 2022) - so the free AA Breakdown that MG UK dishes out had now expired.  Turdycurses.  Now Mickey was booked in for service and MOT 3 days after my return, but there's some bloke who calls himself Murphy who has seen fit to write some law that says that if a Bear did happen to take that diddy risk of no Breakdown Cover for even a few days whilst driving around the M25 then he'd come along and pee on his Chips.  B'sterd.

 

So I decided to consult a certain Mr. Lewis (Moneysavingexpert) to find a cheapie B/D service:

 

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/insurance/breakdown-cover/

 

- scroll down that page and it'll give you this link:

 

https://www.moneysupermarket.com/breakdown-cover/?Source=MSE

 

So I jumped thru' the hoops by selecting what I wanted:

• Cover for just for Mickey, not a Bear in any car (it's cheaper that way)
• If Mickey can't be fixed then take Mickey & Bear where they want to go, rather than some shonky garage within 10 miles.
• Home Start
• Breakdown

And that gave numerous prices - including "RAC Essentials" for.....thirty one quid a year.  Any catches?  Just one - a forty quid excess to pay if you call them out.  Seems OK to me.

 

In fact as I've had it less than 14 days and not needed to call them out I could actually cancel it and get all my money back cos' Mickey has just been serviced so I'm covered with the AA again; however for thirty quid a year a reckon I'll just keep it anyway - it'll give me the option of using whichever service gives the fastest response time estimate if I do need to call on them.

 

Now if you go direct to the RAC Website they're currently "doing a deal" and throwing in 3 months extra for n'owt, which is good of them.  Oh, hang on - they want £181 a year for the same cover**

(**No excess charge, and a "Free" MOT added on - but only at selected RAC Garages).

 

No brainer.

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl,

 

4.5 hours sleep. 3 hours very broken sleep. Not helped by a very early Ben I'd like to go out Collie..

He was put off till a more normal time. Back is complaining due to yesterday's digging.

Ben enjoyed his patrol having a good charge around following scents.

 

The fire has been built up now I'm wrapped up defrosting.

 

More extensive frost this morning, both Landrover and car are ice cubes. No mist though, blue skies.

No wind out there at the moment, but it is supposed to increase slightly for the start of our first race at 11:20, after the silence.

 

Both Landrover and car insurances went down this year if only slightly , and the house went up only slightly. 

Although we get flooding, it's rare buildings get inundated, there is some in Hickling, and in Potter Heigham, but it's not by much, no more than a few inches. We tend to get extensive area flooding rather than deep.

Cars that are flooded are even rarer, and it tends to be visitors who park in stupid places.

 

I've just observed various web cams, here is one from the sailing club I'll be at shortly.

The boat nearest the left is in mooring 1, we are in mooring 8 off to the right.

https://nbyc.co.uk/webcam/

Other webcams around indicate water levels are high. But no longer above quay headings.

 

But more heavy rain is forecast Monday Tuesday Wednesday...

 

Time I got a muggacoffee, only 3/4 hour before I need to set off..

 

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by TheQ

[jamie92208]

5 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Yeah, I just listed some from the top of my head. I wasn't trying to be exhaustive.

 

Tennyson's poem about a cavalry engagement in the hills above Balaclava and the impact of nursing in the form of Florence Nightingale is suggestive of just how shocking, people 'at home' found the Crimean War. Shortly afterwards, Clara Barton would have a similar impact as Nightingale, later founding the American Red Cross after her work in the Civil War.

 

I be, I've that the impact of the Crimean war was felt in Britain because of front line reporting in the newspapers with up to date reports coming by telegraph.  The Times was the leader in this field.  In our village near Leeds the attendance at the Cenotaph was dwindling in the 90's but started to grow again during the Iraq and Afghan wars. The numbers attend g got up to at least 300 and we even started to get PCSO's stopping the traffic during the silence.  In our small French village we had 30 attend yesterday about of a population of 60.  However we asked the mayor why it was held at noon rather than 1100 and she had no idea about the significance of the 11th hour.

 

Jamie

[grandadbob]

Good morning all,

Dull and damp, it was raining at 05.00 but has stopped for now.  A cloudy morning forecast with some more patchy rain possible later.  5°C rising to 10°C.

James was coming today to do the roof on The Shed but that's now looking doubtful.

Nothing else planned apart from another rugby match to watch this afternoon.

Have a good one,

Bob.

[monkeysarefun]

44 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

I be, I've that the impact of the Crimean war was felt in Britain because of front line reporting in the newspapers with up to date reports coming by telegraph.  The Times was the leader in this field.  In our village near Leeds the attendance at the Cenotaph was dwindling in the 90's but started to grow again during the Iraq and Afghan wars. The numbers attend g got up to at least 300 and we even started to get PCSO's stopping the traffic during the silence.  In our small French village we had 30 attend yesterday about of a population of 60.  However we asked the mayor why it was held at noon rather than 1100 and she had no idea about the significance of the 11th hour.

 

Jamie

 

 

A school in  Villers-Bretonneux has this sign on it, though it'd be interesting to find out if the pupils still know why its there.

 

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by monkeysarefun

[DaveF]

A fine morning with quite a lot of cloud, it didn't quite get down to 0 last night.  I have turned off the water to the outside tap ready for colder weather.

 

Today will be the usual visit to church, phone calls and e mails, something to eat - as yet undecided as there are several things which need eating in the next few days.

 

Then the rest of thew day will depend on ther weather and how I feel.  

 

I doubt I'll get to the war memorial today as it is my turn to be clearing up after church,

 

David

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, monkeysarefun said:

 

 

A school in  Villers-Bretonneux has this sign on it, though it'd be interesting to find out if the pupils still know why its there.

 

 

 

Heres' the story, included here because I wasn't aware of the events in the last paragraph, so I guess they DO still remember us! 

 

One small village in France will forever remember the sacrifice of the young Australians who saved them from German occupation and potential destruction in 1918.

 

On 24 April, Villers-Bretonneux was captured by the Germans as they advanced towards the regional city of Amiens. If they achieved their goal and drove onto the French coast, splitting the British and French armies, the Allied cause might have been lost.

 

The fate of Amiens hung in the balance as two Australian brigades were given the task of retaking Villers-Bretonneux through a swift night-time counter attack. One brigade would assault from the south, while another would attack from the north.

 

The assault began at 10pm on 24 April. The 13th Brigade in the south were held up by German machine guns, before the Australians linked up east of the village. After dawn on 25 April Australian and British troops were involved in fierce fighting to clear the Germans from the village. Some Germans escaped Villers-Bretonneux through nearby woods.

 

Later on the morning of 25 April, three years to the day after the Anzacs landings at Gallipoli, French and Australian flags were raised over Villers-Bretonneux.

 

A British general later called the Australian attack “perhaps the greatest individual feat of the war”:

 

 

("Perhaps the greatest individual feat of the war – the successful counter-attack by night across unknown and difficult ground, at a few hours’ notice, by the Australian soldier”

Brigadier-General George Grogan, 23rd British Brigade)

 

The Australian flag still flies over Villers-Bretonneux and a town hall plaque remembers the events of that night. Following the war, schoolchildren in Victoria Australia helped raise the funds to rebuild the village school, named Victoria School, and a plaque recalls the diggers’ sacrifice:

 

Twelve hundred Australian soldiers, the fathers and brothers of these children, gave their lives in the heroic recapture of this town from the invader on 24th April 1918 and are buried near this spot. May the memory of great sacrifices in a common cause keep France and Australia together forever in bonds of friendship and mutual esteem.

 

Another permanent reminder across a school building and above the blackboards are the words:“N’oublions jamais l’Australie” – “never forget Australia”.

The special relationship between the people of Villers-Bretonneux and Australia was highlighted once again after the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria. On learning of the destruction of the local Strathewen Primary School, the people of Villers-Bretonneux raised funds towards rebuilding the school. This gesture, nearly a century on from the Battle of Villers-Bretonneux, is testament to the enduring bonds between two great allies.

 

 

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by monkeysarefun