Early Risers.

[BSW01]

Good morning everyone 

 

Another dull start to the day, but thankfully it isn’t raining, which is good, as We are going to collect Ava soon and then head off to RHS Bridgewater for a walk round the gardens then a drink and a slice, mmmmm, what’s not to like. Following that, we’ll have a look in the garden centre then return home for some dinner.
 

After dinner, Ava will assist me in completing the fruit tea loaf that I left soaking overnight, it’ll fill the kitchen with both a nice aroma and some warmth too. Not that it’s cold, it’s just that nice warm aroma you get from home baking, mmmmmmmm.

 

Back later. 
 

Brian

[DaveF]

I much prefer fresh food or at least frozen things without additives.  It doesn't always work but not much of my food is tinned or in brightly coloured packaging.  I read the ingredients of most things I buy which are not plain fresh to check how much of some oils they contain as they upset my gut badly.  I also have to check for nuts and fungi.

 

As for this morning the rain has stopped, it is grey and may rain a bit later, it could reach 6° this afternoon.  Gardening will be out of the question for the present, some plants are beginning to go brown as they are drowning.  The greenhouse now has 2" of water in it

 

I think I'm doing something at church in the service this morning, I'll need to check when I get there as I haven't been on a Thursday since early February.  Then there may or may not be a visit to a shop depending on how I feel.

 

The strapping on my foot is making a difference, I have ordered some to use from the stong ladies.

 

David

[Erichill16]

 Morning All,

Not a good night, kept waking up sweating and heart racing. No nightmares.

Sat here with a coffee trying to make it last as I really need can’t be bothered to do anything today (or any other day really)

Preparing for retirement is not going particularly well and having Syd round is more of a challenging than it used to be. Weather not particularly good and mil still a ‘wounded soldier’.

Can’t but it off any longer.

As @Ian Abelmay say,

Onwards.

[Barry O]

It's great walking a lot around nice bits of countryside but.. After my accidental fall to the floor last Friday I am more in the mood for sitting and watching the world go by...

 

Hope things start to fall into place @Erichill16.

 

Baz

Edited April 4 by Barry O

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, TheQ said:

Just got considerably darker it's chuckinitdarn...

 

 

 

Same here, the darkness is explained by it being nighttime, but the predicted start of the up-to-300mm-of-rain-in-3 days has  just started.

 

It has been a couple of weeks of heat and dryness  so right now the pitter patter is nice background music as I wait for the AFL to start, I might feel differently this time tomorrow night  if I'm downstairs pumping out the 3D printing basement though!

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun

[Sidecar Racer]

3 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

We're off to Batam for a long weekend tomorrow, last minute impulse thing and got a good package from one of the ferry operators including hotel and transfers. Batam is the bit of Indonesia near Singapore (less than an hour by fast ferry), no I'd never heard of Indonesia either but apparently it's a country which had the impertinence to position itself between Singapore and Australia and cause inconvenience to ships trading between East Asia and Europe.

 

 Just been having a look on Google maps , just a heads up , the ferry terminal is exactly opposite to

the Mega Mall Batam Centre , so maybe a blindfold would be handy  for your good lady .     😎

 

 

[jjb1970]

1 minute ago, Sidecar Racer said:

 

 Just been having a look on Google maps , just a heads up , the ferry terminal is exactly opposite to

the Mega Mall Batam Centre , so maybe a blindfold would be handy  for your good lady .     😎

 

 

Thanks, that's properly useful information that is!

[monkeysarefun]

4 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

apparently it's a country which had the impertinence to position itself between Singapore and Australia and cause inconvenience to ships trading between East Asia and Europe.

 

 

 

The Dutch East Indies. William Bligh would have been mighty happy it was  there after travelling 6,500km to get to it  by open boat after the first  mutiny he suffered from.

On a slightly related topic, two Dutchmen became the first Europeans to settle on the Australian mainland 140 years before Cook "discovered" the East Coast when they were marooned there as punishment for their part in the massacre following the grounding of the  Dutch East India Companies ship Batavia on the NW coast.

 

I say  "settle" but it was probably more like dying of thirst in a few days  or getting speared  by the locals.

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. No call outs from Bladder control last night but I woke up Arthur Itis by turning over in my sleep. So after a trip to the bathroom to preempt bladder control he went back to sleep so did I. My body clock has still not quite adjusted to the hours difference but it's getting there and should be OK in a weeks time.

[PhilJ W]

15 minutes ago, Sidecar Racer said:

 Just been having a look on Google maps , just a heads up , the ferry terminal is exactly opposite to

the Mega Mall Batam Centre , so maybe a blindfold would be handy  for your good lady .     😎

 

14 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

Thanks, that's properly useful information that is!

But check first to see if there's any good model shops there.😉

[jjb1970]

Just now, PhilJ W said:

 

But check first to see if there's any good model shops there.😉

 

There are hobby shops in Indonesia and plastic kits have quite a following. Unfortunately model railways is a micro-niche, there are models of Indonesian prototypes made in small numbers by cottage suppliers in resin, some aren't that bad but they're basic. However interest in railways seems to be growing so maybe we will see more interest in models in the way it really started growing in China in the early 2000's.

[Winslow Boy]

3 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

We're off to Batam for a long weekend tomorrow, last minute impulse thing and got a good package from one of the ferry operators including hotel and transfers. Batam is the bit of Indonesia near Singapore (less than an hour by fast ferry), no I'd never heard of Indonesia either but apparently it's a country which had the impertinence to position itself between Singapore and Australia and cause inconvenience to ships trading between East Asia and Europe.

They did things differently in the Good Old Days. Nowadays it wouldn't be stood for and it'll be a twelve lane superhighway with no emergency lane, no stopping for passengers and all overseen by a control room just outside Milton Keynes.

[Winslow Boy]

1 hour ago, Tony_S said:

All this because I enjoy beans on toast! Actually it has been educational because I never knew that a portion of Heinz beans counts as one of my “five a day”. Not that I am likely to fail to get them, Aditi seems influenced by the more than 5 a day and different colours too diet advice. The only way a tin of baked beans is going to harm my health is if it falls off a shelf and hits me on the head. 

I'd be careful where you said that, about the tin of beans hitting you on your head, if I were you.

[iL Dottore]

1 hour ago, New Haven Neil said:

Morning, from a .............sunny! rock, only 8c though after a cold overnight.

 

We do try to eat food made with fresh ingredients whenever possible, but in modern life it can be difficult, especially in a small village on a small rock.  Local produce is good but obviously seasonal, and for more choice one has to admit defeat sometimes.  Also the only 'big' shops are in the Big City which is 24 miles away. Our veg mostly comes out of fields only a few hundred yards away, and some from the garden, but again seasons command what we can get.  Local meat is again high quality if rather expensive, again we try to buy local whenever we can but there are limits to our finances.

A lot of people are now realising the environmental cost of eating out of season fruit and veg (and some of the more food savvy are also realising how disastrous for the environment vegan [incredibly UPF] meat, cheese and milk substitutes are).

 

As for cost, the percentage households spent on food has dropped since the 1960s - driven by industrialisation and imports. With less UPF available in European shops, food costs are higher, but so is food quality.

 

"Healthy Eating" is an absolute minefield - it wasn't that long ago that the Government was excoriating fat and promoting carbohydrates.

 

Following a combination of  the Mediterranean and the Japanese diet (as I do) will defintely increase the probability of live to an old age: fit, on few meds and in possession of all my teeth and my faculties.

 

@Tony_S may be right, a single tin of beans won't do much more than temporarily mess with your blood sugar values, but overall? Public Health England thinks Britain ain't doing too well: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/health-profile-for-england/chapter-4-european-comparisons

A rich country like the UK should really be doing better - health wise - than it is. And with 57% of the UKs diet being UPF - is it any wonder?

 

But, hey, you've got all the advantages of cheap booze, frozen and tinned produce and microwaveable ready meals, right?

[Ohmisterporter]

Kath had her operation yesterday but I have not been able to talk to her yet. She is still in intensive care but sitting in a chair and has managed a short walk. I phoned at 9:30 this morning and spoke to the ward sister and she said they are pleased with her progress. I will know they are confident Kath will make a good recovery when she is moved into a normal ward. Perhaps things are looking up at last.

[Erichill16]

In need of comfort food today. I have been trying to cut down on UPF, but not today. 

[PupCam]

Morning!

 

5 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

SIGH!
 

When will @polybear, @Tony_S et al. realise that my objections to baked beans, frozen chips, etc are NOT because they are baked beans, frozen fries, etc., but because they are UPF junk!

 

Now, some people (particularly Brits) may love carbohydrates on carbohydrates with a side of carbohydrate, followed by carbohydrates and custard. Fine, whatever floats your boat. But as @New Haven Neil and others can tell you, there are carbohydrates and then there are carbohydrates! So why go for the junk versions? 
 

It may seem to many that I am a pedantic purist regarding food (to a certain extent, true), but there is also a significant professional interest and concern involved. Practicing colleagues refer to seeing more morbidly obese patients, more patients with nutritional deficiencies due to fad diets and patients with mental health “issues”, than when they first started in the late 70s (back when UPF were the exception, not the norm).

 

Data indicate that the UK is the worst nation in Europe for eating ultra-processed foods. It reportedly takes up 57 per cent of the national diet and costs the NHS around £6.5 billion a year (the NHS itself has said that lifestyle related illnesses  [poor diet, drinking and smoking] cost the NHS in England alone more than £11bn each year. And this was the conclusion from Public Health England back in 2016).

 

Perhaps it’s time to consider that eating UPF junk is not only bad for your own health, but it’s bad for the health of the nation and will impact, sooner or later, on your ability to get care from the NHS.

 

Whilst there is no denying UPF are bad for one's well being particularly when excessive consumption is the order of the day  (just look at the average change in body shape over, say, the last 50 years)  moderate consumption is, I would have thought,  no worse than the totally unnecessary consumption of any alcohol or the inhalation of smouldering tobacco products (or as will no doubt be found in scientific studies 10+ years hence their "safe" new substitutes).     On the other hand you do have to eat and you do have to consume water and oxygen.   What is it; 3 weeks, 3 days, 3 minutes respectively or there abouts?

 

Consuming commercial baked beans etc may not be ideal but there are far worse things you can use to abuse your body.   As Father used to say "Everything in moderation",  it's a good motto.  

Is it too early for a G&T?  Asking for a friend ....

 

ION

 

We've been visited by a man in a van from the Water company.    He's very kindly 🤪 installed a new water meter to replace the defunct one.      Hopefully, someone will be back this afternoon to restore the water supply because the pitiful trickle that is now present can't keep pace with the rate at which gravity can empty the pipes.      One expects a few air locks but really!    A number of factors make me wonder if the stop cock in the road has failed?        We'll have to wait and see!

 

Right, what to do now?    Yes, MIUAYGA I think.

 

TTFN

 

 

 

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

Public Health England thinks Britain ain't doing too well: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/health-profile-for-england/chapter-4-european-comparisons

A rich country like the UK should really be doing better

 

 

I dont think the average Australians diet is MUCH better than the UK , although we DO tend to have EVERYTHING accompanied with salad - fish and chips, pasta,  any pub meal.. you cannot get anything here without a bloody salad.  Also we don't tend to do that ridiculous fried breakfast thing  and locally grown  fresh fruit and vegetables  of pretty much every type are easily grown  here and readily available. However, despite  that I don't think the average Australian is too diet conscious - in fact if the stats are to be believed our obesity rate of 32% beats the UK's rate of 26%. 

 

Ignoring the fact that we have a large Pacific Islander population that tends to be on  the cuddly side which probably skews the results a bit, it is still a matter of fact that our average life expectancy is still many  places on the list  higher than the UK, Germany etc.

 

Perhaps decent weather  - which enables a more active lifestyle - plays as large a part in determining  good health as the level of consumption of tinned/processed  food etc?

 

Or maybe its just all the (@#$*$n salad.

 

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun

[monkeysarefun]

Another entertaining AFL game, played at a sold out Adelaide oval. 50,000 fans on a Thursday night is a decent result I reckon.

 

I like the Adelaide Oval, unlike the SCG which built a grandstand on the grassed area known as The Hill  and killed much of its soul, the Adelaide oval still has the mound on the Northern end behind the goalposts, where the scoreboard and a row of large trees still stands.  Much of it is hidden behind the sightscreen during the cricket season so when certain camera angles at the footy manage to get a quick glimpse of trees and darkness it is very reminiscent  of a country footy field  rather than an international stadium. Hopefully it'll remain undeveloped.

[TheQ]

I saw a programme a couple of days ago where they mentioned the cost of food to the average person was 60% of wages just post WW2, but today it's 5 to 10%...

 

Of costs just noticed this...

the light grey is the Cremated Swan, the brick is the house including the former shop, that went with it ( three bedrooms three bathrooms 3 reception rooms).. as in mostly burnt down. the brick encases medieval flint walling that was part of the friary . Note, the house behind means there's not much garden, yes that's a busy road on two sides...

Yours for £665,000!!!

 

Brownie points reclaimed, stand for new loom built, loom frame part built and now gluing and screwing.

 

That's odd. Having told me the sailcloth is coming by Evri herpes yesterday, today it's been updated to say it's coming by Royal mail second class...

Edited April 4 by TheQ

[monkeysarefun]

20 minutes ago, TheQ said:

3 reception rooms

 

 

 

 

I dont think anyone here has a "reception room"  - pray tell, what is it - and why  would you need 3?

 

 

Here's an idea  - turn one into a laundry and get the  washing machine out of the kitchen, that's just plain weird!

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun

[Smiffy2]

Ummm... I have 2 or 3...

Front room, breakfast room and dining room. (Which is full of #1 son's possessions at the moment.)

[monkeysarefun]

23 minutes ago, Smiffy2 said:

Ummm... I have 2 or 3...

Front room, breakfast room and dining room. (Which is full of #1 son's possessions at the moment.)

 

 

Hey, I too have a front  room and a back room and a downstairs room etc, is "Reception Room" just a fancy name for them?

 

  I imagined a Reception Room was a fancypants  room where you did important meetings in,   like the impressive book lined room in The Battle Of Britain movie where the German ambassador meets the English gent  with the moustache in the Brit  embassy in Switzerland or something and tells him that Germany  will win the war but the English gent replies that oh  no they won't plus England will beat them in the world cup  final too a bit later on. (Probably after the inevitable penalty shootout ...)

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun

[Smiffy2]

In the brief period of my life in which I worked for an estate agent, yes, downstairs rooms were referred to as 'reception rooms'. Probably not the dining room, unless you were stretching it.

 

And some of the stories I could tell...

[monkeysarefun]

11 minutes ago, Smiffy2 said:

In the brief period of my life in which I worked for an estate agent, yes, downstairs rooms were referred to as 'reception rooms'. Probably not the dining room, unless you were stretching it.

 

And some of the stories I could tell...

 

 

 

A reception here is something you have after a wedding, so a "Reception Room" would infer it was some kind of venue that catered for that kind of thing.

Real Estate mumbojumbo here for what you speak of is basically "family room", "entertainment area", "living area" , "open plan area", "multimedia space"  and many other meaningless terms for any  rooms that aren't bedrooms, the kitchen, laundry or the bathroom.

Edited April 4 by monkeysarefun