New Haven Neil

Morning, from a bright, breezy rock, whereas I'm anything but. 9c and 13 promised by the seaweed twirlers. Looks like a washing day 😒 pah. We've both been a little off-colour for a couple of days, achey and 'not quite right' feeling, so perhaps a bit of ol Chris's unspecified pottering will be about it for activity, bar said washing. We trimmed the low lying bits of the dreaded sycamore trees at the bottom of the garden yesterday, I think that finished us both off. Her Ladyship went to work in her car despite saying she was going to use the bike.

Derbyshire, nee Liverpool Bridge. Big ol gurl. I still get survivors guilt, lost four good friends on her.

Still used Decca Navigator in my time - which as I'm sure you in particular know, was based on H2S radar technology IIRC!

Just watching the first Vera S1 Ep1, hadn't seen that one before - almost jumped when they used the frontage of the hospital I used to work in, felt really strange. Not sure why, it was used for a lot of filming back in the day when I worked there, Victorian stone frontage type place, often used as a 'Town Hall', but it really popped up for me. St Nicholas', Gosforth BTW for any north-easterners. And yes, it was one of those hospickles. No I worked there, honest.

As I think you know I had a vested interest in all that - having served on her, and my dad was standby 2EO as she built, and a close friend and neighbour was on board with his newlywed wife..... and I was supposed to be first trip extra fourth on her when she sunk, due to being late I went to the Staffordshire instead. I have the book that built the theory of the bulkhead failure, and it rang true to me - she had huge cracks there that were a constant worry and a lot of attention was spent trying to repair them and the unknown cause. The cruciform pipe castings above the cargo pumps fractured too as a result of the heaving, so it all felt fine to this very junior engineer at the time. It was quite a shock after the second enquiry, but neither myself or dad (who was still alive then) would ever direct any malice at the authors of the original conclusions, far from it - they did the best they could with what was known at the time.

Welllllll, Hammy made a lot of places....somewhere. I was gutted for Ricciardo though. Talk about bad luck, but Stroll is just not F1 material, proven yet again. Blaming DannyRic for braking 'for nothing' when there were two cars in front of him all nose to tail. We used to call it driving without due care and attention.

I'm well aware of what they are thanks, my tongue in cheek comment was a little dig at the north vs south thing earlier, that we can also have such 'exotic' garden ornaments at 55 degrees north. Maybe you missed the meaning of the 😇 after my comment - it was an attempt at humour, maybe when you get to know us all here better it may make more sense! Now that rather nice effort at shelf building in the garden looks like G1, mine is G45 but it would be nice to see some photos of it in action, may I advise they are put on Night Mail though, ER's is supposed to be a train-free environment. 😉

Mad Saturday as usual. Torbay Palms? Do you mean Manx Palms? 😇 They're everywhere here, despite us being in the allegedly frozen and food-culture free north. Actually achieved things today, for a change, after Mrs NHN was Pilated and I had a couple of miles walk we had a nice brunch in Glen Helen (prepared by South Africans in their style, to add to the culinary desert) then I split some....a lot of firewood while Mrs NHN gardened, then I washed the bikes.....well two of them, then we cooked a curry. Ourselves, using fresh ingredients and spices, not a tin or packet. M25 my ar$e.

The average price in our village is somewhat skewed by the late Trevor Hemmings (he was worth over a billion) having a mansion and stud/stables here. He was a top line racehorse owner, used to fly out every day in a personal helicopter to races. The house and stud is worth......a LOT. Three time Grand National winner.

Rant Incoming: House and contents insurance. Last year £230, this year £647. WHAAAAT! On a rock where there is hardly any crime, away from water courses, pit heaps, etc etc. So the story is they now use 'blanket cover' in areas, and the value of our house is taken as a million.........I wish. £330k more like it, it's tiny. Tried three other companies, same story. (Probably same underwriters). LV came to the rescue at slightly under £230, with Civil Serpent Motoring Club membership. So why this stupid blanket cover lark, while there are houses in the village with that sort of value (and one of ten times that) why should we be paying their costs? /rant.

Indeed - if you have ever shot a bow without an arm guard, the string buzz from that multiplied by about ten!

ION: I ate the TimTam. Special treat. It was nicer than a Penguin, no contest, very tasty. Therefore it was probably full of Anti-iD stuff......to survive the 'strine climate I suppose. I won't be having another due to previously mentioned diabetes, shame really as it was nice.

We don't shoot traditional, we shoot barebow field, so don't know, but the modern wooden bows are all laminated, no idea what the woods are in them either as we use modern materials. Cheap and last longer! A couple of the guys use modern wood bows, they are exquisite to look at but one v expensive one failed.

Note from Fraggite long term multiple motorcycle owner - don't cut them to accurate (allegedly) length off the bike , cut them down maybe, but mount the pipes up and hang the silencers and see where bolt holes come - the newies will NOT be in the same place, guaranteed!

The one thing in Kiwi that was way better than the UK version (weather too, but foodstuffs at the moment!) is the Moro bar - like a Mars bar, but maltier and very yummy. #sigh#

Nah- either Choco-Leibnitz, or M&S Extremely Chocolatey Rings. All verboten now 😇

🤮🤮🤮

I don't eat biscuits, being diabetic, but will have a nibble of the TimTam to see. As I don't much like Penguins anyway (from pre-diabetes days) I can't see it as a life changing experience! I do like Marmite and can suffer Vegemite if I have to, but not by choice - we have family in New Zealand and they won't buy Marmite.

🤮

Ash is popular for arrows too, but we use terribly modern carbon fibre ones. Our mate Geoff shoots wooden arrows, but with a very powerful bow, you need a more powerful bow as the wood arrows heavy, he is a: a man mountain so can pull a 50lb bow, and b: the best archer in the club. Oh and an all round nice bloke, but you don't want to stand in front of him when he's shooting!

Morning, from a sunny rock that lies, it feels pretty chilly out there despite showing 10c. @monkeysarefun there's no chance of anything being in Annette's luggage without getting severely flattened, beaten and destroyed, non-Australian or not! Think 'The fat broad' from the BC cartoons. Lethal. She also delivered a packet of Tim Tams, they just look like UK Penguin biscuits, but I haven't had a nibble of one yet. Not sure what the day will bring, I'm a bit under the weather so won't be riding out to the Old Farts breakfast, but may go in the car. It's still too cold when you're not quite well.

Mrs NHN met up with a retired work-mate today, on her return from Upside-downie land - she brought an immigrant with her, a boat person....well, an Airbus person......wellllll, a Donk really....called Bruce apparently, who would have thought it. He's just young we think, he's not fully grown but obviously related as he doesn't have Eeyore's dozy eyes but the wideawake mischief making Donk eyes. No doubt he'll be in the news again soon. Apparently the spideys and snakey things in upside-downie land were not to his liking, and who can blame him!

Hmm. Preservative (preservatif?) means something else entirely where Jamie lives!

I have been a member of two of those institutes over the years, one the same as JJB would have been in (but NOTHING like as senior!) and the other #cough# CIPD (HR), but I had to present examined qualifications to both - and money of course. The CIPD in particular used to get my goat as the monthly magazine was literally self promotion and job adverts, and a mere ONE page of new case law that was relevant to my practice. I'm now in neither as I don't send them any money. I did manage to pressure wash a lot of the paths, until my hips and back gave up, we'll see if the remainder looking dirty will provoke SWMBO to do the rest - or just tell me to do it. I can guess.......😇

Always liked that angle! Hope your day is going a bit better......