Malcolm 0-6-0

I think you slightly misunderstand me. I'm an archaeologist and historian by trade (MA, Ph.D etc.). As much as we would like the power, moral judgements about past behaviour are somewhat fruitless as the present can't change the past. No more than a lawyer can step back and undo the events that see his client in the dock. But after viewing the results of past actions we can change our behaviour to create better future outcomes but that's all. So even if I choose to make a moral judgement I am forced to admit that while I may approve or disapprove I can't do anything about the past. However what I can do is point out the means by which events impose influences on other events according to the historical record, which may perhaps help create something better for the future. So the fact that I find slavery repugnant in any form is for the purposes of the argument irrelevant and diverts from the more important understanding of the economic interactions by all the participants that sustained it. But more importantly this emphasises that those participants did not see it in our terms, and which leads to what irritates me about the current breast beating behaviour that it is simply repeating fruitless public angst that I have seen many times before. Perhaps I am getting old and jaded but the current mass leap by celebrities and other wannabees onto the BLM movement etc. (which needs no such defence because of the events that gave birth to it) is simply a way for these rather empty headed people to establish some money making credibility amongst their followers. I fully expect that the truly awful Kardashians will publicly eschew tanning as it disrespects those people whose genetic inheritance gives them a natural tan. That is my overall attitude as a historian and archaeologist - and I am experienced enough to expect no variation in these cyclical outbursts of public furore. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Naahh!!! Columbia home of coke ............... a high time for all Only joking - herein follows the usual disclaimer re etc. etc. etc.

I agree with what our host said in his post on the previous page, especially his comments on the rewriting/retrospective condemning of historical events. I find Brack's comment just above quite apposite in another way. This current publicly confected rage over the slave trade ignores a very important point which Brack's comment alluded to. The British slave trade or the Arab for that matter did not thrive because the respective traders put ashore armed troops who then conquered, captured, enslaved and then exported the local people. The trade thrived because the local rulers were happy to do all the work of conquering, capturing and enslaving because that was a regular part of their pre-contact relations with their own neighbours. The local chiefs made a lot of wealth out of happily selling off their captured neighbours because that what's they normally did. The same practices were integral to most societies in the world, despite many historical and current attempts to recast these historical peoples as epitomies of the Rousseauian ideal. Native Americans regularly raided fellow tribes for slaves for their own use, as did aboriginal Australians who raided other tribes for women. In New Zealand the Maoris were masters of it - the list is endless. Everywhere one looks at the available ethnographic accounts the practice is endemic. Our mutual European Celtic ancestors did a roaring trade selling slaves to the Greeks and Romans and anyone else. As did the local British tribes amongst themselves - enslaved labour was a crucial component of the ancient economies and continued as we know in parts of the world into the 20th century i.e. the Arab states as well as into the 21st in the form of third world sweat shops producing cheap manufactured goods. In fact if we look far enough back there is not one human society that has ever eschewed the idea that one's neighbours weren't fodder for one's own economic or other purposes. That we now find slavery to be reprehensible is a welcome but quite recent advance in our human relations. Yet we still condone third world sweat shop labour. As a species our fellow humans are first a commodity then a human - that's the way of the world. As for tearing down statues etc. it serves no purpose other than to ignore the fact that all it will do is hide the past not atone for it. And hiding the past is not a desirable thing if we are to have some human progress.

I just can't believe that our host was so cruel as to not give them little windows so these poor tiny little West Welsh Miniature Cows couldn't look outside. What is he - prejudiced or something, what have these faithful little creatures done to deserve such abhorrent travelling conditions? Certainly a tiny little West Welsh Miniature Cow is not a really suitable lap dweller like a cat, nor do they curl up up on a rug in front of the fire in a very cute and picturesque way, and, admittedly, they really haven't actually ever mastered the concept of a litter tray but don't they also deserve some concern and affection. We #tiny teeny cows demand action!!!!!!

For a moment there I was envisaging this Chicken Brick as a brick you hit the selected chook with to kill it. But that slight confusion aside it reminds of a method I'd seen used in which the "brick" is actually a hard pastry (pretty much inedible) which you wrap around the chicken when you cook it in the oven. It has the same effect as this ceramic brick would. Personally I found little difference in the end result between that and a traditionally properly oven roasted chicken.

Perhaps insert zeros - thus h0m0 as apparently this obscene censoring system is taking us back to Pol Potian year zero standards of expression. The reason being that as we know the only people who visit these forums are very easily offended young ladies from seminaries. The fact that they might not be the least interested in toy trains seems to have escaped the censor's awareness.

I dunno about that - the sign says they're going to be executed.

When it was marketed in Spain?

A friend of mine has acquired a new grandson whom the parents have called Forrest. I quipped that they might lose him when he goes to kindergarten because they "won't be able to see the Forrest for the threes".

Well I won't tell you my surname but the original intention was to give me two middle names after two uncles on each side of the family. So they started with Malcolm and then went for Alan David, until my father suddenly realised he would henceforth be known as MAD xxxxxxx's father. This was solved by David becoming the first and Alan becoming the second which was a vast relief to him and saved me from perpetual embarrassment.

That's nothing, Elon Musk and his missus have just tried to call their daughter "X Æ A-12". I suppose the explanation is that he's rich and lives in California. I feel sorry for the kid though.

Yes that is the problem, these things are a delicate balance of saving lives by closing down unnecessary contact yet striving to manage the economy so that the same people are not then victims of a deep economic recession which can impose real long term suffering. Governments are damned if they do or damned if they don't in these cases. Ours seems to have erred on the side of public safety which is praiseworthy but I fear that the effect on the economy will take a long time to recover from. Trying times in which the odd instance of a bad choice by a politician is, while not something to be excused, is of little consequence in the greater scheme of things.

One of them doesn't seem to be wearing anything. Not a budgie smuggler in sight.

When Abbott first entered parliament he was memorably described by the Labor Party Prime Minister of the day, Paul Keating, as a young fogey.

We have quite a lot of aboriginal names for places in Australia, a great many of which date back to the colonial days. They are politely understood to mean something descriptive in the local language of the place but I suspect most can be translated from the original to "Piss off white man"

I'm afraid that - 'I must go down to the oggin again, to the lonely oggin and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by; And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a grey mist on the oggin’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.' doesn't read as pleasantly as the original.

When I hear politicians explaining why they broke some rule they had applied to the general population I am reminded of this song

Good thing it didn't belong to someone named Spanking.

Why did they name a place after Mr Jolly's bum?

Speaking of Ikea, I've never been able to take seriously any business where every item they sell is named Billy or Glag. Or for that matter why do a set of book cases have to have a name anyway.

Aaah yes lad those old photos are grand, but the door was still on the engine shed back then. You may worry about the contents of the crate, but have you considered it might be the replacement hinges that got lost.

Could I say in defence of Byzantium, and all things Byzantine, that of all the cities of this world Istanbul, formally Constantinople and before that Byzantium, is my favourite. So much history, life, variety and whatever ...... need I say more. I remember once eating a delightful lunch at a restaurant on the Bosporus, one fine late spring day while having a break before going to eastern Turkey for a period of archaeological work and looking out over the water what did I see? A ship traversing that marvellous waterway that some 12 years before I had been involved with when I was working for a shipping agency in Melbourne long before I had gained the qualifications that allowed me to be in Turkey as a paid specialist. It is a beautiful city. Truly the great cross roads of the world.

I am, let's face it, getting on a bit. People visit my model room which is filled with an incompleted layout, many shelves of model aircraft etc. and following that, they then go on into my living room which is filled with my various antiques (18th century English porcelain, 18th century and Regency glass; antique firearms and shelf after shelf of books etc. ) which are all very dear to me. They then ask in a very accusatory tone "What are you going to do with this when you die, have you planned?". My genial reply is "Won't worry me at all will it, I'll be dead won't I" For some reason that reply always seems to ignite a series of lectures etc. which leave me somewhat nonplussed. But it is the absolute truth. If there is an after life which I really hope not - let's face it a boring eternity of wondering what to do next, I'll be too busy settling in to worry about my mortal baggage. And if there isn't, which I fully expect, well what can I say except I won't be - end of story. In my home office I seem to have not only the normal things that accumulate in offices like files etc. but for some reason the most outdated collection of instruction manuals and booklets etc. for long out of date technology. I periodically have a clean out of those which go into recycling. As a former archaeologist I have an archaeological approach to the piles of unsought paper which inevitably accumulate and which have never been important enough to provoke any action be it replying to or filing. If haven't had any need for it in a calendar year into recycling it goes. Inevitably it's the stuff at the bottom of the pile. We have the material things because they are of either practical or entertainment/sentimental value to us. That is sufficient in my opinion to retain them. If they are no longer practically useful then I get rid of them while those things that offer entertainment or sentimental value I keep. I just seem to have a capacity to accumulate the latter but it's my choice and so be it. Also on the more practical side our local council has two free hard rubbish collections every year for the big items and the usual weekly recycling rubbish pickups every week or fortnight so I make ample use of these. What more could an avid collector ask for? - oh yes several maids to do the dusting.

One topic I see has arisen which is a process called "de-cluttering" - how can that be a solution when we are surrounded by things that are merely at rest until we find another place to leave them? Everything in our existence is always in a state of flux - why should inanimate objects be exempt.

We've had a couple of our various state parliament ministers caught out travelling when not supposed to. They've done the decent thing and resigned, but I suspect that they'll be back in government after a stint in the sin bin. The death toll in the UK is devastating and I can understand the sense of worry if not justifiable fear that invokes. In Australia our overall toll per capita has been very low, miraculously so in fact, but we did embrace social distancing and forced closures etc. quite early and with very little reluctance - except for the ubiquitous fights in supermarket aisles over toilet paper. Our state government has said it will lift some restrictions at the beginning of June, however I must admit that I will be quite chary of embracing them. Especially as I'm well into the 70s age group. But we still await the chance of a second spike and that could change things in an instant. I think the reality is that until someone comes up with a vaccine for this thing then we have no choice but to take all the precautions we are able to. However for many who are losing jobs, have mortgages to meet, families to feed etc. those precautions are sometimes out of the question, and understanding that is also necessary. As strong as the western economies are no government can afford to maintain the levels of subsidies and cash incentives for very long. And yet we see the active flouting by leaders like in the US and Brazil of any restraint despite their rising casualties. That sort of leadership leaves me horrified and thankful our own showed the sense they did. Difficult times indeed. But on a lighter note you should be glad you took up model railways - just think of the engineering difficulties of that lifting panel if you'd taken up model canals.