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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 28, 2020 15:06:47 GMT
My ringtone is the Cuckoo Waltz, aka Laurel and Hardy theme tune. Had it for years. Anyone else personalised theirs? Some decades ago Gilly got a new Sony mobile that featured the ability to assign different ring tones to different groups from the address book, and also allowed you to record whatever music you wanted via the phone’s mike. Depending on the ring tone, you could know whether it was likely to be someone you wanted to talk to or not (as in whether it was ‘business’ or ‘family’ for example). Experimenting with this, instead of music I recorded myself saying: “ Hey Gilly – this is me, Nigel; pick up the phone, I need to chat – Gilly? C’mon, I know you’re there . . .” and assigned it to a ‘group’ comprising only my number. I didn’t let on that I had done this of course. The next time I knew she was off being driven somewhere in a friend’s car, I tried it out and rang her. It was rather a success (from my viewpoint anyway). The bewildered consternation must have been something, when I suddenly began apparently calling out to her from her handbag. History has fogged somewhat as to the aftermath. I suspect I was asked to modify the ‘ring tone’ at some point, or she got a new phone eventually. The experience didn't lessen her dark suspicions as to the extent these things can be used to spy on one.
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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 27, 2020 17:09:42 GMT
He's been on here relatively recently. I hope he and his lady are ok. Knowing they are technically in the "old git/gitess" category one does worry sometimes. Agreed, firmly in the old git category and feeling it, but I would hesitate to attribute that description to milady. Not fallen off my perch just yet, but humbly appreciative of the evident concern.
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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 27, 2020 17:04:46 GMT
Bromptons are great, but expensive, Bickertons can be had cheap, are light, but a bit wobbly NigelMoore travelled the world with one*. There's quite a range of folders around. I started with 2 folding shopping bikes, one found in the cut in Elland, the other cheap, newspaper ad. *any news of Nigel, not seen him around for ages. Bickertons are peerless – but you not only have to learn to ride properly, for serious use the bikes need stripping down and rebuilding as originally designed. Iran, 2001 They can be used for lightweight travel off-the-shelf, but I did encounter problems, albeit remediable on the road. Thailand, 1979 With early improvements, prior to proper reconstruction, crossing the Sinai desert in 1982 – Keeping in an outside boat locker, remember that while most of it is aluminium, chains and gears need rust protection.
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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 15, 2020 16:05:44 GMT
Sliding off-topic, though still on old films, I took delivery today of some old family 8mm reels that a baby sister no longer had room for - and to my total astonishment the collection includes a few reels of a home movie that I and all my other siblings had thought long vanished, following heat damage back in the sixties. It was produced by my maternal grandfather using his 3 children for the cast, titled “Tarzoola” starring my mother as a very young teenager clad in skimpy leopardskin, swinging from trees as a female version of Tarzan. I have always retained a vivid memory of the one time Dad screened it for us, but there seems to be a part 2 that I will not have seen. I am very excited at the prospect of getting it carefully treated and digitised (Dad had at least one of the cannisters marked as too brittle to be projected.) Hopefully there will be places here in the UK that can treat such delicate material appropriately, as they have in the States; the film has to be 75 – 80 years old after all, and appallingly the cans were used as a stove support for some years. It will have been my mother’s only film appearance; she was famous in her day (in Western Australia), but for radio and stage acting and singing, not in film – my grandfather was for a time WA’s only ‘film star’, with a role in “The Overlanders” as well as several other wartime propaganda movies. Perhaps that experience led him to steer Mum away from the scene! Footnote to above – have just downloaded the digitised copy of my grandfather’s movie, which I am wholly delighted with. The scene that I remembered is not there, and I fear that I have just the first half; if memory serves aright, it must have been the latter half that had stuck in my mind (the Part 2 that isn’t amongst the reels I got); I didn’t really remember any of what I have now watched. For the ladies of the forum – my grandfather’s vision of female empowerment and the right to say ‘no’ is splendidly portrayed. The film I have ends with the importunate villain sinking to the ground as a boggle-eyed corpse under the knife wielded by my mother’s character. Serves him right for being silly of course. Who in their right minds would tangle with this ferocious young lady?
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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 7, 2020 11:57:43 GMT
For some reason I found my brain rehearsing scenes from Frank Herbert's 'The White Plague' this morning, as it struggled for complete consciousness prior to the alarm going off. Never made into a film, so far as I know, but an interesting projection of how governments worldwide might react to a (manufactured) plague that could spell the end of human existence.
The plague was deliberately introduced to only 3 countries (England, Ireland and Libya) and the rest of the world told to isolate those countries rigidly, lest the infection spread. Needless to say, that exhortation to self-isolate resulted in too little too late, and the present day reality tends to confirm the accuracy of Herbert's 20thC psychological postulate.
It is a little surprising that nobody thought to make a film of it, though possibly the politics of the day might have made such a project a bit iffy.
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Post by NigelMoore on Apr 6, 2020 11:19:04 GMT
Gawd ... I could kill for a rusk Rog 1956, and a recently uncovered portion of a letter from my father to his, while aboard a liner bound for Freemantle – My sister and I reprised our roles in those costumes a year or so later for some event long forgotten –
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Post by NigelMoore on Mar 25, 2020 18:30:35 GMT
Sliding off-topic, though still on old films, I took delivery today of some old family 8mm reels that a baby sister no longer had room for - and to my total astonishment the collection includes a few reels of a home movie that I and all my other siblings had thought long vanished, following heat damage back in the sixties. It was produced by my maternal grandfather using his 3 children for the cast, titled “Tarzoola” starring my mother as a very young teenager clad in skimpy leopardskin, swinging from trees as a female version of Tarzan.
I have always retained a vivid memory of the one time Dad screened it for us, but there seems to be a part 2 that I will not have seen. I am very excited at the prospect of getting it carefully treated and digitised (Dad had at least one of the cannisters marked as too brittle to be projected.) Hopefully there will be places here in the UK that can treat such delicate material appropriately, as they have in the States; the film has to be 75 – 80 years old after all, and appallingly the cans were used as a stove support for some years.
It will have been my mother’s only film appearance; she was famous in her day (in Western Australia), but for radio and stage acting and singing, not in film – my grandfather was for a time WA’s only ‘film star’, with a role in “The Overlanders” as well as several other wartime propaganda movies. Perhaps that experience led him to steer Mum away from the scene!
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Post by NigelMoore on Mar 23, 2020 9:40:43 GMT
A superb book and the film was, I thought good. As you say a stellar cast with Fred Astaire turning in what I thought was a great performance ..... Another of his books that made a great impression on me was the posthumous "Trustee from the Toolroom" but as far as I know it was never made into a film. A much neglected author nowadays Good to know somebody else has read him! I have ordered a dvd of the film, will see if I can overcome my distaste for romanticised distortions (if that was the case). If one was to characterise Nevil Shute's work, it would be his highlighting the profound and beneficial effects arising from the choices of unassuming “little people” simply doing the right thing in their own eyes after a little careful thought. The seemingly plodding mundane revealed as truly inspirational human greatness of character, enhancing the lives of all around them. What we once might have termed “very British”, though the accuracy of that could now be called in question perhaps. We did the Pied Piper in first year High School; others I've read were A Town like Alice and Beyond the Black Stump. I see that most of his books have been hitherto unknown to me - including the one you mention - must start collecting them.
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Post by NigelMoore on Mar 22, 2020 22:19:30 GMT
The most thoughtful, well-mannered and inspiring of end-of-the-world books I have read was Nevil Shute's "On the Beach". It was made into a somewhat altered movie in 1959 (a couple of years after publication of the book).
One of the enduring scenes I remember from the book concerned a query by one of the characters of a girl, as to why her father was ploughing fields in preparation for a crop that might never get sown, let alone reaped - she shrugged that it was what good farmers did, her father was a good farmer, and intended to carry on living what remained of his life as he always had. It gives rise to conflicting responses in me, and of course other characters responded to immminent demise in different ways - but that is what made it a thought-provoking book. Not sure whether I would like the film (and the author ceased co-operation when the Yank producer insisted on his own creative changes). It did have a 'stellar' cast.
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Post by NigelMoore on Feb 6, 2020 18:14:09 GMT
CANAL & RIVER TRUST TO TACKLE ‘IMPROPER’ MOORING AND MAKE WATERWAYS SAFER The Trust intends the process to serve as a prompt for the boat owner to moor appropriately and to help and educate boaters that may be new to the water or unaware of the issues caused by poor mooring. If a boater does not address their inappropriate mooring the process will allow the Trust to take action that could ultimately result in the revocation of the boater’s licence. Ridiculous. Once again, the only sanction CaRT seem able to entertain for anything, is boat licence revocation and s.8. If a boat is moored contrary to the byelaws, then the appropriate sanction to impose - should the envisaged initial cascade of letters prove ineffective – is prosecution. If a boat is moored otherwise than contrary to the byelaws or statute, then no offence exists and the ploy of licence revocation for breach of T&C’s brings the whole argument over the validity of s.17 of the 1995 Act into play once more. That said, the idea of educating boaters firmly as to good mooring practice is a splendid one. Byelaw exemptions for maintenance boats regardless, it would be good to see CaRT leading by example in this arena.
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Post by NigelMoore on Jan 8, 2020 20:37:54 GMT
It could be something as simple as the BW/CRT culture of deliberately refusing to enforce byelaws. Not a byelaw that is relevant, but s.9 of the 1983 Act. Far simpler than the s.8 process immediately preceding it. However the point of exercising such a power is maintaining the waterways (including towpaths) free of obstruction. Consequently, it does not meet the criteria applied by CaRT for taking action. There is nothing in it for them.
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Post by NigelMoore on Dec 22, 2019 17:36:02 GMT
The EA are continuing in mild panic mode, the rivers going up and down like a yo-yo, even during low tide periods.
Better safe than sorry, but it gets not so safe for either boats or banks when these rapid draw-downs and fill-ups are going on day in/day out.
Last EA warning yesterday was alerting us to forecast flooding between 1 & 3 in the morning, which rather spoilt my sleep-pattern; however there was nothing drastic about the water levels at that time of the morning as it eventuated.
I am nearing the end of drying out such boxes of doc.s & etc that were flooded - in the cock-up that led to this precautionarily excessive reaction - as are capable of and worth recovery. The boxes of boat & bike bits, being hardware, I have paid little or no attention to. At least all this physical reality prevents me obsessing totally over the task of preparing new lots of criminal prosecutions and civil cases - I had hoped that would all be behind me with the close of this year, but it is not to be . . .
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Post by NigelMoore on Dec 22, 2019 16:11:06 GMT
PS Is Evangeline's surname Moneypenny by any chance @someboater ? Entirely out of left field and off-topic (and possibly of extreme disinterest) – but did you know that all phone calls to ‘Customer Services’ at CaRT go through Moneypenny?
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Post by NigelMoore on Dec 7, 2019 12:33:54 GMT
The club was later relocated from Medmenham further inland on another of Sir Francis's properties in West Wycombe, with a maze of tunnels that I think are open to visitors. Medmenham Abbey is now a private residence closed to visitors.
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Post by NigelMoore on Dec 7, 2019 11:38:32 GMT
I remember reading an account of the social conditions in the time of Sir Francis’s Hellfire Club, wherein it was noted that another elitist club of young men considered it sport to bundle watchmen in their shelters and roll them down hills. One anecdote revealed that one of the more strong-minded watchmen arrested the culprits for the assault, and though the judge found them guilty, he publicly admonished the watchman for ‘interfering with the pleasure of the gentry’!
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