Thanks for the tip Geoff! Looks like it should be a clear night here, although living in town it doesn't get really dark.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
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Thanks for the tip Geoff! Looks like it should be a clear night here, although living in town it doesn't get really dark.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
What and go blind and then be attacked by giant mobile plants? No thanks!
Take a night off from the psilocybin and you should be ok :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Macca
Yeah, give the THC a bash instead.:)
No chance of seeing anything round here anyway, it's lit brighter than Las Vegas for some unknown reason. You have to go about half a mile up the road to get to a point where you can even see any stars.
There's a lot of light pollution here, but I still see shooting stars, satellites and the space station (it's quite bright).
Hey you can't be promoting that kind of thing, unless Martin's got a dodgy hip or somethingQuote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
yeah I've seen the space station pass here a couple of years ago, but we have a fair bit of light pollution round here, so couldn't tell if there was any astronauts waving. 14 years since I saw any shooting stars, that was while camping in Spain. I will look out for some later though.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
You can't make out any of the Milky Way from here, but I visit the West Country regularly and it's easily seen from there. Looks like an amorphous band of cloud until your eyes adjust, then you can see that it's millions and millions of stars.
Just been outside for a while, but no luck. Mirror suggests laying on your back, but I may never get up again!
Me and the missus drove to the golf course at 10 and spent 40 minutes looking for shooting stars last night. I don’t really think it was dark enough and there was 50% cloud cover. May have seen 1 or 2 but not convinced that I didn’t imagine them. Had a lovely time none the less :)
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
25 years ago, some friends and I, and my ex, all set up lawn chair recliners, and sit out in a large field. Starring up, a few hours went by with only a few sightings. But suddenly, a rash of them! Several per minute, and some covered half the sky, they were gone in a flash. The Earth is running into this space dust at over 60,000mph. So, I guess they are quick! It was a rare experience.
As a teenager, the family went out to the Rockies and we camped at over 11,000 feet. I’ve never seen the sky like I saw it that night. You could see some stars were closer, some farther, they appeared to spiral upwards forever. You could keep looking for the one farthest away. Some were red, some blue, green, yellow, orange, Even purple! Looking into the edge of the Milky Way was a very 3D view, giant clouds in space.
It’s easy to see why, back before TV or radio, men studied the night sky on a nightly basis, and how they noticed any star that was out of place. You can bet a meteor shower would give them plenty to talk about!
Russell
Just been in the local pound shop & they had those small magnetic bowls, 'handy' I thought, 'I'll have one'. Went to the till & duly paid. It was only when I got home I realised I'd picked up three...
"Small magnetic bowls"? What are they, and what do you do with them? :scratch:Quote:
Originally Posted by Roy S
Glad you asked Barry, thought I was the only one who didn’t know!Quote:
Originally Posted by Barry
Oh, and by the way everyone “STOP, THIEF!” :lol:
Ah, I see - to keep your nuts tidy! Nothing worse than untidy nuts!
:rfl:
I'm nipping to Honda in the week to take a look at the two mini bikes... even brand new they are about £3k.. bargain... :)
Didn't do bad getting 3 for a quid then.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
There's only one thing worse than untidy nuts - and that's magnetised nuts.Quote:
Originally Posted by Alex_UK
As has been mentioned by someone in a previous thread, small bikes may not be easily noticed when in traffic. Might be worth fitting a mast to your helmet, with a flashing beacon on top. Better silly looking than sorry :) And if you choose a blue beacon they may even get out of your way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninanina
I thought the Hornet idea you had would be better - small women on big bikes look super cool imo.
I'll make sure I wear something bright enough to be seen don't worry ;) maybe day-glo pink !!
Visited Honda yesterday and sat on the Monkey, MSX, PCX and Super Cub... and fell in love with the MSX.. it just felt right to me..
The Monkey was a fantastic looking thing but just a bit too jokey for my liking and even though the seat is low it's also wide so my little leggies splayed out too much :doh: the PCX was just huge and heavy and the Cub just looks too old
The MSX is an amazing little machine... I know it's only 125cc but feels like a whole lot of fun to me.. especially as I've not ridden for a while the light weight and small size really appealed to me..
I'm now looking around for a near new MSX but if not I'll do a deal on a new one... From about 2018 they also came with ABS so that's what I'll go for
Now I'm on the look out for some new mc clothing... I've already got a nice Arai full face helmet in a fancy print... I think it was about £300 when new so I'm sure it'll do for the MSX ;)
I've got some Rukka trousers but they are black so I might change them for something a bit brighter.. I've also got a decent Belstaff jacket but, again, I don't really like the colour now... thought about a leather jacket but don't think it'd really go with a small bike so I thought about one of these, mainly as it's red..;) :
http://i.imgur.com/nXGVFnz.jpg
Whalley Bridge Dam.
Which came first, the dam or the town? I'm guessing that when the dam was built 180 years ago, there was no town. Maybe a hamlet and a farm or two, but not much else. So that begs the question, who gave permission for a town to be built/evolve, directly in the shadow of this dam. It's ridiculous! As is choosing to live there.
When considering somewhere to live, the first thing I do is look to see where water is nearby and how high the land is. I'd not live where flooding could be a problem or land erosion near the coast, although we have recently inherited a house right on the Kent coast (might sell that).
There's no way I'd ever live below a dam! We've seen it before, they are disasters waiting to happen!
853 people lived there in 1841 according to this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whaley_Bridge
Pretty rare for a dam to fail in this country, and a catastrophic failure is even more unlikely. It has happened, I think one went bad near Sheffield but that was back in Victorian times. I still wouldn't be comfortable living in the shadow of one though.
This was a bad one in California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Dam
it's alluded to in the film 'Chinatown'.
I can see what happened at Whalley Bridge.
The spillway ramp is clad with multiple rather thin concrete panels and probably due to age, water has got through joint gaps and eroded the soil bank beneath it dislodging the panels. There's a retaining wall to the right which has been undermined, leading to the outside grassed bank to also move.
The whole spillway surface needs replacing with a thicker reinforced concrete surface with a minimal number of panels, heftily tied together at expansion joints.
They'll need to substantially drain the reservior to do this. Not a good time of year for it really, there's six months to a year's worth of work there and the Autumn rains are not far off.
.
It happened in 1925, killing 16 people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Llyn_Eigiau. The cause was poor design (insufficient foundations) and poor workmanship (badly mixed concrete).Quote:
Originally Posted by Macca
I was in N. Wales a few weeks ago and visited the site of the broken dam.
This is the one I was thinking of, from 1864 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Sheffield_Flood
Looks like I was right: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-englan...shire-49220650Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
But then I do have a forty year background in civil engineering. :)
A different approach to 'Page Not Found':
https://www.ft.com/content/8be5512a-...c-000077b07658
That's rather silly! :D
Brilliant! - though probably only those interested in economics would appreciate the humour.Quote:
Originally Posted by Macca
Brilliant indeed!
Well I've started putting aside some basic essentials ahead of the likely chaos after the 31 October Brexit deadline and the inevitable panic buying on the run up to that date.
Panic buying may well cause shortages of stuff other than what comes from the EU, as many folk won't know what's what and just grab anything.
My stockpile won't go to waste. It'll just take a while to use up.
Just imagine running out of bog paper.....What fun! :)
I've got a couple of tins of sardines in. Do you think that's enough?Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
Yeah. That should do. Just keep a frozen baguette to go with them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Macca
Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
Yes, but it might make your arse a bit sore.Quote:
Originally Posted by Macca
Sorry but that ain’t going to work Geoff - unless you have an ice house - no electricity = no freezer! :eek:Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
I wonder if the fuel situation will get interesting?
The water will probably be cut off too. And then flaming meteorites will start coming down out of the skies. Mixed with hot hail.
And the Yellowstone Park super-volcano will erupt, causing endless night and winter..............well for a while anyway.
It will coincide with actual winter though so we probably won't notice much difference.
I'm sure we'll be fine for bog roll, unless you normally use Cushelle, that sounds foreign.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
It occurred to me that if fuel is likely to be short, I can fill the car and my three fuel cans and remain mobile for over seven months. I'll use my scooter, which can do 150mpg, I can just pinch some from the car if need be. The tank on the scooter holds a gallon and that alone will last a month to start with if I take it easy. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
Be sure to keep your scooter somewhere secure, or it's likely to disappear in the night, only to be found later with your one gallon siphoned off.Quote:
Originally Posted by walpurgis
Caved in last weekend and bought another Amp. MF A1.
The old one or the new one?Quote:
Originally Posted by Batty
Alexa :rolleyes: .
I have fallen into the trap of buying the other half such a thing !!
Now if you had asked me a while back if I would have one in the house ,then a big NO would be the answer .
After hearing mother in law going on about them recording your conversation s etc big brother style , I hadnt ever envisaged one resting on my sideboard !
So up to my Mums one day and a neighbour friend of hers had let her have one ,that her daughter never used !
Fup me if she didnt demonstate it right in front of us ,and I thought ,for an 80 yr old ,like the ad on tv , where the son gets it to play his grandads reminder when hes out at work - its actually very amusing and handy (it pains me to admit it !! )
And while shes telling us who gave it her - Alexa chips in too , funny as fup !!
So , I bought one for the Mrs ,and now its thumping out Genesis and Tom Petty ,Test Match Special ,(till the Mrs comes in and puts Abba on )and I can confuse the feck out of Alexa at the same time (Not difficult in my case )
I have a bad hip at the mo ,so jumping up and about is a bit difficult , so to just bite the embarrasing bullet by asking a bloody machine to play this and that ,is quite a novelty !
So , I am now putting another smaller Dot in the dairy next to the milking parlour , (I tried my wifes in there first to check it had ample Wi Fi :eek: ,it did )and hooking it up via a 3.5 ml plug to plug to a mainly redundant stereo player thing , so we can listen to news ,views , or any music the milker wants !!
Cushty :cool: