Leisurely Scribbles (part 5) (Part 1)

Hobbies & Pastimes Hobbies & Pastimes: Chat / Discussions
16182

Just to take you out of suspense, all ye who are biting your nails awaiting news from the Hadron Collider, I googled the latest news, albeit over it’s a year and a half old now.
Notice how it “just happened” to go out of service just as they were about to return to “work’ after the long festive holidays, handy that.:slight_smile:

24 January 2019
“The LHC lies dormant, its superconducting magnets drained of liquid helium to be brought back to room temperature. Along with the rest of CERN’s accelerator complex, the LHC entered long-shutdown two (LS2) on 10 December.”
“During the next two years of long-shutdown two (LS2), the LHC and its injectors will be tuned up for high-luminosity operations: Linac2 will leave the floor to Linac4 to enable more intense beams; the Proton Synchrotron Booster will be equipped with completely new injection and acceleration systems; and the Super Proton Synchrotron will have new radio-frequency power. The LHC is also being tested for operation at its design energy of 14 TeV, while, in the background, civil-engineering works for the high-luminosity upgrade (HL-LHC), due to enter service in 2026, are proceeding apace.”

It’s very important for them to call long shutdown 2 “LS2”, the idea behind that is to confuse the layperson into thinking LS2 is something technical, secretive and way above their heads, so they won’t ask awkward questions like “what the hell are you all doing anyway?” sort of like when the bishop asked the boy he was confirming did he understand the mystery of the three divine persons in the one God, the boy looked at him surprised and said “Your not supposed to understand it your grace, it’s a mystery”:wink:

I was surprised to see Linac2 having to leave the floor to let Linac 4 take over, what happened to Linac3? However it was a stroke of genius to suggest installing new injection and acceleration systems to the Proton Synchrotron booster, nice one lads, that’s good for another 2 billion grant at least.

Well I hope that helps to bring you up to date, it left me drained trying to figure it out, I need a refill, I’m way above room temperature and it’s not liquid helium I’ll be needing.:slight_smile:

I remember a Frenchman telling me that old guillotine operators never die, they just head-off into the Sunset.
Oh God!, I think it’s time for me tablet again.:wink:

Well here she is, 5 billion quids worth of junk lying idle.:slight_smile:

https://i.postimg.cc/kXY3Gxcc/CCJan-Feb19-Intro-frontis-635x418.jpg

16183

I’m beginning to accept that this Covid 19 thing is here to stay, just like the flu that keeps changing it’s makeup every few years, we’ll just have to deal with it in our own individual ways and to hell with the governments ever changing advice, I think it’s a real case of “Lord forgive them, for they know not what they do”;-):slight_smile:

I got a really bad dose of the flu back in the 1980’s, it was so bad that as I lay in bed I wanted to die there and then, my whole body was just one big lump of aching sweating flesh, breathing was murder, I really wanted out at any cost, but I recovered without hospitalisation and the tender care of a loving wife, and (tip wood) I never got the flu again since, colds yes, but never the flu, never had the flu vaccine either and I won’t take a new one for this virus, if it gets me it gets me and thats it, something has to kill you, as the boxer said “If the right one don’t get ya then the left one will”:wink:

My daughter has just left, she came to visit us by bus, she had a fall last week when out walking her dog, broke a small bone in her foot and was told not to attempt to drive for many weeks to come, she’s out of work and hobbling along with crutches, they don’t use plaster casts anymore, they provide you with this huge boot thing and you keep your foot in it for as long as you can without removing it, horrible looking yoke it is too, she was not amused when she was leaving and I starting singing singing “These boots are made for walking”
However I walked her up to the bus stop and she was in great spirits when the bus came after a few minutes.

The bit of good news is that me tomatoes are finally starting to turn red, must have been the bit of sunshine we had for the last week or so, I was beginning to give up all hope for them, not a bad little crop from a few seeds either, there’s more in the small plastic greenhouse.
The wind was playing havoc with them too so the wife tied up a lot of the vines to stop them swinging in the breeze and falling off. hence all the strings, more strings that the Halle orchestra. :smiley:
I’m new to all this, but I’ll have to organise that patch of ground better next year, everything was done in a hurry this year on account of the plague, didn’t even get any cucumbers planted after the lovely crop of them the wife had in the greenhouse last year.

That particular piece of ground if very fertile, it was the wife’s family dogs graveyard since the house was built in 1930, I believe there are altogether about twelve faithfully departed canines resting deep below the surface, fair play to them, they makes great man ure.;-):slight_smile:

https://i.postimg.cc/TYQYrWtp/IMG-2208-copy.jpg

16184

Strange, we have LS2, and HS2, both lame ducks, if we are lucky.

16185

Sadly I think we’ll have a LS3 and LS4 too before we get a real grip on this thing.:frowning:

My seven year old grandson was over with us today, hadn’t seen him for a good while, he had learned a new rhyme in school and wanted to recite it to the wife and me, it was that very old Scottish one “Wee Willie Winkle”, same one I learned in school when I was his age, strange that.
Anyway he was as proud as punch as he reeled off the first three verses of it complete with the actions.

That reminded of of that old rocker dubbed “Britains Wild Man of Rock”N’Roll”
Wee Willie Harris.
My God Wee Willie had some energy for such a little fella, pity he never made it to the big time, but he’s still going strong at the age of 87, well they do say it’s the old dog for the long road eh.:slight_smile:

“Born in Bermondsey, Harris left his job at a Peek Freans bakery in London to start his music career.[2] He began performing at The 2i’s Coffee Bar in Soho, London,[2] where he was the resident piano player, performing with Tommy Steele, Adam Faith, Screaming Lord Sutch and others. He was named for his 5’ 2" height.[3] In November 1957, he was picked by the TV producer, Jack Good, to appear in the BBC show Six-Five Special. His appearances on the show led to concerns being expressed in the media about the BBC’s role in “promoting teenage decadence”.[4] His debut single, the self-penned “Rockin’ At the 2 I’s”, was released on the Decca label in December 1957, and was followed by several others, although none reached the UK Singles Chart.” Wiki.

Here’s a good clear video of Willie in action.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/249YCOmJxjM

16186

Suited and Booted, those were the days.

16187

I see there’s a very interesting thread about dating women in general chat, a bit too serious for an old lad like me to get involved though, I likes the quiet life.;-):smiley:
I gave up trying to figure women out many years ago, there’s no point in it, they have their own methods and ways of thinking that only they understand, it’s really a woman’s thing, but we still love ‘em, and long live love. :slight_smile:

If you want to get some idea of how a woman ticks, I always remember that old joke, where the milk delivery man hears a loud noise “Boom boom boom” every time he leaves the milk outside the monastery walls, it’s beginning to drive him nuts with curiosity so he knocks on the door and asks the monk what the noise is, the monk replies “You have to be a monk to know” and slams the door.

The story can be dragged out and go on and on, depending on the mood of the listener, so i’ll just give you a very condensed version.

Eventually the milkman decides to pack in his job and become a monk, his ordination day keeps getting put back for petty reasons, and every time he asks about the daily noise he’s told “You have to be a monk to know, wait till you are ordained my son”
In the meantime he’s losing weight and he’s only a shell of his former self.

Finally 30 years after he entered the order, the day of his ordination arrives and after the ceremony he is taken down a long corridor led by the abbot, the noise gets louder and louder as he reaches the door at the end, the abbot swings the door open and there facing him is the source of the loud noise that has been tormenting the poor fellow for over 30 long years.

What was it?, your listener will ask impatiently. Then you just smile and say “You have to be a monk to know”.:slight_smile:

And that’s exactly how it is with women, you have to be a woman to know.
They are a mystery, and what’s life without it’s many mysteries…dull, very dull.:wink:

Ah it’s a long time since I heard this, me granny used to play it on her old radiogram when I was a boy, I know it all by heart, and many’s the Saturday night I sang it for my dear Uncle Joe and his mates when he brought them home for a sing-song.
The singer here sings about a mysterious box he finds and can’t get rid or it, sorta like a nagging wife in Ireland when there was no divorce, tough luck, you made your bed now lie on it as the old ones used to say back then.;-):slight_smile:

- YouTube

16188

Yep, dear Uncle Joe, the mind boggles.:lol::lol:

16189

Yes Spitty, but MY Uncle Joe worked in a hush hush government department… the National library, he was the chief hush husher, and everything was on a ‘need to know’ basis, because everyone who went there needed to know something, I believe that was the whole idea of having libraries.:lol:

That takes me back to my youth, and the first time I met Amber Page, a young library trainee introduced to me by Joe, she was learning the noble art of book binding and the restoration of old valuable volumes, the repair crew were nicknamed “The yellow page mob”

Amber was a very energetic well built girl and a keep fit fanatic, whereas I was a skinny lazy lad who spent his whole working day sitting at a bench, a bad match from the word go and it was bound to end in disaster, in fact it nearly dis-arced me.:shock:

That finally came about one night when she was working late behind closed doors in the library, she had rang me earlier and asked me to come to the side door of the building marked “Staff Only” and knock three times, then she would know who it was and let me in, the four night watchmen would be playing cards upstairs as usual and she would be alone in the basement where she worked, an evening of unbridled passion was promised.:wink:

When she let me in she was wearing a tiny mini skirt and a low cut blouse, she looked great and was very keen to get down to business.
As I put my arms around her I happened to notice an old volume lying on a bench entitled “The Reproductive Cycle of the Common Rodent” 1745 by Hardy Rathbone, amazing what turns on these keep fit types.;-):slight_smile:

As our passion progressed she guided me towards another bench where my naked bum touched a large electric iron she had left on, she used this to straighten out old pages, and I let out an unmerciful yelp, immediate deflation and that was the and of that, I was in agony for days afterwards and the awkward part was having to make up excuses to friends and relatives who enquired why I was walking around like a Penguin.:lol:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/EDS_oEWUiUA

16190

Yep, its hard to “Strike” when the Iron is Hot.:lol::lol::wink:

16191

Nice Bird BTW.:lol:

16192

:lol::lol: A first class reply Spitty, very apt indeed, I love it.

I believe Amber had another boyfriend many years later and she would invite him over to her flat to watch a hammer horror video on Friday nights, both of them would be in their underwear, she used to call those evenings her “Hammer and Thongs” nights.:wink:
Yes, with Amber you didn’t have to hang around for long before you got the green light. :smiley:

Read today that black holes have shadows, wonder what colour they are, white?
And the wife says I’m daft. :shock:

A fella called to the door today, he said he was a gas contractor, he had to do something with the boiler, it hadn’t been heating up the water properly and Phyllis feared something was wrong, best to be safe lest the natural gas would burn our ass and blow us all to hell, as the song goes.
I didn’t know she had contacted anyone as I answered the door to him, the wife was busy in the kitchen.

He had one of those identifying label badges on his coat with his name in block letters on it and when I looked at it I’ll never know how I held in the laughing, I asked him to hold on a minute till I got the wife, she’ll know more about it than I would, then I dashed into the kitchen and let out the restrained laughter, guess what his name was?… Percy Fitzswilly!
I kid you not, isn’t fact stranger than fiction, I couldn’t live in the same body with a name like that, I blame the parents for not changing their surname, think of the slagging he must have taken as a schoolboy.
I knew a fella called Michael Swilly, but never heard of a Fitzswilly. Fitzgerald, Fitzpatrick, Fitzmaurice, yes, but no Fitzwilly. I believe Fitz roughly translated means “bastard son of”

Come to think of it, Fitzswilly would be a great name for a condom company.:slight_smile:

Talk about fitting, I remember going to a fashionable tailor in Grafton Street to have a suit made, It was in the mid 60’s and I was flushed with coin at that time, when it was finished I tried it on and it felt a bit tight under the arms, the salesman stood back and said.
“Why it’s perfect Mr. Mac, it fits you like a glove!”
“I know it does, but I wanted it to fit like a suit”:slight_smile:

Ah and then there was sweet little Alice Ryan who lived next door, never got pass a smile and a wink across the fence with her, the family moved to Canada before I could get up the nerve to ask her out, well they do say he who hesitates is lost.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/Z6qnRS36EgE

16193

Yep Jem, Alice would have been toast, next door to me, on the Estate.:lol:

Before long, she would have been “Browned Off”.:lol::lol:

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Seriously Spitty, when you look back on those lustful days of youth anything could have happened, one slip and God knows what a young lad or lassie could end up spending the rest of their lives living with, dangerous times, but and we didn’t realise it then.:shock:

Followers or stragglers?

According to what I’ve been reading It seems important to the kids of today to have many ‘followers’ on F/B and similar social media outlets, seems the more you have the more popular you are with your friends not to mention the opposite sex, good for them I say, it’s their world now let them enjoy it while they can, time passes so quickly.:wink:

I know I’m guilty of being very old fashioned, but when I hear the word ‘followers’ I’m inclined to think of the bible and how Christ had many followers, they followed him up mountains, across deserts, into temples, on fishing trips, and when he wasn’t sitting on his ass they walked behind him following him everywhere he went, if yeh follow me.:smiley:

I can only think of one follower I ever had, it was our family cat at the time, Ginger used to follow me to school then bugger off till twenty past two when he would return and sit on the school window ledge outside the classroom, then when we broke up at half two he’d follow me home again, how he knew the time I’ll never know.:confused:

There used to be many beggars on the streets of Dublin back in the 1970’s/80’s and if you walked down O’Connell street waving a pound note you could have as many followers as you wished, as a matter of fact you couldn’t throw a brick without hitting a follower.
It just goes to show you that money has the most followers of all no matter where you live in this world

I’m wondering do these youngsters have to send their followers a Christmas card or something?
I was thinking perhaps some capitalist could capitalise on this and produce a fairly cheap badge to send to the faithful followers, it could feature a loaf of bread and a fish, to symbolise how Christ fed his followers when they ran out of grub on that miraculous day whilst assembled on the mountain.
On second thought maybe fish and chips or a pizza would be more up to date.:lol:

- YouTube

16195

Cashless society Jem, that is to watch, and what will ensue.

16196

Johnny Cash has gone, timing is everything.

16197

There will be a time for serious Jem, that is logical, but not today.
Probably.:wink:

16198

I’m still marveling at ginger who could tell the time :wink:

16199

Hello Summer, what a lovely surprise to see you here.:slight_smile:
Yes old ginger was some cool cat, out of three brothers and a sister to chose from I was the only one he followed around, our dog used to follow the sister. All the kids at school loved ginger, he was something special, and he knew it too.:wink:
I’m sure animals have strange powers we don’t have or can’t decipher into human logic, imagine what they could tell us if we could verbally communicate directly with them.

Blame.
Why do we as humans have to have someone to blame when things go wrong?
I won’t go into the political blaming game, that’s always been part and parcel of politics and politicians could not survive without blaming either those who governed before them of those who will govern after them, it’s a perpetual merry-go-round of lies and deceit, and always will be.:wink:

What I’m really getting at is the domestic blamers, for those who are in long term relationships. and with me being over 50 years married I’m well used to being blamed on stuff, when I’m guilty I’m the first to apologise, but when I’m innocent I will stand my corner to the last.

Take today for example, I was out in the workshop pottering away, humming a pleasant tune and as happy as a pig in muck until out comes the wife with the portable phone in her hand.
“It’s for you, your brother is on the line”

While I was talking she sort of hung around trying to look busy by picking up tools and examining them even if she hadn’t a clue what they were for, anyway I wasn’t long on the phone so I handed it back to her saying thanks for bringing it out to me.

While she was there she asked me to size up her wedding ring as it was starting to hurt her finger again, I fixed it for her, polished it and gave it back to her and she went inside.

Fifteen minutes later she comes back out and asks me for the phone.
“I gave it back to you my dear”
“Oh no you didn’t”
Followed by a series of pantomime “Oh yes I did’s” and “Oh no you didn’t’s”

Well you get the idea of domestic blaming, she was very insistent that I had put it somewhere until I asked her to ring the home number from her mobile, she did and the ringing came from the kitchen, she had placed it in the drawer with the knives and forks.

OK that happens to us all at this stage of life, but why do we always need to blame someone else for our own short comings? Why could she not just say “I’ve mislaid the phone Jem, can you help me find it?”
To which I would have replied with a smile.
“Certainly my dear”:smiley:

https://i.postimg.cc/GpRxqWTb/tenor.gif

16200

Ginger sounds lovely…Jem I always come here to read your little bedtime story before I go off to dreamland …
.just plain nosey I guess :slight_smile:

16201

I enjoy the nightly bedtime stories too Summer, they are better than most library books!