In the greater Taunton area, we don't have the luxury of late night pharmacists. However, there are two supermarkets; ASDA and Sainsbury's that are open 6am --> midnight that have in-house dispensaries. ASDA is a couple of miles closer to where I live, so it was off to there to get some stronger medication to sooth the symptoms of this lurgy while being drowsy inducing so I could get. good nights sleep. This suff has to be provided by the pharmacist to give them a chance to assess us before handing over the goods. While I was waiting in line, feeling all gloomy, the man in front asked if they had masks suitable for COVID as his wife had contracted it while he was away on business. They were fresh out of them and only had some cloth kids masks. However, pharmacists can perform basic diagnosis of minor conditions here on strict condition that if within 3 days symptoms persist to see a doctor (reminds me of the old Bex commercials). As a result they have stock of masks for such assessments, so she nipped into the diagnosis room and pulled out a handful for the fella - no charge. Yes, the top and bottom ones had her prints on them, but she did say to discard them.

Then, she offered me a generic brand alternative to the medicine I was looking for, which saved me £3 (around 30%), claiming it was made on the same production line as the branded one. 

Two kind gestures lifted my sullen spirits. 

This first one is the older type before built in headsets, where you unbuttoned the ear flap to place separate headphones inside. No date on it, but they are a vintage from the 30's to early war period. Commonly worn in aircraft like the Soviet I-16, U-2 etc., particularly early in the war. For it's age, it looks to be in very good condition.

This 1941 photo shows a soviet pilot wearing the same model helmet.

The second helmet is a bit of guesswork. It's a German LKpW-101 but you can see where it once had front goggle straps fitted. The German helmets didn't have this and it was a feature of the Soviet variant only. It's dated 1947, so the Luftwaffe would have been disbanded and the East German air force hadn't been formed. Best guess is that the occupying Soviet air force used old German factory stock which they modified for their own use and added a dated tag. How it made it's way from East Germany to Belarus is anyone's guess. Most likely brought back by a returning Soviet pilot.

just a general place for musings etc...

Today I had a new "thats doing well in life" moment,

sending parts to a customer, got his address....

XXXX valley
suburb

state postcode

asked for the street number....
oh no there isn't one, that's the property.

admittedly it was a cattle property. but still imagine having a enough land that you get your own address

This thread is for having a Jolly good moan about stuff you're not happy about, no rules, apart from those of the forum, family show, keep it clean.

What is the impact of immigration - not only to Australia, but around the world?

There seems to be a lot of opinion about it - naturally. 

In my eyes, there is good and bad about immigration. 

In the UK, immigration, which has been on a net basis quite high compared to Aus, even on a per capita basis, is under immense pressure at the moment. And it is blamed for the eroision of public services. But this is a convenient blame., A lot of the publoc services have suffered real cuts over the years, leading to less capacity regardless of whether there was any net immigration. For example, this morning on the BBC, I hear that in England and Wales, the number of health visitors has reduced over the last 10 years form 10,000 to less that 5,500. So, even if the population stood still, there is just a little over half the capacity - that is noit the fault of migrants. 

Then there is the cultural impact - how prevasive is it, when the population of nany new wave of migrants is so small?

Then there's the discussion about crime. The stats say they commit less criome per capita than the home population, but there are a couple of things to consider. What is the nature of the crime? Is it petty stuff, or serious? And there was the Rotheram grooming gangs debacle, where there is credible evidence the police didn't take it seriously because they avoiding beign called racists - or was it more sinister - let the grooming gangs get on with it to make all migrants look worse and feed an agenda?

Do they keep wages low. We often say migrants come in and do the work no locals want to do. I was discussing this position with my son and he disagreed somewhat, or had qualified agreement - whichever way you want to look at it. Locals will be willing to do these jobs; just not for the pay that migrants are willing to do it, and therefore keeping wages artificially low. I am not saying one is right or wrong, just stating a viewpoint. 

The reality is humans have been migrating for time immemorial. Without it, none of us would be Australian (unless there are First Nations people on the forums). 

So, when you cut through all the rhetoric, stereotypes, ideological opinion and the like, what has the impact of immigration been on you personally as well as what do you think it has been on the country?

Go for it, Jerry.

Call and think of that line what you like l don't care but just sayin.

But just think of Grok creating a new Grok 10 or even 100x it's power and then that one doing the same again with it's power and then again.

Seen where the robots are atm , check out China stuff, and like Grok , it hasn't even scratched the surface yet.

No l'm not into AI at all , ofc it will just be another shytshow created by mankind where they'll all be sitting here in 10 or 20 or 50yrs time trying to figure out how to stop like all our other eff ups.

l am fascinated by it though , as scary as it is and f it doesn't scare you you have blinkers on - l know what it will do and where it's all headed a child can see that, l want nothing to do with it but eh, it is fascinating none the less .

Although , the anti ageing will be pretty cool if you can survive another 20yrs you'll be here another 50 later but l suspect that won't even be 20yrs away, 10 probably. Do like that part 😁

Well , if we're even allowed to be here in 20 or 30 yrs time that is anyway as AI will probably be ruling that roost. 

All in all, she was much loved by song lovers right around the world, and she has left us some good song memories. RIP, Judith.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-06/seekers-lead-singer-judith-durham-dead-at-79/101308234

The Planets

New photos downloaded from Facebook.

Carlos Santana - in a league of his own.

Eric Clapton - one of the world's most accomplished lead guitarists, but slick and polished to the point of being a bit boring.

Peter Green - absolute legend; I wouldn't mind betting he was an influence on later guitarists like Stevie Ray Vaughan.

[ATTACH]49502._xfImport[/ATTACH]

So I thought we should have a thread just for News, Etc.

I don't think his idea would be too popular with pensioners. Under the current system the family home is exempt along with two hectares of land. For example, if you have a house on four hectares, two hectares of it is taken into account as assets. Under this bloke's plan, every pensioner living on a suburban block in town would be shafted. I can't see how any government would survive politically if they introduced a system like that. A lot of retirees are not rich and own their house and not much else and are cash poor.

https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/4m-pensioners-how-australia-s-tax-system-subsidises-wealth-over-work-20260227-p5o666

In March 2025, Idaho Governor Brad Little signed two laws that together created the harshest punishment framework for child sex offenders in the country. HB 380 made sexual abuse of children under 12 a capital crime punishable by death when at least three aggravating factors are present. HB 37 made the firing squad Idaho's primary method of execution, replacing lethal injection as the default. Both laws take effect on July 1, 2026. 

When signing HB 380, Little said: "The sexual abuse of children is sickening and evil, and perpetrators convicted of these crimes deserve the ultimate punishment." The House passed the death penalty bill 63 to 0. The Senate followed 30 to 5. Before HB 380, Idaho had no mandatory minimum sentences for child sex abuse.

The state is spending $950,000 to retrofit its maximum security prison near Kuna for firing squad executions, and construction is already underway.

They sent in a sizeable force to negotiate with him, but Freeman refused to disarm and came out of the structure carrying a weapon, so the police shot him dead.

It seems obvious that Freeman has had assistance in hiding from the authorities for the last 200 days, so I expect there will be arrests for hiding a fugitive.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-30/live-blog-dezi-freeman-porepunkah-shooting/105719456

Nothing has been outlined as to how the Govt plans to ensure that the full amount of the fuel excise drop is passed on to motorists, and how they can stop oil companies from keeping a portion of it for themselves.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-30/fuel-excise-halved-three-months-petrol-diesel/106510432

https://github.com/CorvusCodex/LotteryAi

Thankfully, well sort of, we do get beaten, just, by the UK, Sweden and France surprisingly to well to me anyway, the chart is complicated to take in but fairly simply laid out none the less,you'd have to look at it.

Buttttt, how sad is that. For all our nanny stating, over the mountain regulation and rules on rules on rules, that's where it's gotten us.

l can't post the charts here bc they were on a "CTO Larsson"  vid- "My top three underrated countries to move to "

But if interested you could watch that or just do an AI stat search , he said that's all his charts were.

He also said some countries lower stats would also be from under reported crime but still- we tripled most of them.

Soooo, if you don't even watch our news last few yrs any more or you watch world news instead like l do just to avoid the horror every night  on ours, or you have thought 1000 times lately this is too much, there's something seriously wrong in our country- you weren't imagining it.

And just to make it even sadder and shameful , you know what one of our highest crimes is, rape  !

over 18,000 rapes per yr and l think it was saying that is only by 1 million scale so you could x that x 27.

Triple and even much more than most other countries.

l knew we were disgustingly high in crime and so much is wrong about the way we're raised/brain fed and tackle things here these days, but those stats were just sickening.