Yenn

No sex please, we're British take me back. I was on holiday in England and decided to go to London to see that show. We got off the train and decided we would do the last bit of the journey by bus. So on the bus we get and there is a rolling electricity blackout. So we don't move, no traffic lights but plenty of traffic. Talking to the others on the bus we realized that we were the only people on the bus who had been born in Britain and we were the only ones not living in Britain. When we got to the theatre in plenty of time, the show was hilarious. I don't know when it was but the main topic of conversation in Britain was would Idi Amin come for the CHOGM meeting? He didn't.

OK so where does causeway come from?

The Archers is still going as far as I know.

I wouldn't be surprised if the Republicans do well. If Biden was the best they could put forward for President I don't see much difference between them. What has Biden done in nearly two years to make the democraps look good? One decision he made ensured that Putin would invade Ukraine, and he has done little to resolve that problem. Whatever happens the USA will get the government it deserves, The bad thing is that our government relies on them for decision making, or at least it has done so for the last many years.

I have lived all my life without Twitter, so I don't care what Elon Musk screws from his Twits. It is not necessary or even desirable.

If the leader gets advice he doesn't like he ignores it, or as in Australia's case he makes it a draft advice, but still ignores it. we are seeing the same problems all over the world. Leaders are only interested in maintaining their position. They have no desire to do what a leader should do, which is do things for the benefit of his country.

Number killed does not really matter. The number put out of action is better. I dead soldier is just one less to fight. 1 injured soldier is one plus his carers out of the fight. I you could injure 30% of the enemy you would be way ahead, more so than killing 30%

Guinness, Lovely stuff. I use d to drink eight pints per night when I was just about ready to leave the Pommy army. Gave it up overnight and couldn't sleep for a fortnight. My doctor recommended Guinness, Rum and iron tablets. Guinness for strength, iron tablets for energy and Rum to give you ideas about what to do with the strength and energy. I drank it bottled in the UK, until Guinness had it on tap at the pub by their hop fields at Bodiam, which was not far from my old mans pub near Hastings.

Hitler invaded Russia, as did Napoleon and in those days i think Ukraine was considered part of Russia and it was the part that saved Russia from being defeated. Of course Ukraine is no longer part of Russia or the USSR as it should really be called and Putin can feel the draught.

I wish they never called it global warming, because it is really climate change. Here in Central Qld we have never had such a good year. Everywhere is green where it is usually dry and gold at this time of year. We have just had the third wettest 12 month period in 40 years or so according to my records although the calendar year may well be one of the drier ones. My place looks absolutely beautiful, with green grass and flowering trees. I am glad I put it on the market, because it fetched way more than i expected. Climate change is real and half of us cannot see it. Big business is flat out denying it. The power stations have stopped maintenance, because they are told coal is going out, leading to failures and power outages, leading to the LNP declaring that coal should be subsidized. Who said "It's a mad, mad world?"

We have the same speed limits as 50 years ago, or lower. The roads are much better and the cars are much better than 50 years ago. Why? My trip to Gladstone used to be 100kph all the way, now it is 80 most of the way. No increase in housing or business along the road, but the road has been straightened and widened, seems the limit is to raise revenue. A bypass has been built, no houses or businesses on it, big wide road, plenty of visibility, so 80 mph, same reason. I reckon Qld will have a record death toll this year, but not because of speeding, just stupidity. The deaths are reported as the car lost control and the driver died at the scene. Does that mean the driver was not controlling the car, or are those autonomous cars?

The reason I left the SES was that it became taken over by theoretical bureaucrats. They were full of theory, but couldn't spot a flaw in their workings when it was obvious to all the practical people on the ground. My son was also in the SES and experienced exactly the same problems. He was in vertical rescue as I was, but in his case he was active several times a year, rescuing people off Mt Tibrogargan or Mt Beerwah. Nowadays the SES has a mile more equipment supplied by the government, but I doubt that it can be used to its ultimate ability because of bureaucracy.

It is not too hard to make soap, but it is much easier to buy it made by someone else. Much like a load of other things, such as vehicle maintenance, which we all did 50 years ago. Painting the house or even washing windows. Somebody specializes in these things and we being lazy pay them good money.

Main roads in Qld look after such roads as the Bruce Hwy and they have upgraded just about all of it in the last five years. It is now falling apart, but more due to poor design that anything else. We have locally a section about a Km long that was upgraded. They raised it through a low patch. Due to not providing bypasses they shut one side at a time. They put in about 150mm of gravel on one side and sealed it, then did the other side, than back and repeated the process. Result we have a sandwich highway with about six layers of gravel topped by bitumen seal. The whole lot slides sideways, resulting in the edge of the road being 150mm above the rest of the road, then a lovely watercourse that is falling apart. I reckon the engineers who work for main rods are those who cannot get a job elsewhere. The few I met in my working days with consulting engineers didn't impress.

OME said "It is odd that petrol stations in rural areas are increasingly being staffed by people from the Sub-Continent, but there are no doctors practising as GPs from the same source. Perhaps those GPs are enslaved in metropolitan medical centres." We may not have GPs from the sub continent, but we seem to have many specialists and experts in medicine from there. The specialist who is supervising my cancer treatment is Indian I think. He looks and sounds as if he is. He has gone on holiday and I had a video check with his offsider, who looks and sounds even more Indian. I could not understand what he was barking at me and the nurse had to translate. He asked me why I was on chemotherapy? What a stupid question. When he told me I was having a scan the next day I thought it was time to spit the dummy, as It was news to me. I think he may have understood why I was so aggro with him because he changed his tone immediately. I just wonder why we have so many foreigners in the medical profession, especially when they will not slow down their speech so us oldies can work out what they are saying. At the Gp 's that I go to we now have a young Australian doctor, who'se family is local. That is among the South Africans and other nationalities at the practice, but they are all easily understood.

Almost killed, but not quite. We just have to overcome those dumb clucks who say religion and politics are not acceptable topics at any gathering. It is standing back and doing nothing that causes the ratbags to take over. If you think the USA health system is bad, have a look at the UK system. I had an email today from my sister in England. She is waiting for a hip replacement, as is my other sister and my brother in law is waiting to see a specialist, and this has been ongoing for years. Meanwhile in Australia I had surgery at short notice and get specialist treatment from an oncologist at very little cost and my only gripe is that the specialists are Indian and the nurse has to translate for me. TheUS syatem allows you to pay for care, while the UK one doesn't seem to have any ability for the general population to insure for payments unless you are extremely wealthy.

That's right.

Are we so much better off and safer now, with better health. From what I see a majority of today's kids are sexually abused, bullied, have some kind of mental problems or should be looked after by today's biggest money sink The NDIS. I wonder if anyone is normal nowadays. There seems to be no will to achieve anything except get a handout from government. My upbringing was full of some form of adventure whether it was riding a bike too fast or climbing a tree too high and I managed to carry this through my working life, to my enjoyment. Nothing was better than to give the bureaucrats who tried to stop me doing something a poke in the eye. One of those bureaucrats who annoyed me for two years on 3 jobs, greeted me as a long lost friend when he thought I was going to save him work by driving a hoist that he had installed. Wasn't happy when I pointed out to him that it was unsafe according to the rules he had for years tried to enforce.

Boris obviously thought he was in with a chance or he wouldn't have cut short his holiday.That means he was told when he got back that it wouldn't work out. Penny Morduant has only 20 or so backers so she is not in the race, What it all boils down to is that the party is severely deficient in quality members. The bottom of the barrel is well scraped and nothing much is left.

The 6 packs I saw were in I think 1999, but I could be wrong, it was when SA had dropped apartheid and they were having hearings about it. I was only told that they were nuclear, but the friend who told me was no bullshitter.

I have seen Austin Princesses with Austin engines.

In South Africa during the times of apartheid they put in lots of 6 packs, which were small nuclear power stations. Small being quite large really, but nowhere near the size of the power stations I worked on. I think the 6 related to 6Mw output, but i could be wrong.

Red I have got to that age and the surprising thing is that my son looks more like me than I do. Congratulations, it all gets easier from now on.

While it was in military service we had very few maintenance problems. It ran as well as a modern Hilux and that was in the days of frequent breakdowns of British machinery. The Humber and the Saracens were also low maintenance. Of the same vintage and also using a Rolls engine we had the Mighty Antar. The biggest wheeled vehicle in the world at the time. That was cumbersome, the engine was OK but the power steering was abysmal. You had to rev like hell and slip the clutch to prevent you going too fast when manouvering in tight quarters. It was designed to haul pipes to the oil fields in Iran, but we used it to haul the Conquerer tanks, which were about 75 Tons empty. Not a bad machine once you got it up to about 20mph but a two man job to steer when the power steering played up, which was often.

I drove and worked on the Champ back in the fifties. I thought they were just wonderful, suspension was the best available at the time, along with the sister ships, Humber combat and the Saracen, Saladin etc. Never saw or drove the civilian version with the Austin engine. I don't even know why they have such a bad reputation. The Humber Combat was the forerunner of the Hilux I reckon, with more power and that lovely suspension. A pity that the Poms never managed to get that sort of vehicle on the market,but produced rubbish instead.