@bullstuff2
Forum Replies Created
-
AuthorPosts
-
The proposed snake origin of this disease is not the first example of disease crossing a species barrier from snakes to humans, Ed.
The latest form of Leishmaniasis, from the deep Honduras jungle, was discovered by many infected members of an expedition to carry out archaeological work in a previously unexplored part of the country. By coincidence, yesterday I finished reading a book about the expedition and its discoveries: “The Lost City of The Monkey God” by Douglas Preston. The author himself, and several others who worked at or visited the site, are still suffering from the disease. Reading about it really chills the blood: the treatment is almost as bad as the disease, one person having to stop treatment due to his organs breaking down.
Leishmaniasis: http://tinyurl.com/y47r4sxf
The title sounds very American/Hollywood monster movie, but it comes from the words of a native Honduran. It is a true story and the conditions faced by the various scientists, archaeologists and reporters at the sites, are a big part of the story. I both enjoyed and was horrified by the story but I recommend it.
The parasitical disease itself is ancient. The author tells a story that he found about its history: a sand fly, a very ancient fly still extant today, is found in Amber, dated to around 300 million years ago. When scientists extracted the fly, they found the Leishman parasites and dinosaur blood, in the gut of the fly. So the fly had been feeding on dinosaurs. Extrapolating that with snakes caught in the region, exactly the same parasites were in the snake and also in the blood of infected expedition members who were continually bitten by sand flies.
Every form of life on Earth is descended from the same basic material. Diseases crossing species ‘barriers’ is bound to happen. Just one small successful mutation is all it takes.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Does that change the DD’s Lee?
Doctor Bob says – Keep up the blood tests, whatever it proves whether good or bad news, you need to know it asap.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.My other half always says women are better at multi-tasking than men. I’ve been looking for a good reply, found one and now I’m now ready for her the next time she does. I’ll simply tell her to – sit down and shut-up. I’ll bet she doesn’t manage to do both…….😀
I would fear for the integrity of my dangly bits if I told my missus that! It gave me a good laugh though and today I need it, don’t feel too good, one of my bad days.
Dave I have a huge, long plastic box with motherboard, graphics card and other boxes in it, it lies under the spare room bed. Somehow I became custodian of boxes for other family members, until I toured their homes and returned them. If I am taking devices apart, carrying out maintenance or DIY, I have a selection of “Sutherlands” meat and fish paste jars that I can drop the bits into and screw on the lid until I need them. those little jars are very useful and I keep loose bits such as hex drive and screwdriver bits in them, in the toolbox.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Thanks VFM, good link.
If a totalitarian state like China cannot contain the outbreak, the WHO had better get its act together, and soon. SE Asia teems with human life, the prospects for containment do not seem good.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.That story Ed, is similar to my senior gson’s old college. When he started there 15 years ago, he was given a very good female one-to-one tutor, who gave him a great deal of support and helped with his diagnosis. In time, he also had one IT and maths tutor who took a great deal of interest in his welfare and education. Eventually, this tutor (ex-industry) had just two students in their last two years: our gs and his mate. That is how he was able to obtain CISCO and Microsoft qualifications without going to University, which would have affected him I know: twice we took him to Aston, the second time he was sick, I took him out of mum’s earshot and he told me he did not want to go. He was obviously terrified. He managed to find a great job where he is highly valued and it could not have been “Apron Strings Syndrome” because he now has his own apartment and can completely fend for himself.
The college has not fared as well. Its Head was originally a great man who believed in his college and his students: he worked to get as many educational benefits as he could. For example: in the summer holidays when our gs was 16, the Head got him a job working with a company installing CCTV and TV screens across the college, designing and installing them along with the control centre. A few years later that Head, a was Head-hunted (sorry!) by Cambridge University. The place has gone downhill, his replacement is not half the educator his predecessor was. A science tutor and an IT tutor were allowed to leave and never replaced. A very good local educational establishment became less than ordinary and it shows in the students. Before the first head left, he would not allow any students out of college at lunchtime. Now they come down to the local cafes and chippies in droves and some are not well behaved.
When an establishment loses its way, it is a sad day for its people, teaching staff definitely but students most of all.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.The problem for many of us Forumites is that older people are worse affected. Might get some face masks in town tomorrow. I can think of a few around the Close who would improve their looks with one! Might quieten one or two more…
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.That rings a bell VFM! Last month my missus gave me a new one she had heard: “Your lift does not go to the top floor!”
I told her, you are confused my dear, we live in a bungalow. Then I quickly left the room, always nice to have the last word, can’t often do that. As for screws, well this is my bits box, or one of them. There are even some prehistoric Compaq screws in there, from before HP bought them. I am a magpie.
Whoever inherits this will be confused!
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.I agree with Richard in that Ed’s two paragraphs are completely correct. This comment especially resonates with my experience of my senior grandson: ” You will find that if she likes something she will concentrate on it to the exclusion of all else. (including you!). ” Spot on, I found that as soon as he found that one thing, our gs was away and flying, totally immersed in computers, computing, how it worked and what it took to learn how to do more. To the exclusion of everyone and everything else, it was a form of “Tunnel Vision” – pursuing a task exhaustively, until it’s done. He is still like that now at work, his boss has learned to leave the keys with him if he has not finished a job to his own satisfaction. Boss has learned what I knew before the lad was a teenager: it is less harmful to let him finish what he begins, than to send him home and have him agonise over it until the next working day.
His father was a wastrel, a bad husband and even worse parent, missing from his toddler years on. I became his replacement, trying very hard from a perspective of an almost 50 years age gap to steer him along. As a result, we remain very close and I still get the “Don’t tell mum or grandma, but… ” conversation.
The only advice I would give Tippon, is don’t let the educational establishment put Alice in a box made of their own preconceptions: don’t let them label her. My daughter and I fought to get our lad recognised for what he was: an extremely intelligent individual, who just needed to be guided on the right path. Having some part of the spectrum, does not mean that one child has exactly the same difficulty as another: they are all individuals. I have said this here before and I still believe it – the human brain is still evolving and of course it will show up in the latest generations. The difference now is that there is recognition and help.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.I love the comment Terry Jones made when Welsh churches castigated “Life of Brian” and asked for it to be banned as blasphemous: –
“Great publicity!”
Being born in Colwyn Bay, he resented being taken away to Surrey with his family all his life, and always considered himself to be Welsh.
Being considered by the Church in Wales to be a Very Naughty Boy, must have amused him.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.I love that acronym Dave. 😁
It was probably the first great Mediterranean seafarers who came to Western Britain for Tin and Copper – The Phoenicians:
An amazing people, they were great sailors. They traded along the western coasts of what is now France, Spain and Portugal, as well as Britain. Shows that these islands were world traders and exporters, well before Rome was founded. Incidentally, the Chinese went a little further with Bronze edged weapons. They used Chromium to keep a sharp edge on the weapons . Such weapons were almost as effective as Iron ones.
I watched “Britain’s Pompeii: A Village Lost in Time” too Dave, really great programme with my favourite historical story teller, Dr Alice Roberts, president of the Humanist Society. I am proud to be a member and recommend it to anyone who does not hold a belief in a recognised religion. Many scientists and Archaeologists are members, including Neil Oliver.
Preaching? No, just the opposite.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Like Ed, I use the growing experiences of my grandchildren to educate ME! They are all 4 different yet similar in other ways, if that is not self-contradictory.
Eldest, now 26, Aspergers, had a bad time at Primary school. Very intelligent but tormented because of a lack of sociability and not taking part. I built him a desktop computer and opened Pandora’s box. At college he blossomed big time and now he is the right hand man to his boss in a very successful IT business. Now he builds and maintains family devices. Thank you, buddy!
His cousin, now 23, began as a chef and is now a bank worker. (No, really!) She still has our old 17″ HP Pavilion Dv7, think about 12 or 13 years old now, still works but rarely used as she is always on her phone, which probably cost as much as the HP when that was new. Just moved in with her BF to a new house and they are both always on phones, not big computer users, don’t Game, just music, videos and FB.
Her brother, 21 now and extremely dyslexic but also very intelligent. I built his first desktop, now he builds his own. A Gamer and an electronic correspondent with young people all over the planet. Likes to repair and maintain his friends’ devices.
Eldest gson’s sister, 14 and an A* student at Grammar. Very intelligent. Began with a 10″ tablet as a small child, then Big brother built her desktop with all sorts of bells and whistles. She is a Polymath: excels at everything but as a result is unsure what future work she wants to do. RAF cadet, Girl Guide, show dancer, taps and ballet. Uses the PC as a tool and her school allows phones to be used to take notes, which she sends to her desktop. My advice to her was don’t worry, just learn what you can and whatever floats your academic boat. (that made her giggle) Whatever you eventually decide, you must put the enjoyment of doing it before the salary. But always ensure you are fairly paid.
They all started with desktops at school, only the 14 yo had a tablet, but became fed up with it at about 8 yo because it just was not fast enough and lacked storage for everything her mind wanted to learn. Personally, I think if the two boys had used a tablet first, it would have been advantageous to them, but tablets were not yet good enough when they were small. Eldest girl was never really into computing, except for pop, FB and friends.
What is always at the forefront of my mind, is that the two boys are at opposite ends of the Autistic spectrum. Perhaps that is why they get on so well together.
Observing children develop is fascinating. I used to be one, once… 😝😄 Missus says I still am.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Ed is right Steve: what vegans forget in their anti-meat fascism, is that humans evolved as omnivores. The meat actually caused the human brain to evolve intelligence and that is the reason for we humans being the dominant species on our planet. Having said that, being omnivorous means we evolved needing a mixed, balanced diet.
If you find chicken boring, try roasting a chicken in a roasting bag, inside a slow cooker. Use whatever spices and flavourings you like: my missus uses a little dried stock, dried onions, a little paprika, black pepper and something else she will not tell me because her mum gave her the recipe. Her two sisters are just as secretive about it and when they get together we BIL’s have tried to interrogate them, to no avail. The chicken has an amazing flavour but the problem comes when trying to carve it – you can’t, because all of it falls off the bone. I sometimes boil up the leftovers and bones, repeatedly skim off the grease until it’s all gone, then blend some veg in to make chicken broth, with a little stock and some chicken Oxo.
Pork I just cannot eat now, I find it tasteless, but I love the thick, lean back bacon my local butcher sells. He also has the best steak and S&K pies I have ever eaten, but tonight it’s the rare treat of fillet steak. We eat red meat only rarely, but fillet, although expensive, has no waste and makes two good meals. We gave up on lamb chops because of the waste: strip the fat and bone, only small pieces of meat are left. Fish is on the menu at least twice a week: fresh Salmon, Cod, Halibut, Plaice, Sea Bream, whatever I can get. I love sea food. A good tomato sauce is great with Salmon if you don’t use too much. I use this BBC Good Food recipe:
As it says, make a big batch and use it on anything.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.January 20, 2020 at 6:33 pm in reply to: Read First if flying on a Boeing 737 Max–or maybe not! #39893Only rarely do I get to a Motorway Richard, Lincolnshire has very few and none in my neck the woods. I love my country roads, until the grockles come in numbers.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Hope you feel better soon Richard.
I can relate to your post box journey, but in a different way. Our village lies along a series of sharp bends on the A157 Louth to Mablethorpe road, a Holiday Route* and supposedly 30 MPH limit, which is ignored by almost every vehicle except locals, who carry out my manoeuvre of slowing them down by keeping to the limit in front of them. One of the worst bends is sited opposite the village shop and we take our lives in our hands crossing the road. Best approach is to find a spot where we can see as much of the road in both directions before taking our chances, and repeat the procedure recrossing the road, but from a different position. What makes this worse is that those residents who live on the same side as the shop, have no footway whatsoever on their side, so have to cross and recross twice. The bends are signed, but not always realised by truck drivers: over the years we have had one livestock truck full of piglets overturned, and a huge truck with a large static park home drop its load onto what was the Post Office, before the RM closed it. The last incident missed one resident local by perhaps a foot.
I had to smile at your comment, ” Why are the wind harvesters called renewables … ” – you are quite right of course, I never considered it in that light before.
*Used to be hordes of caravans, mobile homes and other grockles in the season only, but they are slowly increasing in the winter too, now that the climate is allowing that. Not many of them watch and inwardly digest the weather forecast though: they come in sunshine and go home as soon as it rains.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.The Notts village where I grew up had a great bus service when I was young and right up to around 1990, when it started to decline. No fewer than 7 bus numbers, from 3 different companies, served the village. We could get to Mansfield every 20 minutes via one of 4 different buses.
Mansfield District Traction ran the 108, 105, 208 and 215. The only difference between the 108 and 105, was that the 105 would turn uphill to the Old village before coming down the long Lane where I lived and turning round at the last street, reversing in to go back to Mansfield, sometimes the driver and conductor* got tea and biccies from a house where they parked. The 208 carried on through the village to Newark. The 215 was the bus caught by my fellow
miscreantsstudents from the Tech School 8 miles away. It was the longest route travelled by a Mansfield District bus, around 38 miles around the countryside. I usually cycled to school, but some of the hills were dangerous in ice or snow, so I caught the 215.Midland General ran the B8 and the F3. The B8 took 70 minutes to get to Nottingham from the village, by a countryside meander around lots of other villages. I could get off at a certain pub, have a pint and get back on the same bus 20 minutes later! The F3 turned around in the next village to ours and came back to travel direct to Nottingham: 25 minutes at the most. There was a local service ‘Butler Brothers’ that ran between our village and a small town, Kirkby, which had different shops and was used by residents of both places.
The most remarkable fact about all those buses, is that no service was ever late by more than a couple of minutes. And most days they were well used: packed at weekends. Now my old village has a very reduced service which is never on time and my present village has a service to Mablethorpe or Louth, which ends at 7pm and does not run at all on winter Sundays.
*Yes, conductors. All buses had them at the time.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Bob, no problem at all.
Thanks Chris.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Yesterday one of my 3 mile bashes resulted in views from Skeg Pier. Very nice day, sunny and not as cold as we thought.
From the side of the Pier, looking North, just a faint trace of a turbine.
From the end of the Pier, (not a long walk!) looking straight out to sea. Sea was good, tide ebbing, some good rollers further south. Turbines are just about visible. I keep forgetting to take my Canon.
Drove right up to the last car park north (cheaper, £2 all day) Walked to the shore and then a good walk further north towards Chapel. Walked south to the Pier, another mile or so further south, had a meal, turned back and walked all the way back to the north car park, drove home. Made SWMBO a cuppa and she slept 3 hours. No stamina, these youngsters! 😋😊
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.That is something that will spread, I think. We have to do something for town and city children to breathe air without lumps in it.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.I have just been given (2x2GB) sticks of DDR3 from a mate who has upgraded his system. “No good to me, see if you can find a good home.” Anyone want these? –
Crucial CT25664BA 1339A 240 Pin DIMM 1339A.
Still working perfectly in the old system when pulled. Anti static wrapped, well padded. Will post and ask P&P only.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.January 20, 2020 at 4:21 pm in reply to: Read First if flying on a Boeing 737 Max–or maybe not! #39879And now Airbus Industries is laughing its collective ass off.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out. -
AuthorPosts
