Mandy Lifeboats

20 minutes ago, TheAuthority said:

Well that was uplifting ! 

• You're welcome.  

2 hours ago, Phil Silvers said:

Nigel Pearson 52

Wow. That one's hit me. I knew him 30 years ago when he first started covering Speedway at Wolves and Cradley. I wasn't a fan of his commentary but he seemed a nice guy.  

In the 80s, NATO's "line in the sand " was the Rhine River.  If we couldn't stop the Warsaw Pact crossing the Rhine we were unlikely to stop them taking France, Belgium and Holland.   The USSR knew that was the line that would trigger a Nuclear response.  

At that time the NATO/USSR border was in the middle of Germany.  Since then East Germany, Poland and a whole host of other countries have changed sides. Russia are no longer a credible threat with conventional weapons.  I doubt there is a such a defined line in today's world.  

Russia and China remain a threat with nuclear weapons.  But its a tiny threat.  The main threat is an accidental nuclear holocaust.  There have been numerous instances where we have been minutes away.  

You simply cannot prepare for a nuclear war.  Even if you had a luxury bunker with plentiful supplies its not a long term defence.  At some stage you would have an "incident" that would force your hand.  You might have a fire, you might get appendicitis, you might need a spare part for the generator etc.  You will run out of clean water very quickly.  All you are doing is delaying the day when you have to leave your bunker. 

Life outside would be medieval.  Law and order would be gone. You would be fighting to keep what you had.  Your best hope would be to come across a reasonably lawful "clan" of survivors who were trying to survive together.  Even if you could kill animals for meat you would be taking in so much radiation that it would be very detrimental.  Planting crops in radioactive soil would kick up radioactive dust.   Every day you would be taking in massive radiation doses and getting weaker. 

The most successful exercise I participated in was to gather survivors onto the Isle of Wight and then transport everyone, our gold supplies and the remnants of our armed forces to South Africa.  We'd hand over everything to the South African government in return for taking the survivors.  But that was in the 80s when South Africa's position was very different to today.  We NEVER conducted an exercise where we got life back to some sort of normality.  

My nuclear armagedon strategy is to not survive.  

1 minute ago, Follyfoot said:

Don Amott, king of caravans, the price is right and the choice is yours 

Correct. You win the Internet. 

20 minutes ago, blandy said:

Thanks, but it was ATV when I were a lad 

They had TV? 

4 minutes ago, blandy said:

9. No idea what 

You can sing "Don Amott - King of Caravans". means

Don Amott is/was a caravan dealer. He had an annoying advert on Central that seemed to be on every commercial break.  It had a ridulously catchy tune.  

I remember TNA before they started signing WWE castoffs.  Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles and Samoa Joe were like a breath of fresh air. Signing Cristian Cage was a massive achievement.  The Dudley Boys added more credibility.  Getting Kurt Angle made people feel they were going places.  But then the flood gates opened and the ex-WWE stars started pushing fresh talent aside.  

AEW should sign ex-WWE talent if its worth it.  But my excitement at hearing Cristian Cage had signed with TNA hasn't replicated when he signed for AEW.  Nor do I want to see Taz, Mark Henry, Sting, Big Show and The Hardys when AEW could be creating their own younger stars.  

1 hour ago, El Zen said:

I think you should Quit playing games.

But I want it that way. 

AEW seems to be going down the path that lead to TNA failing.  Too many ex-WWE stars are taking time away from new talent.   
 

I use a Scrabble dictionary to generate passwords. I pick 3 short words at random. 

Today's random result - BackStreetBoys

During WW2 only 12 companies made wristwatches for the Army.  These 12 watches are referred to as the  "Dirty Dozen".  Some watch collectors try to collect all 12 watches. Not many people can, mainly because of a company called Grana which produced small numbers.  

A Grana has just been sold for £12,000. That's a low price. Especially when you consider that only a handful of collectors own the full set. For less money than a Rolex you can buy a watch that is a real part of history.  That's why I love buying old watches.  

My search continues for the Omega that Buzz Aldrin wore on the moon.  

Just now, bickster said:

So how many illegitimate children did he have?

Complete this sentence- 

I wonder how many children Prince Andrew has..............

A German newspaper once published a biography of Prince Phillip that reported he had 24 illegitimate children. 

The following day they corrected the story.  He had 24 god-children.

Nato are the only winners of this conflict.  Finland and Sweden are closer than ever to joining Nato. Russia's army has been significantly damaged.  Natos modern weapons have been proven to be far superior to the bulk of Russian equipment.  Regardless how the war ends, Ukrainians will be killing Russians and tying up Russian troops for the next decade. 

This war has been tragic.  Its done massive damage to Ukraine in the short term.  It will do massive damage to Russia in the long term.  But the military threat to Nato countries from Russia has never been lower than it is today.  

It makes perfect sense to use it as a supply route and easy route into the country. It also makes senseto have that route nominally defended.  Its the lack of training that makes no sense. 

1 minute ago, Genie said:

Aside from all the radiation it makes sense

If its safe enough for Top Gear to drive through in city cars it's probably safe to drive through in a tank.  

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

No. I mean seriously, no.

You/we don't know if they were poorly trained conscripts, or if they were regular army, but uninformed or unaware of the dangers, or if they took their chances, because they'd be blown to bits in the open, or if they would have been shot for disobeying orders...or etc.

It's still ordinary humans.

Agreed 100%.  These troops were likely to be conscripts tasked with defending a lightly threatened supply route.  There was no local population to terrorise.  They are also victims. 

32 minutes ago, Genie said:

Why were they there anyway? Did they think by stationing themselves there they’d be “in den” as Ukraine wouldn’t risk firing at them?

As far as I understand it it was an important and easy route into Ukraine.  I suppose that makes sense. 

This morning I was watching videos of Scientists examined the trenches that the Russians dug in the highly radioactive land around Chernobyl.  These weren't just trenches for personnel. There were massive trenches to house vehicles.  The scientists opinion was that the troops are likely to be seriously ill.  

But he pointed out 2 other things that made their survival chances much worse.

They cut down trees for camp fires. Wood stores radioactivity until its disturbed.  Its very likely that they were sitting around radioative camp fires eating food covered in radioactive particles. 

There are hundreds of friendly stray dogs around the plant.  The scientists avoid touching them because their fur is just a mass of radioactive particles.  Apparently the Russias were feeding and petting these dogs.  

How can any credible military force send troops to a known radioactive disaster area without even a basic knowledge of hazards they will face. 

I think Mr Benn was sexual deviant.  Every day he would leave the house and watch the children play.  He would then go to a mystery shop, put on a costume and have an adventure with a man who came "as if by magic". 

I was listening to a very good radio discussion about Russia.  This expert opinion seemed to explain why Russia is losing so many tanks and is reluctant to deploy their best tanks to Ukraine.  

The modern Russian tanks are smaller than NATO tanks because they have automatic loading of ammunition.  This is quicker and more efficient than doing it by hand.  But the loading mechanism is linear and all shells are in a row that encircles the turret.  If one of those shells is triggered by anti tank weapons the tank effectively self destruct in a massive chain reaction which blows the turret off.  Tanks without an Auto Loader store the shells in an armoured compartment that is designed to channel any blast outside the tank. This massive and proven flaw in the Russian tanks will be with them for decades.  Their top of the range tank has an automatic turret that will turn and automatically destroy incoming missiles.  But its untested in real conflict.  If it fails the Russians are effectively lacking a credible battle tank for the next decade.  

1 hour ago, sidcow said:

OK, what if it's a Hoary puffleg? 

She is from Sunderland.