Cycling UK Forum

al_yrpal wrote:

Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.

I was shocked to arrive at a Brit b&b place near Fleurance on Bastile Day and discover our hosts werent going to go into town and enjoy joining in the celebrations? We did. The next morning then having to accompany them to the Bricolage to translate! Lived in France for years yet totally isolated in a little Brit bubble. Wine boxes abounded... We often stayed at various friends French bolt holes and observed the same sort of behaviour. Sorry, cant feel sympathy for such folk.

Al

And all cyclists jump red lights,any fule knoe that

brooksby wrote:

Spinners wrote:Useful little tool this to check how your MP voted.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-50145265

All I have to do is think, "How did the Govt want their MPs to vote?" And, lo, my MP did that! (Liam bl00dy Fox )

And I feel the same about Stephen bl00dy Kinnock

al_yrpal wrote:

Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.

I was shocked to arrive at a Brit b&b place near Fleurance on Bastile Day and discover our hosts werent going to go into town and enjoy joining in the celebrations? We did. The next morning then having to accompany them to the Bricolage to translate! Lived in France for years yet totally isolated in a little Brit bubble. Wine boxes abounded... We often stayed at various friends French bolt holes and observed the same sort of behaviour. Sorry, cant feel sympathy for such folk.

Al

Nothing beats a nice bit of stereotyping on a Wed morning.

My own experience is totally different, completely the opposite end of the spectrum.

Ian

bovlomov wrote:

mjr wrote:

reohn2 wrote:I can think of a few particularly slutchy smelly ones locally that he and his cronies would feel quite at home in,I'd even take them there myself and 'em all a shove

Oh it has to be Devil's Ditch, surely? Reach to Woodditton in Cambridgeshire. It already contains <i>[rude word removed]</i> toadflax so...

The trouble with censorship: one's mind can insert something far filthier.

I'm having fun adding every disgusting word I can think of to the front of toadflax.

maybe set up a petition that he should keep to his word, get to 100,000 is it and get it debated in parliament?

https://petition.parliament.uk/

I am tempted but I dont want the Secret Service visiting me

does any one have the reference where he said it?

reohn2 wrote:

al_yrpal wrote:

Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.Al, you are quite correct about a fair percentage of the Lotus Eaters from Albion, they set up little Britain Enclaves, avoid both learning the language & meeting the natives! I say this from sure knowledge because my brother is on of the ilk. But at least he & his wife have taken out Spanish citizenship, although the still belly-ache about prescription costs in their bolt hole.

I was shocked to arrive at a Brit b&b place near Fleurance on Bastile Day and discover our hosts werent going to go into town and enjoy joining in the celebrations? We did. The next morning then having to accompany them to the Bricolage to translate! Lived in France for years yet totally isolated in a little Brit bubble. Wine boxes abounded... We often stayed at various friends French bolt holes and observed the same sort of behaviour. Sorry, cant feel sympathy for such folk.

Al

And all cyclists jump red lights,any fuel knoe that :roll:

You are absolutely right and I know because I know of a cyclist who once jumped a red light (and I'm sure of it as I was that cyclist).

Ian

I had a moment's sympathy with the DUP this morning:

Paisley lets rip at Tories. Asks Smith bluntly what county he lives in.
Smith: I like in N Yorkshire and London
Paisley If you had to move goods from N Yorkshire to Lon and have to fill in a form, you’d fill pretty aggrieved ..
We are in the same country, it is disgraceful

At the moment, cyclists living in Cornwall need to get written permission from GWR to leave the county by rail and travel over the border and up country. This usually takes around three days to obtain by post if you don't have a local manned railway station (which most people in Cornwall don't).

An underlying concern about what is happening in Westminster is how it is illustrating how stupid our PM is, how he is totally unable to see a way through anything. His bill got passed but anybody with a half functioning brian cell would have seen that Parliament was going to be unhappy about it being pushed through with minimal scrutiny. So his timetable motion always was going to fail. So rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator whilst steering at the wall, why not set a more realistic schedule and get it passed?

And whilst he'd never have got his mad timetable through the Commons, had the Commons taken leave of their senses, does he really think the Lords would have just waved it through in no time just to help him meet his own totally artificial deadline? (Particularly given the 21 day treaty rule).

It really makes you wonder when our PM seems so short of anything resembling an "IQ".

And even if it's a Demonic Cummings plan designed to fail it speaks equal volumes about stupidity at the top.

Ian

Psamathe wrote:So his timetable motion always was going to fail. So rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator whilst steering at the wall, why not set a more realistic schedule and get it passed?

It's because everything is a game - a zero sum game which he can only win if the other side loses. Since the referendum, it appears never to have occurred to the Tory leadership that there might be any sort of dialogue across the divide. Rather, they have sought to make divisions wider and deeper.

If they hadn't turned Brexit into a culture war, it could have been settled long ago, without nearly so much anger.

Psamathe wrote:An underlying concern about what is happening in Westminster is how it is illustrating how stupid our PM is, how he is totally unable to see a way through anything. His bill got passed but anybody with a half functioning brian cell would have seen that Parliament was going to be unhappy about it being pushed through with minimal scrutiny. So his timetable motion always was going to fail. So rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator whilst steering at the wall, why not set a more realistic schedule and get it passed?

Ian

That presupposes that (a) Boris is unintelligent (he got to be prime minister) and (b) he wants his Brexit bill passed. My surmise is that neither is true. He wants to be prime minister and for a lot longer yet and with a sense of Churchillian accomplishment. He has correctly (IMV) surmised that the British people are by nature not impatient but want black and white clarity in their lives. That is what he offers. And he has won enormous sympathy and support for banging his head against a brick wall. And he has also won my admiration for his political cleverness. Of course, the only problem for the intelligent and clever Boris is that there are equally (and perhaps even more so) clever and intelligent people in Parliament (Dominic Grieve, Hilary Benn, Oliver Letwin and a few others) who can frustrate his purpose. But he still has his eye on the election.

horizon wrote:I had a moment's sympathy with the DUP this morning:

Paisley lets rip at Tories. Asks Smith bluntly what county he lives in.
Smith: I like in N Yorkshire and London
Paisley If you had to move goods from N Yorkshire to Lon and have to fill in a form, you’d fill pretty aggrieved ..
We are in the same country, it is disgraceful

At the moment, cyclists living in Cornwall need to get written permission from GWR to leave the county by rail and travel over the border and up country. This usually takes around three days to obtain by post if you don't have a local manned railway station (which most people in Cornwall don't).

Not correct.
A bike space can be reserved online when you book your tickets on the website. Using the GWR website you can even reserve bike spaces online for travel with other rail companies like LNER which do not have the facility on their own sites.

bovlomov wrote:

mjr wrote:Oh it has to be Devil's Ditch, surely? Reach to Woodditton in Cambridgeshire. It already contains <i>[rude word removed]</i> toadflax so...

The trouble with censorship: one's mind can insert something far filthier.

I'm having fun adding every disgusting word I can think of to the front of toadflax.

Toadflax isn't disgusting. To compare Bojo to these attractive yellow flowers is to do a great disservice to the plant kingdom.

If I wanted to nominate a suitable plant (OK: fungus rather than plant) I'd go for this one:


But there are no shortage of ditches we could dump pfiffle into. Here is one of the ugliest that Google turned up:

horizon wrote:

Psamathe wrote:An underlying concern about what is happening in Westminster is how it is illustrating how stupid our PM is, how he is totally unable to see a way through anything. His bill got passed but anybody with a half functioning brian cell would have seen that Parliament was going to be unhappy about it being pushed through with minimal scrutiny. So his timetable motion always was going to fail. So rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator whilst steering at the wall, why not set a more realistic schedule and get it passed?

Ian

That presupposes that (a) Boris is unintelligent (he got to be prime minister) and (b) he wants his Brexit bill passed. My surmise is that neither is true. He wants to be prime minister and for a lot longer yet and with a sense of Churchillian accomplishment. He has correctly (IMV) surmised that the British people are by nature not impatient but want black and white clarity in their lives. That is what he offers. And he has won enormous sympathy and support for banging his head against a brick wall. And he has also won my admiration for his political cleverness. Of course, the only problem for the intelligent and clever Boris is that there are equally (and perhaps even more so) clever and intelligent people in Parliament (Dominic Grieve, Hilary Benn, Oliver Letwin and a few others) who can frustrate his purpose. But he still has his eye on the election.

People who aren't Johnson fanboys think rather differently about him.
What he has in his favour and has correctly surmised is his brand of right wing populism appeals to a large part of the UK electorate.

pete75 wrote:What he has in his favour and has correctly surmised is his brand of right wing populism appeals to a large part of the UK electorate.

What he has also correctly surmised (IMV) is that for the Conservative party to survive as other than a reduced rump in Parliament it must capture this part of the electorate before it moved off to the Brexit party. The alternative (moving towards the centre) probably isn't a goer. By pretending to save the country he is in truth saving the Conservative party. Whether one thinks that is a worthy cause or not (and justifies Brexit) is another matter.

horizon wrote:

Psamathe wrote:An underlying concern about what is happening in Westminster is how it is illustrating how stupid our PM is, how he is totally unable to see a way through anything. His bill got passed but anybody with a half functioning brian cell would have seen that Parliament was going to be unhappy about it being pushed through with minimal scrutiny. So his timetable motion always was going to fail. So rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator whilst steering at the wall, why not set a more realistic schedule and get it passed?

Ian

That presupposes that (a) Boris is unintelligent (he got to be prime minister) and (b) he wants his Brexit bill passed. My surmise is that neither is true. He wants to be prime minister and for a lot longer yet and with a sense of Churchillian accomplishment. He has correctly (IMV) surmised that the British people are by nature not impatient but want black and white clarity in their lives. That is what he offers. And he has won enormous sympathy and support for banging his head against a brick wall. And he has also won my admiration for his political cleverness. Of course, the only problem for the intelligent and clever Boris is that there are equally (and perhaps even more so) clever and intelligent people in Parliament (Dominic Grieve, Hilary Benn, Oliver Letwin and a few others) who can frustrate his purpose. But he still has his eye on the election.

While all that may be true it (sort of) overlooks the fact that Boris campaigned for Leave.
He is a finished politian if that aim is not achieved.
And he is a finished politician with around half the electorate if it is.
So his rock and a hard place, completely of his own making, is significant and unavoidable.

The only course he has is to steer as he has done, but a deal of it is just pretty empty rhetoric.

I personally think he is a terrified of a hard Brexit as are many others who see the consequences.
He is in possession of the facts( of hard Brexit) and he is (rightly) aware of who will carry the lion's share of the blame.
That that blame can be justly and properly laid at his door is without question.

pete75 wrote:Not correct.
A bike space can be reserved online when you book your tickets on the website. Using the GWR website you can even reserve bike spaces online for travel with other rail companies like LNER which do not have the facility on their own sites.

I buy my tickets on the train (the local station is unmanned). I don't need to buy them in advance except to get my bicycle on the train. That means buying them on-line and for this I allow 2 - 3 days. If the two bike spaces (unlike the 700 or so allocated to non-cyclists) are already booked, I'm unable to leave Cornwall.

This isn't in the Withdrawal Agreement Bill by the way.