Hmmm, cut off from the rest of the world as we seem to be at the moment, I can't help but imagine the disruption it is causing further down the supply chain.
My brother-in-law was due to fly to Delhi yesterday, en route to the Himalayas to climb K2 or some similar high peak. He was unable to go and at this stage is unsure whether a reschedule will be possible. He is frustrated, but think of the Sherpa's who are on standby to help, and the whole infrastructure over there that is dependent on mountaineers coming from Europe. They are their lifeline to a reasonable standard of living, and they are losing out.
Maxines parents nearly booked a last minute cruise last week. They would not have been able to make the flight to Athens to pick up the ship. What happens in that situation, does the ship sail half full, or less? Do they lay off half the staff for the duration of the cruise? Imagine the effect of a half full cruise liner arriving at various ports where the people survive on the back of t-shirt and souvenir sales. It could last a couple more months.
The flip side of the coin sees members of the 1st Rifle brigade stranded in Lisbon on their way back from Afghanistan. They are no doubt glad to be safe, but separated once more from their family and friends, just when they anticipated some R & R. (none of that in Lisbon then eh?....ed)
Airlines face crippling losses particularly when they need to accommodate their clients for extra days, and hoteliers will struggle to account for the lost revenue from tourists unable to travel to their destination of choice.
And what of my GPS system which I sent back to the States to get repairs.....will it be coming by sea or do UPS have contingency plans for such events....it will be interesting to see. We are away ourselves in a couple of weeks, hopefully Eyjafjallajokull has run its course now and not woken up its big sister Katla. If she gets grumpy we could be stranded for weeks.
Monday, 19 April 2010
Friday, 9 April 2010
Take your own luv....
I have just spend the Easter weekend, and some, repairing the fence and refurbishing the front gates. As I was applying the third coat of wood stain, and wondering what Michael Caine must be thinking about (a) the Wood Preservation Society, and (b) his support for the Conservative Party, I cast my mind back to Easters past when I was a lad, and I was forced into that scouting tradition 'Bob a Job week.
In years gone past Bob a Job was one of the biggest events of the year for Scouts and Cubs and one which, in general, scouts hated! So what was a Bob? well it was a shilling in those days, five new pence in later times For the week of Easter scouts spent their school holidays going around door to door all over the area, walking miles, knocking on door and saying 'Hello, this is Bob a Job week, do you want any jobs done?' Scouts took on tasks like cleaning out garages, walking pets, gardening, car washing, shopping, and so on....and the charge? One Shilling.....a BOB!,
Newspapers always cashed in on the good stories and it was a great publicity week for scouts, people thought it was great for young boys (no girls back then) to earn money for scouting....through slavery!!! This Bob A Job week went on for years and years until someone decided that it should be changed to Scout Job Week as the shilling was consigned to history when decimalisation took over. Five pence a Job week just did not have the same ring to it!
As time went on the idea of any young child knocking on any strangers door became a no-no and the great Bob a Job week came crashing down! Bob A Job was phased out, but it had generated much needed funds for scouting, and the days were more innocent then...and perhaps....dare I say....a lot more fun.?
Some Scout and Cub packs continue to embrace the concept, although work is confined to family, friends and near neighbours. There must have been undesirable adults around when we did it, but I can't recall any incidents in our area.
Ah well, looks like the fence will have to last a few years until the grandkids are old enough to join up, then they can all have a dib dib dib at it.
In years gone past Bob a Job was one of the biggest events of the year for Scouts and Cubs and one which, in general, scouts hated! So what was a Bob? well it was a shilling in those days, five new pence in later times For the week of Easter scouts spent their school holidays going around door to door all over the area, walking miles, knocking on door and saying 'Hello, this is Bob a Job week, do you want any jobs done?' Scouts took on tasks like cleaning out garages, walking pets, gardening, car washing, shopping, and so on....and the charge? One Shilling.....a BOB!,
Newspapers always cashed in on the good stories and it was a great publicity week for scouts, people thought it was great for young boys (no girls back then) to earn money for scouting....through slavery!!! This Bob A Job week went on for years and years until someone decided that it should be changed to Scout Job Week as the shilling was consigned to history when decimalisation took over. Five pence a Job week just did not have the same ring to it!
As time went on the idea of any young child knocking on any strangers door became a no-no and the great Bob a Job week came crashing down! Bob A Job was phased out, but it had generated much needed funds for scouting, and the days were more innocent then...and perhaps....dare I say....a lot more fun.?
Some Scout and Cub packs continue to embrace the concept, although work is confined to family, friends and near neighbours. There must have been undesirable adults around when we did it, but I can't recall any incidents in our area.
Ah well, looks like the fence will have to last a few years until the grandkids are old enough to join up, then they can all have a dib dib dib at it.
Wednesday, 7 April 2010
The Aye's have it
The Country waits.........but for what I wonder? The World Cup in June, and news of the first footie fan to be mugged for his or her scarf ? I do hope they are not seriously hurt. Alternatively we could be waiting for England to win the World Twenty/20 in the West indies. I suspect the ladies will have a better chance than the chaps, so who said its not a game for girls Mr Peterson.
No, I think the Country is waiting for the excitement and cracking repartee and riposte which will engulf us all as we prepare for the general election on May 6th . I know I am. President Obama does not care much for our Gordon, so will he become a pub quiz question by virtue of being added to the list of Prime Ministers who have never been elected? He must be hoping we all like him a bit more than they do over the pond.
I can't wait for the battle buses to pull up outside our house and the massed ranks of canvasser's descend on us with their questions and answers and bits of paper and coloured rosette's. It's all a bit like FA Cup Final day.
Consider as well that we have the joy of television debates featuring the party leaders, and no election would be complete without the BBC swingometer now would it?
So yes, the Country waits, and as Haggar The Horrible once said, while sitting in a bar, 'All things come to those who wait, and this looks as good a place to wait as any'
No, I think the Country is waiting for the excitement and cracking repartee and riposte which will engulf us all as we prepare for the general election on May 6th . I know I am. President Obama does not care much for our Gordon, so will he become a pub quiz question by virtue of being added to the list of Prime Ministers who have never been elected? He must be hoping we all like him a bit more than they do over the pond.
I can't wait for the battle buses to pull up outside our house and the massed ranks of canvasser's descend on us with their questions and answers and bits of paper and coloured rosette's. It's all a bit like FA Cup Final day.
Consider as well that we have the joy of television debates featuring the party leaders, and no election would be complete without the BBC swingometer now would it?
So yes, the Country waits, and as Haggar The Horrible once said, while sitting in a bar, 'All things come to those who wait, and this looks as good a place to wait as any'
Monday, 15 March 2010
Tomorrow the world
Sorry about all this but Google have decided they will not support FTP transfers any more, so i have had to use their blogspot publishing option to migrate the site. That means the philanderer brand in the URL can't be used as somebody has registered it before me. I can do an auto redirect from my home page but that will take me a while to work out.
In the meantime all this should be the same with the exception of the pictures which have all disappeared. I will see if I can relink some of the more relevant ones into the various pages.
Frustrating thing is that the blog at thephilanderer.blogspot.com has never been used. I might make a bid for it......
Keep the faith, and here's hoping Google don't decide TCP/IP does not suit them any more. when they do that we will all be buggered!!!
In the meantime all this should be the same with the exception of the pictures which have all disappeared. I will see if I can relink some of the more relevant ones into the various pages.
Frustrating thing is that the blog at thephilanderer.blogspot.com has never been used. I might make a bid for it......
Keep the faith, and here's hoping Google don't decide TCP/IP does not suit them any more. when they do that we will all be buggered!!!
One Foot in the Grave
I have just been browsing a few past blogs. I think the record could be quite useful later in life when one of the memory lapse diseases kicks in....did I really do that I can think to myself!!!
Anyway, one article I noted was about the passing of Clement Freud, chef, wine buff, politician and fanatical Plymouth Argyle supporter. Now the Green Army do not have too many celebrities in its ranks, so it was remiss of me to fail to recognise the passing of another political green Army stalwart, Michael Foot.
Michael was a Member of Parliament from 1945 to 1955 and from 1960 until 1992. He was also the Leader of the Opposition from 1980 to 1983. Associated with the Labour left for most of his career, he was a passionate supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and British withdrawal from the European Economic Community. A passionate orator, he was Labour leader at the 1983 general election when the party received its lowest share of the vote since 1918.
His parallel career as a journalist included his appointment as editor for the Tribune for several periods, and the London Evening Standard newspapers. His books include a biography of Jonathan Swift (The Pen and the Sword, 1957) and Aneurin Bevan.
Foot was educated initially in Plymouth, and was subsequently MP for Plymouth, Devonport so it was no surprise that he was a passionate supporter of the Argyle from his childhood and once remarked that he wasn't going to die until he had seen them play in the Premiership. I share the sentiment. Unlike Clement Freud though, he served for several years as a director of the club, seeing two promotions under his tenure.
For his 90th birthday, Foot was registered with the Football League as an honorary player and given the shirt number 90. This made him officially the oldest registered professional player in the history of football.
The boys could have done with a spiky left winger over the years and blow me there was one in the stands all along.....
Anyway, one article I noted was about the passing of Clement Freud, chef, wine buff, politician and fanatical Plymouth Argyle supporter. Now the Green Army do not have too many celebrities in its ranks, so it was remiss of me to fail to recognise the passing of another political green Army stalwart, Michael Foot.
Michael was a Member of Parliament from 1945 to 1955 and from 1960 until 1992. He was also the Leader of the Opposition from 1980 to 1983. Associated with the Labour left for most of his career, he was a passionate supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and British withdrawal from the European Economic Community. A passionate orator, he was Labour leader at the 1983 general election when the party received its lowest share of the vote since 1918.
His parallel career as a journalist included his appointment as editor for the Tribune for several periods, and the London Evening Standard newspapers. His books include a biography of Jonathan Swift (The Pen and the Sword, 1957) and Aneurin Bevan.
Foot was educated initially in Plymouth, and was subsequently MP for Plymouth, Devonport so it was no surprise that he was a passionate supporter of the Argyle from his childhood and once remarked that he wasn't going to die until he had seen them play in the Premiership. I share the sentiment. Unlike Clement Freud though, he served for several years as a director of the club, seeing two promotions under his tenure.
For his 90th birthday, Foot was registered with the Football League as an honorary player and given the shirt number 90. This made him officially the oldest registered professional player in the history of football.
The boys could have done with a spiky left winger over the years and blow me there was one in the stands all along.....
Tuesday, 23 February 2010
1st floor, ladies and childrenswear, going up......
This weekend sees the first of a series of tower runs, as focused hill runners charge up the 42 flights of stairs in , wait for it, Tower 42 in the City of London. The male winners are expecting to do it in about 4 minutes. That's ten flights a minute, one every 6 seconds!!
It takes me back a few years, this tower running, and like a lot of things the youth of today think they invented, they didn't.
In 1982, a chum of mine, Neil Brown and I embarked on an adventure to the Far East. We were both single having recently come out of relationships and decided to go away for a few weeks. Our mate Figs fixed us up with accommodation in Singapore with AMF Phil, a Spurs supporter, and we made our own plans from there.
We were both fairly fit blokes so to break up some of the days we decided to have our own 'SuperStars' competition over the duration of the holiday. We started off with swimming which I won by virtue of doing the breastroke leg first, and holding Neil off on the return freestyle. He then trounced me at tennis, even after giving me a 0-40 start each game!
His racquet skills came to the fore again in the squash, but it was a close fought thing which finished when my bat smashed against the wall in the deciding set. We were in Penang, Malaysia by now, having tied the beer can pyramid competition on the train from Kuala Lumpa.
The hotel had a giant chess set in the grounds, and so we incorporated that into our competition. We set up after breakfast and gained a few interested parties as they made their way to the beach. Imagine their surprise then when we were still playing when they trooped back for lunch.I managed to dig myself out of a big hole to win that one, which left Neil and I all square as we returned to Singapore prior to our flight home.
Now Phil and Anne, our hosts, lived on the 32 floor of a condo somewhere down Nathan Road so it seemed sensible to have a decider by running the tower. So Phil went down in the lift with each of us in turn and timed us as we charged up the stairs. It was close, but Neil beat me to take the FESP trophy and the bragging rights.
The difference of course with Tower racing is that everybody starts off at the same time, imagine the scrum at the first corner eh!
It takes me back a few years, this tower running, and like a lot of things the youth of today think they invented, they didn't.
In 1982, a chum of mine, Neil Brown and I embarked on an adventure to the Far East. We were both single having recently come out of relationships and decided to go away for a few weeks. Our mate Figs fixed us up with accommodation in Singapore with AMF Phil, a Spurs supporter, and we made our own plans from there.
We were both fairly fit blokes so to break up some of the days we decided to have our own 'SuperStars' competition over the duration of the holiday. We started off with swimming which I won by virtue of doing the breastroke leg first, and holding Neil off on the return freestyle. He then trounced me at tennis, even after giving me a 0-40 start each game!
His racquet skills came to the fore again in the squash, but it was a close fought thing which finished when my bat smashed against the wall in the deciding set. We were in Penang, Malaysia by now, having tied the beer can pyramid competition on the train from Kuala Lumpa.
The hotel had a giant chess set in the grounds, and so we incorporated that into our competition. We set up after breakfast and gained a few interested parties as they made their way to the beach. Imagine their surprise then when we were still playing when they trooped back for lunch.I managed to dig myself out of a big hole to win that one, which left Neil and I all square as we returned to Singapore prior to our flight home.
Now Phil and Anne, our hosts, lived on the 32 floor of a condo somewhere down Nathan Road so it seemed sensible to have a decider by running the tower. So Phil went down in the lift with each of us in turn and timed us as we charged up the stairs. It was close, but Neil beat me to take the FESP trophy and the bragging rights.
The difference of course with Tower racing is that everybody starts off at the same time, imagine the scrum at the first corner eh!
Wednesday, 17 February 2010
And now the weather in Norwegian
I am finally immortalised on YouTube.
I really thought I was doing well with the Portuguese bit, but when seeing it now it was a fairly disjointed stumble through the guttural and the expressive. Still, I tried and it was appreciated by the key participants and the locals.
Next challenge is to play the piano at number one daughters wedding next year. 'Chopsticks' might not be enough, so I need to start banging those ivories soonest.
I really thought I was doing well with the Portuguese bit, but when seeing it now it was a fairly disjointed stumble through the guttural and the expressive. Still, I tried and it was appreciated by the key participants and the locals.
Next challenge is to play the piano at number one daughters wedding next year. 'Chopsticks' might not be enough, so I need to start banging those ivories soonest.
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