LATEST MOAN FROM YOU AND ME 2019

I'm old school. As well as indicating turns, I do use my lights to signal other intentions, but only if it is misinterpreted it won't lead to an accident. Say if I'm approaching a side road and someone wants to come out when there's not a lot of traffic, I'll give them a double flash to indicate that I'll let them. Or when ahead of me a driver traveling in the other direction, wants to turn across my lane to enter a side road and there's plenty of time for them to do this before I reach them, I'll do it again.

What I don't do is at traffic lights where I'm in a "turn only lane" is use my indicators at all.

At roundabouts I only signal just before my exit.

"It's a well known fact," that BMW charge for lots of extras which come as standard on many other cars. That's why on some of their top ranges, some purchasers don't opt for indicators.

 

@Doghouse Riley you crack me up! I'll remember the bimmer/turn signal comment forever

I just got an email from the town regarding my ongoing battle over the business run illegally out of next door. The town representative for my ward is "shocked" that this is still going on... reminds me of that fellow in Casablanca who was "shocked" that gambling was going on in Rick's establishment!

I guess I'll see just how shocked he really is... moan...

 

That was Claude Rains playing Captain Louis Renault.
After he said he was; "Shocked that gambling was going on," the manager of the casino comes up to him and says; "Captain Renault, here are your winnings."


I'm a fan of "film noir."

My board name, I've had since the start of internet message boards, comes from this scene, where a "spaced out on drugs," Carmen Sternwood meets Philip Marlowe.



I read that Martha Vickers stole the film from Bacall, before some of her scenes were cut and more filmed with Bogart and Bacall six months later, after they were married and before the film was released.

Digressing.

When I was working, (I managed big superstores), once a new female employee introduced herself as, Carmen. I said it was an unsual name.

She said she was named by her mother after a character in her favourite film. But like most young people she wasn't interested in "old films," so had never seen it. She looked a bit like her too.

 

I bought my first car at the age of seventeen in 1958. It was a pre-war Austin Seven convertible.
Exactly like these stock photos, down to the colour.

No wind up windows. "Side screens" steel frame fabric covered with some clear plastic in the middle. The rear passenger windows didn't open. The front ones folded back in half and were secured open with press studs. But you could take all the side windows out in hot weather and tilt the windscreen forward, to get some air blowing in as it was hinged at the top.

It was ideal for picnics. I took my girlfriend at the time to Brighton a few times. The window could be made level so you could use it as a table, sitting on the bonnet with your legs dangling over the dashboard. Parked up by the sea wall looking out to see. Such happy times!



This grainy old photo is the only one I have. It's of my dad leaning against it (he couldn't drive, didn't learn until he was 60). It was taken by my sister with a box Brownie camera, she'd have been ten. She found it last year and e-mailed me a copy.







It was a brilliant car, it had had a complete overhall, plus new hood and side panels plus new seat covers. An architect who lived up on the top of Wimbledon Hill had bought it for his wife and had the work done at the garage where a cousin of mine worked. But she couldn't manage the Bendix cable brakes. (stopping power was directly proportional to how hard you could press down on the brake pedal). So he bought her one of the new Minis and asked the garage to get rid of the car. So I got it for £35. I kept it for a year, I had to replace the tyres £16 for a set of 4 re-treads and 5p for a bearing for the dynamo which an uncle who was a mechanic replaced for me.

These had like all pre-war cars semaphore turn signals fitted as standard. But I fitted a set of those new flashing indicators to replace them.

I was still seventeen when I took my test. The examiner told me to only use hand signals to indicate turning or slowing down, which was a bit of a pain, but I passed anyway.

At that age, with a car, you had a lot of "pulling power."

 

I am angry with myself... I was fixing something outside a little while ago and I pushed a little too hard on the soldering iron and it flipped up and burnt the beejeesus out of the crook between my index finger and thumb. The same thumb I accidently performed surgery on with a box cutter last Saturday morning whilst cutting up boxes for the recycle bin and hit a hidden staple and veered off and ... Now that hand has compound injuries. All self inflicted

Oh well, a cold glass of something in that hand will relieve some of the burn pain

 

You might need to take some of that internally too!

 

The toaster saga continued.

The faulty one was collected and returned to Whirlpool at Peterborough on Tuesday of last week. They must have had a look at it and reported to Kitchenaid in Belgium on Wednesday, because they sent us a new one from Belgium which arrived on Tuesday.

"Never mind the reliability, feel the service."

Anyway, I've written to Kitchenaid thanking them for the new toaster, but also asking, as we've had two that didn't last the five year guarantee period, how long can I expect this one to last and for how long is this second replacement guaranteed.

 

There is a Spitfire that flies over here a couple of times a day, always follows exactly the same path, just a mile or so too far west for me to get a good look.

 

We used to have a spit fly over and around the house quite offen, when we would hear he/she was about we would go out into the garden and watch and wave at him/her and sometimes we would get a loop the loop or a dip of the wings but someone in the near by town conplained now no more spit

 

On the subject of memorable plane flyovers.

I can remember seeing this as a kid fly over our home in South London,

Bristol Brabazon.




And I'm sure lots have seen one of these. We were in Hyde Park one hot summer day when it went over.

 

Apparently we have 30+ DC3 Dakotas flying over here on the 5th June .
Part of the 75th D day commemorations, they are coming from Duxford and flying to Normandy.

 

The Brabazon must have been impressive in those days.

 

Apologies, this is petty and cynical and reveals that late on Friday night a well cultured Lady like me reads Daily Mail

But the dresses of today! Body positivity is great, nobody should be ashamed of the way they look. But my old eyes would still select something flattering over clingy bits of lycra covering half a nipple. And this is not the "wild night in Newcastle" story, it's actually races where the Ladies have truly made an effort.

Boozy Epsom racegoers don figure-hugging frocks and plunging necklines on Ladies' Day | Daily Mail Online

We have a young girl around here whom I have seen growing up from a chubby child to an obese young woman. She's the most beautiful girl ever, a face of a fairy and carries herself so very beautyfully. But she dresses herself in too small clingy, cheap crop tops and leggins. I want to shout that if the fabric on her clothes were a bit more self sufficient and carried itself rather than clinging onto her persona, she would knock passer bys off their feet with her beauty.

Beauty is not a big deal when it comes to life in its entirety, but willingly camouflaging it whilst trying hard to be attractive (judging by the effort on make up and hair) is maddening.

Victorian, moi?