Partying like it's 1984

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Welcome

You've found Russell & Carol. We're lucky enough to live in a beautiful part of Cornwall with Astra the rescue dog and a lot of computers. We sometimes get around to blogging about things which interest/enrage us.

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Some of our pictures

Rumor: Vladimir Putin, on a Harley Davidson at Sevastopol’s motorcycle festival (VIDEO) | inrumor.com | inrumorWavesH.M. Post Office Packet Service sailing from Falmouth 1688-1852 | @PRScreddaSt Ives - a beautiful dayA little light refreshmentGold Anglo-Saxon signet ring from North-West Essex, 580–650 ADMagical view of ChyausterMagnolia view @ Trewidden

Recent posts for Russell

Russell's picture

Neo-Liberalism at its finest...?

So, the top man at Thomas Cook trousers £15m in 'hard earned and decent' (my sarcasm) bonuses over the last couple of years and now Thomas Cook is in dire trouble and planning to lay off thousands.  Well thank goodness for Free markets.  Nurses, teachers and other public servants must have their pensions cut, but goold old chief executives must have huge payouts even in times of trouble.  We're all in it together of course....

 

Russell's picture

Gaza Flotilla II Underway

Many brave people are going with the Gaza Flotilla II assembling in the Med right now.  The Zionist Entity has made its usual revolting attempts to stop the ships before they sail and smear the people but the ships are going.  Shame on Greece, Cyprus, The USA, Canada, France and Australia for telling their citizens not to participate.  Interestingly The Zionist Entity is claiming that people on the flotilla entering Gazan waters 'will be treated as individuals having attempted to enter Israel illegally' (Jerusalem Post) thus demonstrating that they consider Gaza to be under the authority of the Zionist Entity...

Russell's picture

Oh FFS religionists again...

I nearly choked on my old man's sherry recently when I read about a 'science' teacher in the USA (where else?) who liked to add christian commentary to his science lessons basically saying the science he was teaching was wrong and that his religious view was correct.  He had been sacked it seemed and there was a 'reinstate him' movement from the concerned kids who were praying for him because they now believed science was unreliable.

 

Russell's picture

Cyrus the Great of Persia - the first Christ of the Judaeans

"And when no elite existed, one could always be imported from elsewhere. Cyrus [the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire], even as he flattered the Babylonians with the attentions he paid to Marduk [Babylonian God], had not ignored the yearnings of the city's deportees, exiles such as the Judaeans, brought to Babylon decades previously - for the Persians had recognised in these wretched captives, and in their homesickness, a resource of great potential.

Russell's picture

The UK Surveillance Society

"If you've nothing to hide you've nothing to fear" is the mantra of the proponents of the surveillance society. It's rubbish of course as we all have things to hide such as our bank account or credit card details! Privacy International's 2007 survey gave the UK the lowest privacy ranking in the EU putting it in the 'endemic surveillance' category alongside Russia and Singapore. So do we good citizens actually need to worry?

 

Recent posts for Carol

Quote - "The pleasure of what we enjoy is lost by wanting more"’

The pleasure of what we enjoy is lost by wanting more

Chinese

 

Quote - "important enough to risk somebody else's"’

...few things are so important you would risk your life for them, but all sorts of things are important enough to risk somebody else’s life.


Chapter 12

The Bullet That Missed: (The Thursday Murder Club 3)
By Richard Osman

 

Quote - "The world is made up of our differences"’

I always thought people like us needed people like Raphaëlle to cope with certain situations but it is way more complex than that.

The world is made up of our differences.    It needs people like us, who only see the coloured stains and not the landscape, and it needs people like Raphaëlle, who only see the landscape even if it sometimes leads them to lose their judgments.  It is only when we are together that we can see the entirety of the picture.    One cannot work without the other.

 

"Astrid Et Raphaelle" S02 E01

Quote - "Would I that he was not here now, but was then, than he never was here at all"’

"Would I that he was not here now, but was then, than he never was here at all’"

Freya North

Quote - "impulse towards good involves choice and is complicated, and the impulse towards bad is hideo’"

"I mean to say that the impulse towards good involves choice and is
complicated, and the impulse towards bad is hideously simple and easy"

Maeve Brennan; ‘Talk of the Town’ for New Yorker

 

When management isn't far away...

When management isn't far away...

Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders Memorial

Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders Memorial

CRUACHAN
SAIR GHAISGICH
A CHOGAIDH-MHOIR
NA LAOICH
A CHAIDH ROMHAINN

Cruachan! [*]
so many heroes
a great war
the heroes
that went before us

 

The large and imposing memorial is to the 8th Battalion Argyll &
Sutherland Highlanders and is in the form of a massive Celtic Cross. The
site for the memorial is located very near to where the Battalion HQ
was in 1916. The French landowner gave the land on nominal terms and on
Sunday the 4th of March 1923, the memorial was unveiled by the Duke of
Argyll. An officer and 20 other ranks from the battalion, plus French
representatives including the Mayor of Beaumont Hamel, attended the
ceremony, at which pipers played.

 

[*] the battle cry for Highland clans Campbell and MacIntyre

MacDonald K C Pte 8th Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders | De Ruvignys Roll Of Honour

MacDonald K C Pte 8th Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders | De Ruvignys Roll Of Honour

MacDonald K C Pte 8th Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders De Ruvignys Roll Of Honour Vol 3

 

MACDONALD, KENNETH CAMPBELL,

Private, No. 3488, 1/8th (Territorial) Battn. Princess Louise’s (Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders), s. of Alexander Macdonald, of 18, Roxburgh Street, Greenock, by his wife, Eliza, dau. of the late Findley Luke; b. Greenock, 17 May, 1897; educ. Holmscroft Elementary and Higher Grade — Schools, Greenock ; was employed as a Clerk in the Cartsdyke Saw Mills, and afterwards as an Apprentice Joiner with Caird & Co., Ltd. : enlisted Oct. 1915; underwent training at Dunoon; served with the Expeditionary Force in France and Flanders from 3 June, 1916, and was killed in action at Beaumont Hamel 13 Noy. 1916.    Buried in Mailly Wood Cemetery.    He was a writer of verse, and his “ Sleep on, Brave Souls " was set to music by Mr. Cargill Linn: unm.

 


 

Quote - "We need to dispel the myth that empathy is ‘walking in someone else’s shoes.’"

We need to dispel the myth that empathy is ‘walking in someone else’s shoes.’ Rather than walking in your shoes, I need to learn how to listen to the story you tell about what it’s like in your shoes and believe you even when it doesn’t match my experiences..”

Brené Brown, Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience, 2021

 

Thin cakes called Crumpits, made from seeds of Polygonum aviculare L. (Knot Grass)

Came across an early mention of Crumpets - in a herbarium !

Culinary uses of Polygonum aviculare L. (Knot Grass): 'The Seeds furnish a nutritious meal; it
is made into thin cakes called Crumpits.'

a small extract in a fascinating article by Jessica Shepherd, Natural History Research Assistant (St. Aubyn)

Bringing a herbarium to life at Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery

Lightning strike | West Cornwall

Lightning strike | West CornwallChar Morris Lighning West Cornwall