mercurydancer

Smiley's people was based on several real spy activities but some could not be told at the time. The exchange of spies usually took place on Glienicke Bridge in Berlin. Due to the Tom Hanks film, its known as the Bridge of Spies. Checkpoint Charlie was not on a bridge and therefore security to exchange spies would have been severely limited. As an aside, Rudolf Abel, in the Hanks film, was in fact a Geordie by birth!

Sydney Smith invented a pressure valve which prevented steam engines from over pressurising and blowing up. Very handy in the age of steam.

I see Paddy Tipping has been elected to PCC of Nottinghamshire. I live in Durham now where the very fragrant and totally incorruptible Ron Hogg has been reappointed. The equally snow white Barry Coppinger has been re-elected to PCC in Cleveland. * I nearly gnawed off the corner of my keyboard about this. Why do we need PCC? Police forces used to have a Chief Constable. Fair one. Now they have a Chief Constable, a Chief Executive Officer and a PCC. So who actually makes the decisions? Or does it end in a bureaucratic mess? I feel it is the latter. Also, the PCC is a member and representa

compo is exactly right. However, for sea levels there is another effect called albedo. Snow is white. Sea is not white. The ground in general is not white (unless covered by snow) Now sunlight hitting white surfaces gets reflected back into the atmosphere, oddly enough keeping it warmer. If the ground or sea does not have ice, the heat is absorbed and the land and sea gets warmer. What the results of this actually are is not possible to say, beyond that there will be climate change. Clever people are trying to work out the annual albedo. USA and Canada had more snow than average, Russia had

Depression is probably not a single disease but a collection of them under one title. Cancer is similarly grouped together. Some people for reasons unknown, and often with no external factors, just drop a chemical from the brain which keeps us functioning. The chemical is called serotonin and a good number of depressive illnesses can be controlled by medication which stops the brain dumping serotonin. At its worst, it can actually slow up everything you do. I have come across many cases where the patient speaks so slowly they cannot be understood. In one case I can remember, the patient move

I do tend to like Shakespeare, but it takes exceptional acting for it to become truly fascinating. Movies are OK but to get totally immersed in live theatre is something else. I recall Ian McKellen as Iago in Othello, probably at the Barbican theatres, and it was not a big theatre, very close and intimate, and he crept along the aisles giving his act in a stage whisper, but very very creepy and slimy and dishonest, as Iago definitely is. I cannot recall ever deeply hating a character in a play as much as that. Absolutely compelling acting.

Last week I got to Nottingham and found the Viccy market stall. Again I bought a bag of blewits. This time they were gorgeous.My favourite recipe is disarmingly simple, fry them in butter. Add bacon if you wish, (I prefer not to) and eat with fried bread. Thats it. A week earlier I was in Leyburn Market in North Yorkshire. There was a market stall there which had a decent selection of wild mushrooms. I asked if they had any wood blewits and the chap on the stall said, rather condescendingly, that they would not sell a poisonous mushroom.

Beduth Not possible. Pain is real but subjective. A temperature is objective. You and I could suffer identical injury and describe the pain levels totally differently, and even within ourselves, pain tolerance can vary tremendously. I'm not sure a pain detector would be that useful. If I have little pain and a machine says I should be in a lot of pain I may do either of two things- agree with the machine and feel strong pain or get all wound up about a machine saying something that I genuinely know not to be true. There is a solution, and its in operation now. Not with machines but very

I was at Mundella from 1970 to 76. Not one teacher was a bully. Not one of them. It was a good school to grow up in. Some teachers, including, and especially Mr Wood, the PE teacher, were totally ineffective, and to this day I blame him for not educating me in sport. I was quite a weak child initially, but as I grew older I got things like coordination and a passion for cricket. I cannot ever remember Mr Wood giving any instruction for cricket, football, rugby, or anything. Not the slightest. I did learn discipline and respect from some, which was of great use in my life. Mr Robinson for ins

Now there are few joys in the world which compare to a decent fritter. Occasionally, and with no concern to my cardiac health, will deep fry a sausage in batter. Onion rings are pretty decent too, but, and I cannot stress this enough, not frozen and in breadcrumbs. It has to be a thick onion with lots of crispy batter and not soggy. I have dabbled with tempura batter, then back to self-raising flour with salt and water, sometimes plain flour with soda water and beer, but always I tend to fail in the ultimate quest for the ultimate batter. Ladies and gentlemen, this is our quest, for the ul

Bamber I was stationed at Worksop. We did foot patrol from Potter Street. Many times I put my helmet on with pride on the steps of the nick. It made lots of sense as we could ensure the safety of the market, and the security of the shops on the high street. We got acquainted with the shop owners and traders and we were a visible presence on the town centre. They knew us and we knew them. It worked very well, because we were there. It reassured people. This trust was lost later, and it is something which the police, to their credit, are trying to regain, with community policing initiatives.

Bubblewrap The batter makes the difference

A proper fritter is a slab of potato about half a centimeter thick, and covered in batter. Deep fried. Nothing else is a fritter. Mushy peas is a good accompaniment.

Margie The pacific is slowly descending westwards along the "ring of fire" or pacific rim. The pacific is therefore getting deeper, although there comes a point where it is absorbed by the mantle of the earth.

The sea level is probably one of the most drastic evaluations of the earth climate. I am not saying that the sea level is not important, it is, but the climate is changing into who knows what. Possibly the change in subtleties in salinity, El Nino effects may affect us much more than a simple rise in sea level.

I know it is an actor who portrays Keith Lemon, but that actor should be waterboarded just for that. I'd do it.

If he had eaten hundreds and thousands and farted, he would not have shot the dog but topped it. Is that my coat over there? My taxi please.

I must apologise for the fart post. Mea culpa. I promise never to fart at a Nottstalgia meet. Partly because it would offend people and partly because it is against Health and Safety Act 1974 (it is really - release of noxious gases!) I could go to prison but I am thinking I would get a cell to myself.

Catfan Have you tried the King Goblin? Me and my step son did somewhat copiously in Weatherspoons in Brighton of all places.

Almost identical build to the old Gregory Boulevard nick. It was a busy station despite its size, although Central nick was 5 minutes away which took some pressure off it.

Well, we could have a statue of Cpl Bill Bartle, the first Nottinghamshire soldier to land in Normandy on D Day. MC and bar. Took a lot more bottle to land and fight on D Day and afterwards than it did to manage a football team.

Benjamin There is already a very expressive and impressive statue to Harold Larwood in Kirkby.

I consider it to be part of my personality and something of a strength but it has actually been a reason why my partner wanted to leave me. Breaking wind. I have always been capable of cracking off a brown one which would startle a New York Police horse. It smells terribly for the benefit of the deaf. When I had dogs I would blame them. To no avail as it is hard to blame a dog when he is walking backwards away from me in full ears back tail down terror or bolting for the conservatory door begging to be let out. It is invaluable on airlines. I could virtually guarantee that I would get a

Michaelbooth President Obama launched his "moonshot" on cancer recently. His hope is that the intelligence, inventiveness and plain old gumption which got men to walk on the moon can be used to defeat cancer. Of course this doesn't dominate the headlines as it is positive news. We would rather hear that Cheryl Version-Orsole-Coal-Twitty (or whatever her name is this week) has broken a fingernail and was VERY upset about it. Obama has put billions behind the project. Its about time. The most likely avenue is autoimmune treatments, where the body can identify and kill the cancer cells with med

I recall very well Tiffanys. Bilborough College had some nights in that place*. It was indeed down some steps off to the right of the entrance. It was surprisingly cavernous. *If anyone remembers the "In the Navy" pop mime it was absolutely nothing to do with me. I deny it completely. It was not me in the kilt.