mercurydancer
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Posts posted by mercurydancer
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I have a pet tarantula I bought 10 or more years ago when I was drunk. Seemed like a good idea at the time. My wife hates the spider but she has been with me longer than the wife and has not caused me any hassle, so I will stay with the spider.
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I use Aexa every day, it is wonderful if you use it right. My wife has a marked Russian accent but Alexa can understand that.
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Ah yes Jill, that is the new build. The entrance of the old nick is still there, with the old rails on the front on Potter Street. many is the time I have walked on those steps. Been closed for years.
The new building connects with the old part (the cells are there) and the car park area is little changed. Offices are cheap to build, secure areas and cells are very expensive, which is why it is like that.
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I have considerable knowledge of Notts Police Stations!
Jill, was it the old Worksop nick or the new build? The changing rooms and the snooker table and the toilets and showers in the old nick were OK. Worksop nick was relatively spacious (compared to Hyson Green) and had enough facilities to make it comfortable and had a decent canteen. I cannot remember the toilets being honking, but you may have been there shortly after my curry night. It was a close nick. One of the canteen girls had to have a termination due to the baby being dead, and we all got behind her and had a whip round and made sure she was OK. The cleaners were great and the admin staff wonderful. That was back in the days when we dictated statements onto acetate discs and after a while, the discs had so many voices on it that it was incomprehensible. I have always hated smoking and although smoking was permitted in the nick, I cannot recall it being horrible.
Newark was lovely, as it was an old house, and Newark was very quiet. Ollerton was quiet as a station but it was centrally placed for a lot of police cars to congregate, especially at refs time. At Worksop we often had the South Yorks lads who we envied as they had the barathea uniforms where we had the heavy serge. Serge in winter is lovely. In the wet, it could weigh as much as your own body weight and in summer was awfully sweaty.
I miss central, but it was a rabbit warren and I dont think I saw that much of it. I was mostly across the road at the traffic department. Canal Street was where we convened for the football matches and the pre-match food was superb. My girlfriend at the time was stationed at canal Street so I volunteered for every footy match.
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Jill
Harry was a character all right. I first met him in about 2004, at Passchendaele. Saw him would be more precise, as the film crew were there. I did get to speak with him in a bar near the Menin Gate, and he was scrounging drinks from everyone. Once a soldier always a soldier!.
The bar was refurbished a few years later, but in the same bar, two years ago, I did a special battlefield tour for a friend whose great grandfather died not far from ypres, so I took her there. As it happened, it was 9 May, Russian national day, so I took my little Russian 9 Mai flags with me and waved them at the Menin Gate. The brass band saw me, and did something I will always recall. After the ceremony we went to that bar. The brass band went to the same bar, as they always do. They saw me and my flags and then went outside and started to play the Russian national anthem. I got on my hind legs and started belting out the anthem too rossiya – svyashchennaya nasha derzhavya, rossiya lyubimaya nasha stranya!!!!!! Strangely two other lads stood up, a little embarrassed and started to sing along! I dont know much more than those two lines but we gave it all we had! The clapping and laughing was wonderful, and the conversations were interesting. A wonderful evening.
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Fly, I knew him a little. Grumpy old bogger, but funny too.
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I do battlefield tours as a hobby, so I am well used to Ypres (or Ieper) and the last post there is a very deeply emotional thing. I usually stand to attention and lean slightly forward so the tears do not land on my jacket.
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My dad often drove us to Chapel St Leonards. I adored the drive there, in a Morris Oxford LNN 430E, which I learned to drive in. I seem to recall that there was a small amusement arcade and a fish and chip shop ( I hate fish and always have done, but I was happy with a pot of mushy peas)
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I wonder if any of our army veterans can remember bisuits AB - for alternative bread, but probably meant all Broken.Completely inedible.
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29 minutes ago, Brew said:
You need to come home MD, the North has turned your brain!
Indeed it has.
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6 hours ago, Mr Meeseeks said:
Ginger biscuits, horrible things. Is there anyone out there who actually likes them, above all the Chocolate suggestives and chocolate wafers?
Food of the gods. I work in a country house hotel now, and my morning duty is to look after an outdoor picnic area, not that it is busy in September! But it has some lovely cabins and I get a coffee and my ginger nuts and look over the South Durham countryside. No other biscuit can match it.
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The ultimate dunking biscuit is a ginger nut. Anyone who says differently is a heretic
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I recall Dr McGrath treating me for all kinds of ailments when I was a kid in that house near the Grand. He was very kind and one time I got knocked over by a car on Berridge Road and had a broken collar bone and a nasty graze, and the dressing stuck hard. He soaked it himself and every 10 minutes took a bit more off. I recall the fear I had about that dressing and I was relieved when he got the last bit of it off. No surgery nurses then.
Acton was indeed a butcher. Brutal irishman, and I recall him chiding me for not brushing my teeth even now.
The riots of 1981! I recall them very well. It was a Saturday night and I was moved from Worksop to Nottingham. The main focus of the trouble was in the Canning Circus area, where I was. I recall hiding in the door of the Running Horse when a petrol bomb was thrown at us. We had a scare later when the radio said that rioters had got behind us and were heading to Hyson Grren nick on Gregory Boulevard, but there was not that much trouble there. We were afraid that they would come back up Alfreton Road and surround us. That is a bottom twitching moment, especially as the Brixton riots were about the same time.
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I recall Lovejoys on Radford Road with great affection. It closed a couple of years ago
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Got a ticket for driving down a bus lane next to Midland station. I would have thought that given the huge confusion regarding the traffic closures with the demolition of the BM centre they would have given some leeway but no, as usual, a Council money making scheme.
Once into that system there is no way you can go but to take the bus lane. £60. The stewards of the bar.
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19 hours ago, letsavagoo said:
I used to play football for Berridge school on this field. It was always referred to as Nuthall Road playing field (1960-66). I found one of the thick heavy very old pennies on the field when it was muddy and churned up with our boots. I got tackled and fell over and it was just lying there. I still have it. You can't make out the date it's so worn but I think it's 17??.
I did play football on what must have been the same ground. I always recall it as being Whitemoor.
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It is indeed a cash and carry warehouse, but was formerly the Co-op distribution centre for fridges, furniture and almost everything non-food. I adored working there.
As to the Whitemoor pub, I fondly recall a barman called Jack, of the old school, with the elasticated metal arm thingys. Always friendly and knew what I meant when I wanted a black and tan.
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I think the rule of thumb comes from the old Roman measure of the last part of the thumb being equivalent to one inch.
I could be very boring about the Roman use of the hand as something like an abacus, and was hugely important in the Roman army getting from one place to another, and some of the counting methods have been used until recent times.
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4 hours ago, Gem said:
I like the pace of life here 'quiet meandering' well most days, my aunt has lived here since 1948 when she married a local fisherman. It's very commercialised now more homes owned by outsiders than locals, we live on Cow Bar bank which being very steep puts a lot of people off visiting us but I shall be happy to spend my time here.
I know Cow bar Bank well, and have walked up it many times. A lovely place. Staithes is one of the most beautiful villages on that coast. It has become more popular because of the success of Whitby, which can be unbearably busy, so people go to Robin Hoods Bay and to Staithes instead.
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It is correct that the prefab building on the playing fields was an annexe for Berridge as we did out sports stuff there. I still recall the playing fields as Whitemoor field.
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Staithes is a truly delightful village. Good place to spend the end of your years.
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102 years? Magnificent.
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On 6/16/2019 at 5:56 PM, FLY2 said:
Manchester Airport is probably the worst in the country, other than Stanstead. I'll never use either again.
Ever flown from Durham Tees Valley airport?
Awful. No public transport goes there, just taxis and its a way from Teeside too.
You have to pay 6 pounds to go through security! I travel an awful lot and it is far worse than Manchester or Stansted.
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I definitely recall Whitemoor Lodge as being where Lomax is now. Never knew what it was, as Lomax has been there since I was a child.
I have some very vague recollections for Whitemoor ending largely where the Wheatsheaf is, and Bobbers Mill started after the railway crossing, possibly the Leen. Is my memory playing up, or were the playing fields a little further up the railway line, near to Gerrards soap factory called Whitemoor fields?
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Spiders, evictions and dithering
in Owt' Abaaht Nowt !
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Jill... It may have been a red knee spider! Yes really that is the name for them!.
They do live for many years ( I have had mine for more than 15 years) but the tarantula I have only ever lives within a small area for its entire life. They do that in their natural environment. It only moves if there is no water or food. Give them both, and they are happy. She has been in a warm glass box for many years and it is warm, moist and lots of food. Desert spider heaven!