rendelharris

I think you've misunderstood James, I'm sure Stephen meant if yours drops then others on the market will, not that there's any order in place that mandates it!

Yes I am indeed one of Putin's fifth column, determined to undermine the nation by mildly querying the official party line on a local forum! Don't tell anyone though, it's a secret...

Given identical properties I'd choose ED, for better connections and more going on. But having moved two years ago from a block to a flat in a house, I'd say there's no comparison for us. No management committee (we share a whole house with one other very lovely family), no service charges (just shared agreement on common bills), no "exceptional projects" (we were unlucky I guess but we got stuck with a ?12,000 bill as our part of heating replacement works and many other smaller "exceptional" charges). Also I just find the ambience of living in a house, albeit just a section of it, so much nicer. No disrespect to those living in blocks, I have friends on our old estate who wouldn't dream of going anywhere else, but for us from a financial, ambience (no people traipsing up and down a corridor outside the front door), and aesthetic point of view a flat in a period house beats it hands down. If you want the delights of ED in HOP you're only a ten minute bike ride away! Good luck.

In the words of Tom Waits, "Come down off the cross, we can use the wood."

flocker spotter Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > It was the russians, this is not really moot, > despite the dots being joined by conspiracists.Its > a message, delivered by the means of grim > performance art. it isnt a messsage directly > however to the UKG, this is a secondary issue- it > is also message for the home audience about > betrayal and reach. It is directly aimed to the > Russian expat community here- those that still > have favour and hold Vlad the poisoners assets. > His wealth is loosely estimated to be hundred of > billions, none of it in his own name. > > Its a crass slavic re-enactment of the horse head > in the bed scene if would wanted to express it in > digestable popular culture terms. things are are > rarely as complex as they may look. It must be great to be you, so certain, so right, so utterly and ineffably pompous and arrogant.

diable rouge Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > True, nothing wrong with doubting authority etc, > it's to be encouraged, but supplanting it with > conspiratorial whataboutery kinda undermines it... As mentioned above, if the mildest suggestion that our government may have got things wrong, or that it's at least worth investigating alternative explanations, is to be classified as conspiracy theorism, that's a very sorry state of affairs.

"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth" Albert Einstein

So it might have happened but we don't know but let's assume it has as it fits a simple blame narrative. Look, we're all going round and round in circles, none of us has access to information that proves things one way or the other, so it's a bit pointless. All I will say is that nations have gone to war on flimsier pretexts than this, it doesn't do any harm to question the official line, be it from our own government, the Russians, the USA or anyone else.

diable rouge Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > rendelharris Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > > Return to first principles and ask why Russia > did > > do it? Skirpal had been tried and convicted > > (correctly) of being a British double agent. > He > > served a prison sentence for it, during which > he > > could have been killed at any time without the > > world blinking an eyelid. Instead he was > > exchanged in a spy swap with the UK and lived > in > > the UK, then the Russian state decided to > murder > > him? > > You've answered your own question. He was more > valuable to the Russians alive than dead i.e. a > future spy swap. Had they killed him earlier they > would've gained nothing, but by keeping him alive > they at least get some of their spies back. This > is long-term standard espionage trading-off, swap > a 'traitor' for a 'hero'. Once exchanged, then he > can be bumped off, a warning to others not to > consider becoming double agents... Never been done before, as far as I know, and I recall former Russian agents at the time were saying it's just not the way it's done, Putin only goes after those who've not been legally punished in Russia. Apart from anything else, it surely ruins the possibility of future swaps - Britain would be damned fools to agree to any more if this is what's going to happen, wouldn't they?

malumbu Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > My word - this is like the Communist Party of > Great Britain being apologists for Stalin and then > in denial about the purges in the 50s. > Concentrate your efforts on who shot JFK and who > was behind it. Or mine the deeper vein of > rendition. I do apologise for not always taking UKGov's word as gospel and for at least considering alternative explanations. Is that what we're reduced to now, accept the official line or be labelled a conspiracy theorist?

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I think we should apply Occam's razor personally. I can't think of any situation where that principle, "the simplest solution tends to be the correct one", is less applicable than the opaque and highly complex world of international espionage.

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > So those who think that the attack didn't happen > with the approval or sanction of the Russian state > - who do you think was behind the use of this high > grade chemical weapon? As noted above, many sources have alleged that since coming to the UK Skirpal has been involved in a highly murky world of Russian oligarchs and criminals (the two often being interchangeable); Russia is highly corrupt and many of its institutions are highly insecure, it's not beyond the bounds of imagination that a criminal entity could obtain nerve agent for its own purposes (and it has been synthesized in other countries, notably Czechoslovakia and Iran). Return to first principles and ask why Russia did do it? Skirpal had been tried and convicted (correctly) of being a British double agent. He served a prison sentence for it, during which he could have been killed at any time without the world blinking an eyelid. Instead he was exchanged in a spy swap with the UK and lived in the UK, then the Russian state decided to murder him? Putin/Russia are murderous bastards, they definitely do have people murdered - Litvinenko being a case in point - but there isn't, as far as I know, a single instance of a spy being convicted, serving a sentence in Russia, being released on a spy swap, then murdered. It's perfectly possible it was the Russian state, but it seems far more likely to me to be either rogue elements within Russian security services (even our own security services have not been averse to taking what they deem "necessary" action without official sanction) or criminal activity.

Jenny1 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > rendelharris Wrote: > ---------------------------------------- > > > > And yet somehow they managed to administer an > > airborne nerve agent in such a way as it only > > affected three people, in a crowded urban area, > > until three months later when it suddenly > affects > > two more? > > There were other people in the area who suffered > mercifully minor ill effects after the > assassination attempt on the Skripals. That the > Skripals and the police officer who came to their > aid were most seriously affected simply shows that > whoever administered the stuff knew what they were > doing. It wouldn't be the first time Novichok has > been used in this way. As rahrahrah says there was > a concerted effort to clean up the area afterwards > and the public were warned of the risks. It's not > hard to imagine that a trace remained somewhere > and has led to further damage. According to the current police theory, it was smeared on the Skripal's front door. According to https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/novichok-agent it acts within thirty seconds to three minutes of contact. So the Skripals got it off their front door, then went out for lunch, not affecting anyone in the restaurant or any of the other areas they visited, then both collapsed at exactly the same time and whatever residue they had on their clothing etc instantly affected the police officer who came to their aid? Incidentally, a Russian scientest exposed to a trace residue in a lab suffered "chronic weakness in his arms, a toxic hepatitis that gave rise to cirrhosis of the liver, epilepsy, spells of severe depression, and an inability to read or concentrate that left him totally disabled and unable to work. He never recovered and, after five years of deteriorating health, died in July 1992." And yet the Skripals, or at least the daughter, appear to have made a full recovery, something seemingly unheard of in the case of this nerve agent? Something dreadful happened, it may have been done by the Russian government or Russian criminals, but the official explanations thus far seem full of contradicitons and circumstances/coincidences that range from unlikely to close to impossible. It certainly does not appear "pretty straightforward" to me.

"While I respect Hersch, that?s an article from RT, and thus pretty suspect. I might try and track down the original broadcast." Here you go, I only quoted the RT as it saved me having to go back and listen again for the quotes! https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b7d131

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Jenny1 Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I think it all looks pretty straightforward. It > > would have been hard to clean up all residue of > > the Novichok and these poor people, living > close > > to Salisbury and doubtless travelling there > > frequently, have simply been unfortunate enough > to > > come into contact with it. > > Exactly this. I've heard a lot of conspiracy > theory and suggestions that things 'don't add up'. > The facts are that a Russian double agent was > assassinated using a nerve agent - an incredibly > reckless act because it is very difficult to > contain such chemical weapons. > > The fact that several months later some innocent > party has inadvertently come into contact with > said nerve agent, underlines what the government > said at the time - such an attack puts the general > public at risk of contamination. This is what > makes the attack all the more outrageous. > > It seems pretty likely that the Russian government > sanctioned this attack. I don't buy any of the > 'false flag' nonsense. As above, just these two coming into contact with this residue months later with nobody else being affected? I don't believe it was a "false flag" either, but many people (including Seymour Hersh, above) have said that Skripal was involved in some pretty dodgy dealings with the Russian mafia. Russian mafia and government being closely intertwined, by no means impossible for private criminal entities to obtain a small supply of a nerve agent illicitly for their own purposes. "an incredibly > reckless act because it is very difficult to > contain such chemical weapons. " And yet somehow they managed to administer an airborne nerve agent in such a way as it only affected three people, in a crowded urban area, until three months later when it suddenly affects two more?

Jenny1 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I think it all looks pretty straightforward. It > would have been hard to clean up all residue of > the Novichok and these poor people, living close > to Salisbury and doubtless travelling there > frequently, have simply been unfortunate enough to > come into contact with it. Just these two people and nobody else? So somewhere in Salisbury there's a residue of Novichok strong enough to put these two individuals in a coma, but nobody else, including people actually living in Salisbury, is affected? Come now!

Actually plastic bottles are easily recyclable, the problem is that we don't, rather than they can't be: we use roughly 40m plastic bottles per day in the UK and fewer than half get recycled. Obviously, recycling uses energy and so forth and so would be better kept to a minimum, but the problems with plastics in the ocean come from dumped plastics. If you took a free bottle of water and conscientiously threw it in your recycling at home no need to beat up on yourself too much!

Interesting take on this situation from the veteran journalist Seymour Hersh on The Media Show last week: https://www.rt.com/uk/431168-salisbury-skripal-seymour-hersh/ He might have added how impossible it would be to poison two people, of vastly different ages, weights, and states of health, with a nerve agent in their home in such a way that they both collapse at exactly the same time some hours later. Obvious that some bad, bad stuff has been going down in Salisbury and environs, but whether it's what we're told...noticeable after the initial period of aggression everything cooled down very quickly...

Fallen off a bin lorry/skip? Paid someone to take it away who then dumped it? Someone asked for the box (I've sometimes been asked for large boxes by people wanting them for moving etc) then decided they didn't need it and dumped it? Quite possibly it is a straightforward case of dumping, though again, why carry a cardboard box a significant distance to dump it when it could be cut up and put in the recycling in minutes? Just suggesting alternatives before we get the pitchforks and burning torches out...

Jim1234 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Would appreciate a bit of advice: if we have a > flat locally and are looking to buy a small house > or larger flat (perhaps ?700k max budget, assuming > our current flat stays approx ?350k), would you > wait and see or try to buy? If you're planning to settle down, work out what you can afford to pay in terms of mortgage and go for it. We dallied for ten years in a flat we weren't particularly happy with (our first buy, all we could afford), trying to work out where the market was going etc, before eventually taking the plunge and buying a flat we adore and plan to spend the rest of our lives in (barring lottery wins etc). We have mortgage payments we can (just about!) afford and which will be finished before we retire, so it really doesn't matter a damn to us if it's worth ?100k or ?1M. If you're planning to move on later on the back of profits it might be different, but if you're looking to settle down and find somewhere you love why wait?

Just to play devil's advocate, I can imagine a number of scenarios where it might end up there through no fault of her own. Seems an odd item to flytip when it would be less effort to cut up and throw in the recycling. Obviously, if she did tip it hope she gets a sanction but there are alternative explanations...

You do realise that "poltroon" means coward? I just ask as you frequently mangle the English language in the giveaway style of the person somewhat lacking in intelligence, choosing the posh-sounding word over one which actually makes sense. Assuming that, in this instance, you've got it right, you really don't see the irony of a sad little keyboard sniper, who does nothing but put others down, hiding behind a username to try to make him/herself feel superior, calling others cowards? I do feel sorry for you - deeply irritating and faux superior as you are, there's clearly a significant lack in your life that you're desperately, transparently and inadequately trying to fill on here. It's awfully sad.

James Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > And Flocker Spotter, this is an obvious point and > not helpful. How would you feel if you were > selling and I told you to discount your house > heavily as the market was slow? Especially since > our house is priced competitively in comparison > with other similar properties. It is very > unsettling when you do not know what your money > will buy. And risk heavily losing out. That's FS's specialty I'm afraid, sneering putdowns of others while not offering anything helpful, informative or constructive to debate. S/he obviously enjoys it, it's rather tiresome for everyone else. That comment is a case in point - if you reduced your ?500,000 flat to ?250,000, you'd sell it at once. No, really?

apbremer Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > The absurd and punitive levels of stamp duty have > killed the market. Stamp duty is currently ?3,750 more on a million pound house than it was in 2011 (?43,750 against ?40,000). On a half million pound house it's the same as it was in 2011 (?15k). That's neither punitive nor absurd, taxes have to come from somewhere. Just tell the truth, which is that rightwingers don't like taxes of any sort, and particularly ones that are weighted so that the richest pay a bit more. Was the housing market dead in 2011?

Got any guests coming from the Cheltenham area? This guy rents for ?75 a day... https://fatlama.com/rentals/cheltenham/hire-nissan-figaro-car-26939860