Penguin68

Pugwash wrote Mum did not know what she was talking about - turns out that she had never received a PIN for this card,and never had PIN for any previous cards, infact she did not understand what a PIN was initially. When explained,said she would never remember a PIN number as her memory was too poor. It is possible to get a bank to issue a debit card which doesn't require a PIN - when it is put into the card reader it instead asks for a signature - this is to take account of those who have poor sight, poor memory etc. - mainly the elderly. This is normally only issued on request and when the bank knows there is a specific problem, but it does allow someone still able to sign, but unsure of what a PIN is/ how it works, or unable to use a PIN to use a debit card. I don't know whether all banks do this, Lloyds TSB certainly does.

The scenario seems very implausible - exposure tends to be a solitary, not a group activity; it is unusual for teenage boys to expose themselves to adults (what they get up to behind what used to be the bike sheds is a different matter) and maintaining an erection in such circumstances might be considered a challenge. Without wishing to denigrate the experience of the poster - who was clearly and properly shocked by the event - might we be looking at a very stupid 'practical' (why are they called that?) joke where some form of fake appendage was being displayed? That (pretending to expose yourself, using a fake willy) seems a much more likely schoolboy prank - possibly even a dare - than actual exposure. It doesn't make the experience any better for the poster, but it might be more likely. Of course, pretending to expose yourself is just as traumatic, unless discovered, as actually exposing yourself, to the one being exposed to, but it displays a different psychology at work. I do recall, from the 1960s, 'humerous' use of uncooked sausages by schoolboys (this was before the days of sex shops with more more realistic simulacra) - if only amongst themselves. Just a thought, but if true we are facing a different sort of peril, and perhaps one slightly less daunting.

Ace77 wrote:- About 2 weeks ago water started steadily dripping through the over flow pipe in my lofts water tank. Could this be connected? This could be being exacerbated by high pressure, but it is most likely a function of a failing ball valve (or other type of valve depending on what is installed). You probably have two tanks in your loft, a water tank fed by the mains that then distributes cold water to upstairs taps, loo etc. and an expansion tank for central heating. In either case you need to get this sorted, and particularly before any chance of winter frost. Whatever the pressure now, once the valve fails to stop water entering the tank once a set level is reached you have a problem. It may be simple to solve - sometimes debris can be blown into pipes when a water main is breached (for instance) and this debris can be jamming the valve - clear the debris and the valve will work again. Or the valve may have failed. Either which way, this is a job for a plumber or competent DIYer.

You will find reference to cats that don't cause allergies here - it's not just the fur actually, but the fur and skin cells which can cause reactions, so hairless cats could be as bad. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/5375900.stm

It's not about cyclists weaving. It's about drivers paying attention Surely it's about both? but when you see a white van man accelerating from zero to sixty coming off a roundabout towards the back end of your other half on a dual carriageway - and white van man is doing his paperwork/yakking on his phone etc etc, and there's two inches to spare between life and death This thread started with a discussion about what seems fairly stupid behaviour of an adult cyclist with children in a suburban back street - I recognise it has been nicely turned to address entirely different sets of circumstances, but attempts to say that because, in one set of circumstances, the driver is to blame and the cyclist is innocent does not then mean that that is necessarily true in all cases. And someone else wrote The main difference is if you are in a car you are using a deadly weapon. Cars kill other people. Bikes do not kill other people. This is not strictly true; there is at least one incident of a cyclist hitting an elderly pedestrian who later died, and I have certainly seen nasty bruising caused by careless cyling - although, of course damage caused by cyclists is infinitesimal compared with damage (and very grave and terminal damage) done to cyclists. I have also seen cyclists running into pedestrians who have stupidly stepped off the pavement without seeing them - often both parties are injured, but, following some of the arguments here, one would have to assume (I don't) that the cyclist, being faster moving and on a vehicle, must be to blame.

When I was young (a very long time ago, it seems, but actually only in the 1950s) the police stopped cyclists, including young people like me, if their bikes didn't have back and front lights - and that was during the day. They sometimes even stopped us to check that they worked. Schools used to train cyclists (cycling proficiency badge, as I recall)and cyclists generally obeyed the highway code, stopped at lights, signalled when turning and so on. A significant number of children used to cycle to school - nowadays I assume smoking amongst schoolchildren must have reduced as there are no cycle sheds behind which to smoke. All of which is meant to suggest that the riding behaviour of cyclists - the fact that in suburban streets children ride haphazardly at dusk and later without lights etc. etc. has made the driver:cyclist relationship much more fraught. Of course drivers must take primary responsibility for cyclist safety - in the sense that they must drive carefully and thoughtfully amongst them - but equally safety is a two-way street - cyclists, and parents of young cyclists, who take, or allow others to take, stupid risks (cycling without lights in poor visibility, without signalling, without care or thought) cannot rely on drivers to make up for their stupidity. I have (on two wheels in London) been hit by cars lurching out of side streets, been side swiped by lorries unaware that in turning the trailer element of an artic can swing out into traffic, so I am aware of the other side of the coin, but the coin does have two sides.

The naming of the road is early - this quote from an article on OS maps - The 1868 map is still quite open, although Lordship Lane and Crystal Palace Road are shown laid out ready for building. So it was not more than 15 years after Crystal Palace was moved before the road was named - I suspect because by then it was a 'popular' local name and would encourage potential buyers to think they were closer to 'attractive' Sydenham Hill than they were - so an early version of esatate agent's spin.

From WikiP After the exhibition, the building was moved to a new park in a high, healthy and wealthy area of London called Sydenham Hill, an area not much changed today from the well-heeled suburb full of large Victorian villas that it was during its Victorian heyday. The Crystal Palace was enlarged and stood from 1854 until 1936, when it was destroyed by fire. It attracted many thousands of visitors from all levels of society. The name Crystal Palace (coined by the satirical magazine Punch)[2] was later used to denote this area of south London and the park that surrounds the site, home of the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre.

Keef wrote: crystal palace itself was just part of penge wasn't it? This may be part of the huge irony attack which seems to have rushed through the posts in the last 48 hours, but if it isn't then I think what is now 'Crystal Palace' used to be treated as Sydenham rather than Penge.

except I think it was in New York and she was murdered in a stairwell or courtyard overlooked by loads of windows, and none of the neighbours even bothered to call the police, let alone go to help It is worth noting that the incidence of urban foxes mating in New York is I believe low, whereas in East Dulwich it has seemed very high - so night-time screams of a particularly agonizing nature are a commonplace here without causing real fears - listen out for words amongst the screams is my advice, and call the police then. [And I really, really wouldn't like to be a vixen]

these are the actual trees that Dinosaurs would have scratched their 'arrises on Strictly I think the types of trees, since I doubt the ones in Oglander Road are actually 60 million years old!

Some years ago I developed the theory of skip equilibrium (based on personal experiences in the late ?80s in SE Dulwich, and some previous observations in Clapham). This theory does not apply to skips used for builders rubble or garden waste. On day one, the skip is delivered and you fill it with household rubbish. On night one the skip is half emptied by scavengers and a quarter re-filled by surreptitious neighbours. On day two you refill the skip by adding a further 25% skipfulls of your rubbish. On night two it is again half emptied and a quarter refilled. On day 3 you add a further 25%, now having thrown away 150% skipfulls of rubbish into one skip. On night 3 the skip is emptied by only a quarter and refilled again. The skip has now achieved equilibrium; small amounts will disappear and be added until day seven, when someone throws away an old, wet, carpet which covers the (now mounded) skip and discourages either further additions or more scavenging. The skip is now collected. The important point is that the skip being used as a public object actually allows you to throw away more than if it wasn't. The only caveat is that you must fill it quickly with your own rubish on the first day.

I was at the EDF drinks on Friday, so wonder if i got sneezed on by any of the people from the private school who were infected. Or when i was wandering around LL on Saturday. I doubt whether even the EDF lets in Year 7 pupils as drinking customers.

I walked the dog at about 5pm and there were several picked daffodils strewn around the grass. If your going to pick them at least take them home! Actually, if the daffs are almost 'over' dead-heading them is a good thing - it encourages growth in the bulb - thus leading to flowers next year, rather than allowing the flowers to go to seed -where the effort is put into seed production and the plant is more likely to be 'blind' next spring. So pulled-off heads (even where the stalk is also snapped off), as long as the leaves are there isn't always a sign of anti-social behaviour - particularly where the flowers are withering/ browning. Oh, and it wasn't me doing it and writing to justify my actions!

You can normally tell brown from sea trout (remembering that they are essentially the same fish, but with different habits), as the sea trout tends to have pinker flesh (from its diet of krill) rather than the duller grey/ taupe of the river-caught brown trout. Unless stated I always assume that it is the brown trout that is advertised on menus as 'trout'. The rainbow trout ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_trout ) is a Pacific species but has been introduced to the UK for sport. I assume from the description that what was being served at Hisar was the very rare desert trout (not listed in Wikepedia) and obviously a non-riverine inhabitant of the more arid parts of Anatolia.

Actually, I have caught, and eaten, a trout in the sea (actually in a salt-water loch open to the sea) - it is called, unsurprisingly, the sea trout, and is a close relative, some suggest a variety, of the common brown trout. See link; http://www.atlanticsalmontrust.org/seatrout_facts/seatrout.html

You can of course have extreme and robust liberals, 'wishy-washy' (apart from being part of what I thought was a well known phrase or saying) is a description of the type of liberal I am - perhaps I should have included a smiley of some sort to flag irony (is there an irony smiley?)

Given that an arms and militaria shop (this close to Peckham) might encourage a 'strange' clientele - and that an element of unfriendliness to unknown customers might be a necessary stock-in-trade, I have generally found, in the few visits I have made over 20 years or so, that the owner is knowledgable and the stock fairly priced (although I have only been interested in the antique items (pre 1900) and not the items from 20th century conflicts). Someone who is interested in arms and militaria (and runs a shop selling it to other interested parties) is likely to take quite a robust view towards the armed services and law and order generally, but I am not sure that sociopath is a happy description of the owner or the majority of his customers - certainly those who form the hard core of regulars - although interest in and admiration for such entities as the SAS could be judged to be evidence of a sociopathic nature by those of a wishy-washy liberal bent - although this wishy-washy liberal is less inclined to think that.

Mobile works best on line-of-sight from the microwave transmitters - one of the problems in East Dulwich/ Forest Hill/ Crystal Palace is hills and being under the brow of them (if the microwave tower is on the other side) - hence people losing signal (I certainly do) coming down Dog Kennel Hill. There may also be a problem where there is a high level of contention for a particular cell (each cell carries only a limited number of conversations at a time - in inner cities we have micro-cells (very small radius) to allow for more calls to be carried - but where someone is actually mobile the call has to be handed over from one cell to the next). I know (because I have had a problem) that Vodafone admits to congestion in Dulwich at times (particularly mid-day) when you may not be able to grab a circuit on a cell (outwith any issues of actual microwave reception). You can also 'lose' out if a car which is making a call comes through your local cell, when a call being made has priority over the regular 'are you still out there' handshake the cell makes with your phone (the 'ditting' interference you can get if your mobile is too close to an radio). Out of interest you need to know, in choosing a mobile carrier, that Virtual Mobile Network Operators (like Virgin and BT) use one of the four major underlying carriers (O2, Vod, T-Mobile, Orange) - I don't think 3 offers wholesale services but I may be mistaken. Hope this helps

Just to copy over the answer to the last question from the now closed 'other thread' - in case anyone else is till interested. The Anatolia has had two incarnations so far - it opened again 2-3 years ago having been shut for about 5 years - when it reopened it was almost unchanged (menu/ decor even prices!). This wasn't a bad thing as the style of cooking (Turkish Cypriot) offered far lighter and more subtle dishes than the equivalent Greek Cypriot, although in the same general style. The (Turkish) red wine and Turkish beers were excellent (for the price), and the welcome was always warm. I am not sure that the style of cooking was actually Anatolian (most of the Anatolians in Northern Cyprus are late arrivals, shipped in to boost numbers by the Turkish government - so Northern Cyprus does not have a strong Anatolian tradition of cooking). The food however was always well and consistently cooked and spiced, and the menu was (relatively) short and very much to a theme, so you did not feel there were freezers full of boil-in-the-bag waiting for an order. It was never gourmet eating, but neither was it gourmet prices, and it was always, in my experience, entirely 'honest' in its cooking and presentation - it delivered what it promised. In both incarnations they never took cards (always cash or cheque). I look forward to seeing what changes are implemented - with the hope that the quality (which was good) still improves, and the prices stay competitive.

The Anatolia has had two incarnations so far - it opened again 2-3 years ago having been shut for about 5 years - when it reopened it was almost unchanged (menu/ decor even prices!). This wasn't a bad thing as the style of cooking (Turkish Cypriot) offered far lighter and more subtle dishes than the equivalent Greek Cypriot, although in the same general style. The (Turkish) red wine and Turkish beers were excellent (for the price), and the welcome was always warm. I am not sure that the style of cooking was actually Anatolian (most of the Anatolians in Northern Cyprus are late arrivals, shipped in to boost numbers by the Turkish government - so Northern Cyprus does not have a strong Anatolian tradition of cooking). The food however was always well and consistently cooked and spiced, and the menu was (relatively) short and very much to a theme, so you did not feel there were freezers full of boil-in-the-bag waiting for an order. It was never gourmet eating, but neither was it gourmet prices, and it was always, in my experience, entirely 'honest' in its cooking and presentation - it delivered what it promised. In both incarnations they never took cards (always cash or cheque). I look forward to seeing what changes are implemented - with the hope that the quality (which was good) still improves, and the prices stay competitive.

bigbadwolf Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Dez Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I think the guy with the old firearms used to > work > > at the Upland pub years ago. > > > I was really pissed off with the gut that > explained the pistols history because I wanted to > know if they still worked but he didn't go that > far. 1. If the pistols had been filled (the normal way of taking pistols like that out of commission) the expert would have commented on that (it would have wrecked their value). He would also have commented if the firing mechanism (the flint lock) was obviously damaged or not working (it strains a gun and can damage it to cock and dry fire it however) 2. They would have been well 'out of proof' and thus very dangerous to attempt to fire. So, they were probably 'in working order' (i.e. nothing done to them to take them out of commission) but anybody trying to fire them would run the risk of the barrel exploding. You also need a licence (I think) for using working black powder firearms, even though owing such an antique unused doesn't require a licence (again, I think).

Out of interest, the reason people stopped clearing the pathway outside their own houses was that a court case demonstrated that if someone slipped on a path where attempts had been made to clear ice and snow, then the person who had attempted (and obviously failed) to make such a clearance (failed because the claimant slipped) was liable for damages - where no attempts had been made the walker was expected to take suitable care and any falls were on their own head (or bottom, or wherever). So, people stopped doing the decent thing in case someone else decided to go for the jackpot. Problem of our (imported) litigation culture, not helped by day-time ads offering no win no fees support from the legal sewers, or do I mean sue-ers?

This is, apparently, the worse snow-fall that London has seen for 18 years - we 'normally' get only one or two even mildly snowy days a year, if that. I, for one, would be unhappy paying for the infrastucture (snow ploughs, gritting machinery for all roads, training, staffing etc. etc.) at the level of Toronto and Moscow for approximately one day's use out of every 600. With train fares at the level they are I would be unhappy to be paying for heated rails etc. etc. again for a minimal use every year. The justification that TFL has is that our general climate does not justify expenditure on snow chains, skid training etc. for our buses and bus drivers. It may well be that we are due to see increased extremes of climate which will cost-justify such expenditure, but snow, in London, is still an extraordinary event. Central London, with its office etc. population, is normally sufficiently warmer than the surrounding countryside that snow rarely has a chance of settling - the fact is that we had a snowfall on Sunday evening - when the capital is probably at its coldest, as the heat sink which is its concrete and pavements (like a big storage heater) has had most time to dissipate. I am very glad that TFL (and local authorities) do still undertake some form of cost:benefit analysis. I couldn't afford their charges if they decided to invest against any eventuality, however unlikely. As it is, for a day or two every couple of years at most, we have a little disruption to our lives, a day off school or work, perhaps, a little inconvenience. And the cities you write of are also disrupted when their weather is (for them) extreme - think of the ice storms that devastated North America some time back, and I can recall reports of hypothermia deaths in Moscow. They had prepared for their (normal) snow, but not for those extremes.

In many cases we (individually) come across something which is frightening or disturbing. We may have misread or misunderstood someone?s signals or intentions, this may be a wholly isolated incident. Or we may not and it may not be. As individuals we don?t know whether we ?ought? to report the incident (perhaps because the person is wilfully threatening, perhaps because they are in need of psychiatric help) or simply let it pass. Flagging such an incident on a board like this allows others to be aware ? if it turns out that others have also been accosted (or whatever) then the pressure to report it becomes stronger; if no one else has had a similar incident then it may well be a one off (in which nothing untoward actually happened, even if the threat of that was real) and can be ignored. It appears, so far, that no one else who reads the board has suffered a similar incident. Good But if we say nothing, give no warnings ? and then something dreadful does happen?