Walsingham

Malcador, my advice is this observation: you just have to put up with them fora while. They have to BE them forever. So have a little compassion.

As an aside: surely you'd be lucky either way?

Supplemental: I would hire mercenaries to track abduct and transplant certain forum members into the revolutionary fighting in North Africa. And by mercenaries I of course mean Monte.

I still can't believe they haven't used Andy Hamilton as the dwarf (Tyrion?) Andy is the actual dwarf on the left. he's a very very smart man, with 30 years of comedy writing and performing behind him.

I just had an image of a plane over Libya flashing up a sign on the pilot's controll screen. 'ABORT ABORT'. Then over the radio a sad flight controller informs him that thanks to Hurlshot defaulting there will be no whoosh bang today.

BTW, over the years I've received the impression that Canada is teh most commmitted nation, per capita, in support of UN combat missions. Is that true, and will that continue given recent upheavals?

Conversation with a friend in the RAF, by phone: Me: Crikey. You're a bit crackly. Are you in theatre? Him: If you can call it theatre. Me: You're in a base? Him: I'm in Italy. Me: Surely if any country is entitled to the title of theatre, it's Italy.

Sweet Gibbering Jesus, Hurlshot. Taking a 180k hit on the sale? I hate to say it - partly because I just got back from hillstomping and my maths may be off - but if the market is set to recover over even 24 months you would surely be better advised to ride out the monthly losses over that period? You're 'only' losing 1k per month, right? Edit, post-edit, post-post edit: No. No, I think that's right.

I had been thinking and talking about moving to Canada. But you chaps are making me wonder if it's not jumping from the frying pan into the moose fire.

On topic: I had an absolutely awesome day at work, and am rewarding myself with four bottles of ales I've not had before. On side topic: I agree with GD. Very little slack is built into revenue collection, and inevitably the n00bs get hit hardest. And it is fundamentally anti-competitive. But I don't know how else it could be jigged. Maybe if elected representatives could be petitioned to put forward a limited number of revue cases per year?

I thought the poor old bugger was ill?

Good God. Not really selling the whole coalition government thing.

So... simply wait maybe another twenty years, by which time one or other of his two sons would have been more than capable of assuming power. Your metric puts rather a high price on having clean hands, and a rather low price on the lives of perhaps two or three generations of Libyans.

As ever, your humanitarian credentials shine through... Of course as an avowed fan of people like the Shining Path you would be perfectly happy to see civilians murdered, since there are no sidelines in the glorious revolution. Speaking of which, how have you found the experience of risking your neck in the Arab Spring? Too many term papers to spare the time?

I wouldn't have said they were the same as a proper gang. Proper gangs to my mind establish themselves as a source of meaningful identity. Even the worst 'gangs' I ever heard of at boarding schools were just a vehicle for providing idle sadistic amusement, illicit capital, or drugs. Because generally there was always something after school to move into, be it University or the Army or whatever. I feel like we're almost drifting into a new topic, but I've had good talks with Stateside gang intervention charities. It's a fascinating business, and I urge you to look up any in your area.

Gorgon: congratulations on your state-thievery. Sluggo: I think you worry too much. However, I'm a bit concerned that these chicks you talk about always seem kind of ...blank. Do you know what I mean?

well, I'm not Canadian, but I have many friends and colleagues from there. Can you give 'us' a context brief, Oerwinde?

No. You have social groupings who engage in varying degrees of violence/theft/drug dealing. But of course nothing like the same degree or scale as a proper gang. As you yourself observe, it is the dynamics which are the same, not the extent. I don't know what the deal with the hats is. I didn't go to 'Eton and Harrer'. Hence I feel secure mocking them.

Like I said, I've been here as much as my post history suggests, but if I had to guess based on my own experience with you lot, I'd wager that this is not the first time you've made this kind of dismissive personal attack on Oby. So for the record what is your view of 'her' posts?

If I call a man's wife ugly, even if she is, knowing it will make him angry, then there is some blame at my door. Besides, I don't know where you get off, accusing me of excusing the violence. I excuse neither. I accuse both.

One interesting thing a friend of mine told me is about some research which suggests that experts are actually easier to confuse about the detail of issues related to their discipline. They get the correct info, but if you ask them WHY something is correct they muddle it up with other data. Wrong designer/wrong fuel/wrong calibre etc. This made sense to me if one believes experts 'chunk' information. Anyway, that could be why your friend got confused.

That's no moon...

You will like it. Trust me.

LOL comms failure: by public school I mean: while you mean:

What makes me genuinely sad is that it can only be a matter of time before every hate-filled racist dingbat from Twickenham to Tallahassee starts burning Korans, and one wonders if that won't spark even more outrage and death.