PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Dec 5, 2011 10:21:05 GMT -5
Sorry I haven't been around for a few days. Following the computer crash I mentioned I have been in and out of hospital having fluid drained from a lung. I have to go back to hospital on the seventh but will, I hope, be posting again soon after.
Take care all
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Nov 11, 2011 19:07:15 GMT -5
Hi gang,
Sorry to have been away for about a week. I had a major computer crash which meant a new motherboard and chip.
However, I'm all up and running again
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Oct 23, 2011 8:00:58 GMT -5
Best wishes, Mickey
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Oct 18, 2011 7:13:41 GMT -5
Happy birthday, Randy.
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Oct 18, 2011 6:48:49 GMT -5
Hi all,
Thanks to everyone for the good wishes.
Had a very quiet family day as I wasn't feeling all that good, but I perked up in the evening and we went out for a very enjoyable family meal.
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 23, 2011 16:26:21 GMT -5
That's a nice looking antiquarian book, MIK. It seems to be pretty good condition. What's its title to have been looked after for 347 years?
With regard to your question, no I don't think that any e-books around today will still be around in 347 years' time, even if there is equipment capable of putting them on to a screen.
When you look at what books are available for reading on an I-phone or something similar, most of them are fairly ephemeral or have been reprinted in hard-back with leather-covered covers as "collectors' editions". These are usually sold on subscription and by the time anyone has bought the whole set, including post and packing, they will have paid out a lot of money.
It's just another publisher's scam, but not a new one. The row of books looks nice in a bookcase, but no-one take them down to read them. Many booksellers who deal in old books have sets of Sir Walter Scott's Waverly Novels. Sir Walter made nothing out of them. They were written - churned out is probably a better term - at so-much a thousand words to pay off the debt of a so-called friend that Sir Walter had foolishly guaranteed. Consequently they are heavily padded to make up the number of words.
They too were sold on subscription and there must be dozens or even hundreds of sets sitting in bookcases as shelf fillers. I doubt if anyone ever takes one down to read it.
Whether any printed and bound books made today will still be around 350 years from now I wouldn't like to guess.
What does concern me is whether or not there will be any equipment that can show some of today’s and yesterday’s classic movies. Will computers of the future have something like a USB2 port into which a hard-drive can be plugged? Come to that, will the contents of a hard-drive still be readable in 350 years?
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 23, 2011 14:45:37 GMT -5
Happy Birthday, Doug.
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 23, 2011 8:37:26 GMT -5
Happy Birthday, Drako.
Hope it's a good one as well.
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 22, 2011 17:07:29 GMT -5
It isn't only some present-day school leavers who are semi literate.
Sitingbourne, in Kent, not far from me has its annual carnival this coming weekend. Notices have been posted in the town about the SITTINGBOURNE CARNAVAL. Oh dear!. Amid comments and laughter the organisers have promised to have all the notices changed before the event.
I don't speak Welsh, but I gather that the Welsh-language manifesto of the Welsh Liberal Democrat party is peppered with spelling mistakes, bad grammar and very poor syntax.
The version in English contains a few howlingly meaningless sentences such as: "We have people up and down Wales are ambitious to go green, but a Government that subsidising pollution and ignoring the needs of rural areas."
The leader of the Welsh Lib-Dems said the documents had been "proof read and proof read several times"
By equally semi-literate people??
On the subject of Biro pens, I bought one of the very early ones in about 1946. It was a black chunky affair with the ink contained in a coiled tube inside. I wasn't impressed. The ball point dried up if left open for five minutes or so, and the ink delivery was uneven and blobby. I beilieve they used ordinary very viscous printer's ink but this was later changed to a better flowing ink.
Today's cheap plastic ball-point pens sold in packs of a dozen for £1 are generally reliable but do nothing to help improve handwriting. The Parker ball-point, though considerably more expensive, is way ahead in feel, and does help anyone who has the inclination to produce decent handwriting, though in my view nothing can beat a good fountain pen for this.
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 22, 2011 16:19:53 GMT -5
Congratulations on the sale, Wayne
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 20, 2011 17:15:36 GMT -5
Hi Doug,
No need to apologise for rambling on. It’s a subject quite dear to my heart, and I’m sorry to say that the situation is much the same in the UK. What worries me is that a fair proportion of male teenagers leaving State secondary schools at 16 years old are either illiterate or, at best, only semi-literate.
Earlier this year the Confederation of British Industry stated that many of its members had started conducting short literacy tests on 16-year-olds applying for their first job. They had to read a short passage and then answer five questions about it. This is part of Key Stage 2 for 9 to 10 year olds in the National Curriculum. The results were dismal. Many of the questions were answered with wild guesses and the writing was peppered with spelling mistakes and atrocious grammar. Some were even answered in “short form” widely used in cell phone text messages. Quite a few, I’ve forgotten the percentage now, were not literate enough to use the company forms that went with restocking supermarket shelves – not the most erudite of occupations.
So, unless these lads take purely labouring jobs such as digging the road or sweeping the pavements, they are going to live on State benefits, the so-called job seeker’s allowance. The trouble here is that the allowance pays them almost as much as a labouring job. They have to apply for at least one job a fortnight so they walk round the jobs vacant board and pick a couple that they know they haven’t got a hope in hell of getting.
But, they’ve gone through the motions so they continue to receive their living allowance and spend their days either watching TV or playing on games consoles or sitting in the pub sending and receiving text messages on their phones and making a pint of lager last a couple of hours. They all seem to have saved enough money to get a cell phone, a laptop computer and a games console. What will happen to them as they get older I just don’t know.
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 13, 2011 17:46:23 GMT -5
Ooh, Mickey, you are a card!
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 13, 2011 13:18:20 GMT -5
Hi gang, Sorry to disagree and throw a spanner in the works, but I have to disagree with almost everyone else about the aesthetic appeal of the later Chrysler Airflow. Sorry it’s a fairly long ramble, but I get the impression that many people are just following others in describing the Airflow as beautiful. I agree that when it first appeared in 1934 the styling was - how shall I describe it? – Radical. And yes, it was streamlined. Chrysler built a number of scale models of the body to test for air drag in wind tunnels. It pointed the way forward, but I have some criticisms. The first is hanging on to side running boards. Why? They served no useful purpose other than to link the front and rear wings (fenders). My second criticism is the front end. To me, this is a mess on the later models. It’s as if the stylists lost their way and didn’t know what else to change after doing away with the “flat” radiator grille of the 1934 design. After providing an elegant long bonnet (hood) and an equally elegant “waterfall” radiator grille the stylists chose to retain mounting the headlights in the side panels of the hood which extended down to the front. This worked fine with the original 1934 “flat” radiator grille but was right out of place with the long waterfall grille. Then, Oh dear, we’ve forgotten the front fenders (wings). Better keep them the same as the 1934 design where they worked well with the front-end styling. But they didn’t work with the later waterfall radiator grille and inset headlamps. They’re just planted on the sides and linked to the side panels of the hood by a couple ugly fairings that don’t help the overall effect at all. An engineering tour de force? Oh yes, here I have to agree. The engineers pioneered a torsionally very rigid monocoque (chassis and body all in one) structure and pushed the heavy engine forward to give a longer passenger compartment that allowed everyone to sit inside the wheelbase. Can't agree with you, Wayne, that the Airflow had too much weight at the back. The change in weight distribution was remarkable. With passengers it was not far short of 50/50 front and back instead of the traditional “two-box” design where the rear passengers sat over the back axle and the weight distribution was roughly 70-75% rear, 25 to 30% front. This meant stiff rear springs that gave rear-seat passengers a harsh ride and, combined with the rear-biased weight distribution meant that the back end lost traction and went often went sideways on even a mildly slippery bend. “Taking a right-hand bend on left lock” was not as uncommon as might be thought. The monocoque construction was subjected to a smear campaign by other makers suggesting that without a substantial chassis it was weak. In a publicity film, (movie)Chrysler pushed an Airflow over a cliff and then got in and drove it away to prove that it wasn’t, but a lot of the mud still stuck. By contrast to older designs, the Airflow had a much better polar moment of inertia that with “a wheel at each corner” improved the handling tremendously. The principle was followed by European designers after the war but in the meantime US auto stylists had gone barmy with huge front and rear overhangs. When the trunk (boot) was loaded with heavy luggage, polar moment of inertia went up the spout and once again the back end drifted out all too readily. Spectacular in the hands of stunt drivers in movie car chases, but a matter of don’t try this at home. Monocoque construction was ignored and instead we got massive chassis, X-braced in an attempt to give the car torsional stiffness. All this achieved was to make the car heavier and worsen the fuel consumption – the gas guzzlers. But what the heck? Petrol (gasoline) was cheap enough. General Motors hung on the monocoque idea, but only as far as the front of the body. Forward of that was the front-end of a conventional chassis. This design was taken up by Vauxhall in the UK in its DY and DX models of the late 1930s to provide a base for independent front-wheel suspension (but that’s another story). Oh yes, the Airflow was indeed an engineering tour de force but this has been almost completely overshadowed by its radical styling. Radical for 1934. It’s a pity that in 1937, before the Airflow went out of production, Chrysler’s stylists didn’t look at the styling ideas coming out from the relatively tiny maker Willys. The front-end styling of the Willys Kingston sedan of the late 1930s went a little aglee on the nose of the hood, but the idea of fairing the headlamps into the front wings (fenders) pointed the way to much more elegant front-end styling, ignored in the US but taken up in Europe, particularly in the UK. I wonder if that type of front end might have given the Airflow a new lease on life? Note that all four doors are front-hinged. No "suicide" front opening doors. But why, oh why, retain the archaic running boards? Elegant treatment of the front wings (fenders) and headlamps on the late 1930s Willys Kigston Sedan. Ignored by US makers but taken up by UK stylists after the war.
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 10, 2011 7:25:02 GMT -5
Love this picture.
Forget composition and lines of sight. Look at the concentration on the keeper's face, and the relaxed muscles ready to jump. I'll bet the ball was a curver and about to dip.
PeterW
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Sept 9, 2011 17:28:59 GMT -5
One of the reasons I decided not to use a viewfinder on top of the camera was that it would have to be taken off each time I put the camea back in its purse.
My favourite type of photgraphy is street and market shooting. By the time I'd adjusted the add-on finder to account for zooming the lens the picture I wanted would be long gone - missed the "decisive moment" AGAIN!!
PeterW
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