28 December 2009

28/12/09


The Aurora Borealis over Iowa

Westminster Abbey was consecrated in 1065.  Iowa became the 29th state admitted to the Union in 1846.  In 1879, the central portion of the Tay Bridge collapsed as a train was passing over it, killing 75 people.  An earthquake killed 75,000 in Messina, Sicily, in 1908.  The Peak District became the first national park in the United Kingdom in 1950 and Nepal abolished its monarchy in 2007.

Born today:  Earl "Fatha" Hines (1903-1983), Pops Staples (1915-2000), Stan Lee (1922), Roy Hattersley (1932), Nichelle Nichols (1932), Ana Torroja (1959)

Today is the Feast of the Holy Innocents.

83 comments:

  1. Morning all

    And just to prove that auxesis is not Bitey, he posts a compliment to Montana on her thread, but in the exact style of BTH...

    Tee hee...

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  2. Just read it, BB, and Montana's reply.

    Fantastic pic of the aurora btw, MW, I'd love to see them.

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  3. BTH/Job/Auxesis:

    To be perfectly honest, I had to read your comment a few times. I kept thinking that there must be some hidden sarcasm in there that I wasn't seeing. But there isn't and I really am touched, more than I can tell you.

    I don't have a clue when or why the bitterness started but I can tell you that I have never taken any pleasure in it. While I enjoy debating ideas and can have a temper and an acid tongue, I don't actually like to dislike anyone and I never mean to hurt someone's feelings unless I feel that I've been unfairly attacked.

    If, all those months ago, there was something I said that hurt your feelings, I sincerely apologise. If you would like to explain to me what it was, you can either do so here or e-mail me by clicking on my user name, either at the top of my comment or in the "Contributors" section in the right-hand column. On my blogger profile, there is an "e-mail me" button. I'm not asking/expecting you to explain -- only letting you know that I'm open to hearing about anything that I may have said to set this whole thing in motion.

    For myself, I need no apology. For me, it ends right here, right now. Welcome to the Untrusted.

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  4. That's very magnanimous of you in the circumstances, Montana. I shan't be doing the same though. :o)

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  5. Montana, I break the habit of responding chronologically, in order to confirm that your search for any hidden meaning in my post, sarcastic or otherwise, was in vain.

    I have never refused to offer praise and congratulations to those whose contributions, both above and below the line, merit such treatment.

    Given the amount of violence in the world today any parent who tries, as you have, to educate their child about the need for gender equality and pacifism should be held up as a glowing example to others, how ever their child reacts. And to admit that maybe somethings they got wrong, is an even better attribute, for which I suggest your child will give you lifelong respect.

    As for the rest of your post here, I have an agenda to follow and more things to say in my own time and will continue to do so until my posting privileges on CiF are restored or I'm also banned from here. So please don't hold out any hope for a new year back-slapping and reconciliation party, as I won't be participating.

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  6. JoB
    I'd like to be the first to not slap your back then, and no doubt there are still miles between posters here, but I would like at least to tell you that was a pretty gracious post. Banning you was yet another in a long line of stupid and pernicious decisions the CiF "editorial" have taken for want of a bland, on-message website.

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  7. Ain't he just, though, Col.

    And a manipulative one.

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  8. Eh up BW!

    How was yours? I am secretly quite glad my Dad went home yesterday. Too stressful trying to manage elderly parents and boisterous kids all at once.

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  9. BB
    Notice how the word "man" appears in manipulate. I'd like to hear Ultima's views on this. No wait a minute. I wouldn't.

    Nice day, off out for a walk now.

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  10. "I have an agenda to follow and more things to say in my own time and will continue to do so until my posting privileges on CiF are restored or I'm also banned from here."

    Makes it sound like you're on a mission from God, bitey. And we don't ban people from here. We tell them to fuck off though, but whether they do or not is their look out.

    Laters, stalkerboy.

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  11. BW,
    Just sobering up, in that 'never again mode' at present but surrounded by unopened bottles. At least I didn't touch the Bailys.

    BB,
    Very manipulative. Has a sense of humour too but went to the dark side when he was sewn into his Y-fronts by mummy.

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  12. RapidEddie said...

    "Hank's already nominated a good few, there seems to be a body of opinion in favour of MAM for it, but my own vote goes to: Bitethehand. For stalking, sanctimony, leg-humping of feminists and hatred of mothers with internet connections."

    RapidEddie, aren't you the one who told us of your girlfriend, "not once did I ever get my cock out and wave it at her"?

    Such a charming man you are.

    "Hatred of mothers with internet connections."

    Please Eddie such hyperbole is almost as bad as your teenage romance story.

    Here's what I posted about Montana on CiF:

    "1. His mother is a major poster to an international newspaper's online edition and is appreciated sufficiently by many of her readers to be nominated on a number of occasions to write articles as well as comment on them. He should be proud of her.

    "2. She also runs her own blog which puts her in a very select group of women.

    "3. She regularly attracts praise from fellow posters along the lines of 'great posts throughout', 'I'm sure you're a wonderful mother', 'a thoughtful and considerate person, and one who cares about the people she comes into contact with', to gather just three from this page alone."

    You see Eddie, I don't let my personal feelings interfere with an objective assessment of someone's talents and achievements or indeed what I consider the faults in their arguments, presentations etc. And as I've said before, I never use obscene language against anyone.

    But here's how I'm addressed by Montana:

    "If you're going to engage in fuckwittery, you will be called a fuckwit at some point in time. Call it Wildhack's Law of Posting."

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  13. Fuck off with your selective editing again, Bitey. We aren't interested in you trying to paint yourself as some sainted martyrised soul. And I for one don't buy your sudden voice of reasonableness on CiF - you are just being manipulative because you don't want the mods on CiF to realise that you are infringing their rules by posting under a different nick.

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  14. bitey
    You see Eddie, I don't let my personal feelings interfere with an objective assessment of someone's talents and achievements or indeed what I consider the faults in their arguments, presentations etc

    Oh, but what a line in sanctimony.....!

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  15. 'i' think that there is no possible way to make "objective assesments" of posts on a blogsite,,

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  16. 3p4

    I agree, a blog is not an exam where responses are judged according to specified criteria, it's a discursive arena.

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  17. Bitey is just a sad addict. He can't stop posting - he needs a space to pontificate to others. I just wish it wasn't here. He's also tried Cath's blog, but there's no traffic there, it's dead as a doornail, so he doesn't get the hit he needs. I think we should just ignore him. He has nothing interesting to say, and he reminds me a lot of that weirdo Gregory Carlin character who invades blogs like a virus.

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  18. Morning Sheff and 3p4. Here I am not doing my housework and guests arriving at 4pm. Ah well. Won't take me long anyhoo.

    I had a new book for Xmas which I haven't started reading yet, but it looks good. Called "The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better", by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett.

    "Across whole populations, rates of mentall illness are five times higher in the most unequal compared to the least unequal societies. Similarly, in the more unequal societies people are five times as likely to be imprisoned, six times as likely to be clinically obese and murder rates may be many times higher. The reason why these differences are so big is, quite simply, because the effects of inequality are not confined just to the least well-off: instead they affect the vast majority of the population".

    ... it says on the back. Sounds promising.

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  19. scherf - ignoring is the right approach, actually. I shall. I shall probably have to bite my fingers a few times, but if it has the BillP effect, so much the better.

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  20. "arena" does seem to 'me' to be the perspective that is most commonly reflected,,and i find that
    the particular choice made by the majority to confront dispute and conquer to be a source of endless personal cogitation,,why why why ? do you "want" to fight ?

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  22. banner #1 trolls will be ignored

    banner #2 never run from a fight

    banner #3 ??

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  23. BB

    I've seen the Spirit Level research (they have a website, too) and find it engaging, but my only concern with this type of statistical data is the way it can be used eg: 'welfare to work' policy for people on long-term sickness benefits was 'justified' because data showed that claimants were clustered in areas where traditional industries collapsed; and the Map of Gaps data for domestic violence services 'hid' shared services across local authority borders. I'm a fan of Danny Dorling's work too. You should take a look at his work.

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  25. I shall probably have to bite my fingers a few times,

    what works(mostly) for me is to write the posts and not send them,,just delete knowing what it was you might have said and reflecting on one more small step on a path that you have chosen,,


    caveat
    too many of these small steps at one time tend to carry one around the bend,, which is better than being up shit creek because some one was trying to lead you down the garden path

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  26. Medve

    I think we got what you were saying! And your guiding motto sounds pretty good to me.

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  27. BeautifulBurnout,
    Young BitetheHandJob's posts remind me a bit of Christmas telly, made well in advance.
    He She or It does not so much engage as splodge a great diatribe onto a thread regardless of whether it has anything to do with what is being discussed.
    The word 'agenda' has been mentioned.
    One becomes bored.
    One is off to Tesco.

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  28. sheff

    Thought I'd take a leaf out of your book & get a new avatar - a Chinese 3-legged cauldron.

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  29. Colin

    Tesco again? But you have all those unopened bottles ..

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  30. Hehehe

    One has managed to avoid Tesco like the plague this season - largely to do with ferrying the temporary son to the next town to see his GF, which also coincides with a damn good branch of Morrisons in the vicinity.

    I have grown to hate Tescos and think I might take up with Morrisons on a more permanent basis.

    MsChin - I will take a look at the website, ta! I don't know if I like the sound of "welfare to work" being based on their analysis though...

    Medve - love that motto too! :o)

    3p4 - good advice, which I will endeavour to follow.

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  31. BB

    Sorry, W2W wasn't based on the Spirit Level findings, I just gave it as an eg of how certain stats are used to further other political objectives - cut public spending - as opposed to being a way of drawing in extra resources to tackle the wider problems in poorer areas.

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  32. BeautifulBurnout writes:

    "As you have been snooping and sniffing around us for so long on here, you will remember my warning about how stalking on the internet is an offence, too, no? Harassing women on websites in particular is frowned-upon by the boys and girls in blue."

    Stalking, Mrs Burnout, and with what motive?

    Harassment, on a public blog with the headline "I've never run away from an argument."?

    Snooping and sniffing around a blog site with the name "Comment is Free"?

    What are you aiming for now Mrs B, the CiF Censor of the Year award?

    Sorry ma'am not something we can help you with there.

    I think if you did approach the people in blue you might find yourself accused of wasting police time and I'm quite prepared to have my contributions compared to yours to see who is likely to be warned about threats and obscenities.

    Let's have them look at:

    "Now, if you want to accuse me of "duffing up" BTH, I stand guilty as charged. Thing is, he shouldn't pick personal fights with people based on misrepresentation, innuendo and smear and expect them to bend over and drop their trousers when he does."

    and one of my favourites which might give an indication of your motives:

    "I have been done over like a kipper by him in the past and know that other people who post on here have too. I reserve the right to point out when he is talking shite on any forum of my choosing."

    And here an indication of who's obsessed with whom:

    "Shame they have closed the thread because I wanted to highlight the differences between the cases of Emma Humphreys and Kiranjit Ahluwalia compared with the Andrews case. And as for BTH... well maybe it is a good thing the thread is closed after all."

    And a rather childish response here:

    "I am deffo going to call BTH "scratchyoureyesout" from now on though."

    And here an indication of you not being too sure who exactly it is you think is stalking you:

    "Book of Job, though. Gets creepier and creepier, eh? I did postulate some time ago that BTH and Ultima were the same person with two personae. Perhaps I am not far wrong. :o)"

    And if you are wrong, does your claim still stand up?

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  33. Ahhh! Good. In fact, rereading what you posted I did misunderstand what you had said. But yes, there are lies, damned lies and statistics, which can be manipulated every which way for any purpose you want.

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  34. Good to see that finally some other people on Cif are paying attention to the actual history of Afghanistan instead of making it up as they go along. Good article by Stephen Kinzer today which has almost got it right.

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  35. Bitey said: "RapidEddie, aren't you the one who told us of your girlfriend, "not once did I ever get my cock out and wave it at her"?"

    No. No, I'm not. I'm the one who said of my platonic schoolfriend that "Not once did I get my cock out and wave it at her. Not once."

    This was my way of expressing with force, good humour and devastating wit that not all teenage relationships between males and females are based on sexual attraction.

    But congratulations. It took you about 30 minutes to go from sincere praise back to your usual stalkerish trawling through people's old posts and quoting them woefully out of context.

    You're nothing if not predictable. I suppose I should just be glad you didn't accuse me of being a bad mother.

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  37. Trolls eventually starve and wither if they are not being fed, darlings.

    Speaking its name gives it life.

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  38. http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3ftbl_al-dimeola-bireli-lagrene-and-larry_music

    what kind of music do you like Job ?

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  39. By the way, 3p4, did you remember to get your doggie a pressie for Christmas?

    Dogs have long memories, you know...

    Should have got him a Jumbone at least.

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  40. Hi Montana, sorry for this delay in replying: ten hours of internet outage.

    I would like to respond in some more detail as I really like your piece on "gender-neutral" child rearing. First some personal stuff: I'm a probably straight oldish male. While at university in the seventies of the 20th century I socialised with a number of more or less radical feminists. Some admittedly identified themselves as "political lesbians", but it is not at all true that they hated men as such, just "male chauvinist pigs" as sexist males were called then.

    Fast-forward to the butt-end of the 20th C. when I became a father (twice) of male children, which I consider the two best things that have ever happened to me. Their mother is a sociologist specialising in LGBTQ issues, who gets on really well with gay men. So even though we live in a quite homophobic country in Central Europe our children will have no trouble coming out to us, should one or both turn out be gay.

    We didn't specifically raise our children in a gender-neutral way, but we never gave them weapons, except water pistols on the advice of child-psychologist friend. But! enter the digital era and some quite violent computer games such as Quake, Grand Theft Auto, World of Warcraft and so on. I struggled for a while like a latter day Canute against these things, but gave up realising that they would play anyway at their friends' houses, or even worse, secretly. So I said, OK, you are big and stupid enough to make up your own minds, you know what I think, but let's not have sneaky hidden stuff at home.

    All in all, I am very happy with way they have turned out, but I am no longer their main source of information about the world. In fact I think the bigger one, (bigger than me) is more responsible than I am.

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  41. BB
    the only xmas present the dog (D.D.)=(Dads Dog)
    has ever gotten from me was in 2001 when he got his very own kitten,it was just 6 weeks old,,
    DD was about 3 years old,,worked out fabulous,,

    Medve

    our children will have no trouble coming out to us, should one or both turn out be gay.""""

    one of mine has already done that,, stayed gay a while(4 years ?) and then went hetro,,grew up with lots of drag queens and fem/les,,


    In fact I think the bigger one, (bigger than me) is more responsible than I am.

    the true mark of the good teacher,,the pupil overtakes,,

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  42. Hi all. BB - I have that book - it is great. It really shows, quite starkly, why we need to end this neo liberal madness asap. Won't happen though.

    Re the discussion of kids and toys and stuff. I do think that boys do tend to go for things like bricks and cars - but here's the thing - I think girls might too if not bombarded with societies messages about playing with dolls etc. My parents did not try to bring me up in a gender neutral way, because back when they had me my mum didn't really know anything about feminism etc.

    But my dad - who I had a difficult relationship with in many ways - was great when it came to toys. He saw early on that I was interested in bricks and trains and stuff like that. So he bought me a Hornby train set and lego and these huge bricks you could make stuff from. I also loved animals and stuff so he made me a racecourse and bought me the toy horses for it and made me a farm. I hated dolls - never owned a barbie and detested the tiny tears my mum bought me. All my friends on the street would come round to play with my train set and the bricks. I have often seen young girls of my friends gravitate more towards boys toys - cars, fire engines etc when allowed to just sit on the floor and play. But of course in childrens television the characters who do the stuff like building or being firemen are all just that - male. If we had firewoman Samantha maybe more girls would buy her than buy Barbie?

    It could be that to children of both sexes things like fire engines and cars and planes are more exciting than dolls and baby clothes? Or maybe I am just a strange old fish and was a very mixed up kid. Who knows?

    And as for dirt - I actually horrified my mother by setting up a worm farm in the top drawer of my chest of drawers (apparently you can make a fortune selling worms now - I should have kept it up). I think girls like to run and play in the dirt too. I suppose what I am saying is that society probably does constrain girls natural instincts to just be kids and muck about. Maybe we just let boys express that childlike exuberance more.

    Montana and BB. I think it sounds great the way you have brought up your boys. You obviously communicate well with them and discuss issues with them. You allowed them freedom to express themselves but did not bombard them with negative stereotypes. I heard my friend tell her four year old son the other day to stop crying or everyone 'would think he was a girly wuss'. Seriously!

    I am off now to watch a cheesy film and eat some chocolate shortbread. The Mr. has gone to the in-laws and due to the flu I am not going - too many little ones to risk spreading it around - so an afternoon on the sofa with the dogs and rubbish telly beckons. Ah bliss.

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  43. @3p4

    Thanks for that, I will feel smug all day ;)

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  44. As for the rest of your post here, I have an agenda to follow and more things to say in my own time and will continue to do so until my posting privileges on CiF are restored or I'm also banned from here. So please don't hold out any hope for a new year back-slapping and reconciliation party, as I won't be participating.

    Oh, I see. Well, I guess you are an irredeemably nasty little fuckwit. I genuinely felt remorseful this morning -- worried that I had hurt the feelings of someone who hadn't deserved whatever it was I'd said. I had honestly hoped that we could put the rancour behind us.

    But I see now that I can't hurt your feelings because you have none. You are a psychotic little creep and I won't worry about your non-existent feelings. I shall rest assured that I am your moral and intellectual superior.

    With this, I will return to my policy of ignoring you and I will entreat others to do the same. You deserve not one more moment of my time or thoughts.

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  45. Medve

    So I said, OK, you are big and stupid enough to make up your own minds, you know what I think, but let's not have sneaky hidden stuff at home.

    How very sensible!

    Princess - great post, just what I think. I always liked the "boys'" toys too, although perhaps I played with them in a different way from that which I think boys might have done: ie I imagine that boys with a little tank that could fire matchsticks or bits of potato might have identified with the soldier doing the firing; on the other hand, I seem to remember making up some elaborate and horrendously over-romanticised story about why the tank needed to do the firing.

    But I was still damned proud of hitting my target.

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  46. G'day everyone. Flying visit during a rare hour of sobriety.

    Ahh, the power of not responding to annoying things.

    See yers down the road, my resting place tonight will be the third alleyway on the left.

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  47. The poor dog has hurt hurself. I think she caught one of her dew claws while she was out running today; at any rate, there was blood running down her foot. Which didn't slow her down at all, so I didn't worry at first.

    When we got home, it looked to me as if it was at a bit of an unnatural angle, so I worried that she'd broken the joint, but she didn't complain when I cleaned it off, even when I moved it to clean under it, so I don't think it's broken, just cracked at the painful part.

    She was OK for a couple of hours, but got into a whinefest a while ago, so I've given her half a cocodamol tab (after googling it first to make sure it's OK! - didn't have any aspirin) and now she's looking nice and relaxed....

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  48. one of my less useful fixations is annoyance when ever i see a Great Pyrenees Mountain dog with its huge double dew claws on the back legs,, it looks like they must get in the way,,


    """""'I've given her half a cocodamol tab (after googling it first to make sure it's OK!"''''

    that was a surprise,,i never would have considered it,,i shall have to go and have a look
    i did think to give mine glucosamin when his hips got creaky,,

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  49. Glad I've stumbled onto this blog, my problem with cif is that there seem to be a lot of posters who just want to be unkind.

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  50. Welcome, Medve! We're mostly quite nice here, although we do go off on one every once in a while.

    3p4 - really, Pyrenees have dew claws on back legs? I never knew that! What's the purpose? Mine uses her front ones to hold onto bones she's chewing, but I can't see a reason for rear ones.

    My vet recommended something or other for joints from the pet shop, but I can't remember what it was now. She was very specific to buy 'this' and not 'that'. But as she's not shown any joint problems, I haven't bothered.

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  51. as she's not shown any joint problems

    ... the dog, that is! ...

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  52. Also, 3p4 - vets have advised me to give half an aspirin to my large - 75 lb - dog if she's in pain, but NEVER ibuprofen. That's bad for dogs, apparently. So I googled paracetamol/cocodamol to make sure it wasn't deadly.

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  53. Medve

    It can get quite lively round here at times! But nonetheless its a welcome refuge from the worst of CiF.

    thauma

    Hope the hound recovers soon, the half tab has probably reduced the swelling and so the pain.

    3p4

    I know several dogs who are given glucosamine for their stiff joints, as well as cod liver oil, so maybe it's a good idea.

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  54. Hi Medve - welcome.

    Thauma - I hope the beastie is okay tomorrow, after the painkiller and a good nights rest. Re the playing thing -I used to like being shot and pretending to die in a very drawn out, hammy kind of a way. I used to roll around in agony for ages before I actually popped my clogs. No wonder I got a D in GCSE drama years later.

    3P4 - you learn something new every day - I never knew about the double hind-leg dew claw.

    More snow apparently tomorrow. And freezing weather too. It certainly has been very Christmasey!

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  55. MsChin - thanks, she is quite happy now! She dozed off, woke up and wanted her dinner, ate it happily, went outside and is now ensconced in my armchair....

    A further warning to anyone reading - apparently paracetamol should NEVER be given to cats. It can be fatal.

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  56. Princess - LOL, I certainly feel an affinity to the hamminess! Mind you, I think John Wayne and that type had the same urges. Not that I'd like to think I - or you - had anything in common with John bloody Wayne.

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  57. i am a freak for dog genetics,breeds, communication etc etc

    here is a cool one and i am not giving a link
    as having to read the name enough to google it may mean its true flavour of the arcane might strike you all the more

    Double Nose Andean Tiger Hound

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  58. 3p4 - googled the images, and some look like a pit bull / staffie, some like an unfortunate greyhound, and one poor sod like a malformed hound of the pointer type....

    Without having actually read the links, suggest it is a malformation rather than a breed?

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  59. it is (was) a breed but more or less died out,, recently rediscovered as throw backs in mixed litters by an archeologist visiting remote villages,,which is why the variety of examples,,
    kennelclub wise it should be a small staffie type with striped coat and the bifurcated nose

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  60. Interesting, 3p4 ... is there an advantage or disadvantage for hunting as far as the bifurcated nose goes?

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  61. Ooh no - not John Wayne! Although I did spend many a saturday afternoon watching his westerns as a young 'un. I quite like hammy acting. I love Dynasty and Dallas - they amuse and entertain me. And I love watching The Shatner in just about anything.

    Right 3P4 I am off to look up that breed now.

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  62. Sorry, princess, that was the first name that came to me in hammy-staggering-about-dying-for-at-least-10-minutes acting!

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  63. is there an advantage or disadvantage for hunting as far as the bifurcated nose goes?

    i dont know,, and my comment about it being real breed is not based on 'knowledge' either,,
    but it is based on my record of canine insights proving correct over time,,

    i would expect the nose did have a benefit for tracking,,although most tracking dogs use their jowls rather than nasal passages,,smell is also taste,,in fact smell is airborne taste,,if you watch dogs following scent you may observe them
    constantly licking their own nose,,in order to clean it and be able to take another 'taste' of air,,

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  64. 3p4 - I could easily be wrong, but I thought the purpose of the jowls (which my own hound has aplenty) was to shuffle the scents up to the nose?

    I think taste is largely smell, if you know what I mean.... I've heard that people who lose their sense of smell cannot taste anything.

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  65. The other interesting thing about many hound breeds - please stop me if I'm boring you all - is that their ears are designed to fall on the ground around their noses when their heads are down on the scent, thereby driving the scent up t' nose....

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  66. Evening all!

    I am well lubricated after a lovely afternoon/evening eating and drinking far too much junk!

    Ah well. What is Christmas for if not to over-indulge?

    Hope the doggie is all right, thaum :S

    And good to see you - did you have a good crimbo?

    Slightly sozzled kisses to all xx

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  67. Hi BB - thanks, she is snoozing happily although I suspect she may lose the claw temporarily....

    Nice to hear you've had the perfect decadent crimble as I have - off to bed now in fact as I have done the same!

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  68. Here's a song for heyhabib if he turns up tonight. He works the night-shift for minimum wage and that's OK. (The song is also for everybody else, of course, but mostly for heyhabib.)

    cat

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  69. Night thaum. Glad to hear she is comfortable.

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  70. Just got back from the annual family love-in, so am mostly loved-out, but am pleased to see that BTH is now a regular.

    Big kisses, bitey xx.

    You'll always be amongst friends here, sweetheart.

    Not as much as you would be on gary glitter's guide to nights out in thailand over at www.sadanalpaedoweirdovirgins.co.th of course.

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  71. Hey there, Mr. Scorpio. Glad you survived.

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  72. scherfig

    Good tune, that. Wonder if habib has the night off, as he worked the Xmas late shift?

    hank

    Erm, yes, it's been an interesting day, in one particular respect.

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  73. @Montana, just looked at Cif. Well done on getting 400+ responses, but having read yesterday's thread on here, I don't think I can be arsed holding my nose long enough to read the replies.

    Laddo sorted me a Bowie cd for Xmas, anyway, and it reminded me how much I love this song...

    leninsonsaleagain

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  74. choon, sherf!

    Hey Hank and Montana.

    Chilling here with a glass of red in front of The Matrix for the ninety twelfth time. Love that film though.

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  75. Superb Bowie choon also, Hank.

    "Take a look at the law man beating up the wrong guy"

    Story of my life really

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  76. I don't think I can be arsed holding my nose long enough to read the replies.

    I've had to reply to the numpties, the least you could do is read them. :-)

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  77. "I've had to reply to the numpties, the least you could do is read them. :-)"

    No offence, Montana, but I really can't be arsed with it atm. I posted on the Xmas Eve thread as hallotommy in response to gillesboy's call for an amnesty for banned posters. I said that it was more likely that the mods would allow a truce rather than an amnesty and, quelle fucking surprise, I was right.

    My posting rights were short-lived.

    To be honest, if I wrote a piece on what I'd learned in the last ten years, it would be that the concepts of liberty and free speech are essentially fluid, and that the Labour Party which I'd grown up trusting was more easily bought than I could ever believe, that values which I always thought had spiritual or ethical markers turned out to be mercenary above all and easily bought, and that the Guardian was not the paper it was when I was young and idealistic, nor the paper it was when I was older, more cynical but not easily bought, and that I thought that Comment is Free meant that free speech was valued, and not that it was a commercial operation which welcomed airheaded morons, above and below the line, in the interests of pagehits.

    What a fucking country the UK has become.

    And how sadly reflective of it the Guardian/Cif is.

    Man of the Year: Alan Rusbridger. The man who finally convinced me that there is neither integrity nor hope.

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  78. They both still exist. Just not in the halls of power.

    (and I was only joking -- I actually wouldn't wish that thread on a dog I didn't like.)

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  79. Off to bed, Montana, before I say something I might regret about Isabella Rusbridger...

    Nite x

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