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Post by kerouac2 on Mar 6, 2019 20:03:42 GMT
My brother and I knew that our parents were getting divorced, no question about that. My mother had driven our father out of the house and we basically approved of this, because he had done some unacceptable things. Personally, I was pretty happy with the idea that we would have our mother all to ourselves.
But she sat us down one day to inform us that she was going to marry Jack, the family friend who had driven our father into an unjustified rage one day when he made a totally innocent compliment. Of course, I was only 13, so it is quite likely that I had missed a few details. Anyway, she said "I know he doesn't look like much, but he is really so nice." I am disturbed by this comment even today. No, he was not handsome, but he was absolutely no worse than our biological father. Was she hoping to find somebody more handsome? I think it was just a clumsy statement because she didn't really know how to announce that she was getting married again, but I still find it strange.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Mar 6, 2019 21:33:57 GMT
Our Mother died in 1994 after 53 years marriage to Dad. They were happy I suppose... my father refused to allow Mum to go out to work, even after us children were grown up. I think that she would have loved a little bit of independence, especially after raising 6 children...but she did all the 'domestic duties' and basically Dad organised their lives and made all the decisions...she was very submissive and to a certain extent I'm quite like her...well I used to be. Much more assertive these days.
ANYWAY..Mummy died on October 12th. On November 5th I still put on my customary bonfire night party for the family to try to cheer us all up a bit (pre-dog...hate fireworks now) Father brought along a ' lady friend' without warning...myself and my sisters were astonished and a bit annoyed..this lady was a friend from before he met Mummy (the rest of us had never met her before) and had lost her husband a few months before. It wasnt this lady's fault and we were all lovely to her of course...but it was a complete shock to see Dad could move on so swiftly whilst we were all still crippled with grief.
I think Dad would have liked to have found someone else after he lost Mum, and I sometimes wonder if our rather childish reluctance to let go of our idea of our Parents' idyllic marriage prevented him from doing that.
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Post by bjd on Mar 7, 2019 6:14:53 GMT
When I was doing my geneaology research, it struck me how often people remarried very shortly after the death of a spouse. Mostly after the death of a young wife so there would be someone to help with the kids, I imagine, but even older wi.dows/widowers remarried quickly.
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Post by Kimby on Mar 7, 2019 15:14:48 GMT
Widowed men remarry. Widowed women travel. Don’t need another man to take care of. (Been there, done that.)
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Post by kerouac2 on Mar 7, 2019 15:47:56 GMT
If only that were true, Kimby. One of the biggest issues in France is widowed women left with almost no revenue who have to go to the associations that distribute food. I think the category of traveling widowed women is not as big as you might think.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Mar 7, 2019 16:58:19 GMT
I'm really happy that I decided to take on a work pension when I started working for the NHS in the 80s. I dont get my state pension until I'm 66 but the NHS pension meant that I could retire at 60. We'd never have been able to manage just on hubby's state pension that's for sure.
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Post by kerouac2 on May 18, 2019 17:42:57 GMT
The very first Eurovision song contest that I ever saw was in 1965 during the year I spent with my grandparents. The television was in the kitchen on a shelf over the refrigerator, so all evenings spent watching television were at the same yellow formica table where we ate all of our meals. The matching formica chairs became quite uncomfortable after a few hours. We were extremely lucky in those days because we had 2 television channels, while most of France had just one. We had the French channel but we also had Télé Luxembourg, since Luxembourg was only about 50 kilometres away.
Anyway, that evening, it was the same programme on both channels, so I don't know which one we watched. There were 18 participants that year, a new record, and the show took place in Italy, which had won the previous year. Besides the Western European Eurovision zone, it was also broadcast for the first time in Eastern Europe on the Intervision network.
The show lasted 1h38, compared to tonight's estimate of 3h40. Luxembourg won the contest, with France Gall singing Serge Gainsbourg's Poupée de Cire, Poupée de Son. For us, it was like a hometown victory. Luxembourg was so much closer to us than Paris. Of course France Gall was French, but nobody cared about such details. She became one of the most beloved singers in France over the years and died last year at age 70.
In any case, the Eurovision song contest became embedded in my life at that moment, so I have remained faithful to it over the years. There are too few moments when all of Europe comes together, and that has always been important to me. My grandfather was mayor of the village, and he constantly received letters with DDR stamps on them. He threw them away unopened, but I was totally fascinated that another country would continue to write to a small village in France.
And the DDR was not even in Eurovision.
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Post by mossie on May 19, 2019 9:27:56 GMT
I note that Australia is part of Europe where Eurovision is concerned, perhaps Mars will soon join.
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Post by lagatta on May 19, 2019 16:49:58 GMT
Is Québec in Eurovision? I honestly don't know...
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Post by kerouac2 on May 20, 2019 3:19:05 GMT
The CBC is an associate member of the EBU but not a full member. However, Céline Dion won the song contest in 1988, representing Switzerland. Totally different look back then!
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Post by kerouac2 on Jul 10, 2020 14:41:47 GMT
At my grandparents' house -- and seemingly, every house in the village, there was a barometer on the kitchen wall. I loved resetting the manual needle every day for the comparison to where the barometric needle would go. Even though there were weather reports on the radio and television, in those days there were no weather satellites, so meteorology was a precarious profession. We have all noticed that even with satellites, the weather does not always turn out as expected.
I don't think my grandfather was paying as much attention to the barometer when I was around as he did 20 or 30 years earlier. He was probably listening to the radio instead.
In your other countries, did homes have barometers in them?
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Post by mickthecactus on Jul 10, 2020 14:55:02 GMT
I still have one. Probably Victorian.
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Post by patricklondon on Jul 10, 2020 15:03:58 GMT
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Post by mickthecactus on Jul 10, 2020 16:44:50 GMT
I still have one. Probably Victorian.
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Post by mickthecactus on Jul 10, 2020 16:47:07 GMT
My Nan had a donkey which told the weather.
If the tail was wet it was raining. If it was dry it was good. If you couldn't see it, it was foggy If it fell off it was earthquake.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 10, 2020 18:41:58 GMT
My grandfather had the same thing. I was a piece of wood with a line drawing of a donkey looking over its shoulder toward the viewer. Its hind end, with a little rope tail, was toward the viewer and the words Mick quotes were written below.
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Post by mossie on Jul 10, 2020 18:50:33 GMT
I think I have told you before that, a meteorologist is a man who can look deep into a girl's eyes and tell whether. I were a met. assistant once so I had to practice quite a lot.
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Post by questa on Jul 11, 2020 0:39:18 GMT
In the distant desert in Western Oz, near the place where South Oz and Northern Territory borders meet is one of the loneliest buildings in the country.It is the Giles Meteorological Station, one of the most important in the world for the masses of data it collects. It is usually run by 3 men on rotation...bit like the old lighthouse keepers. I've been told the same donkey is on a veranda pole with added lines...if the tail is red there's a dust storm, if the tail is gone, there are thieves around.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 3, 2020 19:54:34 GMT
The name of my drug dealer in university was Craig Coffin. I thought that was brilliant.
I also hope that he never sees that and decides to sue me.
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Post by mickthecactus on Aug 3, 2020 20:05:26 GMT
Your own drug dealer?
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 3, 2020 20:30:56 GMT
Yes, it was long before the time of mobile phones and all that so you had to know your local dealer very well. I was extremely "straight" so I decided right from the start that it would be ridiculous and humiliating to say that I had any interest in cannabis or hashish. Therefore I started directly with LSD, and with Craig's friendly recommendations, I moved on to mescaline and psilocybin when I could afford them. Craig was a great salesman and could describe the variations of the experience ("Mescaline is much more mellow."). Once I had a foot in the door, it allowed me top introduce my friends to these same items, since they were also totally "straight" but curious as to what all of the hippies were doing. I had to start buying in bulk because there were at least six of us doing everything we would absolutely never reveal to our parents or siblings.
Now that I have horrified you, I can also say that absolutely none of us ever became a drug addict. It was merely a case of student experimentation and everybody went on to live normal lives -- doctor, real estate agent, accountant, travel agent, etc.
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Post by questa on Aug 3, 2020 23:17:17 GMT
Who ever read the Carlos Castaneda books and didn't just...wonder if... But in those days being caught out meant you lost your qualifications and were not allowed to practise ever again, anywhere. Then the books were shown to be a hoax and spoiled all the fun.
PS That explains a lot, K2
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Post by htmb on Aug 5, 2020 2:04:41 GMT
Three weeks ago my former son in-law died from a dose of fentanyl. I wonder if he knew his dealer’s name. Even if he did, it makes no difference to my two young granddaughters who are devastated and whose lives are forever changed, or to his poor, broken-hearted parents. At least he was an organ donor and, thanks to the paramedics and doctors, some fortunate individuals have received his lungs and liver. It’s amazing how they can flush out the drugs to make the organs usable.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 5, 2020 3:10:06 GMT
Oh, Htmb. I am so sorry and feel terrible for those little girls and their grandparents, who have to live with this forever now. Your poor daughter, too, who has to try to comfort and make sense of it all for her daughters.
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Post by htmb on Aug 5, 2020 12:19:35 GMT
Difficult times for them all right now, for sure, Bixa.
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Post by kerouac2 on Mar 15, 2021 18:35:44 GMT
Since they're doing all of that Fashion Week crap on television here (a down side of living in France), I suddenly remembered today that many years ago, I had dinner with a minor fashion model along with various friends (I can't for the life of me remember which friend knew him.) But he was interesting and friendly and it was clear that it is not an easy profession, especially when you are not one of the stars. Not to mention the fact that for 99% of the models, the profession does not last very long.
But what I remembered was that he said he had been lent a rather grim flat where he could stay free of charge, but it was a total nightmare for him. "There's nothing worse for a model than having to stay in a place that doesn't have a mirror!" It was both very funny and sad. He had to go down to the café to check himself out before going anywhere. What an awful job.
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Post by Kimby on Mar 21, 2021 21:17:34 GMT
At my grandparents' house -- and seemingly, every house in the village, there was a barometer on the kitchen wall. I loved resetting the manual needle every day for the comparison to where the barometric needle would go...In your other countries, did homes have barometers in them? We had multiple barometers at home and cabin. One of my traumatic childhood memories was when we were doing a weather unit in school and my teacher asked if anyone in class could bring a barometer to school. I volunteered, and my Dad presented me with one of his many barometers, with a dark plastic or Bakelite housing, and clear plastic lens, therefore less subject to damage at the hands of my classmates than the glass and brass ones. I proudly handed it over to my teacher who took a quick look at it and said, “This isn’t a barometer; it’s a fishing gauge!” I was humiliated, and embarrassed for my father to have made such a mistake. I took it home and confronted my Dad who gently pointed out the atmospheric pressure numbers along its circumference, and explained that although it had “FISHING IMPROVING” and “POOR FISHING” stamped on the dial, it was indeed a barometer. I can’t remember how I handled the teacher, but I was glad that my Dad was still infalliable!
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Post by mossie on Mar 22, 2021 8:16:52 GMT
Having worked in weather dependent industries all my life, in fact was an employee of the Met Office for a year in my youth, barometers have always interested me. I have 2, one is part of one one those fancy digital radio controlled clocks, as well as the pressure it shows the humidity and symbols for the weather. Actually I think it must have a very clever little fellow inside who has to poke his head out when no-one is watching to see what the weather is doing. The other is a little aneroid dial type with the needles so one can see tends which can be useful for forecasting. Checking them can become an obsession if one lets it, but it is something else to occupy ones mind in these bad times.
As an aside, and with reference to the Elfin Safety craze today, as a sixteen year old I was expected to work on an airfield at night when there was nobody else at work. We had to go outside every hour to take readings, and at 2am to release a hydrogen balloon and track it with a theodolite in order to find what the wind was at heights. To fill it there was a shed with a large hydrogen cylinder from which one drew off enough gas to float the balloon when a weight was attached so that the balloon would climb at a certain rate so that by timing observations the height was determined. Here comes the best bit, in order to see it one attached a little paper Chinese lantern with a little candle and LIT it in the shed with the cylinder. All good fun.
After each shift one faced a several miles bike ride home, whatever the weather.
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Post by kerouac2 on Mar 22, 2021 9:13:38 GMT
Hydrogen and candles, what a great combination!
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Post by onlyMark on Mar 22, 2021 11:12:56 GMT
Just caught an article about an 'influencer' (I think) making a tiktok video about making a wine bottle into a vase. She was following the instructions on a youtube video. The plan is you wrap cord around the bottle just before the neck, soak it in some flammable spirit and set it alight, plunge it in water and the bottle cracks off at that point. The girl doing it has a lot of serious burns because the wine bottle exploded.
I think what she failed to account for is it is supposed to be an empty wine bottle.
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