August 2019 Chit Chat

Quick... write out your gift lists, head for the malls...
                           
                                               There's only 143 shopping days til Christmas.


Hurry Hurry

Peter Fonda has died he was 79.

I saw that yesterday. Sad. I remember him most for "Easy Rider", which I saw long ago. It upset me so much I have never been able to watch it again. I didn't see much of his later work, but I always thought he was a talented actor. RIP.

I haven't seen Easy Rider.....Slaps Hand.... !

Why does it upset you Lizzy ?   

I cry easily lately during films or series

So....

Will it have that effect on me chuck ?

I guess whether it upsets you would depend on how much sympathy you have for a couple of counter-culture druggies in the '60s. I'm not sure it would affect me the same way now as it did the first time I saw it, but (spoiler alert) the ending is brutal no matter how you feel about the characters.

Though taken to the extreme, it's a perfect time capsule of a certain time in America and well worth a look. If you do decide to watch it, I hope it doesn't make you cry.

A while back, when we thought we might lose COH, some of you were kind enough to share your email addresses so we could keep in touch if the worst happened. Well, a couple of weeks ago my computer crashed and my tech guy had to use factory re-set to get it working again. In the process I lost all my contact info. (Please don't ask why it wasn't backed up. I thought it was!)

Anyway, I'd appreciate it if whoever wants to would pm me their email addresses again. I promise I won't lose them this time because I'll write them down, old school, with paper and pencil, and put them in a safe place!

Hey everyone, guess who's back!

I jacked in my job and am back in the UK again.  Hope to have more time to spend with you all - and George.

That's great news, Katie!
Welcome back!

Did anybody see this? I really liked that:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-newzealand-parliament-babies/bringing-up-baby-nz-speaker-makes-parliament-more-parent-friendly-idUSKCN1VC0GJ

Bringing up baby: New Zealand speaker makes parliament more parent-friendly

Charlotte Greenfield

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - As New Zealand lawmakers vigorously debated fuel prices in parliament this week, speaker Trevor Mallard called for order while feeding baby Tūtānekai his bottle.

Screenshot from a Parliament broadcast of New Zealand Speaker Trevor Mallard feeding a Member of Parliament’s baby during a parliamentary session in Wellington August 21, 2019. New Zealand Parliament and Speaker's Office/Handout via REUTERS

The six-week-old son of Labour MP Tāmati Coffey and his husband, born via a surrogate mother last month, was being cuddled by his father in the debating chamber on Wednesday when the speaker offered to hold him.

“There are times when I can be vaguely useful,” Mallard told Reuters, adding that he tried to help care for lawmakers’ babies when possible.

The newborn joins many other babies in the legislature after Mallard relaxed rules in 2017 to make parliament more child-friendly.

About a dozen MPs have had infants in a parliamentary baby boom, and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern last year became New Zealand’s first premier to take maternity leave and the world’s second elected leader to give birth in office.

Her daughter Neve Te Aroha made headlines in September when she accompanied Ardern to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

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But worker rights advocates told Reuters that few New Zealanders get the same rights to balance caring for their families with work, and they hope the high-profile parliamentary babies will bring a wider change in working conditions.

Tania Te Whenua, a Māori lawyer who is working on a case for New Zealand’s largest union, the Public Service Association, alleging discrimination against indigenous Māori women employees, said she had felt hostility in previous workplaces over her young children visiting her at work.

“The ability to have, nurture and raise children is a celebrated aspect of Māori culture....and to be made to feel as though that is frowned upon in the workplace leaves Māori feeling like the outsider,” she said.

She expressed support for the parliament speaker’s family policies.

Mallard, a political veteran, and father of three adult children, with six grandchildren, hoped more employers would follow his lead.

“What I’ve found is that it adds to the positive atmosphere of the workplace,” he said, adding that he regularly encountered babies in the halls of power and even the indoor parliamentary swimming pool.

Their presence provides a boost to morale, evidenced from the eagerness of official messengers to swap their usual document deliveries for the task of taking an infant into parliament instead, he said.

“When there’s a baby to be carried in....there’s a fair bit of competition to do the job,” said Mallard.

Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield; Editing by Clarence Fernandez

Hi, Katie! Welcome back. Do you think you're home for good? I've missed you and I hope you do have more time for us. You always make things more fun.

Admin wrote:Hey everyone, guess who's back!

I jacked in my job and am back in the UK again.  Hope to have more time to spend with you all - and George.

Now that you're home in UK, any chance you've secured an apartment in or very near Sonning-on-Thames?????????

HI Katie glad your back.

Katie’s back on board Good to have you back!

PigPen wrote:Now that you're home in UK, any chance you've secured an apartment in or very near Sonning-on-Thames?????????

I wish!! Sadly, for some reason George completely forgot to invite me to move in. Inexplicable, I know!

So I'm currently renting a little flat in what I like to call the 'ethnic quarter' of the city [the plus side: I can buy just about every kind of food at any time of day or night but on the minus side: have to ask the druggies sitting on my doorstep to make way whenever I come or go and I can't tell you how many empty nitrous oxide canisters I clear away from around my front door every week]. Still, 'tis only temporary until I sort myself out with a job and buy somewhere just a little nicer.

By the way, what on earth was happening in the forum on 14th August???  1,400 visitors that day - what did I miss??

I don't remember anything special on the 14th Katie.

I saw that number last week and couldn’t for the life of me figure out why there would be so many online that day??? A non newsworthy Wednesday. :/

Ah well.  May there be many more such non-newsworthy Wednesdays!

You know, the one thing I'm still struggling to get my head around in this country (apart from separate taps - choose between freezing your hands or boiling them every time you wash - about time the manufacturers of mixer taps set up shop here) is the weather.

Yeah, I know, another Brit moaning about the weather (well it beats Brexit!).  We've had miserable autumn temperatures for much of this month but yesterday we finally got our August heatwave and yet this morning, it's wall to wall fog and jacket weather again.  How come?

Quick question. Has "The Serious Side" been dropped or is Annemarie on vacation? Her "Serious Side" updates are usually the first thing I see in the morning, but they've been missing for a couple of days. I'm getting worried about her.

Hey Lizzy , I'm here just wasn't feeling well for a couple of days. I will be adding to the serious side today.

Admin wrote:Ah well.  May there be many more such non-newsworthy Wednesdays!

You know, the one thing I'm still struggling to get my head around in this country (apart from separate taps - choose between freezing your hands or boiling them every time you wash - about time the manufacturers of mixer taps set up shop here) is the weather.

Yeah, I know, another Brit moaning about the weather (well it beats Brexit!).  We've had miserable autumn temperatures for much of this month but yesterday we finally got our August heatwave and yet this morning, it's wall to wall fog and jacket weather again.  How come?

Katie,
I just remember one thing when I first met Brits - which was in 1982 (gosh, I'm so old! ):
A group of young swimmers from our British twin town came for an exchange with my swimming club, and they all stayed in families. After the firsf day, we were asked if we really were that rich. "We aren't rich. In fact,weI live in a quite 'poor' region in Germany." "But your bathrooms are so luxerious!" -
A few months later, we paid them a visit and stayed in families, and all of a sudden, I did understand their question:
I stayed with a family which had moved in their newly-built house the year before. They had a sink, a toilet and a bath tub. The tub had a water drain but no water intake. Instead, you had to use an instrument I had never seen before, it looked a bit like a rubber stethoscope, you had to pull one end over the hot water intake, one over the cold water intake and put the third end into the bathtub. This fascinated all of us since we had never seen anything like that before. Most of us had no showers oin the bathroom but had a guest bathroom with a shower in the house or flat. And nobody had ever seen a sink without a mixer tap!
A German family lived (and still lives) in our twin town, so I asked them about it. And they said that that's normal in Britain. So when they wanted to renovate the Manor House they had bought(they are quite wealthy, and her husband had a very good job in the UK), they were looking for a plumber who was able to achieve the standard zhey were used to - and couldn't find one. So they hired a German plumber who brought all materials he needed.
So Ingeid, the German lady said that everybody was really happy when plumbers from mostly Poland and other European countries were allowed to work in the UK because they really set standards.

Admin wrote:By the way, what on earth was happening in the forum on 14th August???  1,400 visitors that day - what did I miss??

You were the last site I visited b4 I did a walking tour of Santorini.... I put my phone in my back pocket.... I was in and out all day .... my pedometer said I climbed 67 stairs .... I would have estimated more than 1400 Hay ho...

Donnamarie wrote:I saw that number last week and couldn’t for the life of me figure out why there would be so many online that day??? A non newsworthy Wednesday. :/

Wasn't that the day Way2Old4Dis was named by the Daily Mail as the other woman????

hey COH gang....  sending good vibes to any COHer who is in the path of Hurricane Dorian.  It's being described as a monster.  So far, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Barbados and Florida will be getting hit between now and Monday.

PP - Puerto Rico is out of danger but it looks like Florida is going to get hit hard. To anyone in the storm's path, please be safe and if they tell you to get out - GO!

With a little luck it will only take out drumpf's properties and just wash everything else clean.

PigPen wrote:Wasn't that the day Way2Old4Dis was named by the Daily Mail as the other woman????

Ha! in her dreams!!

Right, that's it for the day for me, folks. Off to watch Carnival Row on prime to see if it's any good. See you all at the weekend!

Admin wrote:

PigPen wrote:Wasn't that the day Way2Old4Dis was named by the Daily Mail as the other woman????

Ha!  in her dreams!!

If only you knew how many of my dreams...

Valerie Harper passed a way she was 80 years old. She died after a long battle with cancer.