Ox which?

 

Cheeky little visit to St. Illtyd's church in Oxwich on the Gaar this afternoon. The tower & the walls ignored the vertical, but may follow them once again if you visit.

Without looking too far we found a few relatives in the graveyard. Dead, of course. Indy was impressed by their smells.

There is a QR code with information on one of the signs. Not sure if you can open it?

Also an info board

In case you can't:-  St Illtyds Oxwich should work. 

More on the history of the church here:-

Oxwich church history

Catch a Chicken

Lets hope the Lions make chicken soup of the Brumbies today, by first catching a chicken

Hat-tip Bum-Ba-Clart sport

Ps. They made a weak, thin version, more like a Chinese type.

Hogs I've known & loved part 2

 The Skinny:-

When I mentioned that I needed a motorbike to nip back & fore to Uni, my Mum wanted me to buy a Vespa. (Yeuch) I managed to persuade her that this would be safer than a scooter. God knows how. So I went out and bought my first bike.  It was a 125cc, which was the max you could ride on 'L' plates back in the dawn of prehistory. It proved to be a trusty steed until I went on a trip, & forgot to check the 2-stroke oil. It ran out, and almost trashed the engine. After limping home, I decided to rebuild the engine, with the help of a 'Haynes Workshop manual', lots of enthusiasm, & and new piston rings. This went well, so well that I even had bits left over at the end of the rebuild! It didn't seem to be a problem....

Then Mum & Dad went to London for the weekend, so I sold it & bought this:-

My next ride was bigger, better, faster, and even had orange backlit dials, like a BMW. How could I resist? The seat came off to reveal a secret compartment, easily big enough to hold some sandwiches, if I didn't overfill them. It was a lovely bike, the 4-stroke twin being much smoother than the old 2-stroke single thumper. However, I grew up to be an adult, ish, got a job in Manchester & bought a car. My love affair with bikes didn't end there though.

The car alone proved to be too boring, and my mate in Proctor & Gamble had a bike, sooooo,  I talked myself into buying this: A full-on dirt bike. 

What was I thinking? This was one of my least well thought out plans. The bike didn't have a starter motor, indicators, a second seat, a battery, or even a horn. Instead, to be street legal, it had a kids bike rubber horn. Just to compound that, the gearing was all wrong, giving a top speed of about 65. The fuel had to have oil added as it was a 2-stroke and didn't have an oil tank. Still, it was fun off-roading, and would climb near vertical grades. In a moment of madness, me & Maldwyn Aldwyn drove our bikes to Lytham St. Anne's one weekend, in a feat equal to Hannibal crossing the Alps.

It was a very, very, stupid bike. So I sold it & bought Maldwyn's off him. This was the

CB 250 RS. 

This was a strange mix of 4-stroke, single, twin exhaust slightly smoother thumper. It did a fine job commuting, and even doing the weekly Tesco shop, two-up, and with cardboard boxes of provisions bungeed to the tail rack. Nuts. This wasn't really practical, so the bike had to go, in favour of a 'Brand New' Ford Escort. The Troll wrote this off after 2 weeks, so no more bikes, & bought a Volvo instead.

Later, I wrote the troll off, so I could have a bike again! Hooray! I decided on a new sorta hybrid trial/road machine, (or so the salesman told me)

He lied. After a few months of being disappointed with its performance, I flogged it to a mate, and bought a bigger one. My mate subsequently found that it was an import, and had a power restrictor in the engine. Bastard! I'd sold it needlessly. Off to JT's again, & back to square one. 

I went for this beast, a big, hairy-arsed thumper with a shocking colour palette. A 650cc single. Plenty of power, but lumpy on the road, & too heavy off road. The worst of both worlds.

I took it back to JT's and looked for a swap. The salesman gave me one of these, & said take it for a spin. I returned to the salesroom & bought a new one then & there. THE BEST BIKE I HAD EVER RIDDEN! I've now had it almost 30 years, & never once regretted it. It's smooth, powerful, corners well, brakes well. It's stylish & comfortable. It's a perfect machine. Me & it have lived happily ever after.

Oh, & why Hogs I hear you ask? Simples:-

Hogs I've known & loved part 1

Yamaha DT 125 e 

Suzuki GSX 250

Honda CB 250 RS

Montesa Cota 350

Suzuki DT 350 

Kawasaki KLX 650

Honda CBR 600 F3

King Tut's curse finally explained

 

A toxic fungus, once thought to have caused fatal lung infections in tomb explorers, may hold the key to powerful new cancer treatments, new research suggests.

Within months of the discovery of the tomb of King Tutankhamun in 1922, the earl who had financed the excavation and visited the "wonderful" burial site died, leading many to believe the mummy had cursed those who entered the tomb. 

In the 1970s, 10 of the 12 archaeologists excavating the 15th-century crypt of King Casimir IV in Poland also met a similar fate.

Analysis of Casimir's tomb revealed the presence of a fungus called Aspergillus flavus, the toxins of which are known to cause a deadly lung infection.

Now, the same fungus has shown promise as a treatment for leukemia, according to a new study published in Nature Chemical Biology. The researcher team identified and engineered a class of molecules within the fungus, called asperigimycins, that kill leukemia cells in a laboratory setting

Wow.

Aero-modeler

HMS Colombo, C Class Cruiser 1943 - 1/350

My oldest bestest buddy is an addict. His addiction is building military models, currently focussing on naval vessels. Above is an example of one of his builds. HMS Colombo, named after the TV detective of course. I am amazed at the level of detail in this model, down to the rigging, all being historically accurate. Absolutely stunning. 

His latest work can be found here,

and looks a bit like this so far:-

HMS Euryalus - Dido Class Cruiser 1/350

It's a special commission for an upcoming publication. Chapeau!

They wouldn't let it lie

From the Grauniad, Manchester museum is currently asking its visitors if the unwrapped body of Asru, mummified in circa 900 BC. Should be displayed or not:-

"Asru’s mummified body was unwrapped at the Manchester Natural History Society in April 1825. She has regularly been on display for the two centuries since. In that time, we have also changed as a museum and are thinking more about how we care for people.”

I was amazed at how much information about her life & particularly her illnesses has been found. This may help in the eradication of disease in Egypt today.

What do you think?

Cwrw'r Wythnos # 4

 🏝️sland in the Sun

Rhys really got it together with this little corker. Perfect summer drinking, fruity, fresh yet full bodied. Pouring @ BeerRiff now.

God dammit, Barnett

From Wiki:-

Devolved governments budgets are mainly determined by the Barnett Formula, devised in 1978 as a temporary measure.

Barnett himself later called a 2014 pledge to continue using it a "terrible mistake".[4] In 2009, the House of Lords Select Committee on the Barnett Formula concluded that "the Barnett Formula should no longer be used to determine annual increases in the block grant for the United Kingdom's devolved administrations... A new system which allocates resources to the devolved administrations based on an explicit assessment of their relative needs should be introduced.

So all this does is keep the status quo. If that's pants, then pants it will remain.

From AI search:-

In the UK, public spending per person varies across regions and countries. For the financial year 2023/24, the UK average was £12,958

Northern Ireland received the highest per capita public spending at £15,371, which is 19% above the UK average 

Scotland followed with £14,759 (14% above the UK average), 

Wales with £14,424 (11% above the UK average). 

England's public spending per person was £12,625, which is 3% below the UK average. 

Interestingly, London: £14,842 per person; higher than Wales or Scotland. 

So, the Northern Irish still have their bribe for supporting the Tories, the Jocks get more by threatening independence, the South east gets a bung from the days where Riki Sunshine gave them a bung. The Welsh come a poor 4th. So much for Westminster favoring Wales

As for the Health Service, each Surgery in England gets £164 per patient, but in Wales it's only £117. It seems that England is a bigger drain on the NHS than Wales.

Corbinschism

Thought for the day....

Two political parties cannot contain all viewpoints and are therefore doomed to failure, leading to splits, schisms & extremism. Some factions are guaranteed to be ignored leading to disenfranchised voters becoming destructive.  Hence the current first past the post, 2 party system fails all the time. 

Its not until you give a voice and representation to all the varying shades of political opinion that you can create a system that represents all viewpoints in proportionate measure. 

Thus we get Tommy feckin Yaxley Lennon, Nigel Farage, Jeremy Corbin & his pals, and I suppose even SNP, Plaid & the Greens, SLP, SDLP and back to the Liberals. What a waste.

We need to pick the best of the PR systems in the rest of the world, & implement this before we can get any form of political stability & consensus governance.