Looks like it's not a good year to have been an actress in the Dr. Who series.

Well, lets hope that's the last of the sad news for a while.

Find us some cheery or funny news for your next post, Sig!  W

Some very odd goings-on: in his meeting with Cameron, Beckham was wearing an 'Old Etonians' tie.

Extremely bad form, that man!

Wonder if his wife dressed him this morning. Hmm.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

Don't forget: candy rots your teeth. Think what it might be doing to your eyes.

'Eye candy' for me is Debbie Harry circa. 1979 (Heart of Glass UK video) with just a touch of 'filler' imagination. She was a bit like an ironing board with two aspirins on it. But a very pretty ironing board.

I have nothing against the Olympics themselves. Some people like all of that running and jumping around, some even like watching it.

My beef is mainly with the 'organisers'. Most of them are inadequate to the task and only have it due to some personal influence, an old school pal or simple fluke.

They all, however they got their jobs, acquire a self-importance all out of proportion with their actual task's place in the scheme of things.

A reasonably personable sports celebrity can become an Ur-Emperor, even though his position is something that occasionally requires him to hold a clipboard and speak to a TV news reporter.

A guy you played darts with in the pub last week is suddenly the reincarnation of Adolf Hitler due to being asked to 'guard' the torch as it passes 2 miles outside the village.

A budding politician imagines himself in Churchill's shoes because he got German Ordinary Level Certificate at school and has been asked to translate for his opposite number from Deutschland: they'll no doubt spend a month or so misunderstanding each other, the result of which will be Cameron declaring war on Germany in December.

As for the banks, if you want to know who runs all that stuff you should watch 'Yes Minister' and 'Yes Prime Minister'. Most people thought they were sitcoms. Some of us knew they were docu-dramas.

I don't mind knowing about the millions of 'friends' we carry around with us and sleep with. I just don't care for microscope pictures at 1500x showing me what these alien passengers actually look like. I'd probably run away from most of them. The rest I'd splat with a rolled newspaper or flush 'em down the loo.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

Wendy, I could be in London in about 3.5 hours, but I won't see the opening ceremony unless someone ties me to a chair and forces me to watch it.

Boris is always good for entertainment. It is widely believed that he only got his mayoral position due to his appearances on the BBC's 'Have I Got News For You'. Having 'funny' politicians would be nice if their other talents were anything more than 'a little dim'.

And 'Low Cognition' probably fits much better than their actual unweildy title does. To be honest I had to look it up myself.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

Loved the link, Sig!  (Are we the only ones "talking" in this thread?)  Are Hugh Grant and Stephen Fry happy that they're the "poster boys" for that article?  I love the term "Jafaican" -- the centre of Canada's universe (that would be Toronto) has quite a number of Jafaican speakers, too.  Wendy

It does seem to be that we suffered a quartet of losses in this round.

Unless, of course, Geoff was the start of a second trio. That, too, is not unprecented. And the thought of it will probably be responsible for a number of quavery line deliveries on various stages spotted around London's West End tonight.

As to messrs Fry and Grant's feelings about being used as the models to illustrate the Beeb's humorous foray, I'm sure they'll take it as it was intended. Stephen Fry can't get angry at Auntie Beeb when she's so fond of filling up his bank accounts alongside making him ever more famous. And Hugh Grant probably couldn't care less. Thing is, it was all pretty much the truth, so no-one can get or stay upset for long.

And it really was 'QI' - quite interesting.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

Police said the raider left the scene in the digger, driving it along Barretts Lane, and it was later found abandoned in a field.

Wouldn't a digger on the road at 3:30 am be a bit conspicuous?  Maybe no one else was in the lane.

Perhaps the "offender" was just trying to recoup some of his losses incurred by Barclays' interest rate fiddling...

After reading a post by Bookwik on the 'Why can't I stop buying books?' thread I was going to post there. But this got out of hand for that thread, so I thought it better placed here.

I delight in the odd success. The feeling a dramatic 'coup' can give you is definitely worth the effort.

But I try to remain in a sort of penurious position where I can just about afford to keep the wolves from the door, even having to resort to robbing Peter to pay Paul most of the time.

It doesn't allow of foreign holidays (or indeed any holidays at all); a car or any vehicle, other than the bus, to get about in; expensive hobbies such as eating out, socializing in pubs - socializing at all other than visiting or being visited by friends - or anything considered a 'luxury' (other than my Nescafe Gold Blend 'Black Gold' instant coffee, but I consider that an essential survival item).

I sell my books simply because they no longer fit my collection - an ever-evolving beast - and in order to pay for the things that will fit when I manage to find one that I can afford.

Its a disease. I've had it since I was a kid. No idea who I caught it from as no-one else in my family is what I would call a 'collector'.

But I'm not interested in riches. It would be very nice to have all that is necessary to inflate my library to the proportions I could never have hoped for, even to have that Bugatti Veyron in its glass box on my lawn so that I could just look at it. But I can see a Veyron by watching a bit of Top Gear any time I like. And I'm happy to allow my books to accumulate as and when they will.

My aim is to stay so close to the poverty line that no-one will have grounds to try to take anything away from me. There are far too many bodies here in the UK, official and otherwise, only too keen to take anyone they can get their claws into for everything they have. Having nothing really p*sses them off when they try your doorbell.

I'm not supposed to mention politics, but it does have a part in my agenda. I don't want them to have any real contribution from me to fund their slimy evil ways. I'm happy to pay for local services; garbage-collection, police, fire, etc. And we all pay for the national health system - long may it last - but I want no part of central government's wastefulness.

I suppose, like a great many in this 'world's most watched on CCTV' population, I like to have a ready and open target to moan about. It is one of our national pastimes and, had there been an event, we'd have won every Olympic medal offered in it. We Brits will moan about and to anything, and we don't care how big a stick it carries.

And there's always the benefit, when 'recession' time comes around again, where if you have nothing it is damned hard to lose it. We have these economic dips quite regularly - according to the press - and occasionally there are headlines describing something called a 'boom'. I know what they're saying, but both situations have always appeared to be the same from wherever I was standing.

There was a 'boom' during the reign of the great beast (Thatch.... damn, now I have to wash my keyboard again). But all I saw was the unemployment and devastation of industry that held more than 3 million of us for close to two decades (bloody Tories). It would appear that the view of a 'boom' can only be had by standing on top of your family fortune - if it ain't big enough there's nothing to see.

I suppose I should be cheered up by the Olympics. But I'm not a big sports fan and never have been. Plus I did get a view of some of the ticket prices and could only laugh at the absurdity: some of the cheapest tickets to some of the daftest events were in excess of £100 each - that's TWENTY times what I paid the first time I saw Queen live, and the entire Olympic games couldn't come close to equalling that event.

Well, I had to let the curmudgeon out for a while. Couldn't stop it wandering into here. I think it may be insane, but I daren't ask.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

It isn't anything I'd ever considered. And I doubt I would know how or where to begin such a thing. I did start a 'Me' page on eBay once. But other things got in the way and it was left almost before it was begun.

I am, however, very much enjoying adding to this thread.

I might even acquire some kind of stage fright if I thought it was reaching too big an audience. I estimated there are perhaps 100 regulars on this board who might look in. I felt that was a number I could handle; I can, after all, hide behind my keyboard and monitor. Had there been a webcam or such involved I probably would have passed up the opportunity in the first place.

I like talking to people, but I'm not sure I could manage to talk to them all at once. I have often got away with speaking to complete strangers at bus stops and on buses, in main streets and shops and such. That is considered a short step down from High Treason in a place like London. But I'm a northerner, and we don't hold with anything those soft southern buggers get up to; we'll talk to anyone, whether they listen or not: their loss if they don't. But it is usually only one or two at a time.

Why does one 'blog' and where, and who for? I thought you had to be hired by somebody to do that sort of thing. And only to their agenda, like a journalist tied to one publication.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

Very odd that a post from this thread should be removed: I don't recall it being in any way offensive or disreputable.

Yet a thread I requested be removed is still alive, kicking and getting more posts. It was my own 'Foot' thread, and the request was made on Saturday.

Did they remove the wrong thing and just give the first reason that entered their heads?

Am I just being foolish trying to figure the motives of the blind behemoth?

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

I'd put money on it being left completely alone if I were to repost it.

But that would put it out of order as it really belongs at number 120.

Letting the brainless meddlers have their way seems the best plan on this occasion.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .

It is odd how 'old money' usually remains just that by being uselessly (to anyone else) left to accumulate. Yet 'new money' is busily doing things that need to be done and helping many whose need is more than obvious.

It would be difficult to imagine some country-mansioned toff, whose family fortune stems from the 'Triangle Trade', putting his hand into his Cayman Islands account to donate to  a worthy cause. Unless, of course, such donation offered a profitable tax break.

Yet today we have news that a young lad who lost his leg to Ewing's Sarcoma, a rare and aggressive form of cancer which affects fewer than 30 children a year, has been given a donation of a five-figure sum to afford him a prosthetic replacement.

The donation comes from the winners of the largest lottery prize ever won in this country. A couple from Ayrshire in Scotland scooped their £161 million win on the Eurolottery and have been handing chunks of it to good causes ever since. When they were made aware of the 13 year-old's plight they were only too happy to assist.

The evidence for the existence of the Higgs boson-like particle, whose discovery was announced on 4 July this year, has been boosted from the '5 Sigma' one-in-3.5 million chance of an error, to a '5.8 Sigma' which is a one-in-300 million chance of it not really existing.

The data from the LHC has strengthened the case after both Atlas and CMS submitted fuller analyses of the 'decay channels'. The CMS team reports the '5.8 Sigma' numbers whilst the Atlas team report results reaching a significance of '5.9 Sigma' - a one-in-550 million chance that, in the absence of a Higgs, the signals they see would be recorded.

Anyone brave enough to bet against those odds?

It seems that pretzel-thinking is still catching them out. A trio of low-emission, hydrogen-fuelled London taxis, introduced to ferry VIPs and officials during the Games, must now be carried on a transporter for a 130 mile round trip in order to refuel.

A hydrogen refuelling station at Lea Interchange, very close to the Olympic park, has had to be closed for 'security reasons'. The next nearest source is at Honda's manufacturing plant in Swindon.

So much for low-emissions and energy saving ideas. No doubt the truck used to transport the three vehicles produces enough unwelcome gasses, and drinks sufficient quantities of fossil fuel to negate any gains made in that direction.

I wonder if the 'security reasons' quoted as being to blame are anything to do with the wonderful G4S, who appear to have been trying to foul up the entire thing since not quite starting to do the job for which they wish to be paid their £57 million fee.

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A preoccupation with the next world is a clear indication of an inability to cope credibly with this one. .