xylophone

I watched an Agatha Christie 2 episode offering on BBC iPlayer last night and thought it was by far the best I've ever seen! Called, "Witness for the Prosecution", starring Toby Jones and it was an intriguing mystery right up until the very end.....with an enexpected ending!!

Is this a true story/stories or part fiction/part truth?

I have seen that many, many times; so much that the owner of some apartments had a sign made telling men not to urinate at the bottom of his drive (just off the road) because of the smell.

You make some good points on your post Presnock, and much of my life mirrors what you have posted and I also dislike dishonest people, which explains some of my posts on AN. In my earlier years I completed an electrical engineering apprenticeship and worked under a fantastic foreman/boss, whom I still keep in touch with to this day, and even though he is 90 years old, we can still have a laugh about the old times and I still consider him to be a major influence in my life, a mentor if you wish. As a person I haven't really changed much over the years as I was always independent and wanted to seek out adventure, which is why I spent time in Libya just after the revolution, then spent time in Nigeria at the end of the Biafran war, which was not a good place to be at the time and I escaped death after having a loaded gun pressed against my temple! I settled down a bit for a while although I did spend time working in the North Sea and on an oil platform off the coast of Norway, which was horrendously dangerous, despite all of the supposed safety requirements. After a near miss on that platform it was then that I realised I needed to do something else in my life so I took to honing my skills, taking sales, management, marketing and financial planning and investment advisory courses and gaining membership of those associations. I initiated and built a $2 billion investment fund whilst working for a major New Zealand bank as a Chief Manager Investments and prior to that successfully managed several teams of people, and that gave me great satisfaction, seeing them grow and achieve their goals. I couldn't have asked for a better life, although I have settled down somewhat at the age of 76 years of age and although I think I've grown as a person in some respects like interpersonal skills and team leadership, I am still a pretty driven person. Luckily enough I've been able to help my unofficially adopted Thai daughter to achieve great successes at university here by paying her way over the past 10 years, and I've also helped her mother (although we are not together and haven't been for years) with her financial situation, so I am generous, sometimes far too much so, but then again, "why not" because I am doing some good in these respects and when I depart this mortal coil I will have left them in a strong financial position. To sum up, I am a driven person, I value true friendship and hate dishonest and untrustworthy people, and have made it my goal to look after my two Thai folk now, and when I depart this mortal coil.

Oh, the Deep State delusion again........shows what you are and what you believe in, yet you say you are not part of his cult. You have given yourself away! Well there is no other explanation for believing a compulsive liar, multi-bankrupt, a man who steals from charities and cheats repeatedly on his wife and denigrates American war heroes.......unless of course they are the sort that trump likes..."the poorly educated", in his words, or cultists. Sad, so sad that you cannot see what is in front of your eyes.

You are delusional unless this was sarcasm..........trump dismissed Covid and said that it would go away and he was very wrong and under his watch thousands of Americans died. Get your facts right, but then again, how could you as you are a Maga cult follower!

You trumpies are really trying to build some sort of "superman" image around trump when the fact is that he is an overweight unfit grifter........but continue with the idol worship as his "poorly educated" followers will lap it up. LOL.

From what I can ascertain, Rice Bran Oil is amongst the best, even though I use EV Olive oil for salads/dressings etc, using it just occasionally for frying an egg or similar.

Wrong again..........."Instead, Trump has been the object of repeated jest and even mockery by fellow world leaders"

I do like your response Old Croc, and I would like to add that these days America is seen as a laughing stock/joke, mainly because around 50% of the voting population decided to vote in as president, a compulsive liar, a bankrupt many times over, grifter, thief (stealing from charities), adulterer and someone with very little in the way of a brain; this in itself shows how far America has fallen since its heyday. It was a key talking point during President Trump’s 2016 campaign, and even before it: The idea that other countries were laughing at the United States. “The world is laughing at us,” he said in May 2016. “They’re laughing at us, at our stupidity,” he said of Mexico in his campaign launch speech. He used the phrase “laughing at us” more than 50 times between 2011 and his election as president. Trump, the argument went, was going to make it stop. Instead, Trump has been the object of repeated jest and even mockery by fellow world leaders. And it’s been caught on tape!! The problem being that some American folk think that they are still in a "revered position" globally, when in fact the world is laughing at its stupidity in wanting to elect a dumb liar and grifter again – – not very smart, but the problem is that the alternative is Biden, and at the moment he is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, although he has done well with the economy. Sad times.

I believe that you are purposely missing the point, because although the flag raising at Iwo Jima was staged, it was done so to celebrate a victory, whereas lauding trump in a statue, alongside war heroes he denigrated is, IMO, disgusting. This is the pic I am talking about and you know it. Or perhaps you don't as you could be one of the supporters whom trump prefers???

We are talking about different photographs; you are talking about the one where he has blood on his cheek and his fist raised in the air, I'm talking about the one where he is depicted in a statue along with war heroes, which is a travesty of justice and good taste, because this loser and coward belongs nowhere near those brave people who fought for their country, whilst he denigrated them.

Whomever put that together should be ashamed of themselves, because this lying, spoilt narcissistic Dumbo dodged military service by way of "bone spurs". He then denigrated an American war hero, Jon McCain, calling him a loser......... This article by Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg reads: "Trump remained fixated on McCain, one of the few prominent Republicans to continue criticizing him after he won the nomination. When McCain died, in August 2018, Trump told his senior staff, according to three sources with direct knowledge of this event, ‘We’re not going to support that loser’s funeral,’ and he became furious, according to witnesses, when he saw flags lowered to half-staff. ‘What the f--- are we doing that for? Guy was a f---ing loser,’ the president told aides." To even put Trump's likeness on a memorial for those fallen in the war is disgustingly shameful.

I don't think it was proven that he played in an orchestra!!!!!!

And needed some shooting/markmanship training.

Whilst no one knows the reasons for this attempted assassination yet, there are probably loads of possibilities as to the reasons.......... – The suspect could well have been part of a family that was "stiffed" by trump when his many companies went bankrupt and the poor everyday working American didn't get paid. – Maybe someone who lost money when they bought into the "trump University" scam? – Could well be a far right Christian who finds trump abhorrent because he lies, cheats and breaks just about every one of the 10 Commandments, whilst holding up to be a model Christian. – Then again it could be someone who just hates compulsive liars and could put the USA in jeopardy if he was elected again. – Perhaps someone who dislikes a president who steals from charities. The list could go on and on and we probably won't know for a while, but there are many possibilities as listed above (and more) – – just saying!

Oh dear, more nonsense about a "deep state". Another Maga trumpie supporter.....so sad.

Although I haven't been to Bangla or the other nightspots since my accident just over three months ago, I did arrange to meet up with a few friends last night at an Italian restaurant that I hadn't been to in about eight years, La Capannina in Soi Nanai 2 and was very pleased that I did. Luckily it is only a short hop from my new Condo, so no problem in getting there. I can honestly say that I had the best Italian meal I've ever had in my life last night and it was so good that I made a pig of myself, eating far more than I really should have. The antipasto was superb and plentiful and the accompanying pizzas were varied and very tasty. The restaurant was empty apart from one other table and the owner, Mario, came to the table to say hello and remembered me after all of those years, which was surprising, although maybe not so much because a group of around 8 to 10 of us used to visit Italian restaurants on a Tuesday night, calling ourselves the, "Italian Food and Wine Appreciation Society" (IFAWAS) and this restaurant was a favourite of ours. I will obviously go back after this experience and not only was the food great, but Mario and his staff were extremely friendly and made us feel very welcome – – a great night.

Quick Take John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Republican President Abraham Lincoln in 1865, was affiliated with the anti-immigrant Know-Nothing Party and was a supporter of slavery and the Confederacy. Social media posts claim without evidence that Booth was a Democrat.

Trump has built his campaign on the idea that everyone is out to get him. Federal prosecutors, judges, election officials, rival politicians and journalists have all been accused of trying to bring down his campaign and prevent his return to the White House. Now he has got more ammunition to add to his claims (pun intended) and after the incident trump stated, it was “incredible that such an act can take place in our country”. Did he forget the storming of the Capitol Building which was a threat to American democracy and values? And the shooter was a republican….so he is hated by them also. Who’d have thunk it??

I watched the movie, "House of Gucci" last night and thought it was pretty good, with Adam Driver, Al Pacino and Jared Leto turning in good performances, whereas I didn't think Lady Gaga came across as mean and conniving as she was supposed to be. All the same, it was a good evening's entertainment.

I do agree with your comment, because I believe he should step down, but perhaps he is not aware of how much damage he is doing to his party and the country....... The President just made America look like an international joke. If Joe Biden wanted to design a pair of gaffes to cause his presidency as much damage as possible, it would be hard to do better than his performance on Thursday night Introducing Pres Zelensky as “President Putin” was his first major gaffe, then confusing Kamala Harris with Donald Trump, was another. He had also suggested that he was the first Black Woman to serve with a Black President!! So it's pretty obvious that Joe is suffering from some sort of senile decay, but at least most of the time he's got his wits about him, whereas his opponent is just a dumb, lying, cheating conman with more than a dozen failed businesses to his name, and I do recall how several "captains of industry" who met with him at the White House, came away from that meeting commenting that, "the man is plain dumb", "he doesn't know what he's talking about" and so on, and they were his backers! Step down Joe and let someone else take over the reins, because the last thing the world needs is the dumb orange clown at the helm of what should be the greatest nation in the world.

LOL. Too much Kool Aid consumed on the way down the rabbit hole!! A book that trump didn't write, and according to sources, probably never even read and much more about trumps poor command of language and grammar can be found regarding this..... Schwartz (the writer) later admitted that his motivation was purely financial. He needed the money to support his new family. According to Schwartz in July 2016, Trump did not write any of the book, choosing only to remove a few critical mentions of business colleagues at the end of the process. His singular skill is convincing people that what they are observing with their own eyes isn’t true. We’ve seen that vividly around his decades-long claims of success as a business executive despite his myriad failures and then, as president, in his insistence that we’re “rounding the corner” as coronavirus cases soar and his false proclamations of innocence as he was impeached.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump:_The_Art_of_the_Deal

Wonderful......thank you for the links and many thanks to @pauku1 for the spreadsheet and info.

I may have mentioned this before but I have just watched, IMO, a very good movie on iPlayer, called "Mr Jones" and it is very pertinent with what is happening with regard to Russia's war against Ukraine right now. Well worth seeking out as it is a cut above some of the other rubbish out at the moment.