siftasam

My Maths. are terrible.

Had he been to Hooters? If so, if he came back with three Hooters and each Hooter had two hooters, how many hooters is that altogether?

Enough? More than enough?

I think we'll find there were 3.

Shane believed in the power of three (and in multiples of 3 , the 'lucky' so-and-so!). 3 children, 3000 Test runs, highest Test score of 99, Test hat-trick at the MCG.

He turned up at Uxbridge (of all places!) for a Hampshire match in Playboy pants and with 3 pretty dollies in attendance.

Chest pains? With 3 little spinners ('Leggie', 'Topper' and 'Flipper')? - 2 on top and going for a hat trick?

He'd need more than Vegemite on toast to tackle that.

"Unhealthy food, dangers of beer and smoking, bad liquid diet"?

Wherever Warnie is now (and I hope he's not where he's really going to need lip zinc!), he'll be laughing his socks off at what's been said, I suspect.

Thanks for all the memories, cobber. If I had a Green Baggy, I would doff it, Shane.

Pretty good, but the PG Tips Extra Strong from M and S at Central Festival better, I think.

Can taste rank if left to brew for too long though.  About 3 minutes is usually fine for me.

The tea I want to find is Lapsang Souchong. Tried to get here for years (could buy in England). No luck, but now I see Lazada has some. Got that distinctive Capstan Full Strength aroma, do I remember?

I haven't read a newspaper or a magazine for 40 years. I don't feel I've missed anything. The standard of journalism is usually deplorable. Rubbish concocted by mostly Grub Street hacks desperate to earn a few bob. Gossip, scandal, celebrity rubbish.

I'm even cutting down on YouTube every day because of all the ridiculous self-aggrandizing, falsified or plagiarized posts. More and more nutters crawling out of the woodwork every day, particularly it seems from the USA.

I see no reason to trust anything much I see or hear. 'There's no news like bad news' is the mantra. I have long thought that the BBC is a disgrace, gutless, and, at times, an evil institution. The BBC World Service is absurd - smarm, shiny suits, expensive frocks (presumably what their oft quoted Sony awards were presented for). Poor reporting not remotely on a par with the best of Kate Adie, John Simpson and the Man in the White Suit. Debase the educational system and this is what you get.

I do glance through the headlines on the internet and I'm sorry to say that I do look at BBC Sport website every day. More rubbish usually, but it varies. Some soccer and rugby reports are good but sports in which the British can do quite well are virtually ignored, e.g. badminton.

I do respect and generally trust Wikipedia, though!

After 12 years with none on the horizon, there's a Typhoo blowing in at Rimping. An Extra Strong one too.

The video of Nigel Kennedy (oops, sorry, 'Kennedy') reminds me of standing in a long 'Control/Hand Baggage' queue at Gatwick about 20 years ago.

There was a shorter, presumably 'Priority' queue. two rows away.

Nigel Kennedy approached the Control man with one piece of hand baggage and his violin case.

I kid you not - the man looked Nigel up and down, clearly regarded the assorted pins and piercings in his face with distaste and suspicion, (or was it his Aston Villa scarf he objected to?) pointed to the violin case and said (Yes, you've guessed it!): "What have you got in there?"

I've never been a great Kennedy fan, but Nigel much endeared himself to me that day. He looked at the guy, gave him a great grin, his shoulders shaking, and said: "It's me fiddle, mate."

The guy told him to open the case. "Me fiddle," Nigel repeated laughing. "It's me livin', mate."

Just then a very anxious young lady airport official rushed up and saved the Control man from further embarrassment and shame.

Delighted  for  her. 

She deserves to break into the Main Tour. She's proved that she's got  courage. She's not yellow (like some on the Tour!).  She's made all the other lady players green with envy. I bet they're really browned off

Stay smiley, Mink, don't ever get blue. Remember the money you'll be able to pocket.  Take a cue from Ronnie O'Sullivan.

Go for the max. Keep chalking up the victories.

I take it as red that you'll  do well.  Take a rest before you pack for the Tour.

Maybe we'll soon see you playing Jimmy White on Pot Black!

I ''ve just acquired a couple of ex-sniffer dogs from Suvarnabhumi.

I was told they were no good now for that  type of  work. They were falling down on the job.

How beautiful! Marianela even better than Darcey Bussell?

Darcey in her famous 'Elite Syncopations' dance - live on YouTube. Wow! Divine dancing and very sexy! Lovely Scott Joplin music.

A few more LIVE 'gems':

Handel 'Ombra Mai <deleted>' - Sung variously by Andreas Scholl (counter tenor), Dimitri Hvorostovsky (the opposite), and Gigli (in the middle - in 1933!)

Grieg 'Wedding Day At Troldhaugen' - Tiffany (Thailand's own - why not?)

Liszt 'La Campanella' - Evgeny Kissin

Mendelssohn 'Violin Concerto' - Ray Chen with the Gothenburg Symphony

Mozart 'Papageno, Papagena' (from 'The Magic Flute') - one by Simon Keenlyside and one by Roderick Williams

Puccini 'Vissi d'arte' (from 'Tosca') - Maria Callas 1964

Ravel 'Bolero' - Dudamel and the Vienna Philharmonic

Rodrigo 'Concierto de Aranjuez' and 'Fantasia Para Un Gentilhombre' - Pablo Sainz Villegas'

Rossini 'The Thieving Magpie' Overture - Dudamel and the Vienna Philharmonic

Schubert 'Standchen' - Marcin Dylla (guitar)

Sibelius 'Finlandia' - Jukka Pakka Sarastre with the Finnish Radio Symphony

plus:

A wonderful full performance of Tchaikovsky's ballet 'The Nutcracker' by the Mariinsky Theatre 2012

The famous  'Tosca' (only part) 1964 - Maria Callas and' the evil' Tito Gobbi (English subtitles)

A surprisingly good outdoor complete 'Carmen' by Bizet - Opernfestspiele Sankt Margarethen 2005

and, lastly, as a 75 year old, I love a leading  tenor of a bygone age Giacomo Lauri Volpi singing in Barcelona at the age of 80 'Nessun Dorma'. He  had not sung in public for about 13 years and nothing could deflect him from singing 'Nessun Dorma' - and why not?

I became a 'born again' classical fan from looking at YouTube: the Dave Hurwitz videos leading me on. These are a few of the LIVE videos on YouTube that I much enjoy:

The wonderful acoustic guitar videos produced by Siccas Guitars  - Ana Vidovic, Alexandra Whittingham etc.

JS Bach 'Ebarme Dich' - Lisa Batiashvili - magical

JS Bach Piano concerto no. 1 - Polina Osetinskaya

Beethoven Symphony 9 - Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra

Beethoven Violin Concerto - Maxim Vengerov with the Poznan Philharmonia

Bernstein 'Candide' overture - Gustavo Dudamel with Vienna Philharmonic

Debussy 'The Girl With The Flaxen Hair' - Michelangeli

Elgar 'Nimrod' - Jonathan Scott (pipe organ)

Faure 'Pavane' - 12 Cellists of the Berlin Symphony

Gershwin 'An American In Paris' - Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic

Handel 'Fireworks Music' 2012 Proms - Herve Niquet and Le Concert Spirituel ('Water Music' fine too)

Victornoir: we're straying off the classical subject, but, yes, wonderful Miles - before all the 'fusion junk'. (His Carnegie Hall performance 1961 I treasure. You know the great Miles discs of that period)

Of course, he didn't want to play the same music and in the same way that he'd played for so long before, but it's still junk.)

Had Clifford Brown not been killed in a car accident in 1956, he would have been a greater trumpeter and composer than Miles. Perhaps Fats Navarro and Lee Morgan too, both dying very young.

Talking of that, have you heard Roy Hargrove (dead at age 49) playing live on YouTube "I Remember Clifford'? Blissful.

Thankfully I missed it too.

I hope I'm wrong but I've not heard of Lawn Bowls being played now in Chiang Mai since the worst days of Covid.

Does anyone know where I can obtain a set or sets of decent lawn bowls please?

Many thanks, Mahseer. Yes, I have a 10 year one.

(TheHammer - I know what you mean,  but I didn't want the bother (and the expense!) of paying a solicitor (?) for certifying each page of a 'full' passport I've had for 9 and a half years. 'Each  page must display the phrase: "this document is a true, authentic and complete copy/original document." Bureaucracy gone mad  again?)

Sounds familiar?

I am endeavouring to 'open' my existing account with Bristol based Hargreaves Lansdown. I rarely looked at it and I lost the password (when my gf blew up my mobile!).  

I was sent the usual 'money laundering guff' letter requiring me to send certified copies of 'two separate documents' ('separate'?) from 'List A' or one from 'List A' and one from 'List B' . They must show my full name and at least one must show my date of birth and current address in Thailand.

I can comply - with a recent Teachers' Pensions statement. But I have only one further option. A copy of my 'Current signed FULL Passport'. BUT what is a FULL Passport? The photo and personal info page at the front or the whole blessed thing?

Sorry to say that I have absolutely no idea what is going on with vaccine.

I am a UK citizen aged 75 who has lived in Lamphun for 13 years.  I am recovering from a blood clot in my leg and I have an operation coming up soon at BKK hospital in Chiang Mai to remove my gallbladder.

I'd like Moderna but I have not registered anywhere since scribbling my name on a list at BKK hospital in Chiang Mai 6 months ago. This has proved, of course, a waste of time.

Neither the BKK hospital in Chiang Mai not the Parc Hospital in Lamphun has shown any interest in me and provided no helpful information. The Lamphun hospital has not even agreed to place me on their patient list. What do I do? Where can I profitably register?

I am a patient at BKK but will they refuse me vaccine because I live in Lamphun?

Do I refuse my gallbladder operation at BKK and deprive them (temporarily at least) of my 300,000 baht until they vaccinate me with Moderna?

The 'Scala'!

What memories of the 'Scala' cinema in Walton Street, Oxford. Some of the best years of my life were spent there. Anybody else remember?

And no! Watching movies at home can never be like watching movies in a real cinema - real, not these boring modern multiplexes, of course. Boring cinemas showing boring movies.

The first movies I saw were with Dad - great double bill of 'Lives of a Bengal Lancer' and 'Gunga Din' at the Theatre - and then we saw 'High Noon' at the Palace - and "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes' at the Ritz (no idea why he wanted to see that! He probably told Mum he was taking me to a cowboy movie!)

Bag of hot cashew nuts from Woolies. a Kia-Ora orange drink, and a strawberry Mivvi - heaven! Three cinemas in a town that now has none.

The Philistines! Good God, have they never heard of Bingo?

(I lived near Bourne in Lincolnshire. It had a lovely small cinema tucked away in an alley. I went to see 'Rainbow Man' but all the seats had been sold -  so they brought out for me a lovely armchair and sat me in the side aisle. No extra charge of course. Those were the days of kind, generous and gracious living, my friends.)

'I do my star gazing on Loy Kroh rd'

I've seen the dark backside of the moon there a few times.   And what look strangely like tattoos. A lot of unexplained phenomena in Loy Kroh. Better viewed from afar with a telescope my doctor advises.

Khaomao-Khaofang Imaginary Jungle Restaurant is fantastic. Off the Hang-Dong to Airport road. Ratchapruek Road, Nong Kai, Hang Dong.       0636655838

You MUST book ahead for a fixed time (and turn up at that time!)

So beautiful (including the toilets!)  Great internet photos.

And buy what we call in Northamptonshire a couple of 'bluddy grut dugs'? Scare the ### out of anybody who goes near. Put the kennel as near as possible to the bloody place. They won't like the noise either and neither will the customers like theirs!