Uninteresting Trivial Facts

[C H Calthrop]

The likelihood of going 10 meals in Victorian England without some form of crippling bowel contortions was virtually non existent.

Edited August 9, 2015 by C H Calthrop

[JohnG69]

The Daily Mail vocabulary contains 3 words "ample", "assets" and "cleavage"

[Futtocks]

The Daily Mail vocabulary contains 3 words "ample", "assets" and "cleavage"

Plus three more words: "all", "grown" and "up".

[Wolford6]

Plus three more: "cellulite", "loony" and "love-rat".

[Griff9of13]

Tomorrow I'm off for my annual trip to the Great British Beer Festival at London's Olympia.  

[ckn]

The Mirror's website tag is "The Intelligent Tabloid".

[tonyXIII]

The Mirror's website tag is "The Intelligent Tabloid".

 

As in T.I.T.?

 

Sorry.

[Tiny Tim]

Big storm outside. Lots of rain.

[Wolford6]

Big storm outside. Lots of rain.

 

 

Any excuse:

[ckn]

When I got home tonight I discovered that we had a maggot problem in our back garden near our bin.  By "problem" I mean it was like a horror story with swarming maggots.  I'm a relatively robust ex-squaddie with few fears in the world but maggots make me really unhappy.  Genuinely no idea what got them, maybe a gap in the bin lid two days before our fortnightly black bin collection after a scorchingly hot weekend.  About 20 boiling kettles of water killing them then I checked the bin.  My maggot-rage was high by this time so I decided to escalate to chemical warfare and bleach the bin with a bit of boiling water to get fumes going.  After doing this with a smug grin, I quickly lost the grin when I remembered I put a full tray of used cat litter in the bin earlier today, all cat pee ammonia'd up, probably unintentionally creating something more dangerous than I planned.  So... step back, make sure there was nothing seriously hazardous and monitor up-wind from the bin.

 

Ah well... all's well that ends well, it's a maggot graveyard out there now, I'll blast them clear with the hose in the morning.

 

In fact, it's not all well, psychologically I'm itchy all over thinking the little blighters are crawling over me.  Good luck with me falling asleep tonight.

[ckn]

Nope, given up.  I have a decent sized glass of whisky now.

[ckn]

I think I may get a good bit of reading done tonight.

[hindle xiii]

I think I may get a good bit of reading done tonight.

Lord of the Flies?

[Old Frightful]

When I got home tonight I discovered that we had a maggot problem in our back garden near our bin.  By "problem" I mean it was like a horror story with swarming maggots. 

This happened to us the other week. I couldn't believe how many maggots were in our brown "green" recycling bin, esp as it's collected every two weeks. Out came the bleach and in the bin it went. The next thing was a mass exodus of maggots from the bin falling onto the drive and road. Feeling fairly embarrassed about it I poured some more bleach all the way round the top of the inside of the bin to stop them climbing up. The stomach churning stench was horrendous.

 

After there was seemingly no life left in there, I did a major grass cut, emptied half the cuttings into another brown bin, tipped the maggot soup bin on top of the first lot of grass cuttings, then dumped the final amount of grass on the top of it all.

 

It didn't stop me retching but seemed to cut down the stench and the recycling lorry took it all away a few days later.

 

Apparently, to stop any maggot infestations occurring in your food waste bin, you can buy degradable paper bags to but the food in first before it goes in the bin. This begs the question, how far do you go to be an upstanding recycling citizen, when plenty of folk still chuck cans and bottles in the regular none recycling bin?

[Farmduck]

As someone who had ducks, chooks, geese, turkeys, cats and dogs for the last 20 years, I can't remember the last time I had any putrescible waste. Maggots? Wait till one of the neighbour's cows drops dead in your back paddock.

[Wolford6]

The most disgusting thing I have ever smelled was maggot farm waste. It didn't look too clever, either.

[Wolford6]

The historic slave trade: This is morbidly fascinating.

 

'Of the more than 10 million enslaved Africans to eventually reach the Western Hemisphere, just 388,747—less than 4 percent of the total—came to North America. This was dwarfed by the 1.3 million brought to Spanish Central America, the 4 million brought to British, French, Dutch, and Danish holdings in the Caribbean, and the 4.8 million brought to Brazil.'

 

 

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_history_of_american_slavery/2015/06/animated_interactive_of_the_history_of_the_atlantic_slave_trade.html

[ckn]

This happened to us the other week. I couldn't believe how many maggots were in our brown "green" recycling bin, esp as it's collected every two weeks. Out came the bleach and in the bin it went. The next thing was a mass exodus of maggots from the bin falling onto the drive and road. Feeling fairly embarrassed about it I poured some more bleach all the way round the top of the inside of the bin to stop them climbing up. The stomach churning stench was horrendous.

 

After there was seemingly no life left in there, I did a major grass cut, emptied half the cuttings into another brown bin, tipped the maggot soup bin on top of the first lot of grass cuttings, then dumped the final amount of grass on the top of it all.

 

It didn't stop me retching but seemed to cut down the stench and the recycling lorry took it all away a few days later.

 

Apparently, to stop any maggot infestations occurring in your food waste bin, you can buy degradable paper bags to but the food in first before it goes in the bin. This begs the question, how far do you go to be an upstanding recycling citizen, when plenty of folk still chuck cans and bottles in the regular none recycling bin?

On the last point, our council doesn't collect bottles as part of recycling and the nearest bottle bank is a privately owned for-profit one on the Tesco car park.  Apparently too many broken bottles in the recycling pile has made it dangerous for the recycling staff. It does annoy me that I have to go out of my way to recycle bottles just so someone else can make a profit.  The council shut down half of the council waste and recycling yards meaning ours is a long way away and has long queues to get in. 

 

We regularly put out our blue recycling bin full to the limits, inc crushed down boxes and plastic bottles but we have some neighbours who seem to skip recycling bin weeks.  Do they not recycle or are they just more efficient?

 

My elderly neighbour's view is that she's paid for the goods so why should she go to the effort of making them fit to recycle?  Her view is that if they want her to recycle then she should see something from it, the example she uses is glass bottles where she thinks there should be a price levy on each bottle that the customer can reclaim by returning cleaned ones to certain stores.

[ckn]

Lord of the Flies?

No, but I did have a dream about a maggoty version of Aliens with them swarming my autoguns and closing in on our position in an unstoppable swarm.  I think the facehugger maggot will really become part of a long-term issue for me when I see a maggot now

[Farmduck]

The historic slave trade: This is morbidly fascinating.

 

'Of the more than 10 million enslaved Africans to eventually reach the Western Hemisphere, just 388,747—less than 4 percent of the total—came to North America. This was dwarfed by the 1.3 million brought to Spanish Central America, the 4 million brought to British, French, Dutch, and Danish holdings in the Caribbean, and the 4.8 million brought to Brazil.'

 

 

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_history_of_american_slavery/2015/06/animated_interactive_of_the_history_of_the_atlantic_slave_trade.html

 

In the USA there has been a push in some school districts to drop the term "slave trade" and replace it with "triangular trade." The boats sailed from Europe to Africa to load slaves then to the Americas to unload slaves then load tobacco and sugar then back to Europe, hence, a triangle.

[Wolford6]

In theory:

Recycling is a financial con on the respectable public. People spend at least £1 on petrol and spend an hour to load and deliver recyclable waste with a value of  50p to a household waste site. Then they see disrespectable traders dumping commercial waste in the skips to avoid paying the correct disposal fee.

 

In practice:

Most of those members of the respectable public, particularly the retirees, actually love going there. It gives them a feeling of being a good citizen and is something of a social outing. They all talk among themselves about the dodgy traders and meet up with people they haven't seen for yonks.

[Tiny Tim]

Yesterday I got a letter from HMRC telling me I had paid too much tax and a second letter with a refund cheque.

 

Today I get a third letter from HMRC telling me I owe them tax as I have not paid enough. This letter was dated 27th July.

 

The amount they think I owe is a hell of a lot more than the refund cheque.

 

Now on hold hoping to speak with someone at HMRC who can explain what the hell is going on....26 mins and still waiting.....

[ckn]

Yesterday I got a letter from HMRC telling me I had paid too much tax and a second letter with a refund cheque.

 

Today I get a third letter from HMRC telling me I owe them tax as I have not paid enough. This letter was dated 27th July.

 

The amount they think I owe is a hell of a lot more than the refund cheque.

 

Now on hold hoping to speak with someone at HMRC who can explain what the hell is going on....26 mins and still waiting.....

Be very, very careful what you tell them.  Stick to hard facts.  P60, P11D, their letters, etc.  Volunteer nothing beyond that as anything will give them the opportunity for a fishing expedition if there's anything they don't like.

 

Be also careful that the lovely current government has introduced the rule that you can be given a demand to pay any outstanding tax before you get a chance to appeal, if you win then you get a refund.  Even if it's a clear mistake, they'll take the tax and tell you to claim it back by appeal.

[Tiny Tim]

Be very, very careful what you tell them.  Stick to hard facts.  P60, P11D, their letters, etc.  Volunteer nothing beyond that as anything will give them the opportunity for a fishing expedition if there's anything they don't like.

 

Be also careful that the lovely current government has introduced the rule that you can be given a demand to pay any outstanding tax before you get a chance to appeal, if you win then you get a refund.  Even if it's a clear mistake, they'll take the tax and tell you to claim it back by appeal.

I will if I ever get to speak with someone.

 

I am on PAYE (and always have been) so not sure where all this unpaid tax could suddenly have come from.

 

They want to change my tax code to recover what they think is owed but it's not exactly a small amount.

 

Earlier this year they did write to me telling me that as they expected my income to exceed £120,000 and that I would receive no personal allowance.....which was something of a surprise unless they are expecting me to get a enormous pay rise that I know nothing about.... I did call them then and they corrected my tax code.

 

45 mins...and still on hold

[ckn]

I will if I ever get to speak with someone.

 

I am on PAYE (and always have been) so not sure where all this unpaid tax could suddenly have come from.

 

They want to change my tax code to recover what they think is owed but it's not exactly a small amount.

 

Earlier this year they did write to me telling me that as they expected my income to exceed £120,000 and that I would receive no personal allowance.....which was something of a surprise unless they are expecting me to get a enormous pay rise that I know nothing about.... I did call them then and they corrected my tax code.

 

45 mins...and still on hold

Be aware that there is a known thing around multiple use of NI numbers that triggers this type of thing.  You might have one someone using your NI number for an identity fraud thingy.  Most likely not but bear it in mind.