General Chit Chat

[Montreal Wanderer]

Weird coincidence. I'm flying to Philadelphia this weekend (before spending M-F in Allentown for work) so will hopefully be watching England's opening Euro 2016 game in a bar there. The last time I was in Philly was June 2012 where I watched England's opening Euro 2012 game against France. Bet your house on a 1-1 draw.

Pittsburg may be the place to be these days.

[clapton is god]

Just had my second call of the morning from scammers from India claiming to be from 'the Technical Department at BT' and wanting to protect me from hackers who had access to my computer. I managed to string this one along for almost 15 minutes before he accused me of playing smarts with him and hung up. Does this make me a bad person?

[Bruce Rioja]

Just had my second call of the morning from scammers from India claiming to be from 'the Technical Department at BT' and wanting to protect me from hackers who had access to my computer. I managed to string this one along for almost 15 minutes before he accused me of playing smarts with him and hung up. Does this make me a bad person?

Absolutely not

Can you flesh it out a bit for us please, Clapton?

[Worthy4England]

^^ I think you have to get to at least 45 minutes and get called a jackal and a hyena to approach "bad person"

[clapton is god]

Just had my second call of the morning from scammers from India claiming to be from 'the Technical Department at BT' and wanting to protect me from hackers who had access to my computer. I managed to string this one along for almost 15 minutes before he accused me of playing smarts with him and hung up. Does this make me a bad person?

Absolutely not

Can you flesh it out a bit for us please, Clapton?

He started by telling me his name, Ricky Smith, and giving his BT security number, which he proclaimed made him obviously genuine as no scammer would give such details. He then gave me my 'computer registration code' which stretched to about 20 digits but was flummoxed when I asked who it was registered with. I remember telling him I was 94 at one point to keep him interested. He was manoeuvring me into putting code into my putter when I picked him up on his phonetic code. He had every letter correct except, ironically, I for India but he said 'indigo'. Not long after that he became slightly aggressive with me, giving me a mild telling off for giving smarts when he was helping me. He threatened to cut my internet off inside 15 minutes if I didn't take him seriously. He invited me to check his credentials with BT so I said 'righto, I'll do that now,' and left him hanging. He'd hung up when I picked up again.

[Bruce Rioja]

Splendid work, Sir.

[Bruce Rioja]

Isn't it pretty amazing how looking for summat on the internet sends you off at various tangents so that you end up reading something completely different that completely grips your interest? Such a thing has just happened and I ended up reading up on a singer who went by the name of Johnny Kidd, of Johnny Kidd and The Pirates (apparently Kidd needlessly wore an eye patch) , a band that I'd never heard of, or at least I didn't think I had. The were responsible for not only 'Shakin' All Over' (Number 1 and still trotted out to this day) but also 'Please Don't Touch' which I honestly thought was a Motorhead and Girlschool original.
Seemingly Kidd was one of Britain's biggest international singing stars before the likes of The Beatles pitched up, the band even played the Bolton Odeon and it didn't get much bigger than that .
Seemingly though it was the arrival of the likes of The Beatles, Stones, Who? etc that signaled the end of the limelight years and Kidd ended up on the chicken-in-a-basket circuit. But now here's thee thing. It was whilst he was on his way to play a cabaret gig at the Nevada in 1966 that he was killed in a head-on-smash on Bury New Road near The Three Arrows. Now, I'm not saying that there should be a statue there or owt, but is this event really such uncommon knowledge amongst our townsfolk, or is it simply me?

Tango, et al, what are your memories of this?

[TANGODANCER]

Isn't it pretty amazing how looking for summat on the internet sends you off at various tangents so that you end up reading something completely different that completely grips your interest? Such a thing has just happened and I ended up reading up on a singer who went by the name of Johnny Kidd, of Johnny Kidd and The Pirates (apparently Kidd needlessly wore an eye patch) , a band that I'd never heard of, or at least I didn't think I had. The were responsible for not only 'Shakin' All Over' (Number 1 and still trotted out to this day) but also 'Please Don't Touch' which I honestly thought was a Motorhead and Girlschool original.
Seemingly Kidd was one of Britain's biggest international singing stars before the likes of The Beatles pitched up, the band even played the Bolton Odeon and it didn't get much bigger than that .
Seemingly though it was the arrival of the likes of The Beatles, Stones, Who? etc that signaled the end of the limelight years and Kidd ended up on the chicken-in-a-basket circuit. But now here's thee thing. It was whilst he was on his way to play a cabaret gig at the Nevada in 1966 that he was killed in a head-on-smash on Bury New Road near The Three Arrows. Now, I'm not saying that there should be a statue there or owt, but is this event really such uncommon knowledge amongst our townsfolk, or is it simply me?

Tango, et al, what are your memories of this?

Yes, I remember Johnny Kidd and the Pirates very well( and saw them two or three times, one was Talk of the North I think, when places like that, Crompton Way Casino, Navada etc, had all the live groups regularly. "Hungry for Love" which was a Searchers hit, was one I remember the Pirates for. And yes, I rememeber the shock when the news went out that J.K had been killed in a crash locally. There's a site called Lanky Beat that has the history of those times.

http://www.lankybeat.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Hoboh]

And this years Gerald Ratner award goes to

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... irm-tweets" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[thebish]

And this years Gerald Ratner award goes to

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... irm-tweets" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

what a dick.

[malcd1]

And this years Gerald Ratner award goes to

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... irm-tweets" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Classless pricks.

[Bruce Rioja]

And this years Gerald Ratner award goes to

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... irm-tweets" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Does it not go to Cristiano Ronaldo, the classless c*nt?

[TANGODANCER]

And this years Gerald Ratner award goes to

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... irm-tweets" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Does it not go to Cristiano Ronaldo, the classless c*nt?

Nah, he's already got a lifetime version.

[thebish]

To put a different side of Ronaldo...

there's a statue of ronaldo in Funchal, Madeira - it looks NOTHING like him - not even close. The town got Ronaldo to pay for it - and then asked him to unveil it...

someone I spoke to who was there at the unveiling said that despite the totally obvious fact that this statue looked nothing like him - he was the perfect gent - saying that he loved it and it was an honour - even though he'd been fleeced out of thousands of quid for a deformed and stunted monstrosity!

still - he's a knob! (but not irredeemable!)

[Bruce Rioja]

To put a different side of Ronaldo...

there's a statue of ronaldo in Funchal, Madeira - it looks NOTHING like him - not even close. The town got Ronaldo to pay for it - and then asked him to unveil it...

someone I spoke to who was there at the unveiling said that despite the totally obvious fact that this statue looked nothing like him - he was the perfect gent - saying that he loved it and it was an honour - even though he'd been fleeced out of thousands of quid for a deformed and stunted monstrosity!

still - he's a knob! (but not irredeemable!)

It's worse than the one of Fred Dibnah.

[LeverEnd]

To put a different side of Ronaldo...

there's a statue of ronaldo in Funchal, Madeira - it looks NOTHING like him - not even close. The town got Ronaldo to pay for it - and then asked him to unveil it...

someone I spoke to who was there at the unveiling said that despite the totally obvious fact that this statue looked nothing like him - he was the perfect gent - saying that he loved it and it was an honour - even though he'd been fleeced out of thousands of quid for a deformed and stunted monstrosity!

still - he's a knob! (but not irredeemable!)

It's worse than the one of Fred Dibnah.

Or Ted Bates.

Oh and bish, have a day off and stop being so bloody forgiving. It's allowed!

[thebish]

Oh and bish, have a day off and stop being so bloody forgiving. It's allowed!

I forgive you.

[Bruce Rioja]

We should have a 'be nice' day. Here, I'll get the ball rolling;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-36532687" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[TANGODANCER]

To put a different side of Ronaldo...

there's a statue of ronaldo in Funchal, Madeira - it looks NOTHING like him - not even close. The town got Ronaldo to pay for it - and then asked him to unveil it...

someone I spoke to who was there at the unveiling said that despite the totally obvious fact that this statue looked nothing like him - he was the perfect gent - saying that he loved it and it was an honour - even though he'd been fleeced out of thousands of quid for a deformed and stunted monstrosity!

still - he's a knob! (but not irredeemable!)

He's probably got much better ones in his garden...

[Bruce Rioja]

To put a different side of Ronaldo...

there's a statue of ronaldo in Funchal, Madeira - it looks NOTHING like him - not even close. The town got Ronaldo to pay for it - and then asked him to unveil it...

someone I spoke to who was there at the unveiling said that despite the totally obvious fact that this statue looked nothing like him - he was the perfect gent - saying that he loved it and it was an honour - even though he'd been fleeced out of thousands of quid for a deformed and stunted monstrosity!

still - he's a knob! (but not irredeemable!)

The sculptor appears to have given him little more that a button mushroom by way of a todger too.