En Passant

70 days later why am I reading this shit? SC You tell us. It is after all even titled the biggest deaths of 2014. N,B. On top of which you have now merely added to the new posts in it, causing those who use unread posts as a guide (as perhaps you do) to revisit it yet again. Ofc the same could be levelled at me now, but mine is is a humourous dig at you and worth a read

To be fair that seemed like quite a consensus view. He didn't make the DDP drop forty. If they had been fair to me they'd have read my fucking suggestions. What are you doing up at this hour anyway dad? He's not necessarily the only one, young whippersnapper-me-laddo.

Having previously worked in the computer department of a national news organisation (we all need money sadly), I can confirm your feeling is not without some foundation.

Hasn't the Eurovision Song Contest become a parody of itself these days? A parody of itself? Maybe that's a bit too strong. But nowadays, the winners would rarely embark on a huge international career in the music industry, like ABBA had done in the heyday of the contest. And yeah, it's not a song contest in the strictest sense, the quality of the music might be of secondary importance, being "interesting" and "different" should be the key to a winning entry. You could list quite a few weird winners from the last decades, like transsexual Dana International in '98, hard rock/heavy metal band Lordi in 2006 and bearded lady Conchita Wurst last year. Electro Velvet might get some points for its novelty value (strange genre: electric swing) and Bianca has an interesting background story with her cystic fibrosis, but I doubt that these will be enough for a podium. On a positive note, they can't do much worse than Jemini... It's been at least 30 years since I last watched it, Probably around the time Bucks Fizz won. All kinds of everything in it, I can't decide if the daftest song title that ever won it is ding-ding-a-dong or diggi-loo diggi-ley, I'm still having trouble making my mind up, its my personal waterloo, still whats another year?

Don't get it either. You don't even have to know or do the maths, it only takes the thought "I wonder if they invested all this money in high street shops so they could give even more money away?". If you cannot answer that one you probably deserve to go broke.

This. So Chris.

Only one I can recall or most folks that I know of. And I checked, it's interesting, wiki describes a few as making some mark on the charts indeed, but, only that one went platinum, and the next best only made silver, rest nowhere. It may be a peculiarity of the way the charts worked that some songs made it higher on less sales that week or something. I'm not into arguing, its a waste of time, so you call it as you see it and I'll do the same. Will it enter any book as a one hit wonder? Probably not, but she isn't ever going to be a multi hit artist in the UK to me, or plenty of others.

Ok, not quite a 1-hit wonder in the accepted sense of absolutely nothing else. A couple of her other singles made a few ripples but nothing of the order of "That don't impress me much" which went platinum, after that, she didn't much impress us either.

See? The Dutch and their speed skating? Mind you, All the way round the world seems a bit of an endurance test to me, even for the dedicated and it must be expensive refrigerating the equatorial bits.... Oh, is that the time? Got to go.

I'm still feeling somewhat jaded after getting all excited after seeing Bauhaus when they reunited after 15 years, they then spent the next 8 years working on a new album which was mediocre at best and them promptly split up again. Although I doubt they'll get back together again as no-one gets along with Peter Murphy these days. What is it with creative types? Musicians especially. Buggers are always falling out with each other. Must be the way the synapses are linked together, along with the talent goes a propensity for being a prima donna or an arsehole or both.

Well, lets put it this way, neither Kiss nor Shania are really my thing so I don't much care what they get up to. I just smashed her UK one hit wonder into a somewhat relevant sentence and pushed it out there. That said, the sentence does also reflect my somewhat suspicious and cynical outlook and you've summed that up nicely.

No, but check closely, my English may not be journalistic standard but I probably wouldn't use the word don't where it should be doesn't without a reason

This retirement only to re-invent oneself later for increased publicity don't impress me much.

Sorry but how does one unsuccessfully shoot themselves in the head? Either they hit the target or they didn't. SC He shot himself in the head but didn't inflict a fatal wound. It's fairly simple to deduce. that's what he meant but didn't say On a point of pedantry he was successful in shooting himself in the head. I have to go with SC on this one. Did I just say that? Clearly it was a fair ribbing but I am enjoying ferreting out those who have OCPD around here. SC Oklahoma City Police Department? I thought it was what Nimoy died from. No, it was a certain Terence Walker. Nimoy was a pale dyslexic shadow of it.

Well, I learned one thing today:- I probably shan't be using the "shocked" smiley again. One off isn't so bad, but quoted a few times and it starts to get annoying. How far off topic can I go? Just watch me.

Not a survivor any more then.

Helicopters, now that's a forced landing when the engine quits . Contrary to what some believe and also perhaps seems intuitive they can keep flying after a fashion with no power by doing something called auto-rotation, but the glide ratio is a touch steep, somewhere around 4:1, that said you don't exactly need a long strip of flat ground either so perhaps it's swings and roundabouts. Not something I fancy a go at mind you.

Practice Force Landing is something you do rather a lot of when learning to fly. In theory at any rate you can put a small Cessna 152 (What I learnt in many years ago) or something similar into a field and walk away. How true that turns out to be in practice may well be another matter, spotting what looks like a smooth field from 3000ft agl or so isn't a cakewalk and there's electric wires and other things to consider, but it can be and is done if not routinely, not that rarely either. It's a far different story in something the size of a commercial jet, although perhaps surprisingly (or maybe not) that has also been done, see this (I remember the levee one from the examples at the bottom). Edit since phantom posted at the same time nearly: I suffer badly from 'vertigo' as well, but as best I can make out it's not terribly rational (beyond the obvious), I have had terrible vertigo in the Eiffel Tower and similar structures, and even at ground level in a tall building with a high atrium whilst looking up.. But never, ever in a plane. Can't really explain why, just is. Make of that what you will.

I hate the acronym / phrase lol (candidate for room 101), people use it as punctuation now. However... Lol.

Fairs fair, <hoary old maxim> even a stopped clock is right twice a day</>. Incidentally there are is almost a club of people shot in the head but survived the 'experience'. From spurned husbands/wives to victims of crime or police shootings. A short search will reveal as much.

The writer of which has also co-authored a book which is well worth a read for those interested in the statistics of life and death.

When did you get jiggy with Deathray the first time? Looking for that duck.gif now, ah there it is.

And from a link on the same page. Some new 'Farrari', I'm kidding right? A national newspaper? That spelling? No, I'm not. They get it right lower down the page, but I didn't read the whole thing so perhaps it's supposed to be misspelled and it's explained later, but I was already bored of it:- Sit in the same traffic in your 1/4 million Farrari as I do in my Foard shitbox. Edited to add:- Perhaps unsurprisingly, by this morning they had fixed it.

Damn, cause I thought for a minute I'd been on the same forum as a guest who went out with somebody so famous I'd nearly heard of them. I'm crushed now.

The T.T. looks like its a piece of film that's been speeded up to me when you see the parts in town and near walls. I'm nowhere near qualified to know about the outright talent v. moto gp but the sheer size of the balls required to ride that course at those speeds means they must be hidden in a special receptacle in the seat somewhere. Offhand I can only think of perhaps base jumping as a faster way to meet your maker due to participation in a 'sport'.