THE FLATLEY DRYER

[Stanley]

David, we didn't have that pleasure. The early fridge we got was more a chiller, it wouldn't freeze Ice lollies...
I like that idea for making Applejack. I've had it in the States and liked it. I wonder whether it was made that way or by distilling like Calvados.... (I like that too!)
Tiz's experiment with the home made wine reminds me of when me and my mate made soap. We left it to dry on a painted window cill in the outside toilet and it took the paint off so we decided not to use it.....
I've told you before about putting the Sodium balls down the grid in the school playground at night, very impressive! My mate Dennis Robinson's father worked on the railway as a plate layer and Dennis got hold of a couple of fog signals. They were copper discs with a clip to fasten them to the line. I suppose they were filled with Fulminate. We put them on the railway line and they worked like a charm, two sharp cracks and the passenger train stopped immediately, it was only going slowly. I can't tell you what transpired, we ran like hell!

[Tizer]

Tiz's experiment with the home made wine reminds me of when me and my mate made soap. We left it to dry on a painted window cill in the outside toilet and it took the paint off so we decided not to use it.....

That's because you had excess caustic soda left in the soap after neutralisation of the fatty acids.

[Stanley]

That was our conclusion as well but honour was satisfied, we had made soap! We both had chemistry sets and between us we could do some fairly adventurous experiments. Our favourites were the ones that caused pops and bangs in test tubes! We both survived despite there being no safety gear at all. Modern Elfin Safety would not be amused!
Looking back, my dad was as bad as I was. I used to got to General Gas with him on Saturday mornings and I remember once they had got hold of some Verey Light cartridges and we threw them on a rubbish fire at the back of the old Planet Foundry. Very impressive! Military thunderflashes were quite common, I think we got them via the Home Guard who were issued them for exercises. They had a friction igniter which lit the fuse when you tore it off and they were very powerful! Surprising how high in the air a dustbin lid would go (if the dustbin survived!). The thing that started most of these adventures off was the question 'I wonder what would happen if....' and sometimes it led us into quite dangerous territory. This curiosity persisted in later life and I remember once when I was helping Wallace Neave in the garage at West Marton someone speculated how big a wagon tyre inner tube would get before it burst if we attached it to the air compressor and let it run. We decided to find out so we took an old tube out to the spare ground at the back of the garage, connected it to the airline and let it grow. When it got to about 15ft diameter we started to get a bit worried, it was the end of lunch break anyway so we shut the compressor off but daren't go near it to disconnect the line from the valve. Wallace had the answer, he went home and got his twelve bore and blew a hole in it! I don't think the pressure was very high and the result was a dull thud and a concussion rather than an explosion but Wallace didn't know this when he went out and shot it! However, we knew the answer! A lot bigger than 15ft diameter! Useful information?

[Tizer]

There's an article on the BBC web site about 92-year-old Stewart Adams who worked for Boots and discovered the painkiller drug we now know as ibuprofen. He relates how he tried out many of the early attempts on himself.

[Stanley]

I admire scientists who try out their new formulations on themselves. I watched a TV programme the other night about a man who injected himself with the substance he was working on and narrowly escaped death. I forget what it was but it's now a recognised treatment, they have got the dose right!

[plaques]

Would that be UK-92480?

[Stanley]

Sorry P I don't know what that means.....

[Stanley]

I looked it up on tinternetwebthingy and found it was Viagra. No, I don't think that was the one, annoying but I can't remember.
Something that struck me this morning while listening to the continuing coverage of the Paris attack was that perhaps the fact that I was reared during WW2 has had an effect on me. Watching the reaction of others I believe that mine is calmer and more measured because I've seen much worse. I'm not saying whether this is a good or a bad thing but reflect that in subsequent emergencies we had politicians who had the same experience. Men like Macmillan, Eden etc and perhaps they had a more objective and less sensationalist view. Just a thought......

[Tizer]

Just before reading Stanley's post I wrote a related comment on the Paris attacks on the Politics thread.

Scientists trying new drugs on themselves...perhaps you were thinking about the man who discovered LSD? He got the stuff on his fingers and had hallucinations so then he started trying it out on himself in a controlled way.

[Stanley]

My memory has failed me on that one Tiz. I know there was a scene where his wife found him flat out in the hall and had to revive him, possibly saving his life.
Another element in the reaction to Paris is of course fear. Our reaction during the war to hearing a 1000 pounder going off was good, that one missed me. Today it would be panic I suspect..... As I said yesterday, that's not a criticism, just an observation on the difference experience makes....

[Stanley]

I can remember when most of the M6 was closed because there was an IRA bomb planted somewhere. Eventually it was found, a small amount of explosive at Spaghetti Junction if my memory serves me right. The only time I can recall a road being closed in WW2 was if there was a UXB under or very near it.
That small bomb served the IRA well....

[Stanley]

Waking up to the first properly cold morning of the winter reminded me of the days when the fire went out overnight and you got out of bed in a freezing bedroom and huddled over the fire your mother had just lit. A thin rug to cover the lino next to the bed was the height of luxury as your bare feet hit it when you got out of bed.. I can remember my mother putting my dad's Home Guard greatcoat on my bed to keep me warmer. We had single glazed Crittall steel window casements and on a really cold morning the condensation had frozen on the inside making lovely fern patterns. A hot penny placed on the glass gave you a nice tidy peep-hole!
This morning I came back in after our morning walk and was enveloped in a wall of comparative warmth and remembered how it used to be. In the old weaver's cottages there was the additional benefit of plenty of fresh air (draughts!) from ill fitting doors and windows. This is why there are houses in Barlick which are not back to backs which have no back door. It alleviated things because there was no through draught. I can remember from the early days at Hey Farm how depressing it is to huddle by the fire and see the thin carpet flapping at the back door because of the draught that was coming in. Deep Joy! CH and double glazing has made a hell of a difference. I can remember listening to a man from English heritage telling me how important it was to retain the original windows in listed buildings. They were very hot on this. I asked him if he'd ever lived in an old house with sash windows in winter.....

[Stanley]

One of the early, and most effective, draught eliminators was the Baxi Underfloor Draught system on open fires. Can anyone remember them? The air supply for the fire came from under the floorboards which, in a well built house, was ventilated by air bricks in the wall. So as the fire pulled air in it didn't have to be replaced directly into the room under the door!
I can still remember staying in a house where the owner had gone to enormous lengths to almost completely eliminate draughts. It worked and was very efficient. The only problem was that the house smelled like a ferret hutch but they had got used to it......

[Stanley]

This morning's frost and the fact I built a stew yesterday reminded me of my mother's wartime winter stews. How she managed it I don't know but with half a pound of meat and loads of vegetables she made wonderful stews and always put dumplings in them. I am so grateful to her for forming eating habits that are still with me! Apart from anything else it's very economical cooking and so good for you. I think of all the people living on take-aways and ready-cooked meals and feel sorry for them..... They don't know what they are missing.

[Stanley]

Watching the flood of reports about terrorist alerts and security lock-downs I can't help reflecting that in WW2 the only propaganda I can remember is 'Keep calm and carry on' and 'walls have ears'. I can't help thinking that the IS PR men must be hugging themselves with glee at the reaction they have caused. Of course news was managed at that time but on the whole we trusted what we were told because the bad as well as the good news was reported as information.

[Stanley]

My mother was very good at looking after our feet, we were always well-shod. Up to going to grammar school I always wore lace-up boots (never clogs, we lived in a modern house and clogs were frowned on). Once I was at SGS I had to wear shoes and I must have worn out three pairs a year! In those days the better shops like Timpsons X-Rayed your feet to make sure the fit was right! Old habits die hard and thanks to mother I have always looked after my boots and my feet.
What brought this to mind is the fact I go for foot inspection at the Diabetic Clinic today and so last night I gave myself a treat and got the foot spa out. Considering the mileage my feet are in wonderful condition and I reflected that this was largely due to my mother's care of me and my footwear. I wonder how trainer feet will fare after 80 years work!

[Stanley]

Thinking about boots reminded me that when I was in the army, if you needed new boots and they weren't available in black you were issued with officer's brown boots which were better quality. They also gave you a bottle of Radium leather dye and you had to convert them to black before you polished them.

[Stanley]

In those days all boots had leather soles. They were reinforced by hammering a pattern of steel studs in them, ordinary boots had the flat studs preferred by the army but serious working boots were hobnailed, smaller deeper suds in a close pattern all over the soles. When the studs wore down you got the boots re-studded until the leather sole gave up the ghost. I still like steel tips on my heels even though the boots are soled with rubber.

[Stanley]

I was triggered by another topic into thinking about the inflation in wages and prices I have seen in my lifetime. Of course there is another way of looking at it, the devaluation of money. I can remember going into Mather's greengrocers in Stockport and getting a penny apple, that's an old penny, the new one is two and a half times as much. I spend the equivalent of my 1958 full week's wage in the greengrocers now without even thinking about it, £8.50 in today's money. Is it any wonder that I can't comprehend today's prices and wages?

[Stanley]

Xmas comes but once a year..... There was no such thing as a commercialised Xmas when I was young. There was no frenzy of buying. You got one good present and a stocking filled with whatever treats could be afforded. Even in the worst times we always got a present. I remember that mine one year was a wooden scooter made by a carpenter at my father's works, I loved it! Many presents were second-hand but we didn't mind that. The best one I ever got was an enormous Meccano set and I was in heaven! Today I look at the piles of presents for each child and wonder whether their affections are being bought. And then they tell me there is the playground competitiveness where presents are compared and kids ranked by who has the latest brands or the most expensive ones. How things have changed. I doubt if they are any more excited or satisfied than we were.

[Tizer]

A bit like job satisfaction declining. I think that has a lot to do with computers, especially for people whose work largely involves inputting or modifying data - which means a large proportion of people in work. At the end of the day they don't have anything material to show for it, the computer looks the same, the desk hasn't changed. Where is the result of all those hours of work? My first job was as a progress clerk in a big factory and I had a desk in an office with about a dozen other people doing the same job, recording stuff onto job cards. Boring but at least I could see one pile of cards growing and another shrinking. The I took the processed stack to the main office. Not very exciting but I could see the product of my labour. I didn't have a computer, no emails, no internet browsing, no smartphones but I had more job satisfaction than similar workers now. Also there was no distraction and we got more work done.

[Stanley]

Dead right Tiz. I was thinking about this yesterday. Every job I have ever had started the day with a clear task and objectives and you could see the results as you worked. Bit like ploughing a field and at the end of the job looking back over the gate and congratulating yourself that it didn't look half bad. Or driving a 60 foot motor 500 miles in a day and finishing up with calves delivered and 32 big beasts unloaded safely and having a good feed back at home. And that was without the additional satisfaction of knowing you had one of the biggest outfits on the road, you were seeing lovely scenery and meeting wonderful men in Scotland. I loved it! You'd think that a job like going round the same farms every day picking their milk up and delivering it to the dairy would get boring but it never did. There was great satisfaction in picking up about 240 12gallon kits and unloading them on to the runway at the dairy in the correct order so that they could be weighed and recorded by the tipper. You ran to a timetable and it was a matter of pride that you were punctual. Quite separate was the fact that it was an intensely physical job, many a time 168lb kits had to be lifted from the floor, and you knew you were a top man doing a job very few people could have attempted. All very basic I know but as you say, you had job satisfaction in buckets full!
Like you I think of those poor buggers like battery hens in call centres, management on to them all the time to increase 'success' rates and ridiculed if they fail to achieve their norm. I know I sound like an old fart but there was much to be said for the old days!

[Stanley]

I was watching a programme last night which showed Ocado's operation at a large delivery hub catering for supermarket on-line shopping. The thing that struck me about this 'miracle of technology' was the way it had eliminated jobs for human beings..... Is it any wonder that we have no jobs available for the lower skilled workers. Lots to be said for the old 'labour intensive' ways.....

[Stanley]

Can anyone remember the double seats on the back row in the cinema? Do they still have them? I remember the usherette (!) flashing her torch on us to make sure we were not being too naughty! A lost age I fear.....

[Stanley]

One of my Father's friends, Mac Parker, who lived not far from us on Norris Avenue, was manager of the Carlton Cinema in Stockport and every Thursday the whole family got free seats on the front row of the circle. If my dad was late home from work, he always tried to get home early on Thursdays, mother would make him a flask and some sandwiches. I can still remember the lady in the cash box in the foyer, Phyliss, who gave us our tickets..... Macs favourite music and the signature rune of the Carlton (They all had them) was The Sugarplum Fairy..... Hard days under bombardment but a wonderful distraction.....