HossC

I just read on the BBC website how people are skating on the canals in Amsterdam. It looks fun.

Well done, Hobie. I'm sure you know a good way to celebrate! Roger, I just assume that you're Fan of the Month when no one else is nominated .

I've just got back from a walk around town. We had a little more snow overnight, but it looks like most of the shops decided to close early yesterday, and stay closed today. The only businesses open were a couple of convenience stores, a couple of fast food take-aways and most of the bars (well, it is Ireland ). I think a lot will be open again tomorrow, although I should have enough food to see me through the weekend. At least we don't have such cold temperatures. It's only about 0/-1 Celsius (32/30 Fahrenheit) here. Roth's -9 C works out at about 16 F.

Hey, Roth, did you get the cold weather you mentioned? We've had a couple of days of snow here which has closed schools and a few businesses, but it's less than 10cm (4") deep, especially where some has melted during the days. Parts of the UK are much worse off than we are, and you must have got the bad weather before them.

Uncle Jesse (he's a relative )

tread

I've just remembered another "good guy in a fast Ford, bad guy in a Jag" chase. It's from the 1975 John Wayne movie 'Brannigan'. I don't think I've ever seen the movie all the way through. All of the chase part is in the first half of this video clip. You'll have to add your own "yee-haw" at three minutes in .

I'll save you the trouble, Hobie. Here it is: Funnily enough, there was a commercial showing recently in the UK that used Kenny Loggins' 'Danger Zone'. I'd forgotten it was on the 'Top Gun' soundtrack. While we're talking '80s movie soundtracks, I recently re-watched 'Young Einstein', I think for the first time since I saw it at the cinema (almost 30 years ago!). I'd completely forgotten about the song 'Great Southern Land' by Icehouse. The video has more Australian scenery than a Super Bowl commercial : Of course, 'Great Southern Land' probably has a different meaning to Dukes fans .

I just watched that part of the episode again to see what happens. Bubba's driving the RV, and Squirt's in the back with Loretta and Leona (although Leona disappears after briefly appearing reflected in a mirror). Cindy peels out of the Boar's Nest parking lot and is seen quite close behind the RV in its next couple of appearances. After Bo and Luke crash into the haystack, the blue car is further behind the RV but still following. The car isn't shown in any of the shots of Loretta dropping the pictures - the inside shots only show the curtains at the window, and the exterior shots only show the rear of the RV. The only explanation for Cindy not spotting the pictures is that she either dropped further back or took a different route to the barn, but both seem unlikely given that the car is shown pulling into the barn just behind the RV. On a related issue, I've just noticed that the window at the back of the RV where Loretta drops the pictures has light-colored curtains which split in the middle when viewed from the inside, but a dark-colored blind from the outside. Although it's possible to have both, the curtains let in too much lights for there to be a blind too.

Maybe you've identified the problem, Roger. The male wrestler is teased because his female opponent isn't seen as a worthy adversary by his teammates, despite the fact that she's probably trained at least as hard as him. I'm not familiar with mixed competitions (I'm not a wrestling fan), but if wrestling is the profession that a woman has chosen, surely the best way to respect her is to treat her as an equal to the other competitors. Then, the stigma of "losing to a a girl" will become a thing of the past (it's not going to happen overnight). They can be a threat to your chances of winning without being a threat to your masculinity. If the boys are encouraged to respect all of their opponents, I don't think that's setting a bad example. Hurting someone within the confines of a sporting event, whilst obeying all the associated rules, is very different from hurting someone in normal life. Note that I've carefully used the word "someone", because the latest reports I've read over here suggest that over 40% of domestic violence is now against men, so both sides need to be educated about respect.

Are you forgetting that George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Dwight D. Eisenhower and Franklin D. Roosevelt were all cheerleaders at college. It's still possible for any cheerleader to grow up and become President* . * So long as they're at least thirty-five years old, a resident of the United States for at least fourteen years and a natural-born citizen.

Without wanting to get too serious, there's a big difference between boys hitting girls (or girls hitting boys) and girls competing against boys, even in contact sports. If both parties are willing participants, I don't have a problem with it. Regarding female drivers in NASCAR, I don't see why there shouldn't be more. As long as they're given an equal chance in the lower ranks, the best ones should come through. I know some people have said that Danica's only in NASCAR for the novelty factor because she's a woman. I'd accept that if she came last every week, but while she's never looked like winning the series, she beats a lot of male drivers on a regular basis. Speaking of women in motorsport, I don't know how well the story has been reported in the US, but F1 has announced that they will no longer be using "grid girls" this season. The grid girls, sometimes is pretty scanty costumes, were used for promotional tasks as well as holding the drivers' number boards on the grid and lining the route to the winner's podium. They will be replaced by "grid kids", who will be aspiring young drivers from junior categories. Read more here.

Welcome to HNet, Joseph.

Not exactly, Roger, although there were some good car action shows in the late-70s. Unlike Dukes, the British shows were normally more gritty, adult-oriented dramas. The good guys usually had fast Fords (although they may not be models familiar to viewers in the US), and the bad guys often drove Jags! Here's a chase from 'The Sweeney' (1975-78) - the title comes from Sweeney Todd, which is Cockney rhyming slang for "Flying Squad", a specialist branch of the Metropolitan Police. This is a more comical chase from 'The Professionals' (1977-83). During some downtime, the agents were asked to collect a desk for their boss, but work got in the way. The original video I posted was deleted, so I found this compilation. A clip of the deleted chase can be seen at roughly 0:53-1:00.

I've got about half of those in my DVD collection, and they're nearly all repeated regularly on the satellite channels (Dad's Army is currently still being shown every Saturday night on the BBC). The exception is Mind Your Language, which I don't think I've seen since the '80s - it's just too politically incorrect to show again, even though it has an 8.9 rating on IMDb. I hadn't seen Waiting For God for ages until it was repeated last year. I see that you watched the original of Porridge. Did you catch any of the new series which aired last year in the UK? It's never going to match the original, but it was quite fun, and was done by the original writers. Another Ronnie Barker sitcom which you probably watched, Open All Hours, has also been reprised as Still Open All Hours. Arkwright has passed away, and the little shop is now being run by G-G-G-G-Granville, although the hand-eating cash register is named in honor of the former owner.

Initially, the European markets didn't suffer as badly as the US and Asia, but I see that they've dropped today. Having said that, it isn't front page news over here.

Tasmania is one of the states of Australia, and is only about 150 miles from the mainland. It's also home to the Tasmanian devil - yes, they're real, although they don't look much like the cartoon character!

rings Thanks, Roger, I've never heard that term before. I Googled a picture, and they look similar to our spring onions/scallions. Leeks are also related, but our leeks don't have bulbs on the end.

Are you forgetting that Sonny's from Georgia?

Assuming that you mean Southern US accents (as opposed to Southern Ireland), I think they're liked here, so long as they're not being used to aggressively quote lines from 'Deliverance' . Although Ireland's much smaller than the US in terms of size and population, it still has very definable regions. You may have noticed that the accents video referred to Cork as "The People's Republic of Cork", which is just a nickname implying that it's like another country. I don't know who's currently the butt of the jokes in the US (I'm afraid it was the Irish when I was in the UK), but over here they're told about the Kerryman. I could go on, but you get the idea.

Care to name any of your favorite British shows, Andrew? You seem surprised, Hobie. I know America is much bigger than Ireland, but accents vary just as much here. I'm sure you could easily tell the difference between a New Yorker and someone from Texas, and it's the same with Irish accents (in which I do not claim to be an expert). Here's a humorous comparison of just a few that I found online:

Dragons

That's not a problem that we have here. The unleaded I bought last week was about €1.38/liter, which converts to just under $6.50/US gallon. It looks like US prices are less than half of that figure.

Ireland (Titanic's last port of call was Queenstown, County Cork. The town was once called Cove, but was renamed Queenstown when Queen Victoria visited. After Ireland became independent, the name was changed to Cobh, a name which means nothing in Irish, but it's still pronounced "Cove" ("bh" is pronounced "v" in Irish, as in names like "Siobhan"))

ship