HossC

DiXie I had Trixie breathing in my ear earlier tonight, but sadly it wasn't Hughie's genie, it was my friend's dog!

Happy Birthday, MeadowMufn.

Stooges

City

TRIXIE

The drivers for the final seats on the 2025 F1 grid have now been decided: Constructors' champions McLaren are staying with their 2024 lineup of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. After a whole career powered by Mercedes engines, Lewis Hamilton is moving to Ferrari to partner Charles Leclerc. Red Bull are keeping World Champion Max Verstappen, but have finally decided to replace under-performing Sergio Perez with Liam Lawson who drove for their junior team RB for the second half of 2024. Mercedes are keeping George Russell, and Lewis Hamilton's place is being taken by promoted Formula 2 driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli. Aston Martin are also keeping their 2024 lineup of Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll. Alpine are keeping Pierre Gasly, but they're promoting reserve driver Jack Doohan to replace Esteban Ocon. Doohan previously raced in Formula 2. Esteban Ocon is moving from Alpine to Haas and will partner Oliver Bearman, another Formula 2 driver who got three F1 starts in 2024. Red Bull's junior team RB will use their full name Racing Bulls in 2025. They're keeping Yuki Tsunoda, and partnering him with Formula 2 runner-up Isack Hadjar after Liam Lawson got promoted to Red Bull. Williams are keeping Alex Albon, but Franco Colapinto (who replaced Logan Sargeant mid-season) is making way for Carlos Sainz who moves from Ferrari. Finally, Sauber are replacing Zhou Guanyu and Valtteri Bottas with Nico Hulkenberg from Haas and 2024 Formula 2 champion Gabriel Bortoleto. This will be the team's last year being known as Sauber before they rebrand as Audi in 2026. Valtteri Bottas is returning to his former team Mercedes as their reserve driver.

Hoggo the ROUND

We wrap up at work tomorrow and then I get two weeks off, but we had to keep holiday aside to get paid throughout the time off. In other news, Taoiseach [Irish Prime Minister] Simon Harris has assured the nation that Christmas will go ahead as planned, as Santa Claus will be allowed into Irish airspace on the night of 24 December. In a video posted to Instagram, he said: “This authorisation will allow Santa [to] enter Irish airspace, will allow him have access to any airports or airfields that he requires on Christmas Eve so that he can get all of the presents to all of the boys and girls right across the country.”

I moderated this post in a hurry the other morning and forgot to comment later. They're both really good. Maybe you could share some details of how you create them. You'll see some of my fan art efforts in this forum, but they're more technical drawings done with vector art.

Dog

"A couple of arrows ain't gonna do much good against KING KONG out there." Coy when Vance suggested using exploding arrows against the Mean Green Machine.

Wax

HARPERVILLE

Roger, one of our free-to-air channels has been showing The A-Team from the start, and they're now near the end of season 4. The reason I mention this is that tonight's episode was 'Mission of Peace' which included Nedra Volz in the cast. I found it on YouTube (split across several parts). She has a couple of scenes at the start and another at the end. I thought you might like to see her as someone other than Miz Tisdale. Her character's pretty feisty as she chastises BA.

Alcohol "Closing time, one last call for alcohol. So, finish your whiskey or beer"

Including the red DINO 246 in 'Undercover Dukes'. It belonged to John Schneider.

After I wrote the review, I went back to the other videos. One was Lewis Hamilton's last lap, and included a very emotional slow down lap and sharing the moment with other drivers and team bosses. If anyone doubts the passion that at least some of these drivers have for their sport and their teams, watch this video.

Well, that's the F1 season over for another year with the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix yesterday. The Drivers' Championship was decided a couple of weeks ago, but the one that the manufacturers want to win is the Constructors Championship, and that was still to be decided between McLaren and Ferrari. Ferrari suffered a blow to their chances before qualifying when Charles Leclerc got a 10-place grid penalty for using a new energy store which exceeded his allowance for the year. He then qualified 14th and ended up starting in 19th (of 20) when other drivers' penalties were applied. A combination of bad strategy and bad luck (he got a loose bollard stuck under his car) saw Lewis Hamilton out in the first qualifying session in his last race for Mercedes. He started 16th. Pole was taken by Lando Norris with his team mate Oscar Piastri taking second for a McLaren front row lock-out. At the start, Red Bull's Max Verstappen passed Ferrari's Carlos Sainz, but then collided with Oscar, which earned him a 10-second penalty. Max's team mate Sergio Perez also had a spin on the first lap when he was hit by Valtteri Bottas. Two laps later, Oscar got a penalty for hitting one of the Williams cars (I think it was Franco Colapinto). Meanwhile, Charles made quick work of getting through the field. There was some good racing and plenty of overtaking throughout the race. At the end, it was Lando Norris who led from start to finish to help win McLaren their first constructors' title since 1998. Ferrari finished in second and third with Carlos Sainz ahead of Charles Leclerc. Lewis Hamilton had been quite despondent for the last few races, but he seemed back on form yesterday and managed to overtake his team mate George Russell on the last lap to claim fourth. He'll be a Ferrari driver next year and says he looks good in red! You can see the race highlights here. Now the long wait begins for the Australian Grand Prix on March 16th!

"You scuffed my VEHICLE." Variations on a theme from Rosco in many episodes.

This weekend is the season finale for F1 with the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, but I never posted a review of last week's race in Qatar. There were a couple of reasons for this, not least of which was the late time I was able to watch the highlights on TV. Aside from that, the race seems to have been overshadowed by off-track arguments and dubious penalty decisions. Nearly-crowned champion Max Verstappen returned to form by taking pole, but was found to have blocked Mercedes driver George Russell and driven slower than the minimum lap time during qualifying. For this he received a one place grid penalty which no one seems to remember happening before (they're normally 3 or 5 place drops). This later caused Max to say he'd lost all respect for George due to pursuing the penalty. At the start, Max and McLaren's Lando Norris passed George at the first corner, so it didn't really matter. There were a couple of crashes in the race, and debris caused punctures for Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz. Under one of the safety periods, Max made continued protests over the radio that second-placed Lando Norris had failed to slow for a yellow flag. Rather than a simple time penalty (5 or 10 seconds), the stewards decided that a 10-second stop & go penalty was needed, which takes a total of about 35 seconds and put Lando out of the points. Everyone seems to have been surprised by the severity of the penalty, and I can't remember the last time one of these was given. Max went on to win, and Lando got back to 10th to claim a point for the position and a point for fastest lap. It means that the Constructors' Championship between McLaren and Ferrari will now go down to the final race. A notable mention goes to Zhou Guanyu, whose 8th place scored Sauber its first points of the season. You can see the highlights here. I don't watch F1 for off-track spats, and inconsistent penalty decisions continue to ruin the racing. They really need to sort this out. I thought I'd be calmer writing this a few days on, but I'm still annoyed! To give you an idea of what's been said between Max and George, here are some examples: "People have been bullied by Max for years now." "George is a backstabber. That he brings all this stuff up. He's just a loser." "Max has been enabled because nobody's stood up to him. He cannot deal with adversity, he slams his whole team and loses the plot." "George lies and pastes all kinds of things together that aren't true." If you're really interested, you can read more about the dispute here. Cards on the table, I'm on George's side.

Christmas (too early?)

sad

Glass Correct.

The ambulance in 'Coltrane vs Duke' was a late-70s (probably 1978) Chevrolet Chevy Van. The one in 'Brotherly Love' was very similar, but the grille and a few minor details were different. I think they may actually have used two different ambulances in 'Brotherly Love' because the one at the hospital has a "63" decal just behind the passenger door, but the one at the end of the chase doesn't. Either way, all I can say for sure is that the ambulances in those two episodes were similar. I'd imagine that the studios (or their vehicle suppliers) had a few of each type of emergency vehicle and added signs to suit whatever show they were in. Dewey's ambulance was completely different being based on a 1979 Ford F-350. BTW. Did anyone notice the blooper with the ambulance in 'Coltrane vs Duke'? Just after Rosco falls out of the ambulance it can be seen making a U-turn in the background, but seconds later when the Dukes turn around the ambulance is back parked on the right.

Hour (The 1957 movie 'Zero Hour' was made into a famous parody in 1980 - who knows what it was?)