Obvious Things You 0nly Just Realised - 2020

[touchingcloth]

I don't imagine it was the only check, just a broad and fun one.

Yeah, it makes for a good story, and it does make sense for checking whether the rider has been followed, I just can't imagine safety was a serious part of it. If the staging could kill someone if not installed properly then someone would have said "the staging could kill someone, so these instructions tell you how to set it up, which are very important to follow to the letter and we will check on afterwards to make sure" rather than "here's how to set up the stage, and here's he we like our chocs. See you in spring."

[beanheadmcginty]

Wasn't it more to do with setting up the instruments/speakers/other sound stuff properly rather than safety? Once again, I'm quite sure this is all fairly common knowledge with even the slightest tickling of Google.

[Ptolemy Ptarmigan]

If it has any logic at all, and isn't a cover story after the fact, as touchingcloth suggests, then it can't be anything other than just checking that someone at the venue is on top of the catering before the band arrives. Their own road crew would be responsible for rigging and electrics.

[touchingcloth]

My point wasn't even about M&Ms really, I just reached for the most widely-known example of a rider request from the top of my head. My point was that there's a route which can lead to people being treated like divas, even if they don't feel like it themselves. I'd bet something along the lines of a star finding some Cornish clotted cream fudge left in their dressing room on one show, remarking to their agent how fucking delicious the stuff is, and the agent then sending the upcoming venues on the tour a demand for clotted cream fudge.

[Ptolemy Ptarmigan]

My point wasn't even about M&Ms really, I just reached for the most widely-known example of a rider request from the top of my head. My point was that there's a route which can lead to people being treated like divas, even if they don't feel like it themselves. I'd bet something along the lines of a star finding some Cornish clotted cream fudge left in their dressing room on one show, remarking to their agent how fucking delicious the stuff is, and the agent then sending the upcoming venues on the tour a demand for clotted cream fudge.

And all because of a cancelled Jethro gig the night before.

[Hand Solo]

Who does Mike Pratt (from Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)) look like?



Simon Day? (mixed a bit with Paul Whitehouse)

Pete Postlethwaite?

Bit of Super Hans?

Possibly several other people, it's been bugging me.

[Dex Sawash]

James Coburn


[

[Hand Solo]

Certainly use the same dresser.

I think it's definitely Paul Whitehouse I'm thinking of but there's some niggling feeling it's someone else as well.

[Cerys]

Kevin Eldon?

[Hand Solo]

Kevin Eldon?

No. I think it's some weird confluence of Paul Whitehouse and The Orgazoid??



Usually I'm very good with faces, and I haven't seen Randall and Hopkirk since the repeats in the mid-90s but tonight his face just popped into my head for some reason and I couldn't place it.

[buzby]

U-boats couldn't stay submerged for long or communicate by radio with each other without surfacing, so effective tactics to defeat them were developed and they weren't the silent, sneaky menaces of the deep I had assumed.

Most submarines were diesel-electric - driven by electric motors powered by diesel engines when running on the surface, or batteries (charged by the diesel engines) when submerged. The battery capacity limited running on battery power to only a couple of hours. However, laterin the war the Germans adopted the use of snorkels to supply air and vent the exhaust from the engines so they they could also run off engine power a few meteres beneath the surface.

Early in WW2, the only way to find a submarine was when it surfaced to use it's radio. The Royal Navy used a system called High Frequency Direction Finding (known as HF/DF or Huff-Duff) to get a bearing on their transmissions, To locate them when they were submerged, ASDIC was developed.

After the use of ASDIC became widespread, the safest way for a submarine to sail was on the surface (provided they maintained radio silence) as the only danger was from maritime patrol aircraft (the limited range of these led to the Germans chiefly operating in the Atlantic Gap. As RADAR became more sophisticated and capable of operating at centimetric wavelengths it was also able to detect submarines travelling on the surface at beyond visual range.

Towards the end of the war high-frequency millimetric RADAR was under developement which would allow aircraft and ships to detect submarines travelling sub-surface via their periscopes and snorkels, but the war ended before it could be deployed.

Wasn't it more to do with setting up the instruments/speakers/other sound stuff properly rather than safety? Once again, I'm quite sure this is all fairly common knowledge with even the slightest tickling of Google.

It was because they had an especially power hungry lighting rig (twice the number of lights that was the norm for bands then), and a lot of venues they were getting booked at didn't have an adequate power supply for it so they would turn up and find they couldnt' use the full rig or they would have to find somehwere to hire a generator. The M&M clause was added to the contract as a check that the promoter had read it. If Roth saw brown M&Ms backstage he knew they were going to have problems elsewhere.

[phantom_power]

Who does Mike Pratt (from Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)) look like?



Simon Day? (mixed a bit with Paul Whitehouse)

Pete Postlethwaite?

Bit of Super Hans?

Possibly several other people, it's been bugging me.

David Cann?

[the]

Who does Mike Pratt (from Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)) look like?

[...] Possibly several other people, it's been bugging me.

Proportionally he has a similar face to Humphrey Bogart.

[beanheadmcginty]

Who does Mike Pratt (from Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)) look like?



Simon Day? (mixed a bit with Paul Whitehouse)

Pete Postlethwaite?

Bit of Super Hans?

Possibly several other people, it's been bugging me.

It's clearly Fred West

[Norton Canes]

Scottish: Kirk, McCoy, Scott
One syllable: Kirk, Spock, Scott
Short 'O': Spock, McCoy, Scott
Hard 'K': Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott

[Hand Solo]

Scottish: Kirk, McCoy, Scott
One syllable: Kirk, Spock, Scott
Short 'O': Spock, McCoy, Scott
Hard 'K': Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott

Don't forget the original Captain was called Pike, after Albert Pike, as Rodenberry was a big Freemason. Kirk also means church in Scootish.

[Norton Canes]

Kirk also means church in Scootish

I know! That's why I included him in the 'Scottish' category :)

[olliebean]

Ball, Ballet, Ballad, Ballas: All things to do with dance.

[Menu]

This one's very embarrassing and only came about because someone basically spelt it out in another thread.

Here goes:

I've only just realised that concentration camps are so-called because they 'concentrate' humans of the same ethnicity in the same place. So, er, they aren't called concentration camps because the people inside were being asked to 'concentrate' a bit more on their perceived wrong-doings.

[Hand Solo]

Everyone knows ...---...  is morse code for SOS, but the more familiar ...--... ingrained into my head from mobile phones vibrating during a message stands for SMS, duh!

[Icehaven]

Everyone knows ...---...  is morse code for SOS, but the more familiar ...--... ingrained into my head from mobile phones vibrating during a message stands for SMS, duh!

Oh my god! -- .. -. -.. -... .-.. --- .-- -.

[touchingcloth]

The theme tune from Friends has a melody which follows the pattern for the Morse code for "friends".

[Hand Solo]

The theme tune from Friends has a melody which follows the pattern for the Morse code for "friends".

You've made this up, can't see any reference online. Though Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em did so.

[olliebean]

Really disappointed to find that Google Translate doesn't do Morse code.

[NoSleep]

However, there is a morse code translator:

https://morsecode.world/international/translator.html

You can even make sound files.

I was trying to remember the old BBC morse signal, and realised the first bit spelled BBC (although I had remembered it as DDC), whilst my memory tells me the next three letters were (something like) NDC (-. -.. -.-.).

[olliebean]

However, there is a morse code translator:

https://morsecode.world/international/translator.html

Oh, there are loads of them. But I have an add-on installed for Google Translate and I was hoping it would work for Morse code.

[Ambient Sheep]

Everyone knows ...---...  is morse code for SOS, but the more familiar ...--... ingrained into my head from mobile phones vibrating during a message stands for SMS, duh!

On my old Nokia 3210, there was a choice of two tones for an SMS.  One was the above, the other was a much longer series of beeps, which apparently spelt out "CONNECTING PEOPLE".

[buzby]

On my old Nokia 3210, there was a choice of two tones for an SMS.  One was the above, the other was a much longer series of beeps, which apparently spelt out "CONNECTING PEOPLE".

Yes, it was only Nokia who used the morse code SMS tones. The 'Standard' tone used the morse letter M (for Message) the 'Special' tone played the morse for 'SMS' and the longer 'Ascending' tone plated the morse for 'CONNECTING PEOPLE', ramping up the volume as it went along. Sadly they all went when Nokia moved to Symbian-based smartphones.

[pigamus]

Spicy Nik Naks are basically curry flavoured, aren't they? I suppose it should be obvious, but...

[DrGreggles]

Spicy Nik Naks are basically curry flavoured, aren't they? I suppose it should be obvious, but...

Nah, not curry. More chilli.