Off Topic And Now for Something Completely Different

  • Please bear with us on the new site integration and fixing any known bugs over the coming days. If you can not log in please try resetting your password and check your spam box. If you have tried these steps and are still struggling email [email protected] with your username/registered email address
  • Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!
TwoWrights said:
Each to their own but not for me, stink of fish and cocoa, a bus station best suited for the 1920's, the disgusting stilt building on the front of Paragon Station, Blundells Corner ruins, derelict docks, Ferensway car parks, flooded Old Town with high tides, et al. :emoticon-0143-smirk


The views expressed in my posts are not necessarily mine.
Click to expand...
The stink of hashish and kebabs has replaced the fish and cocoa... Just glad it's someone else's view not yours:emoticon-0103-cool:
 
  • Like
Reactions: TwoWrights
balkan tiger said:
Here's one from the world of internet, not mine but i wondered what the font of all knowledge that is hull city not606 would make of it.

Sent a Vw commercial in for a check on a potential issue which as it turns out isn’t an issue. At the same time they did a ‘complementary’ vehicle health check. In the check they found a minor oil leak on the front shock and a minor issue with the turbo damper seal.
They then proceed to tell me that if they deem the issues to be a hazard to the environment and if they aren’t covered under the warranty then they won’t release the vehicle until they’ve been rectified and I’ve then paid them for doing this work.
Anybody come across this kind of thing before? It’s not a leased vehicle. It’s owned and paid for.
Click to expand...
There's a lot of bollocks on the internet. Exhibit #1028657.
 
dennisboothstash said:
From the ‘Cultural Tutor’ on Twitter


The football star Kylian Mbappé was offered $1 billion to join the Saudi Arabian team Al-Hilal.

But that wouldn't have made him even nearly the richest athlete in history.

Because there was a Roman chariot racer called Gaius Appuleius Diocles who earned more than $15 billion...

Chelsea FC in England have spent over one billion dollars on new players in the last year alone, and Cristiano Ronaldo is currently earning $200 million per year at the Saudi club Al-Nassr. Has football gone mad? Is it right for athletes to earn such exorbitant wages?

Let's leave the politics of that question to one side and simply observe that, as with so much else, there are historical precedents — and one in particular: Gaius Appuleius Diocles.

Chariot racing was the most popular sport in Ancient Rome, with races held all over the empire — there are ruins of huge stadiums around Europe. The crowds flocked to watch their favourite teams or racers, and the money came pouring in.

Gaius Appuleius Diocles was born in the province of Lusitania, modern-day Portugal, in 104 AD. That's where many charioteers came from — not just those who raced in Rome itself, but right across the empire — because it was where the fastest racehorses on the continent were bred.

And such was the career that Gaius pursued; he made his racing debut in Rome, which then had a population of well over one million and was the richest and largest city on earth, at the age of just 18.

There were four "factiones", sort of like teams, in Ancient Roman chariot racing: Green, Red, White, and Blue. Each had their own stables, managers, breeders, agents, patrons, sponsors, and racers. These were large, professional organisations with hordes of fans and fierce rivalries. Even the Emperor himself usually had a favourite faction.

Gaius joined the Whites and won his first race after two years. He stayed with them for another four years. Then he moved to the Greens, where he had a torrid run of poor performances and a serious injury, followed three years later by a move to the Reds. There he remained for fifteen years, winning over one thousand races, before retiring at the age of 42 to a lovely little town called Praeneste.

Where did Gaius race? At the Circus Maximus in Rome, now a ruin but once a racing stadium which could hold more than 150,000 spectators. It's hard to imagine the atmosphere, with the thundering of the horses drowned out by the roaring of the crowds and the sound of splintering chariots...

We know much of this because of two monuments made in Gaius' honour after his retirement. They also include the rather impressive statistics of his racing career — 4,257 starts and 1,463 victories — and the prize money he won: a grand total of 35,863,120 sesterces.

These earnings are estimated to have been, in modern terms, about $15 billion, which would make him by far the richest athlete in history. His fortune was equivalent to about 1.5% of the Roman annual state expenditure, which would be like an American sportsperson being worth over $100 billion.

But this is not merely an interesting factoid. What does it tell us about Ancient Roman society during the Empire that regular people had enough time, and that there was enough money in the system, to support such a wealthy sporting scene?

Alas, if you don't much like sports and wonder why some people get so worked up about athletes running round a field and kicking a ball... there's also a Roman precedent for that. Here's what the lawyer Pliny the Younger wrote to a friend in the year 98 AD:

"The Races were on, a type of spectacle which has never had the slightest attraction for me. I can find nothing new or different in them: once seen is enough, so it surprises me all the more that so many thousands of adult men should have such a childish passion for it."

Whether sports stars should earn the money they do is a complicated question. But, in any case, Kylian Mbappé has a long way to go before he's on the level of Gaius Appuleius Diocles...
Click to expand...

Yeah but what did the Romans ever do for us...
 
  • Like
Reactions: dennisboothstash
balkan tiger said:
Here's one from the world of internet, not mine but i wondered what the font of all knowledge that is hull city not606 would make of it.

Sent a Vw commercial in for a check on a potential issue which as it turns out isn’t an issue. At the same time they did a ‘complementary’ vehicle health check. In the check they found a minor oil leak on the front shock and a minor issue with the turbo damper seal.
They then proceed to tell me that if they deem the issues to be a hazard to the environment and if they aren’t covered under the warranty then they won’t release the vehicle until they’ve been rectified and I’ve then paid them for doing this work.
Anybody come across this kind of thing before? It’s not a leased vehicle. It’s owned and paid for.
Click to expand...
I’ve been told a few times they can’t let the car out
Cos of some of the old bangers I’ve had
Cars not women
 
Good old Ken Dodd...

1. My dad knew I was going to be a comedian. When I was a baby, he said: “Is this a joke?”

2. I haven’t spoken to my mother-in-law for 18 months. I don’t like to interrupt her.

3. My act is very educational. I heard a man leaving the other night, saying: “Well, that’s taught me a lesson.”

4. On his marathon live shows: “You think you can get away, but you can’t. I’ll follow you home and I’ll shout jokes through your letterbox.”

5. “So, do I believe in safe sex? Of course I do. I have a handrail all around the bed.”

6. At the Royal Variety Performance: “This audience tonight represents the creme de la creme. That’s French for evaporated milk."
 
  • Like
Reactions: John Ex Aberdeen now E.R., rovertiger, TwoWrights and 1 other person
https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk.../exhibition/happiness#section--the-exhibition


said it before on here the old man used to go up n see Ken Dodd and take me along every time he was in summer season brid
I’ve seen him loads of times
Only comedian I’ve seen who made my old man cry with laughter
He saw him first when he was in the army back in the 50’s

I’ll have to go see the museum in Liverpool soon
 
  • Like
Reactions: John Ex Aberdeen now E.R., gtigerbackin hull, rovertiger and 2 others
Chazz Rheinhold said:
https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk.../exhibition/happiness#section--the-exhibition


said it before on here the old man used to go up n see Ken Dodd and take me along every time he was in summer season brid
I’ve seen him loads of times
Only comedian I’ve seen who made my old man cry with laughter
He saw him first when he was in the army back in the 50’s

I’ll have to go see the museum in Liverpool soon
Click to expand...
A friend of mine was a very good friend of Ken Dodd, him and his wife often went to see his gigs. He said that he would be on stage for hours, then back in the dressing room afterwards they were often there until after 2.00 in the morning as Ken just wouldn’t stop talking.
 
  • Like
Reactions: rovertiger, TwoWrights and Chazz Rheinhold
Chazz Rheinhold said:
https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk.../exhibition/happiness#section--the-exhibition


said it before on here the old man used to go up n see Ken Dodd and take me along every time he was in summer season brid
I’ve seen him loads of times
Only comedian I’ve seen who made my old man cry with laughter
He saw him first when he was in the army back in the 50’s

I’ll have to go see the museum in Liverpool soon
Click to expand...

Saw him a few years ago. Came on at half 7, had a few fillers for costume changes. An interval at half 10ish. Didn’t pack in ‘til around half 1 in the morning. I was starving, we’d planned to go for something to eat afterwards.

Didn’t repeat the same joke. A genius.
 
  • Like
Reactions: dennisboothstash, gtigerbackin hull, rovertiger and 2 others
Sir Cheshire Ben said:
Saw him a few years ago. Came on at half 7, had a few fillers for costume changes. An interval at half 10ish. Didn’t pack in ‘til around half 1 in the morning. I was starving, we’d planned to go for something to eat afterwards.

Didn’t repeat the same joke. A genius.
Click to expand...
When we saw him he repeated the first ten or fifteen minutes of his act, good old Steverico turning up late and having seats near the front, of course Doddy spotted him, and started again just for him and Mrs Rico. :emoticon-0125-mmm:


The views expressed in my posts are not necessarily mine.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sir Cheshire Ben
TwoWrights said:
When we saw him he repeated the first ten or fifteen minutes of his act, good old Steverico turning up late and having seats near the front, of course Doddy spotted him, and started again just for him and Mrs Rico. :emoticon-0125-mmm:


The views expressed in my posts are not necessarily mine.
Click to expand...
He he my claim to fame won’t be beaten
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sir Cheshire Ben, dennisboothstash, rovertiger and 1 other person
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back