The Modern Boater

[roland elsdon]

24 minutes ago, carlt said:

Sorry but if you were born after 1960 you have no concept of true happiness. 

 

Personally the late 70s early 80s were a great time for me... Followed by a renaissance period in the early 90s when I moved to Paris and discovered MDMA. 

 

Oh and living on a boat between 97 and 2006 wasn't too shabby either. 

 

Subsequently having kids and rediscovering lumpy water has been great too. 

 

Now... When exactly was that golden age of blissful happiness again? 

Hopefully today and tomorrow and next week, but in between there will be periods of normalness ...

[tree monkey]

33 minutes ago, carlt said:

Sorry but if you were born after 1960 you have no concept of true happiness. 

 

Personally the late 70s early 80s were a great time for me... Followed by a renaissance period in the early 90s when I moved to Paris and discovered MDMA. 

 

Oh and living on a boat between 97 and 2006 wasn't too shabby either. 

 

Subsequently having kids and rediscovering lumpy water has been great too. 

 

Now... When exactly was that golden age of blissful happiness again? 

Sigh, I missed out obviously,  it's my dad's fault as he refused to have any more kids after my sister because he thought we would all die in an exchange of nuclear bombs.

 

This is actually true and I only recently found out, I always wondered why my sister and I had such an age difference

[carlt]

14 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

... but in between there will be periods of normalness ...

No such thing here. 

 

Normality fosters this "it was so much better in my day." mentality. 

 

I remember my grandad telling this to my dad and my dad telling it to me. 

 

I break with tradition by telling my kids that life is what you make of it not how crap old folk might tell you it is inevitably going to be. 

 

People have been shouting "slow down!" since I started boating in the early 80s and the modern age has no monopoly on selfish gits. 

 

Smile and wave at them and remember that it is them who are missing out and the world will be a happier place. 

 

Getting grumpy about grumpy people just creates one more grumpy person. 

[Jess--]

My best one was being told to slow down while sitting out of gear approaching the narrows / turn at sutton stop / hawkesbury

 

I had watched a full length boat ahead of me go through the narrows and mess up the turn so decided to hang back and let them get sorted before going through the narrows myself so I had dropped out of gear and slowly drifted to a stop between the boats moored each side and was now just sitting not moving when a head popped out shouting slow down, I looked at them, their boat and my own boat and asked them if they want me to tie up alongside them as that was the only way I could go any slower, the head dissapeared.

 

 

[1agos]

I can count on one hand the number of boaters who have irritated me, non boaters get to me  more often.

 

I'd say 99.9% of boaters I have met are genuine friendly sorts. Almost all are happy to stop for a chat or help out a fellow boater or boat in trouble and happy to abide by the rules. As on these pages anyone with a boaty problem gets first class advise(usually) even offers to come and  help out on site. 

 

It appears a few seem to find problems with fellow boaters with alarming frequency. 

 

 We have been boating since the 80's, now retired on our 6th boat, CC'ing for the last 6 years and we are still enjoying every day on the water. 

[Chris Williams]

5 hours ago, tree monkey said:

he thought we would all die in an exchange of nuclear bombs.

My happiest days were between Hiroshima and 1980.  I live near Aldermaston and Burghfield.

[roland elsdon]

I feel very happy that i can travel particularly in europe, and there has not been a world war in my lifetime, unlike my parents and grandparents. Generation born after 1945 are truely lucky.

[tree monkey]

2 minutes ago, Chris Williams said:

My happiest days were between Hiroshima and 1980.  I live near Aldermaston and Burghfield.

We lived between capenhurst nuclear research facility, a shed loads of petrochemical works, plus various other chemical factories, like you we would have been toast

[Chris Williams]

7 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

there has not been a world war in my lifetime

You are tempting fate.  Don't say things like that.?

[Lily Rose]

53 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

I feel very happy that i can travel particularly in europe, and there has not been a world war in my lifetime, unlike my parents and grandparents. Generation born after 1945 are truely lucky.

 

Totally agree. I was born mid-50s and feel I have probably lived through the best time to be alive in all of human history.

 

Sadly, I fear that due to what is currently happening in the UK and in the wider world, that my children and, even more so, my grandchildren will not be anywhere near so lucky.

 

[MtB]

4 minutes ago, Lily Rose said:

Totally agree. I was born mid-50s and feel I have probably lived through the best time to be alive in all of human history.

 

Me too, and I always think this too. 

 

Odd though, from your avatar I always imagined you were born earlier than the mid 50s. Or did you mean 1750s?

[Lily Rose]

36 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Me too, and I always think this too. 

 

Odd though, from your avatar I always imagined you were born earlier than the mid 50s. Or did you mean 1750s?

 

?   1770 to be precise. 

 

[Mac of Cygnet]

5 minutes ago, Lily Rose said:

 

?   1770 to be precise. 

 

16th December, to be even more precise!

[Lily Rose]

9 minutes ago, Mac of Cygnet said:

16th December, to be even more precise!

I immediately regretted using the word precise and wondered long before someone corrected me!

 

Anyway, Classicfm say "born in Bonn, Germany in December 1770… but no one is sure of the exact date! He was baptised on 17 December, so he was probably born the day before."

 

So there ?

[MtB]

10 minutes ago, Lily Rose said:

I immediately regretted using the word precise and wondered long before someone corrected me!

 

Anyway, Classicfm say "born in Bonn, Germany in December 1770… but no one is sure of the exact date! He was baptised on 17 December, so he was probably born the day before."

 

So there ?

 

Who is it then if not you? 

 

My money is on it being Slash, from Guns N' Roses...

 

 

[Lily Rose]

13 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Who is it then if not you? 

 

My money is on it being Slash, from Guns N' Roses...

 

 

Far too young, just a lad really, and, at least as far as I know, of no interest to Classicfm.

 

I'll give you a clue... somewhat hard of hearing. And no, it's not Pete Townsend either.

 

 

[MtB]

4 minutes ago, Lily Rose said:

I'll give you a clue... somewhat hard of hearing.

 

Eh? Could you repeat that please...? 

 

 

[cuthound]

1 hour ago, Lily Rose said:

Far too young, just a lad really, and, at least as far as I know, of no interest to Classicfm.

 

I'll give you a clue... somewhat hard of hearing. And no, it's not Pete Townsend either.

 

 

 

No, I'll have to roll over on thst one ?

[p6rob]

On 27/04/2019 at 12:11, Stilllearning said:

I got shouted at for going too fast past a long line of moored boats a few years ago. I was going fast, the alternative was to hit every boat as there was a howling gale blowing from the right that would have pushed me straight onto the boats moored on my left. 

I got the slow down signal while passing somewhere around Alvechurch yesterday. We were fighting against the headwind from storm Hannah and another boater was going the other way. 

I did wonder how much affect we could possibly have made compared to the wind that was already battering his boat.

 

Rob

 

[Mike Todd]

9 hours ago, Chris Williams said:

You are tempting fate.  Don't say things like that.?

Given that this was one of the founding motivations for what became the EU, you have good reasons to worry!

[MtB]

24 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:

Given that this was one of the founding motivations for what became the EU, you have good reasons to worry!

 

As someone who appreciated and sympathised with the arguments on both sides, this was, I found, the most convincing argument to vote remain.

 

Sad that so few people considered this important. 

 

 

[TheBiscuits]

4 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

As someone who appreciated and sympathised with the arguments on both sides, this was, I found, the most convincing argument to vote remain.

 

Sad that so few people considered this important. 

 

As my father grew up in occupied territory, I consider this crucial.  Have you any proof that the EEC/EU has had more impact on this than the Cold War did?  I think that NATO and the Warsaw Pact had more impact than the EEC did on peace in Western Europe ...

[MtB]

15 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

Have you any proof that the EEC/EU has had more impact on this than the Cold War did? 

 

Nope. But there was a prog on the beeb a day or two ago discussing how commercial integration back in the 14th century was recognised as a way of making warfare pointless. The principle still holds today, IMO. 

 

[frahkn]

16 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

As my father grew up in occupied territory, I consider this crucial.  Have you any proof that the EEC/EU has had more impact on this than the Cold War did?  I think that NATO and the Warsaw Pact had more impact than the EEC did on peace in Western Europe ...

How would you envisage that "proof", one way or the other, could be gathered?

 

I think that it will always be a matter of opinion. If the consequences were less serious we could just toss a coin (or have a referendum).

[TheBiscuits]

6 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Nope. But there was a prog on the beeb a day or two ago discussing how commercial integration back in the 14th century was recognised as a way of making warfare pointless. The principle still holds today, IMO. 

 

Good theory.  There have been no wars in Western Europe since the 14th Century ...  oh wait!

4 minutes ago, frahkn said:

I think that it will always be a matter of opinion.

Absolutely.  But the Cold War and M.A.D. made the invasion of France much less likely in the 1950's than it was in the 1930's!

 

France and Germany were trading with each other quite a bit in the early '30's ...