Tweets for February 2022

Bio: Kazoo Academy & Barrel Organ Disco/Yorkshire Almanac/translator Romance & Germanic languages & Russian/old-style jazz trombone & vocals/brass bands/allotmenteer

Tue Feb 01 00:34 Historia de Barcelona, 1/2: #otd * 1568: Auto de fe en el Born (0) * 1624: Faltan provisiones en Barcelona por la nieve (10+7) * 1809: Edicto anti-rave (242) * 1830: Nieva (8) * 1848: Los puercos de San Antonio (345+23) * 1881: Nace La…
Tue Feb 01 13:51 Energy prices are rising & our water isn't metered, so considering running the tap 24*7 & plumbing in a hydroelectric station under the sink
Tue Feb 01 14:01 Comment: She imitates the kiddies' premature & pronounced pitch-fall at phrase ends & is probably the best Bob Dylan imitator I've heard since Glenn Lang, Local Studies Librarian in Barrow-in-Furness
Tue Feb 01 22:26 Looby takes the Yorkshire Almanac to 33.33% I haven't approached Alan B yet, but conversations re reuse are so far easier than writing the PHP to calculate the phases of the moon, which is shudderingly unreliable
Wed Feb 02 00:45 Historia de Barcelona, 2/2: #otd * 1428: Terremoto de la Candelaria (95) * 1637: Pagado el altar mayor de Santa María del Mar, pero al cronista le parece dinero perdido (38+19) * 1848: Bendición de las candelas (491) * 1919: Pla: Arribà l’oncle…
Wed Feb 02 20:04 Dunno where this going, but toddler has serious conversations, e.g. re new special bed, with mad falsetto voice one does for U&A's froggie puppet, e.g. on mobile with voice standing next to her. But froggie no longer invited to share meals now she knows he prefers flies & slugs
Wed Feb 02 21:18 Comment: Transitioning to a full bedtime story routine to go with the new special bed: - What bedtime story would you like tonight? Goldilocks? The Ninjabread Man? - How Trains Work!
Wed Feb 02 21:19 Comment: (I see there are already Ninjabread Men out there.)
Thu Feb 03 01:26 Historia de Barcelona, 3/2: #otd * 1112: Boda en Arlés de Ramón Berenguer III y Dulce de Provenza, inaugurando el dominio de la Casa de Barcelona en Provenza y, según la leyenda, de los trovadores provenzales en Barcelona (0+476) * 1510: Regocijos…
Thu Feb 03 10:36 Comment: @tombcn So not just a Cristiano Ronaldo lookalike, as I foolishly thought
Thu Feb 03 20:27 Comment: @jennitpk Do you buy the "global issue, guv" line, do you think it's a (calculated) lack of strategic energy planning, do you think it's a Tory-Green the-hell-with-the-poor-round-the-corner thing, or is there something else you'd tag? I'm not evangelising, simply curious
Thu Feb 03 20:27 Comment: @ibexsalad Stop boasting, you lucky sod
Thu Feb 03 20:28 Comment: @tombcn Cameron, because without Cameron you wouldn't have got Johnson
Thu Feb 03 21:56 So the toddler has seen the 1967 Jungle Book 3 times, & instead of learning the Louis Prima Monkey Song dance routine - one of Hollywood's finest - she's singing "Mother's cooking in the home / I must go to fetch the water / Till the day that I'm grown"
Fri Feb 04 01:31 Historia de Barcelona, 4/2: #otd * 1387: El concilio de Juan I de Aragón se decide por el antipapa, Clemente (24) * 1493: Romería de los reyes católicos a Montserrat (16) * 1848: Los bailes particulares (1675) * 1872: Antonio López y López…
Fri Feb 04 17:47 Toddler may be onto something when she eggcorns "unicorn" as "loonycorn" Inevitably there's already an internet business with the name
Fri Feb 04 18:00 RT @BBCLookNorth: “Please just don’t park on the pavement.” A Yorkshire man has shared this footage of his guide dog to warn people abou…
Sat Feb 05 01:39 Historia de Barcelona, 5/2: #otd * 1567: Torneo en el Born (19) * 1601: Gran nevada (0) * 1640: Entra el conde de Santa Coloma tras su victoria (pírrica) en Salses (183) * 1848: La fiesta de Sta. Águeda y un refrán misterioso (60) * 1919: Pla:…
Sat Feb 05 23:17 Historia de Barcelona, 6/2: #otd * 1461: Negociación entre Juan II de Aragón y los catalanes sobre el encarcelamiento de Carlos de Viana (29) * 1610: Gran nevada y helada (58) * 1919: Pla: .Montjuïc * 1939: Falta de confianza en los mercados…
Sun Feb 06 08:39 The counter-terrorism Prevent programme in schools is clearly failing if the children of visiting scholars feel free to criticise that most fundamental of British values, the appalling weather
Sun Feb 06 08:59 First political bet since Trump & Brexit wins: Tories to get more seats than Labour at the generals: Starmer's complete lack of nous + impossibility of replacing him, even if, dans le meilleur des mondes possibles, Gove were to defect
Sun Feb 06 10:47 No gnus is good gnus ... for palindromists
Sun Feb 06 20:58 Valentine tip: get your buttocks enhanced in Upminster
Sun Feb 06 23:24 Historia de Barcelona, 7/2: #otd * 1163: Alfonso II reconoce los derechos locales de Barcelona (10) * 1564: Llega Felipe II a Valldonzella en la vispera de su primera entrada como rey (14+5) * 1848: Los bailes de buen tono (1520) * 1919: Pla: A…
Mon Feb 07 23:28 Historia de Barcelona, 8/2: #otd * 1461: Sublevación a favor de Carlos de Viana; fuga de Galcerán de Requesens (22) * 1554: Nuestra Señora de Montserrat resucita a un niño muerto (176) * 1630: Magnífico espectáculo y fiesta de disfraces para la…
Tue Feb 08 12:00 Comment: @jennitpk Etched on my eyelids: the Times cartoon of Johnson as Savile saying "I'll fix it"
Tue Feb 08 12:02 A student admires one's "vintage" cords. - I only bought this jacket in 2012. - I was at primary school.
Tue Feb 08 20:51 Comment: @jennitpk I don't get the focus on this rather than on what appears to be massive embezzlement during the pandemic - a let-out to some of the mafia, who merely have to say that they spoke out about Johnson on Savile & they're then in the clear
Tue Feb 08 20:58 A potty was acquired a while ago, but no campaign to introduce it. Then today, in 1 of 3 remarkable events, the Queen indicates a desire to sit on it, takes Paddington Does It Himself to read, & 10 minutes later coolly announces a massive stinky poo. And that's that
Tue Feb 08 21:03 Comment: Also: wakes at 05:20, story duly told, goes back to bed with a book, falls asleep, wakes again at 08:30
Tue Feb 08 23:40 Historia de Barcelona, 9/2: #otd * 1425: Una gran procesión pública pide ayuda contra los terremotos (114) * 1842: Primer día de Cuaresma, 1842 (67) * 1848: Los dentistas y la fiesta de su patrón, santa Apolonia (278) * 1919: Pla: Diumenge * ☼…
Thu Feb 10 00:18 Historia de Barcelona, 10/2: #otd * 1319: Privilegio de Jaime II concediendo a Barcelona el derecho de usar pendón (163) * 1887: Intensa nevada (19) * 1939: Pla publica su "retorno sentimental de un catalán" (537) * 1944: Ejecutado Justo Bueno,…
Fri Feb 11 00:22 Historia de Barcelona, 11/2: #otd * 1742: Nace Ramón Lázaro de Dou, último cancelario de la Universidad de Cervera (19+58) * 1873: Proclamación de la Primera República (0/i) * 1919: Pla: Les porteres de Barcelona no arriben a fer mai, quan parlen…
Fri Feb 11 20:37 RT @PolemicTMM: Urinals of the week award. (Discovered this lunchtime).
Sat Feb 12 00:27 Historia de Barcelona, 12/2: #otd * 1808: Bienvenida con reservas para las tropas de Napoleón; infelicidades meteorológicas y eclesiásticas; Brusi entra en la clandestinidad tras confiscarse su Diario de Barcelona (7+552) * 1826: Corre agua del…
Sat Feb 12 21:34 Comment: @SocialHistoryOx Sounds a bit Milton, Tenure of Kings & Magistrates...
Sat Feb 12 21:46 Day Out In Keighley (double speed recommended)
Sun Feb 13 00:35 Historia de Barcelona, 13/2: #otd * 1939: Una "operación policial" sustituye a la guerra civil (117) * 1960: Amistad al azar entre un marinero estadounidense y un niño sordo (50) * ☼ 07:47-18:23, 10:36 horas; ☾ luna menguante, iluminación…
Sun Feb 13 21:08
Mon Feb 14 00:40 Historia de Barcelona, 14/2: #otd * 1257: Expansión de la participación en el gobierno político (20+27) * 1494: Primera edición de las constituciones catalanas de Johann Rosenbach (60+494) * 1630: María Ana de Austria se muestra muy religiosa…
Mon Feb 14 21:46 Toddler made friends at the library with two older girls, earnestly colouring some cartoon characters a jaundice yellow. Last heard they were insisting their mothers implement a careless suggestion & take them over to the General Infirmary to ask for chocolate to treat them
Tue Feb 15 00:50 Historia de Barcelona, 15/2: #otd * 1519: Carlos I de España entra y jura los fueros (36+23) * 1603: Tres palmos de nieve en Collserola (132) * 1938: Cuatro días de nevada (33) * 1971: Pete Seeger da su primer concierto en Barcelona en el bar…
Tue Feb 15 20:35 Comment: @PolemicTMM Subplot: Johnson had threatened to do something about money-laundering unless Putin found a way to get him & the public's attention away from No. 10. Putin will find an excuse to take Mariupol anyway & where would high society be without the ruble.
Tue Feb 15 20:38 Comment: @jennitpk Is he any good on LBC? I hadn't got him down as a great communicator
Wed Feb 16 00:58 Historia de Barcelona, 16/2: #otd * 1528: Guerra contra Francia e Inglaterra (23) * 1604: Nevada sobre la ciudad (0) * 1615: Nevada (0) * 1711: Los ingleses pierden un buque de guerra frente a la costa (87) * 1809: Decreto por el qual se…
Wed Feb 16 18:36 Comment: @MattChorley Grand Old Duke of Pork
Wed Feb 16 20:53 - Looking after the toddler has enabled me to talk to people normally off-limits, but there's no war-hero reception (@AasmahMir on @TimesRadio), &, particularly in Leeds (vs London), many mums steer well clear of a man - That's because you play the kazoo when she's on the swings
Wed Feb 16 20:53 Comment: @tombcn I'll bet they cover the Olympics too
Thu Feb 17 01:35 Historia de Barcelona, 17/2: #otd * 1566: Solemne oficio en la capilla de la Diputación tras justas en el Born (59) * 1839: Espectáculo del prestidigitador y titiritero Antonio Muñoz en un café de la Rambla (93) * 1846: Abre la escuela de…
Thu Feb 17 09:21 Toddler doing good woodpecker impressions this morning as we examined storm damage on Woodhouse Moor: inch-thick pieces of sycamore bark containing tasty insects, large branches poised to fall, silence from the pied wagtail colony & the rooster on the allotments
Thu Feb 17 09:44 Comment: @clare_dowding I have a letter from TfL granting me permission to take my barrel organ on the underground & overground networks
Thu Feb 17 09:47 @tombcn
Thu Feb 17 10:07 Comment: @tombcn @CervantesLondon The town's Alcarrás in Spanish, but the film is whatever the producer chooses to call it, so Alcarràs. I always confuse it with Alfarràs/Alfarrás, where some people also get bothered about accents and flags. I'm in favour of repurposing the circumflex: Alcarrâs, Alfarrâs
Thu Feb 17 20:30 Why do the English bother with fridges? Beer tastes better chilled outside
Thu Feb 17 20:47 Three well relaxed & comfortable-looking white chaps on the UCU picket yesterday. Spine points were new to me, but seem to have something to do with the 1832 Canadian penny
Thu Feb 17 23:58 Historia de Barcelona, 18/2: #otd * 1566: Se lleva a bañar la Vera Cruz para aliviar la sequia (17+7) * 1919: Pla: Com que la situació de Barcelona continua essent molt delicada i no es pot anar enlloc sense que us facin posar amb els braços…
Fri Feb 18 14:21 Comment: @ibexsalad Vaya lío
Fri Feb 18 14:30 Rather than a receptionist telling one to wait 10 days for a NHS GP appointment for a child, why not be honest & say we've privatised it, & if you pay X you can see Y today? The same hypocrisy exists re NHS dentistry, which now generally exists only in name
Fri Feb 18 23:43 A tape in PA in the late 90s & still there!
Sat Feb 19 00:14 Historia de Barcelona, 19/2: #otd * 1925: La regulación municipal de los taxis en respuesta al Decreto Real de 25/12/1924 introduce franjas de color amarillo y azul para distinguir su categoría de servicio (1140+15) * 1944: Nieva (10) * ☼…
Sat Feb 19 17:42 People ask what the use is of the union jack, but superimposing crosses is a pretty good way of spreading the oil/water/salt glaze over a focaccia
Sat Feb 19 17:44 Comment: @lordbonkers I'm determined never to find out why they thus migrate
Sun Feb 20 00:20 Historia de Barcelona, 20/2: #otd * 1809: Edicto por el qual se manda barrer las calles de Barcelona los miércoles y sábados de cada semana (174) * 1815: Se comienza a arar para hacer el Jardín del General (15+100) * 1919: Pla: Dijous * 1956: 5…
Sun Feb 20 11:06 Curious as to the geographic applicability of John Evelyn's Kalendarium Hortense, then and now: was/is it great in the Home Counties/London & not so great elsewhere?
Sun Feb 20 11:23 A comparative for anyone who thinks that political corruption in the UK will necessarily be punished at the polls
Sun Feb 20 21:54 Estate agent: Oh no, that'll never flood. They've spent millions on prevention along that bit of the Wharfe. Hoping he hasn't got any visits booked for tomorrow.
Mon Feb 21 00:20 Historia de Barcelona, 21/2: #otd * 1852: Estrena de la comedia bilingüe "La festa del poble", con castells y bailes provinciales (96+114) * 1873: Rebeldes militares de varias regiones de España y con apoyo popular exigen una república federal en…
Mon Feb 21 21:26 Comment: @tombcn Snacking descent to hell, from experience: Spain, Netherlands, England, US east coast, which almost killed me
Mon Feb 21 21:40 Highlight of the afternoon: playing pooh sticks on the best streams from the springs rising NW towards Hyde Park Rd at the edge of the deep bed of sandstone which constitutes the high ground on Woodhouse Moor. Next step: a woollen mill
Mon Feb 21 22:21 Comment: The crocuses on the Hyde Park Rd side are marvellous, but a patch next to the playground struck me as quite tragic & recalled Dorus' miscegenationist ballad of the crocus and the hyacinth
Tue Feb 22 00:26 Historia de Barcelona, 22/2: #otd * 1550: Celebraciones por la coronación del papa Julio III (15) * 1571: Jueves lardero 1571: justas a costa de la Diputación (23+19) * 1789: Guerra entre cirujanos y médicos sobre una niña con dos cabezas…
Wed Feb 23 00:33 Historia de Barcelona, 23/2: #otd * 1432: La Diputación compra unas casas más para el Palacio de la Generalidad (20+11) * 1559: Entra el virrey García de Toledo en el primer coche visto en la ciudad (49) * 1560: Encarcelados unos músicos y…
Wed Feb 23 20:45 Several freezing hours this afternoon while the toddler gambolled in & around the playground at Burley Park. Is there some law that says kiddies' playgrounds (Kirkstall, Woodhouse Moor...) must be on cold, windy, unsheltered hills where one might in the past have erected gallows?
Wed Feb 23 20:48 Comment: The local social centre, based in a Victorian ex-primary school, is currently consulting on the future the playground, which recently has been in use as a carpark. It's got four walls, so I'm hoping it will become ... a nice warm playground, within the meteorological constraints
Wed Feb 23 21:23 It is said that sanctions against Russia won't affect core items, such as the provision of barrel organ/шарманка services to mysteriously-funded expats, who believe that the monkey will never genuinely turn against the organ-grinder
Wed Feb 23 21:33 AMA said that learning to use the pedals on a piano helped him learn to drive
Wed Feb 23 22:06 Comment: Some ideas I believe someone was killed falling from the slide at Portswood, & someone else got their head stuck under a turning roundabout, with grisly consequences
Thu Feb 24 00:35 Historia de Barcelona, 24/2: #otd * Jueves Lardero es el 24 de febrero este año; en 1842 fue el 3 de febrero * ... y en 1571 fue el 22 de febrero * ... y en 1848 fue el 2 de marzo * 1560: Fiesta de toros y cañas para celebrar la boda de Felipe II…
Thu Feb 24 08:39 Wasn't the Belovezhsky Agreement lost? Does the USSR still formally exist?
Thu Feb 24 10:17 Billing and cooing in case Swift goes down
Thu Feb 24 10:56 Rumours of elderly American bachelors signing up to go defend the maidens of Ukraine
Thu Feb 24 17:47 RT @PolemicTMM: Small home diesel generator uses 0.5 litres of diesel/kWh =500l per MWh Red diesel 73p per Litre . Therefore £365 per MWh…
Thu Feb 24 20:46 CO2: cows vs cars in the Netherlands
Thu Feb 24 21:46 Pre-school US -> zero/negative academic & behavioural outcomes Currently 3 mornings, & Ofsted says outstanding, but sometimes you see poorly paid, somewhat apathetic women sitting there at 8 & you think, hmm
Fri Feb 25 00:46 Historia de Barcelona, 25/2: #otd * 1017: Muere Ramón Borrell (6) * 1565: Torneo de á pie en frente del nuevo palacio del Lugarteniente General (26) * 1793: Herido el científico Méchain inspeccionando una máquina de su colega Salvá, que hace de…
Fri Feb 25 22:18 Comment: @tombcn Ah but payments between our lot and the organ-grinder go through channels other than Swift
Fri Feb 25 22:40 RT @elorganillero:
Fri Feb 25 22:40 Comment: Resident Ukrainian nuclear fireman, 1 quid from Walthamstow Oxfam several years ago
Sat Feb 26 00:49 Historia de Barcelona, 26/2: #otd * 1559: García de Toledo visita los baluartes (19) * 1887: La abolición del cuarto a favor del céntimo hace subir el precio y el tamaño de La Esquella de la Torratxa (192) * 1919: Pla: Ara que em revé el gust de…
Sat Feb 26 01:16 The Diocese of Dork is familiar, but not Cudor
Sat Feb 26 10:48 Is it still acceptable to watch Masha and the Bear?
Sat Feb 26 10:59 Free streaming this weekend of Adolfo Aristarain, Un lugar en el mundo/A place in the world: If the war has been lost, at least I want to give myself the luxury of winning a battle
Sat Feb 26 20:30 Even Stalin liked (the stage version of) Bulgakov's White Guard, a great but regime-unfriendly novel set in 1918 civil war Kiev. Putin is said to have pretended to be a translator at one stage, but surely not a literary one
Sun Feb 27 02:03 Historia de Barcelona, 27/2: #otd * Domingo de Quincuagésima es el 27 de febrero este año; en 1848 fue el 5 de marzo * 1461: En el conflicto catalano-aragonés, noticia de la liberación de Carlos de Viana por su padre Juan II (30) * 1632: Muere…
Sun Feb 27 09:30 come on, young @tombcn
Sun Feb 27 17:46 Comment: @tombcn Master communicator! Quite startling, the contrast between the two parties - the Russians telling the folks at home virtually nothing (alla Afghanistan, cos that was such a success) & even if they'd got something to sell, they wouldn't have the faintest internationally.
Sun Feb 27 21:27 Russian celebration->404: "China & India, LatAm & Africa, the Islamic world & SE Asia: no-one believes the West leads the world order, let alone makes the rules. R has not only challenged the W, it has shown the era of W global domination can be considered totally & finally over
Sun Feb 27 21:29 There's nothing like being charged by a deranged horse, on wet ground & with a toddler strapped to one's back, to make one appreciate a quiet beer. Up there with the bull on a hillside near Bristol airport & the bear in foggy forest early in the morning near the head of the Ebro
Sun Feb 27 21:35 Comment: Unfortunate that you now need a VPN (e.g. in Opera) to access in the UK - the fawning commenters are enough to convince anyone but an already convinced antisemitic, homophobic etc etc loon of the nature of the cause
Sun Feb 27 21:36 Comment: On the same free-speech rant, let us celebrate, not ban, the anti-Nato movement in Barcelona:
Sun Feb 27 23:12 Historia de Barcelona, 28/2: #otd * 1461: Prohibición de bailes de carnaval mientras se celebra la paz entre Juan II y Carlos de Viana (57) * 1919: Pla: Inquietud general * ☼ 07:25-18:41, 11:16 horas; ☾ luna menguante, iluminación 49,38%,…
Mon Feb 28 17:38 Since it appears that Putin will either go nuclear or undergo a military coup, would it not be smart to rescind the ban on iodine?
Mon Feb 28 18:41 Mother at the library who bans Thomas the Tank Engine from her house on the grounds that it is "socially regressive" (true) rather than because it is badly written. Former criterion surely disqualifies everything except the abysmal neo-Victorian morality tales of our time