Jump to content

anyone past 50 on here?


Recommended Posts

9 hours ago, Thea2 said:

I got sorted yesterday by Pottermore into Hufflepuff,  that’s my favourite house 🤗. What’s your house?

Apparently my house is Ravenclaw (and my patronus is a blackbird). 

 

11 hours ago, Midland Tyke said:

A stones throw?

Yeah - it's a bit of a long shot isn't it? :P When I am in NZ I won't have time to get over to OZ. But maybe I will get to Australia another year.

 

I think I'm supposed to get back home from my NZ trip about 3 hours before I depart NZ. :D 

 

13 hours ago, Tja said:

Tomorrow is an air travel blitz. With layovers, about 30 hours of travel, in a 10 hour period. Yeah, still can't wrap my head around that.

Time zones! :P

I hope it all goes without a hitch. Keep the memories of your journey alive! :) 

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, daveb said:

Apparently my house is Ravenclaw (and my patronus is a blackbird). 

I'm also Ravenclaw and my patronus is a Brown Owl (which is supposedly unusual - or so it said).

 

Screen_Shot_2018-01-16_at_8.59.17_am.png

 

16 hours ago, Tja said:

Tomorrow is an air travel blitz

Safe travels, Tja.

  • Like 5
Link to post
Share on other sites

Evening of January 15th and half the month is gone already.  As the years are passing, I am finding time moving ever faster.  Today was the 56th birthday of girl from my elementary school days.  Coincidentally, the first girl who ever looked "different" to me :lol: 

 

I used the holiday today to clean up a bunch of things I had been putting off.  Wound up with a nice large bag of trash going out the curb.  Sadly it is but a mere dent in what I need to attack.  Baby steps.

 

I signed up for Amazon Prime today on a whim.  I had a $20 off offer plus a $30 credit on Amazon due to a problem with their shipping over the holidays so I decided it was worth signing up to get access to the video and music services as well as their e-book lending.  I am also allowed to share the service with one other adult so my sister suggested sharing it with my brother-in-law.  I can also sign up children so I will see about giving my niece access too.  She has a daily reading assignment of her choice of books so possibly there will be something online that will interest her.

 

Back to the office tomorrow morning.  

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites
18 hours ago, Midland Tyke said:

A stones throw? 

To my fellow British Avenites:  Is a "stones throw" a defined distance?  Is it related to the "stones" you use as a unit of weight?  

I use the term "stones throw" in the literal sense, and had never heard of a stone used as a unit of weight until I started hanging out around here, always to describe body weight.

 

@Tja I hope your journey home was uneventful and pleasant.  Thanks for sharing your travel adventures with us.

  • Like 10
Link to post
Share on other sites
12 minutes ago, Muledeer said:

To my fellow British Avenites:  Is a "stones throw" a defined distance?  Is it related to the "stones" you use as a unit of weight?  

I use the term "stones throw" in the literal sense, and had never heard of a stone used as a unit of weight until I started hanging out around here, always to describe body weight.

 

@Tja I hope your journey home was uneventful and pleasant.  Thanks for sharing your travel adventures with us.

It's used in Canada too. I've never heard anyone explain the distance, which I'll use from time to time. I think the best definition of the stone is one you could comfortably throw, something golf ball-sized.

  • Like 9
Link to post
Share on other sites

@Muledeer  The term "stone's throw" is just a figure of speech here, meaning a short distance, often further than you could throw a stone, but still not far away.  It has no connection to the stone weight as far as I know, which is 14lbs.  Despite years of metrification, people generally use stones and pounds for their weight, and feet and inches for their height here.  Most people use miles per hour for speed and measure journeys in miles too.

 

The vets use kilos for weighing animals. 

  • Like 12
Link to post
Share on other sites

To elaborate on what @Mz Terryhad suggested, I wonder if the term stems from the days of catapults and trebuchets, as it is usually applied to somewhere local but out of sight. 

  • Like 10
Link to post
Share on other sites
17 hours ago, daveb said:

Ravenclaw (and my patronus is a blackbird). 🐦

 

14 hours ago, Kazbe said:

Ravenclaw and my patronus is a Brown Owl 🦉...

 

12 hours ago, faraday☘ said:

Ravenclaw.  My  patronus is a Bay Mare.:D 🐴

Thank you for the replies. 😊.   It made me smile, because I did think daveb and faraday would be Ravenclaws. 🤗 Kazbe I was less sure.  

 

My patronus is a mink. https://goo.gl/images/cY88ia

  • Like 8
Link to post
Share on other sites
10 hours ago, Mz Terry said:

@Muledeer  The term "stone's throw" is just a figure of speech here, meaning a short distance, often further than you could throw a stone, but still not far away.  It has no connection to the stone weight as far as I know, which is 14lbs.  Despite years of metrification, people generally use stones and pounds for their weight, and feet and inches for their height here.  Most people use miles per hour for speed and measure journeys in miles too.

 

The vets use kilos for weighing animals. 

 

9 hours ago, Skycaptain said:

To elaborate on what @Mz Terryhad suggested, I wonder if the term stems from the days of catapults and trebuchets, as it is usually applied to somewhere local but out of sight. 

Agree with @Mz Terry regarding 'stone's throw'. But more and more people are quoting height and weight in metric, I find. Especially in the NHS. I think children have been taught this way for some time and they are through to young adulthood now. Catapults and trebuchet? Interesting, not heard of that as an explanation. And I hadn't heard of it being necessarily out of sight, either. I'd say it was somewhere really close, but not in the same building. A bit further than 'just across the road' and maybe about the same distance as 'just around the corner'. :D

  • Like 11
Link to post
Share on other sites

the latest stage of travel was to sail across from North Island to South Island through the fabulous Cook strait. On a beautiful sunny day. Three and a half hours of bliss. Followed by a two-hour drive to Nelson through impossibly beautiful scenery in picture-perfect weather. :D

 

Unfortunately the rain forecast for tomorrow and the next day, looks almost certain to arrive. Boo. 

  • Like 9
Link to post
Share on other sites

As far as I know the 'stone' has never been used as a unit of measure in Canada.

Dont get me on metric.

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

It's our half metric half imperial measurements which must cause most confusion. Especially in one of the few areas where you cross measuring systems. 

 

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Skycaptain said:

It's our half metric half imperial measurements which must cause most confusion. Especially in one of the few areas where you cross measuring systems. 

 

I had pretty much was comfortable with the Imperial system as a kid and then the metric system comes along. People would say to my father (who was a draftsman), "it's so much more accurate than Imperial". My father would say, a system is only as accurate as your measuring devices."

 

I'm pretty sure my 0-1" micrometer is just as accurate as a 0 - 25 mm mic'.

  • Like 8
Link to post
Share on other sites

I prefer metric myself.  Back in engineering school, problems were so much easier to solve in metric (Newton/Meters vs. Foot/Pounds for example) than in the "English" system.  My late grandfather was a machinist who emigrated to the U.S. from Germany in 1924.  My mother told me that he too preferred metric but you worked with what you had to.  Back in the 1970's it looked like the United States was going to switch to metric and we spent a lot of time in school learning about it.  I even had a large government issued wall poster in my room titled "The Modern Metric System" given to me by the head of the math department at my first high school (the exact same poster is seen in the lab on the 1970's TV show "Quincy").  Road signs also began to pop up with both English and metric distances (the last dual system sign was removed about 10 years ago from the New York State Thruway in Sloatsburg, NY - there was a news story about that).

 

Of course there is a second issue with our "English" measurements.  We use the "old" pre-1825 English system instead of the Imperial system.  As such, we have 32 ounces in a quart instead of 40 ounces as Canada and other English aligned countries used (Canadian liquor bottles are 1.14L reflecting the old 40 ounce Imperial quart and customs still exempts a bottle of liquor on the old Imperial Quart standard - The U.S. changed its customs code to 1L from 1 quart). 

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites
56 minutes ago, Techie said:

I prefer metric myself.  Back in engineering school, problems were so much easier to solve in metric (Newton/Meters vs. Foot/Pounds for example) than in the "English" system.  My late grandfather was a machinist who emigrated to the U.S. from Germany in 1924.  My mother told me that he too preferred metric but you worked with what you had to.  Back in the 1970's it looked like the United States was going to switch to metric and we spent a lot of time in school learning about it.  I even had a large government issued wall poster in my room titled "The Modern Metric System" given to me by the head of the math department at my first high school (the exact same poster is seen in the lab on the 1970's TV show "Quincy").  Road signs also began to pop up with both English and metric distances (the last dual system sign was removed about 10 years ago from the New York State Thruway in Sloatsburg, NY - there was a news story about that).

 

Of course there is a second issue with our "English" measurements.  We use the "old" pre-1825 English system instead of the Imperial system.  As such, we have 32 ounces in a quart instead of 40 ounces as Canada and other English aligned countries used (Canadian liquor bottles are 1.14L reflecting the old 40 ounce Imperial quart and customs still exempts a bottle of liquor on the old Imperial Quart standard - The U.S. changed its customs code to 1L from 1 quart). 

We still refer to liquor bottles as a 26er or a 40.

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites
9 hours ago, Midland Tyke said:

 

Agree with @Mz Terry regarding 'stone's throw'. But more and more people are quoting height and weight in metric, I find. Especially in the NHS. I think children have been taught this way for some time and they are through to young adulthood now. Catapults and trebuchet? Interesting, not heard of that as an explanation. And I hadn't heard of it being necessarily out of sight, either. I'd say it was somewhere really close, but not in the same building. A bit further than 'just across the road' and maybe about the same distance as 'just around the corner'. :D

That's pretty much what I think of when it comes to "stone's throw", too. I always thought it was a stone's throw in terms of a person throwing a stone, not a machine. But the gist is what matters, and that's as you said - close, but not necessarily adjacent. :) (around the corner, if you can throw a stone around a corner) :lol:

 

8 hours ago, Midland Tyke said:

the latest stage of travel was to sail across from North Island to South Island through the fabulous Cook strait. On a beautiful sunny day. Three and a half hours of bliss. Followed by a two-hour drive to Nelson through impossibly beautiful scenery in picture-perfect weather. :D

 

Unfortunately the rain forecast for tomorrow and the next day, looks almost certain to arrive. Boo. 

Sounds cool (except maybe the rain forecast, especially if that interferes with any plans).

 

On the subject of measurement systems - I still maintain that inches has some advantages in limited cases (being based on base 12 makes for easier arithmetic when it comes to fractions like a quarter of something, for example). And lots of colorful (not to say off-colorful) expressions work better in the "old" measurement units ("give him a centimeter and he'll take a kilometer" doesn't have quite the same ring. :lol: ). And fahrenheit makes more sense to me, with it's finer gradations in the range of temperatures we mostly live in day to day. Be that as it may, conversion to metric is probably best done by just doing it and letting it become more standard as the generations go. Not sure about the cost of changing over tools and infrastructure and all the "stuff" though. (I do encounter plenty of youtube videos and hobby blogs and such, by Canadians, Brits, Aussies, etc., who use inches - but maybe mostly from older generations? Or "transitional" generations who are still in the process of metrification?)

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

The easiest conversion is that 6*750ml wine bottles is accurate to <1% a UK gallon :P

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites
Guest Jetsun Milarepa

Sounds like a great day of travel @Midland Tyke, I bet the roads are considerably quieter than some places in the UK.

@will123, I remember my dad using a micrometer in his work, he did quality control for the British Aluminium company, so he measured the thicknesses of the different grades of aluminium products. This was after the farming finished and we moved into the town.

I'd forgotten about Pottermore, as I lost it after my computer crashed three years ago and I got this laptop. Will have to get back on!:D

Nothing much going on here, just work and lazing...have gotten tickets for Ray Mears and Noel Fitzpatrick's tours. Ray Mears is coming here in February and Noel Fitzpatrick in London from September. Looking forward to that!

Link to post
Share on other sites

@chandrakirti I could have been referred to Noel Fitzpatrick's practice when Little Dog had his accident.  The estimate was very expensive though, and in the end my vet did a wonderful job.  The little boy is walking and running well on the leg, and all seems on track for a full recovery, hopefully.  Of course, for really difficult cases SuperVet is probably a lifeline.

  • Like 9
Link to post
Share on other sites

Metric, Imperial, Whitworth (shows age) quality tools are quality tools, I still have a few from when my grandad started his garage and engineering business over 80 years ago 

  • Like 8
Link to post
Share on other sites
12 hours ago, Midland Tyke said:

To elaborate on what @Mz Terryhad suggested, I wonder if the term stems from the days of catapults and trebuchets, as it is usually applied to somewhere local but out of sight.

Being the type of person who has to look up the etymology of words and phrases, I've discovered that the phrase goes back to the Bible and Jesus' visit to the Mount of Olives in the week before his death. Luke 22:41 states: "And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed, ". A stone's cast means a stone's throw. Not sure what the original Greek was but the translation is something to do with chucking a stone.

 

So now we know. 

 

6 hours ago, will123 said:

As far as I know the 'stone' has never been used as a unit of measure in Canada.

We used stones as a weight measurement way back before metric. However, we've had metric since 1971 so it is a dim memory. I learned imperial measurements in primary school and the first half of high school, then had to learn metric for the last half of high school. I think in metric for weight nowadays but still find 1 foot/12 inches more meaningful than 30.48 cms.

  • Like 8
Link to post
Share on other sites

@Thea2 I started on Pottermore a long time ago and got sorted into Slytherin. I always get Slytherin or Ravenclaw when I take House quizzes. My wife is Hufflepuff all the way.

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Kazbe said:

Being the type of person who has to look up the etymology of words and phrases, I've discovered that the phrase goes back to the Bible and Jesus' visit to the Mount of Olives in the week before his death. Luke 22:41 states: "And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed, ". A stone's cast means a stone's throw. Not sure what the original Greek was but the translation is something to do with chucking a stone.

 

So now we know. 

 

We used stones as a weight measurement way back before metric. However, we've had metric since 1971 so it is a dim memory. I learned imperial measurements in primary school and the first half of high school, then had to learn metric for the last half of high school. I think in metric for weight nowadays but still find 1 foot/12 inches more meaningful than 30.48 cms.

In Canada, lumber for the most part is still measured in inches, 2 x 4, 2 x 8. Plywood is still sold in 4' x 8' sheets.

  • Like 8
Link to post
Share on other sites

I have taken various HP quizzes and I am always Ravenclaw, which I am happy about :) my patio us from Pottermore is a doe which I don't feel is quite "me". I was hoping for either a dog/wolf type or a horse. 

 

The he construction on this house is feeling so slow! Thursday and am ping out to get light fixtures, have tub and vanities on order, electrician is scheduled for next week, plumber in 2 weeks. Coordinating all this is starting to feel cumbersome.

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

The variability is quite wide.  I have taken 3 quizzes from various sites.  I always think I'm going to be Hufflepuff, but I always end up Ravenclaw.  My patronus always changes.  It has also shown a falcon and hare.  So not sure how accurate they really are.  They all ask different questions.  I like all animals, so I suppose it's fitting.

 

@Mocha Jo good luck with the construction stuff.  I was stressed during my basement remodel.  I still need to get lights and blinds installed.  My small project installing shelves in my grow room is somewhat stressful too. I'm little disappointed in the quality, but it's not too bad.  I can make it work, and improve the aesthetics with paint...probably. 

  • Like 6
Link to post
Share on other sites
5 hours ago, chandrakirti said:

I remember my dad using a micrometer in his work, he did quality control for the British Aluminium company.

Now, there's another regional variation, not in measurement systems but in spelling: aluminium -- a.k.a. aluminum in American English. Coincidentally, I only just learned of this distinction a couple of weeks ago when I came across the British spelling in a work document.

 

(BTW, as I started typing aluminium in my first sentence of this post, the site's spellchecker wanted to fix it to the U.S. spelling. :P)

 

And @daveb's comment about colorful expressions losing something in translation to metric reminds me of a time I traveled with a friend to some decidedly non-imperial-measurement countries. My friend was prone to using lots of U.S. idioms, and I'd wonder what the locals thought when she'd obliviously sprinkle phrases like "the whole nine yards" or "get a lot of mileage out of" into her conversations with them.:unsure:

  • Like 7
Link to post
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...