1949threepence

Oh it was definitely 100% the action of the gulf stream, and the track of the resultant deep depressions an expression of it. The talk now is of reduced salinity at the surface which will have the effect of slowing the overturning circulation. It hasn't really happened yet, but climate modellers are convinced that it will. However, at present there is really no evidence to support such a change as a fact yet in being.

I've said before and I'll say again, we've tried to run before we can walk when it comes to net zero. Moroever, setting ludicrously tight target deadlines such as 2030 reflects a dogma with no meaningful thought or logic behind it. As a consequence we've neglected existing sources of energy and somehow set up reducing our existing <1% Co2 emissions as a sort of global example, when anybody with an ounce of intellect can see that the big players like China don't give a tuppenny damn about climate change. Again - we can't move forward one jot as a planet until they take an interest and it's mind numbingly stupid to suggest or imply otherwise, talking of which I don't see ER demonstrating outside the Chinese embassy. We could have been self sufficient, but have been well and truly caught with our pants down. As for increasing bills, again it's blindingly obvious that probably more than half of households won't be able to afford the projected figures and will need a lot more help than £400 over 6 months. How we get round that via anything but a totally blunt approach which takes in the rich as well as the poor, I honestly don't know. We could offer credits in £100 blocks upwards to households who can provide evidence of hardship, but that would present an administrative nightmare, probably presided over by badly trained civil servants. Or maybe we could just say nobody gets cut off over the Winter months and we look at affordability for individuals next year, with a view to many bills being written off. Again an administrative nightmare and open to abuse. One thing that could be done is to maybe restrict to pre April 2022 rates, anybody who is on Universal Credit. State pensioners are already in line for £500 in November.

The last one I won at LCA was an 1806 gilt proof penny. I bid £800 and got it for £800 - surprisingly enough ! Sarcasm aside though, I still think it was a bargain, as FDC and there was another FDC example on offer by a dealer for over £2, 250. Same KP No.

At the moment though, there is absolutely no sign of the gulf stream weakening. If anything its gaining strength, as testified by the number of more intense Winter storms we get (eg, Storm Eunice 17.2.22). During the incredibly mild Winter of 2015/16, the gulf strem was unremitting as one after another depression arrived, ensuring we were in a very mild South Westerly for probably 80% of the time from November to February - especially December and January. It was so mild that the cherry blossom was appearing in mid January - 2 months early.

Covid's been and now gone bar the shouting. Don't think it's that. But either way, it's yet another big disappointment in terms of what's on offer.

There are many amateur weather stations, but only a few officially recognised by the Met Office as authentic sources of information. Anyway, I thought you lived in Kidderminster......

Hmm.....well I can guarantee it's something the BBC would sooner forget they ever said. But of course they go back a very, very long way, and must have shown many different faces over the 100 years involved, most of which is long forgotten, apart from the odd unearthed snippet like the above. Anyway, back to the heat, which is building again. Looks like 4 days of 35 degrees plus, potentially. But 30 odd degrees today and I've hardly noticed it. Evidence, perhaps, that we soon become acclimatised.

Not for ideal reasons, but it looks as though the use of cash in the form of notes and coins, is rapidly increasing after a long decline, accelerated somewhat during covid. Many people are now turning back to cash as a means of helping them budget effectively. link to article

Fair comment - I'm afraid that trying to communicate with many organisations has been made - in my view - deliberately difficult. Yes, sorry, but this is obvious to anyone with half a brain, it's deliberate. It has to be. Nobody designing this stuff could be that moronic for it to be well intentioned. It was installed to be as obstructive as possible in order to discourage customer contact. From (very) inferior voice recognition software, to bots that you can't get past, to pressing endless option choices, to eventually getting through to someone whose accent you can't understand. This is the panoply of so called customer service these days. Moreover, coming back to your point about a smartphone, there is also this weird - I say weird - obsession with everything having to have or exclusively be operated from a mobile app. Fair enough if you're able to use the website from another device, but that's often not the case nowadays. If you want to keep your blood pressure within reasonable parameters, try to avoid contact if at all possible.

Yes, they were obviously minted with that in mind.

Pennies having holes drilled through them was very much a 19th century trend. Not many from the 20th. Same with letters and names being stamped in the fields of coins. Wonder what the psychology or practicality of it all was

I also feel that the booming laughter which followed "I am not a number, I am a free man" was a cryptic message to us all. Much more true today, in fact, than it was back then. #dem bones, dem bones, dem...dry bones, now hear the word of the Lord. I wonder what inspired that being included.

Yes, the ending was a bit odd. Effective, but odd.

Many apologies to all from me and on behalf of fellow forum members for the off topic posts. I think we got a bit carried away there. I'm going to message @TomGoodheart to see if he will possibly move the errant posts to the "Nothing to do with coins" area, under a new thread title called "The Prisoner"

Not bad, although I'd vary that slightly by - yes - still having him on the outside, but also attempting to find out who is funding the operation and why. Also, what the big deal was in determining why he resigned. He gets nowhere with outside enquiries, so again sets out to find the village, and how it's so immaculately protected from the outside world - land, sea and air. There has to be a border zone as it's not an island. In real life this would attract the attention of nosey and curious outsiders. How are they kept out? I'd then have him in the village trying to get the information he couldn't get on the outside, and with agents outside the perimeter working on breaching it, so that locals can get in. Ultimately, the village wouldn't be destroyed as such, but there'd be a mass incursion of outsiders. Need to put some meat on the bone however, and have a meaningful conclusion. Also, a question which was never answered in the original series. How come the village appeared deserted in a couple of episodes, with just a cat remaining? Where did all the residents go? Remove any fantasy and make it as real life as possible.

A great pity. I bet that would have been really interesting. No - never saw that. Again, a great pity. On someone else's recommendation, I did see the original series for the very first time when it was broadcast on the Horror channel early this year. Absolutely brilliant. Started out watching under sufferance as I'd thought it might be not my style, but was gripped less than a quarter of the way in to the first episode. Patrick McGoohan was a great actor with a lot of presence.

"I am the new No 2" "Who is No 1?" "You are No 6"

Oh well, shouldn't be too critical. At least they did apologise and sent the pics, albeit 5 months after first enquiry. Not going to blame them for getting it wrong either, as the 1854/3 is probably one of the hardest overdates to correctly identify, until you've seen some actual working examples.

Yes, they did, although it dropped into the spam folder (don't know why those things even exist, they're completely and utterly useless), so have only just seen it. They'd advertised an 1854/3 penny in NEF for £195, which if for real, would have been quite a bargain. No photo was on the website, which is why I requested one, as it's very easy to mistake a non 4/3 for the genuine article. Didn't need to go closer than this to know immediately it wasn't a 4/3. Although some close ups were provided.

Not me, more's the pity.

I did reply to them, Bruce. Maybe a little sarcastically. That was last night. I'll now see if I get a response today. Should just clarify that their enquiry yesterday was a direct reply to my e mail of 15.3.22, Would have understood if it had been a separate one.

Unreal - where to start with this one. I sent an e mail to Ingrams on 15.3.22 asking for a close up pic of a coin they had on offer, and never got a reply. Then forgot about it anyway. I've just had a reply today completely ignoring what I requested, and asking me if there's anything I'm interested in at the moment.

Probably need to see it in hand then, because from where I'm standing there is absolutely nothing about its appearance, which suggests that it's a proof. Just a slightly scruffy, a/UNC business strike, with pretty much full lustre. Unless someone can point me to various features on the pic which mark it out as a proof. Maybe I'm missing something. Do you have a photo of the reverse? Maybe this is the sort of coin which at auction would lend itself to being videoed. Rotation through the angles in natural light might aid identification as a proof and show up the mirror like finish - unless prior provenance already exists.

Are some non proofs sneaking through as proofs? We've already seen that slabbing companies are making errors by accepting the customer's assertion on the coin itself, without checking. Maybe it's the way the pic has been taken, but that really doesn't look anything like a proof.

Some very interesting info. With regard to the 1841, I bet you wouldn't see much change from £1500 now.