Zombie

No pressure then Andy Seriously, though, you shouldn't do the QA. QA is a key process control - it has to be done independently otherwise it's not a control but a fudge. Email your Risk Manager or Internal Audit and request a speedy reply to get something suitable in place. You need to protect your back. If it goes pear-shaped QA is your protection. Oh, and the general public's. Not that we count of course. Being only the customers ... I'm serious, this is a horror story. Your manager should be fired - what an irresponsible d*^@head - and you should be given the job. Good luck!

I've been enjoying this thread. Now you just ruined it!

Seems like there's a difficulty in understanding what's " political" or "controversial" enough to be banished to the wastelands of the Soapbox. I've not found it clearly explained anywhere. The Lounge has lots of threads on gay and social issues and for some people these could be political / controversial - "Gaybies" [eeek!], "Teachers", "Bullying" "Disability Prejudice" etc. Maybe this is more about US sensitivities and members in countries that have stronger legal protections aren't always tuned into these? Whatever, some guidance would surely be helpful.

I just googled "gay hispanic sportsmen" and, er ... let's just say it came up with a load of stuff not allowed in The Lounge

Um, there's already a thread on this but it's been moved to Soapbox

Happy birthday Daddy! Here's a special low-cal treat I made just for you

The Paper Boy Here's a restrained review: "Dirty, violent, sexy, and sweaty, The Paperboy is 107 minutes of B-movie goodness. Like the sinful act of picking a pair of dirty undies off the floor and putting them on without a care in the world, The Paperboy is comfortable in its own filth. This is a film that is trash and knows it. Jack is smitten with Charlotte on first sight. She’s the perfect object for his horny fantasies. Charlotte is also the lust-puppet for Hillary, so Jack is forced to watch his prized woman shamefully shed herself of her virtue whenever they visit the jail. A true “wham, bam, thank you ma’am,” The Paperboy likes it rough and dirty. Daniels pushes the actors into provocative scenes and he knows how to frame the contours and shiny sweatiness of their bodies with exploitative goodness. Daniels seems especially fond of his leading man Zac Efron, who spends a good chunk of the movie dancing around the set in his tighty whities. (He even does a little romp in the rain.) Efron is far from the Disney days of High School Musical and he holds his own among the other actors in the camp. Charlotte amps the camp value up the wazoo as she slinks her booty, mashes her gum, and pees on Zac Efron. (The golden shower scene truly lives up to the hype.) A B-movie to the core, The Paperboy is a tasty slice of pulp fiction. Viewers willing to go along for the ride will love the tawdry debauchery of The Paperboy. Bring fried chicken." Gulp! *books front row seat and giant bucket of KFC Wings *

Since 2002 in the UK there's been legal parity with straights for all gays - whether single or a couple - who can provide a stable loving family environment, and discrimination because of sexuality by any adoption agency has been illegal since 2007. Here's an extract from one UK agency's web site: "We do not have any requirements about your marital status. Our adopters may be single, married, in a civil partnership or living with a partner. You can adopt jointly without being married. We welcome gay and lesbian adopters whether they are single or looking to adopt jointly with their partner." I would guess preference will always be given to couples, and if you leave it too long then in terms of age there will come a point where that will start to count against you, but that seems sensible.

Pretty feeble. Should have been a hefty fine as well. There's a similar problem in English football with homophobia. Racial abuse has a zero tolerance policy and it's moving in that direction for homophobia too but there's still work to be done. The authorities have to take a lead and stamp hard on this crap.

If you wear contacts - do you swim in them? - do you shower in them? - do you wash them in water? - do ever let water get on them? - do you sometimes not follow the lens handling guidance? - do you sometimes forget to change you lens case every month? - are you sometimes careless about washing your hands thoroughly? If "yes" to any of these you need to be aware of the risks of eye infection and even blindness and you might want to read this http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2191190/I-swam-contact-lenses--Im-blind-eye.html

What?? No Beach Boys? No Marvin Gaye? What's Going On??? Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler), Marvin Gaye [1971] This is a song from that album, about black America and life in the ghetto. Not many singers can say something with the power of Marvin Gaye. It is a terrific song. Sloop John B, Beach Boys [1965] This early stereo recording is an extended version with a much richer sound than the mono version that was released in 1966. My favourite BB song - a cover of an old folk song brilliantly arranged by Al Jardine and Brian Wilson. Interesting archive film too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjpA5X-9Bv0

British men love their garden sheds. They're a refuge from the real world where they can enjoy their hobbies and dream their dreams. One such man is a 68 year old engineer, Alan Bond. Alan has devoted his whole life to an obsession with space travel. As a boy he loved the 1950s Eagle comic which featured Dan Dare, the spaceman. He dreamed of being Dan Dare and flying in a space plane. Here's an issue from 1960, showing the new Nimbus Two single stage to orbit space plane - the holy grail of space travel As a boy Alan played with, built and launched small rockets. He then studied engineering and worked on real rockets during the British Space Programme [yes, we had one ]. Lucky Alan got to do what he loved dreaming about as a boy. And he continued to work on his Dan Dare space plane ideas in his garden shed. In the 1980s he was the principal designer of HOTOL, a single stage space plane designed to take off and go straight into space without all the expense and complicated external gubbins of the Space Shuttle [huge external tank and throw-away solid boosters]. The key to this was an air breathing engine that removed the need to use onboard liquid oxygen until very high altitude has been achieved. This combined two known technologies, jet engines [which Britain developed in the 1930s] and rocket engines. Essentially a jet engine compressor is bolted onto the front of a rocket engine to deliver massive amounts of air containing sufficient oxygen for the stored hydrogen to operate the rocket motor without stored oxygen and provide exceptionally high thrust right up to 17 miles / 90,000 feet [Concorde's maximum altitude was 60,000 feet from where the Earth's curvature is clearly visible]. At that point the air intakes are closed and the engine becomes "closed cycle" using stored oxygen until orbit is achieved. The problem was the temperature of the air as it enters the engine at supersonic speeds is too high for the turbine compressor feeding the rocket engine at the back so Alan and his team had to design special lightweight heat exchangers to reduce the gas temperature. This is the key to make the whole thing work. Sadly, a small team never had the kind of resources NASA has and the small amount of government money was never going to be enough to solve the inevitable technical difficulties. So the project was abandoned. Alan then sought patents on his design but the UK government immediately classified his technology. What meanies - the government wasn't going to pursue it and it wasn't going to let Alan and his team do so either. So it was back to the garden shed, and with some new ideas Alan found a way around the original patents and set up Reaction Engines with a small team of specialist engineers near Oxford. With no government money they succeeded in building the "pre-cooler" and in April this year it was successfully tested To avoid the patent problems Alan had with HOTOL none of their groundbreaking work has been patented. All the knowledge is in the heads of just a few individuals within the company. This is really exciting stuff but Alan and his team can only take this project so far. Sadly Britain has a long track record of coming up with new technologies but not exploiting them. A project like this is going to need huge investment if Alan's engines are ever going to get into space. This can only happen with the backing of the European Space Agency or NASA. The ESA has assessed the technology and is currently evaluating the project so maybe the Dan Dare space plane will become a reality. In the meantime here's to garden sheds and boyhood dreamers like Alan. http://www.reactione...o.uk/about.html

Just checked my sports pics archive and here's a picture of that historic match [sadly the loser lost his head]

Good advice from daddy

Well the good news from all of this is if she can make a pile of money from writing then anyone can!

From the 1960s A Whiter Shade of Pale [1967] by Procol Harum Inspired by JS Bach, this is one of the most famous British pop songs of the 60s with original 16mm colour film of the group in London with psychedelic clothes, London bobbies and quaint red double-decker buses Gimme Some Lovin' [1966] by The Spencer Davis Group Watch and gasp as an original 45 rpm vinyl single from 1966 spins and plays analogue music - in low-fi mono !!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is iconic 60s British rock - it really does, er ... ROCK!!!! And listen to the legendary Steve Winwood playing the fantastic Hammond B-3 organ

Good point. I can't find any evidence for deaths either and I can't access the report published in The Lancet as it's subscription only so I'll delete that bit quoted in my original post. That was evidently written by The Guardian - sound like they got that wrong. Re seizures I believe this was about confiscations, not medical seizures. Just to clarify, the study's author [David Nutt] believes cannabis is relatively low risk hence it came in at number 11, well below alcohol and tobacco, and essentially he lost his government job for not towing the government line. This wiki link gives more info http://en.wikipedia....wiki/David_Nutt

True, but I did say "it's all about relative risks". Singling out classified drugs - as governments like to do - is unhelpful. The study was quoted because it was a review of all drugs to give a more balanced picture of risks rather than just those of illegal drugs. The methodology of ranking should be reviewed as new data becomes available but the approach is surely correct.

True, but then marijuana, hash, grass, weed, or the whole dictionary of street names weren't listed either Just like alcoholic drinks there's a wide spectrum of names and strengths to choose from. "Grass" was the 60s dope, probably quite mild for today compared with skunk [the strongest - very high THC], but they all share the same active ingredient.

I love the way the naughty Director has used the lighting to highlight the voluptuousness of Jesse's pecs - jeeze, the right one's even casting a shadow

All drugs, including cannabis, have potential harmful side effects regardless of why they're taken. For recreational drugs it's all about relative risks and it's important people understand what these are. A 2009 study ranked the top 20 in terms of their risk to health: 1. Heroin Class A drug. Originally used as a painkiller and derived from the opium poppy. There were 897 deaths recorded from heroin and morphine use in 2008 in England and Wales, according to the Office of National Statistics (ONS). There were around 13,000 seizures, amounting to 1.6m tonnes of heroin. 2. Cocaine Class A. Stimulant produced from the South American coca leaf. Accounted for 235 deaths – a sharp rise on the previous year's fatalities. Nearly 25,000 seizures were made, amounting to 2.9 tonnes of the drug. 3. Barbituates Class B. Synthetic sedatives used for anaesthetic purposes. Blamed for 13 deaths. 4. Street methadone Class A. A synthetic opioid, commonly used as a substitute for treating heroin patients. Accounted for 378 deaths and there were more than 1,000 seizures of the drug. 5. Alcohol Subject to increasing concern from the medical profession about its damage to health. According to the ONS, there were 8,724 alcohol deaths in the UK in 2007. Other sources claim the true figure is far higher. 6. Ketamine Class C. A hallucinogenic dance drug for clubbers. There were 23 ketamine-related deaths in the UK between 1993 and 2006. Last year there were 1,266 seizures. 7. Benzodiazepines Class C. A hypnotic relaxant used to treat anxiety and insomnia. Includes drugs such as diazepam, temazepam and nitrazepam. Caused 230 deaths and 1.8m doses were confiscated in more than 4,000 seizure operations. 8. Amphetamine Class B. A psychostimulant that combats fatigue and suppresses hunger. Associated with 99 deaths, although this tally includes some ecstasy deaths. Nearly 8,000 seizures, adding up to almost three tonnes. 9. Tobacco A stimulant that is highly addictive due to its nicotine content. More than 100,000 people a year die from smoking and tobacco-related diseases, including cancer, respiratory diseases and heart disease. 10. Buprenorphine An opiate used for pain control, and sometimes as a substitute to wean addicts off heroin. Said to have caused 43 deaths in the UK between 1980 and 2002. 11. Cannabis Class B. A psychoactive drug recently appearing in stronger forms such as "skunk". 12. Solvents Fumes inhaled to produce a sense of intoxication. Usually abused by teenagers. Derived from commonly available products such as glue and aerosol sprays. Causes around 50 deaths a year. 13. 4-MTA Class A. Originally designed for laboratory research. Releases serotonin in the body. Only four deaths reported in the UK between 1997 and 2004. 14. LSD Class A. Hallucinogenic drug originally synthesised by a German chemist in 1938. Very few deaths recorded. 15. Methylphenidate Class B drug. Brand name of Ritalin. A psychostimulant sometimes used in the treatment of attention deficit disorders. 16. Anabolic steroids Class C. Used to develop muscles, notably in competitive sports. Also alleged to induce aggression. Have been blamed for causing deaths among bodybuilders. More than 800 seizures. 17. GHB Class C drug. A clear liquid dance drug said to induce euphoria, also described as a date rape drug. Can trigger comas and suppress breathing. Caused 20 deaths and 47 seizures were recorded. 18. Ecstasy Class A. Psychoactive dance drug. Caused 44 deaths, with around 5,000 seizures made. 19. Alykl nitrites Known as "poppers". Inhaled for their role as a muscle relaxant and supposed sexual stimulant. Reduce blood pressure, which can cause fainting and in some cases death. 20. Khat A psychoactive plant, the leaves of which are chewed in east Africa and Yemen. Also known as qat. Produces mild psychological dependence. Its derivatives, cathinone and cathine, are Class C drugs in the UK. http://www.guardian....erous-drug-list Edit to add: deleted Guardian reference to deaths for cannabis as this is unsubstantiated [see jamessavik post #12]

Happy to report the first episode of Dallas maintained the Ewing family tradition of scheming, duplicitous, back-stabbing, plotting and downright villainy in an alternative universe of unreality. And that's just JR Here's some classic JR quips from the original series: "I've never seen a woman open her mouth more and say less" "Monogamy is not exactly second nature to me, so I want full credit for my efforts" "I don't get ulcers, I give 'em!" Looking forward to seeing more of Jesse heheh

Hey, lighten up some of you Welcome to trash culture - a multi-billion dollar global industry You could equally criticise pop music ["extraordinary how potent cheap music is" - Noël Coward], or fast food, or most "entertainment". Do most people want to see Cosi fan tutte or Dallas! Writers want to be successful, which means being read, so who would honestly say they wouldn't want the success of Dan Brown or EL James instead of writing a literary masterpiece that earns a quarter? As Mencken said "nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the public" [for pedants - a snappier version of what he actually wrote] But this raises a more interesting question. Why do girls go for the bad boys?

Yeah, a real feelgood video. Thanks for posting Symp

Aaaaaaaarrrrgggh! *runs screaming from the room ......* Heheh this was blasted out of the No. 1 slot in 1979 by ........ THIS! Hit Me with Your Rythm Stick [1978] The unique Ian Dury and the Blockheads in a live performance. Ian was severely disabled by polio from childhood but he truly "lived" his life and left a legacy of unique music that just gets better the more you listen to it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldm_H8IAHM4 And from the 60s Reach Out I'll Be There, Four Tops [1966] There'll still be playing this long after we're all dead