Re: OT. Freedom Of Speech

On 2006-07-06, Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Whiskers <catwheezel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

snip

<Chuckle> We used to scrape our studs on the coarse concrete ramp down
from the changing-rooms onto the pitch. Doubtless it was my generation
who grew up and legislated against what had given some of us such
interesting scars.

<grin> While *WE* had a half-mile tramp along the streets to get to our
playing fields...

Our playing field was a 4-mile bus ride away. I got permission to cycle
instead of take the bus; I'm certain that the ride there and back did far
more for my health and fitness than anything that happened on the field -
and certainly did more for my self-esteem.

But many of the rule changes - affecting scrummaging, for example - that
they've introduced to rugby (union) for safety's sake did need
introducing. Collapsing scrums has long been outlawed, but they had to
get deadly serious because too many teams were deliberately pulling
scrums down anyway. For those who don't know why this is a problem: it
tends to break necks.

Mid-'60s third 15 lock forward speaking. The third 15 lacked the
commitment to actually try to cripple the opposition on purpose. I had
the height to be a prop, but not the eyesight - wouldn't know which way to
run with the ball without following a blob of the correct hue. No good
for conversions, either. Scored a few good tries though.

The best prop I had in a school match (I was hooker) was in the year
below me at the time, and had *terrible* eyesight. Marvellously solid
in the scrum. Dreadful eyesight. At one point in the match, he got a
bit disoriented (as happens from time to time if you've been knocked
flat or somesuch), but sorted himself out on rising from the mud,
located the opposition ball carrier, and tackled him. Except he was
more confused than he thought - what with one thing and another, that
was a goal post he tackled. Thump! Bump! I was there... They were
padding the goal posts by then, so it wasn't too bad, but even so.

We didn't have padded goal posts, so they were too thin for me to see one
from far enough away to make that mistake. I can quite see how it might
happen.

snip

<chuckle> We never had deaths amongst the staff - just madness (at
least two of 'em ended up in the looney bin, from what I heard).

I always though that madness in some degree was a pre-requisite to working
as a teacher.

btw, re: weapons in school and whatnot. My littlest brother nearly got
expelled for taking an axe into school one day - just for the hell of
it. Only a little thing for splitting firewood. I wonder why similarly
straighttforward approaches aren't used these days.

You can't confiscate what you can't find. A hatchet is tricky to conceal,
but a bread-knife isn't. Nor is a sharpened steel comb, which was the
thing in my day - beware of anyone with tousled hair and a comb ...

There were knives available in most class-rooms, as I recall, for
sharpening pencils and dividing up large sheets of paper and so on
(although a well-worn steel ruler is just as effective).

It was the school calculating machine that we weren't allowed to touch.
Only the maths dept teachers were allowed near it.

snip

There were glass
jars (with glass stoppers) containing lovely stuff like 'conc Nitric' on
the racks above each bench in the Chem Lab.

That kind of thing was on the racks on the walls in the chemi labs at my
school, rather than abvoe every bench. Why not have huge glass jars
full of deadly chemicals lying around? You learn this: `The contents of
jars are often deadly, so don't mess unless you know all about it.' Not
a bad lesson (actually, my dad had a shed which was even more deadly in
contents - I'd learnt that lesson at a *very* early age).

Creosote, arsenic, quick-lime, turps, benzine, nicotine bombs, camphor,
DDT, ... no garden shed was complete without a good selection of dangerous
chemicals.

'Safety precautions' meant taking your blazer off and rolling up your
shirt sleeves, and tucking your tie into your shirt-front. For the really
dangerous stuff, like metalwork with the forge and gas brazing and welding
torches, we were meant to wear tough canvas aprons.

snip

Like the hard hats that everyone on horseback
is meant to wear now, and the crash-helmets for pedal-cyclcists that
propaganda would have us believe to be a good idea.

Yers... I've not looked at cycling helmet effectiveness. But note
this: I *have* read studies of motorcycling accidents. The injuries
that kill motorcyclists were (when the study was done) head, neck, and
chest injuries. A helmet can improve yer chances of snuffing it from a
head injury - but it'll also improve the chances of yer neck snapping,
and does nothing for your chest area at all, one way or the other.

Yes. The best thing a motor-cycle helmet does is keep the cold or the sun
off, mostly. But there probably are several people still able to talk, if
not walk, who wouldn't be talking if they'd had no helmet.

The trouble with a pedal-cycle helmet is that your head overheats and you
get a stiff neck. The ventilated helmets are worse; you get alternate hot
and cold patches all over your head. Not good at all. I found a 'Tilley
Hat' best, with a fleece cap as an alternative in the coldest part of
winter.

One big problem with helmets is that they give you a sense of security,
which means you're likely to act in a more reckless fashion. When I
cycled everywhere as a child, I felt terribly vulnerable on the road and
took great care to ride sensibly as a result (after the usual mistakes
made at a tender age, one of which took most of the skin off my chest
and stuck my head underneath a moving car).

Yes - but how many kids these days get the chance to learn early and at
low speed? Around here they seem to go straight to 'BMX' or 'Mountain Bike'
and ride at breakneck speed on the pavement 'because it's dangerous on the
road'. The only kiddy-bikes or trikes seem to have a control-stick with a
parent at the other end, or 'training wheels' to make it as hard as
possible to learn how to ride properly.

Do the kids on mopeds in your area habitually ride with one or both feet
almost scraping the road, at anything less than 'full speed'?

snip

--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~
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