Lets Fly!

Typhoon

Coming back from Sainsburys I ate my Fig & Honey grossly overpriced at £2:30 bread while searching the 'Flightradar24'site.   The man downstairs works at the airport nearby dealing with one of those long distance parcel carriers that arrive daily from the US or Germany or wherever.  Thus, with nothing to do while chewing I looked to see if any aircraft were on site.  Naturally there were a handful though many more come and go at ridiculous hours of the night.  Consideration for those under the flightpath is not required.  The usual flights were noted, 'Ryanair' overcharging for trinkets as much as possible, 'Jet2' hurling people into sunny Spain, and flights bringing holidaymakers back from unpronounceable places that lie far from their ultimate destination.

I then decided to look around the Ukraine area.  Sometimes you get a response from aircraft that hang around Moldova watching what those pesky Ruskies are doing in Ukraine.  Nothing to see there at the moment, so I wandered over to Cyprus to have a look at RAF flights from RAF Akrotiri.  

Just the normal flights heading into Larnaca full of poor English pensioners running from the weather, and not much sign of anything else.

However, just of the coast of Israel I noticed two small yellow triangles flying close together.  This could only be RAF Typhoons on an errand.  I followed them for some minutes, realising that they were not on a fighting mission or the transponder would be turned off, so where were they going?  They flew over Israel without any interruption from the home defences.  On and on over Jordan until they approached the Iraq border.  Here the two aircraft, flying in normal flight plan with one following just behind and to the side of the leader, and then they turned north.  Here I noticed the airspeed on offer differed, and one appeared to be chasing the other.  The practice manoeuvring then continued for some minutes 27,000 feet above the empty Jordanian desert.  Clearly someone was being instructed, or both were practicing their role in dogfights against an enemy.  

I was quite enjoying this when suddenly they disappeared!  

Either they both crashed into the empty reaches of Jordan or they both switched of their transponders to hide from people like me watching them.  Most irritating!  I suppose we ought to be grateful the RAF actually train to do their job and do not just fly about enjoying the multi-million machines they have to fly.

Interesting also how both Israel and Jordan are happy to allow such exercises.  Israel is well in with the UK, both in receiving and giving training in various military skills, and of course spends money here.  As indeed does Jordan, our one friend in the Middle East, a friendship that dates back to Lawrence of Arabia.  Of course we were not friends enough to stop the Saudi's kicking Abdullah and his men out of Saudi, hence we 'arranged' Jordan.  

I enjoyed this so much that when a large black helicopter flying from Wethersfield flew across the town I had to follow it.  He passes often and I wished to know who he was and where he was going.  So, for the next 30 minutes we hovered our way across the northern reaches of Greater London, never going about 1200 feet, and often as low as 650 when crossing under the flight paths into various airports. 

It just kept going, and I had work to do, but I followed him until he landed eventually near Windsor. Annoyingly I cannot specify where he actually landed, just the locale, but it is clear he considers himself important enough for an £8 million helicopter and a flight into the park.  I do not think he landed near enough to 'LEGOLAND' to be going there.  I could be wrong.

Time wasted, I had to then get up and work!

Saturday Mope

It's a long time since I have been down at Poole Harbour, which is just visible as a dim hump in the far distance.   I dreamt of buying a wee house with a view such as this over the harbour, but decided the several millions required could be better used elsewhere.  I used to walk near here with a friend and we often contemplated a flat with a higher view, just up the way from here.  We both decided that a million pound for a flat was too much.  There again, having 47pence between us, this was an easy decision.  Dreams are cheap, but the more I look at rich folks throwing their money away on expensive items, mostly for show, I wonder if they are as happy as you and I are in our struggles?  How many are divorced, unstable, depressed, and looking for meaning by gaining more useless items?  I have done similar but at a cheaper level, it does not work.  Obtaining a property such as this may be good fun but you would end up mixing with the type of high flying greedy guts that you prefer to avoid.  Those who can cheerfully afford a £10 million house are not the people I want to live next to.  Obviously some would be decent, but those desperate to be among the higher orders would proliferate, and what a bore they would be.  

It is five years since I took this picture of Corfe Castle.  That seems like a generation ago.  Those living in Corfe, in houses made from castle stones, must be among the rich of Dorset.  A house near to the castle costs around £800,000, but it does come with a couple of thousand tourists outside your door, cameras clicking as much as their tongues, kids screaming, and traffic a couple of feet from your window.  I'm not sure I could enjoy that.  

The thing of course is to be where 'your people,' are found.

Not far from me, the main road north from historic times, dives down the hill.  Traffic flows day and night, yet people pay vast sums, similar to Corfe, to live amongst 'their people.'  In one way this is understandable, in another, I wonder if 'their people,' could be found in a better area?  We like to be with 'our kind,' and object when incomers to the country behave in the same manner.  An example I read of the other day was 'Green Lanes,' in London.  Many are Cypriots who came here in times past.  At one end Turkish Cypriots gather in coffee clubs as they did back home.  Up the road, sharing many of the same shops, Greek Cypriots live similar lives as lived back in the sunshine.  The distinction is clear, but they need to be near one another to live lives as they always have.  Together, but separate.

Humans are funny...

Spelling Nazis

Can I just point out that while we all can make use of the spellchecker found on Blogger, and indeed on most browsers, the correct spelling of some words remains in dispute. This applies also to names and none more so than from names from antiquity. By antiquity I do not mean your granny and her doing in the junk shop, I mean the ancient 'classical' world of long ago.

(At this point I must point out for our younger readers that the term 'Classical' has nothing to do with the music you so detest and which intellectuals like I and the entire Radio 3 audience happen to appreciate - barring those screeching women singers of course.)

We must take into account that ancient words had a habit of being written in Greek or Latin or Aramaic or Akkadian. Thus when translated the correct spelling is less to do with the actualpronunciation of the word in its setting but relates to the one doing the translating. The wide variety of accents available today indicate a similar situation existing in the ancient world. So for instance 'You say potato and I say potato, you say tomato and I say tomato,' does not reveal that the one gives the word correctly and the other does not. And we all know who is right! I happen to know that the ancient people of Cyprus spoke in a Scots like accent, they were hardy, highly intelligent, and I must add humbly, nice, which proves this to be the case. Therefore I must point out to the spelling Nazis who are among us that the name 'Barnabus' is correctly spelt, and the use of 'Barnabas,' is mere middle class Tory, 'Daily Mail' reading snobbery.

I rest my case.


p.s., I have discovered I spelt spellchecker wrong!