St Landrew

Must have sailed into Cowes, Newport, Wooten, Fishbourne, Newtown Creek, Yarmouth and Bembridge at least a 100 times since I returned to sailing about 6 years ago. Love the place. Quirky, provincial and friendly. Such a change from the cynical mainland. Island people are all right.

Less information would be highly desirable.

Seriously though Baj, if you can get a non-knocked about Toyota Yaris, it'll pay you back in so little heartache you'll consider it a bargain. I really do think you should be able to get one now for £2000 or a little less. They are great little cars and their very low depreciation reflects that.

May I suggest to people who didn't live through the times of the Moon landings, and who are not technically savvy, but may be slightly interested in getting some data sorted in their heads, if presented to them well, that they try watching the HBO drama series From The Earth To The Moon. This can be found on DVD now, and is a pretty damn accurate depiction of what actually happened. You'll find out why NASA chose to go to the Moon the way they did, and not land with a huge spacecraft, as in the science fiction stories. How the Lunar Module was designed, and why lots of it was covered in several layers of hi-tech foil. How the U.S. public lost interest in their Space Programme; why the first American to go into Space, went again many years later despite having been grounded most of the time; how the Lunar Rover came about, and why Galileo was right all along. Although it has never been officially explained, you may find out for yourself why Neil Armstrong was chosen as the first man to lead the first ever landing. I have my own theory, but you should be able to make up your own mind from watching this series. Buy it or borrow it, but give it a go. The 40th anniversary is as good a time as any.

Toyota Yaris..? They must be getting cheap enough by now. Tough as nails, handle well, perky VVT engine that sips fuel, ultra reliable. Hmm, you'll possibly have difficulty getting one for £2000.

Now they are behaving like trolls.

Well it depends on what you call debate WSS. If people write reams and reams of relevent stuff and you essentially write no they didn't as a reply, then I don't call that debate really. Frankly, I don't see where the debate of if they went comes in. They did land on the moon, 6 times in all and 1 gloriously failed, and it's as well proven as anything possibly could be. The intervening time of 40 years makes not a jot of difference. I can seriously debate whether they learned much, or whether it was valuable to the world, or whether they should bother to go again, or whether they should or shouldn't have stopped going. But as for whether or not they went in the first place, I think people have to be amazingly blinkered to deny the evidence. I mean, do you believe I am sat at a computer typing this in..? After all, it's only circumstantial evidence. But it is evidence you understand, so you might take my word for it.

I'll accept that you're not being a troll, WSS. However, what you are being is lazy. I find it slightly odd that anyone could sway towards the never went there side as there is overwhelming scientific, photographic and actual sample evidence that suggests they did, and general nitpicking rubbish which suggets they didn't. Unless your standpoint is to deny anything unless taken to the Moon yourself to stand next to any of the 6 remaining descent stages, and then still doubt it was possible because someone or something has drugged and hoaxed you in the intervening time, then I fail to see what can be suggested to you. As for Sadly Not - your smiley icon [in another relevent post] seemed pretty pleased with itself. That alone doesn't suggest an open minded stance, does it..?

There used to be a siren on the green beside Cheviot Road in Millbrook, but I've just had a look on Street View and it appears to have been removed.

Every once in a while they test the Civil Defence sirens throughout the City. AFAIK, in many instances, they use the same design/hardware as was used in WWII. I spoke to my Mother about it a couple of years back, and she says that every time they test them it still sends a shiver of fear down her back, remembering the bombing raids on Southampton. Came across this: http://www.ringbell.co.uk/ukwmo/index.htm

It's the old Robot V Human debate again. As I mentioned before, and the people ITK did so at the time, a Robot is not qualified to tell the difference between what is a significant sample to return to Earth with, and what is just a rock that weighs a lot. And there are plenty other reasons to send a human, if only to prove that humans can be made safe in space. Besides, as also mentioned before, the learning curve that the U.S. went under in the technological, scientific and industrial sectors was incredible. The entire space programmes gave the world everyday 99% fault free design engineering and technology. It's why, for example, such complex units as computer hardware plod on day after day uncomplaining.

And the reason why humans haven't been back to the Moon in the intervening years is because there hasn't been sufficient reason to do so. In the 1960's, there was the political will to make the journey. Technically, it wasn't possible to do it when announced by Kennedy. But he gave the U.S. scientific, engineering and industrial sectors a 9 year proving time, and they just came through with months to spare. It cost the U.S. billions of dollars, which many people of the time said should have been spent elsewhere, and possibly they were right. But it gave the U.S. an enormous technical and political advantage over the rest of the world, a reputation which still holds true today. So I consider the moon landings quite good value. By the time the later missions came in, the 10 minute attention span that exists in the average U.S. citizen [i'm joking, of course] kicked in, and public opinion took the political will, and the remaining money, away. Reducing the programme by 3 missions was quite stupid really IMO, as it had all largely been paid for by then. It's a tribute to the design and strategy of the original Apollo programme that the recently announced lunar venture resembles the Apollo one in many ways. They found that NASA had got it right the first time around.

As for evidence of hardware being left on the moon from the Apollo missions; there is a lunar orbiter, only recently sent, that has, amongst its other tasks, taken some high resolution pictures of the old landing sites. Here are a couple of examples: http://news.cnet.com/8301-19514_3-10289551-239.html EDIT: Oops, Baj beat me to it. Will, you should have a little more appreciation of 1940/50/60's technology. We weren't going around wearing animal skins with clubs before 1990. It was an incredible achievement, and if you were sufficiently interested, you'd find out for yourself, rather than just assuming it was far-fetched.

Derry, I hope you'll remember that if Saints win their first 3 matches of the new season, and are on -1 points, that you look at the overall picture and not the fact that we're still bottom of League 1.

We have a current sportsman considered by most as the Greatest Of All Time [GOAT] in Valentino Rossi. He now has 7 World Titles in MotoGP [2 of them in the 125 class] and 101 wins [the latest was last Sunday]. Yes, as in F1, it is about the machine, but in motorcycle racing the rider input makes more of a difference - a slower bike can win. Giacomo Agostini won 122 races in his career. Rossi is obviously looking to pass that target before he retires. Are they greatest ever sportsmen..? No, not even close. That title easily belongs to Muhammad Ali.

I thought Buzz was quite restrained.

Just read about this. Also looked at your http://msn.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10584830&ref=rss link. It made me laugh to read that Tash from Invercargill said it was the most exciting thing to happen in the city in quite a while. Having lived near and needing to visit Invercargill for many a time during job prospecting days in NZ, I can quite believe that.

The Russians might not have got there first [or at all in a manned way], but by the next year they did send Lunokhod I. They kind of got it together in a hurried way when they realised they weren't going to win any races to get to the moon, because they simply couldn't develop the necessary technology in time. Lunokhod was fairly effective, and for a short while did re-ignite the debate of why manned flights were necessary. Later Apollo science mssions put that argument firmly to bed. Robots can't stand next to rocks and choose the one that tells the geological story. It just picks up any old bit of rock and soil. Hence why geologist Harrison Schmitt got to be be in the Apollo 17 [and last] crew. During one of Schmitt's stoops to pick up a notable rock with his trowel, he picked up the rock of all the missions, because that rock sample has become the central evidence that suggests that the moon once had an active magnetic field. It took a geologist to recognise a certain rock, and not another, might have those properties. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunokhod_1 EDIT: Hamster - Amazing how Armstrong picked up a golf ball shot by Alan Shepard 3 missions later.

No. I've managed to keep that one at bay until now.

If this thread turns into another UP/NC slanging match I'll close it. Just thought you'd like to know.

Pretty good set of races today. The 125cc one was highly competitve, and the only shame was that young Brit Bradley Smith crashed out TWICE. Yes it took two goes to get the lad out of the race. He was fuming too, and rightly so, as he is so close in the Championship. The 250cc race was distinctly odd. They were all a bit edgy going round, and then suddenly the race was red flagged and called a wet race. Which meant it all started again with practically everybody on wets. Only they didn't in the end as the intermittent drips stopped and, on the grid, mechanics were frantically changing to slicker options as the time to restart the shortened race ticked away. Reigning World Champion Marco Simoncelli won again, which was apt, because he was leading the race before the red flag. So much for the expected rain then, as the sun appeared during the main event. The entire field rushed off to the first corner and bunched up on the outside, squeezing 4th placed Hayden back to 9th. That put a dent in his enthusiasm. JT started in 14th and rounded the first corner in 15th, but his day got better. The 4 main protagonists; Rossi, Stoner, Pedrosa and Lorenzo did the early laps in that order, when Casey decided enough was enough and shot past Vale on the big downhill left hander. He managed to keep Rossi at bay too, but eventually the Factory Yamaha M1s started their creep forward and in the final laps Lorenzo and Rossi swapped the lead a couple of times. It wasn't Catalunya again, but it was almost as close, with some really nice dicing. During posts race interviews, everyone was knackered, and only Dani Pedrosa seemed really pleased, with 3rd, as he explained his front tyre troubles. He'd been told of Dovizioso, his teammate's, shredded front tyre [it looked like it had been cut about a hundred times with a stanley knife on the left side] so he was chuffed with his podium finish. Notable rides were Elias, who started last and finished 6th, and JT who managed 10th in the end. With teammate Colin Edwards always seemingly on the point of leaving Yamaha at the end of a season, I can't seeing them making room for a poorer performing JT. He's got to do better as, at this stage in the season, the Monster Tech 3 Yamaha is pretty much the same bike as the Factory Fiat Yamaha, and only the set up and rider skill is really making the difference. But Nicky Hayden is getting his act together, so it can happen. Here are the results: German MotoGP 1 V Rossi (It) Fiat Yamaha 41:21.769 2 J Lorenzo (Sp) Fiat Yamaha 41:21.868 3 D Pedrosa (Sp) Honda 41:24.668 4 C Stoner (Aus) Ducati 41:31.995 5 A de Angelis (SMR) Honda 41:43.291 6 T Elias (Spn) San Carlo Honda 41:52.621 7 M Melandri (It) Kawasaki 41:53.070 8 N Hayden (US) Ducati 41:53.495 9 C Edwards (US) Tech 3 Yamaha 41:54.634 10 J Toseland (GB) Tech 3 Yamaha 42:05.695 11 L Capirossi (It) Suzuki 42:19.144 12 N Canepa (Ita) Pramac Racing 42:22.308 13 C Vermeuluen (Aus) Suzuki 42:25.414 14 M Kallio (Fin) Ducati 42:25.924 15 G Talmacsi (Hng) Scot Racing + 1 lap Championship standings 1 V Rossi (Ita) Yamaha 176 points 2 J Lorenzo (Spn) Yamaha 162 3 C Stoner (Aus) Ducati 148 4 D Pedrosa (Spn) Honda 108 5 C Edwards (USA) Yamaha 83 6 M Melandri (Ita) Kawasaki 70 7 A Dovizioso (Ita) Honda 69 8 C Vermeulen (Aus)Suzuki 64 9 L Capirossi (Ita) Suzuki 61 10 R de Puniet (Ft) Honda 58 11 A de Angelis (RSM) Honda 47 12 T Elias (Spn) Honda 47 13 N Hayden (US) Ducati 46 14 J Toseland (GB) Yamaha 45 15 M Kallio (Fin) Ducati 28 16 N Canepa (Ita) Ducati 20 17 S Gibernau (Spn) Ducati 12 18 Y Takahashi (Jpn) Honda 9 19 G Talmacsi (Hng) Honda 1 125cc race result 1 J Simon (Spn) Aprilia 39:57.337 2 S Gadea (Spn) Aprilia 40:06.752 3 J Olive (Spn) Derbi 40:14.896 125cc championship standings 1 J Simon (Spn) Aprilia 129 points 2 S Gadea (Spn) Aprilia 104 3 B Smith (GB) Aprilia 98.5 250cc race result 1 M Simoncelli (Ita) Gilera 27:11.034 ? 2 A Debon (Spn) Aprilia 27:11.513 3 A Bautista (Spn) Aprilia 27:11.562 250cc championship standings 1 H Aoyama (Jpn) Honda 134 2 A Bautista (Spn) Aprilia 124 3 H Barbera (Spn) Aprilia 106 Next week the last British MotoGP at Donnington Park, as they all go to Silverstone for 2010.

German MotoGP qualifying result: 1 V Rossi (It) Fiat Yamaha 1'32.520 2 J Lorenzo (Sp) Fiat Yamaha 1'33.160 3 C Stoner (Aus) Ducati 1'33.759 4 N Hayden (US) Ducati 1'34.404 5 A de Angelis (SMR) Honda 1'34.490 6 R de Puniet (Fr) Honda 1'34.564 7 C Edwards (US) Tech 3 Yamaha 1'34.607 8 D Pedrosa (Sp) Honda 1'34.725 9 L Capirossi (It) Suzuki 1'34.741 10 M Kallio (Fin) Ducati 1'34.771 11 A Dovizioso (It) Honda 1'34.892 12 C Vermeuluen (Aus) Suzuki 1'34.937 13 M Melandri (It) Kawasaki 1'34.938 14 J Toseland (GB) Tech 3 Yamaha 1'35.005 15 N Canepa (Ita) Pramac Racing 1'36.012 16 G Talmacsi (Hng) Scot Racing 1'36.055 17 T Elias (Spn) San Carlo Honda 1'36.531 125cc qualifying result: 1 J Simon (Spn) Aprilia 1'38.671secs 2 B Smith (GB) Aprilia 1'39.686 3 M Marquez (Spn) KTM 1'40.010 250cc qualifying result: 1 M Simoncelli (Ita) Gilera 1'32.962 2 H Barbera (Spn) Aprilia 1'33.105 3 A Bautista (Spn) Aprilia 1'34.246 Saw very little of today's qualifying owing to being out buying another motorcycle. Caught the last few minutes because the seller is also a mad keen MotoGP fan. Amidst, yet again, the pouring rain, Nicky Hayden had the most amazing highside from his machine - catch it if it ever comes up on Youtube - but he still managed to qualify 4th. His season has finally arrived, it appears. Stoner was just happy he was feeling better; and Lorenzo, although carrying an injured shoulder from last week, was satisfied with his day's work. Rossi came in with the expected last gasp lap which ended up half a second faster than his teammate. Please let it be dry during the races. All this wet stuff reminds me how pathetic this summer has been so far.

Is there any confusion..? Of course it is photoshopped. Yes, the bloke is enhanced by training, but photoshop has further hugely developed his size. Try to find the original. Very, very odd looking.

Traditionally close racing here, and a seemingly endless series of left hand corners. The riders seem to be careened over, as if to reveal their undersides for the watching public. It makes it hard to get away from the pack. In 2006 for example, the race was really super close with the first 4 passing over the finishing line within a split second, after exchanging the lead the whole race. Sachsenring is often overshadowed, as a circuit and race, but often provides great entertainment. Here's the broadcast times: Saturday 18 July Qualifying 1150-1500, BBC Red Button/online Sunday 19 July 125 and 250cc race 0950-1205, BBC Red Button/online 800cc MotoGP Race 1230-1400, BBC Two/online MotoGP Extra 1400-1430, BBC Red Button/online EDIT: BTW, reports say that Suzi Perry has meningitis. It's been a bad year, health wise for our Ms Perry. Motorcycle News suggests she won't be at Sachsenring. Get well Suzi. Here's the circuit:

Dare I suggest you turn it face down..?