Carl Sagan

Has this become a finance thread rather than a Warne thread?
I would definitely have fired Warne earlier in the season. And said so at the time. Obviously he is Clowes's man and the recent statement from Clowes makes clear they are going forward together long term. DC sees much more of what happens around the club than me. From a far distance as a fan, I would still have considered replacing Warne now, with a proven Championship manager like Cooper or an exciting up-and-coming coach like Skubala, so they would be the ones directing the spending over the summer. But it's very clear that's not going to happen.
What Warne has done well is the even keel, the acceptance that you win and lose games, but instilling in the team the understanding of the consistency and desire and togetherness that is required for a promotion campaign. We had the best defence in the league and the best goal difference. Hopefully we can build on that, but good midfielders and then forwards (the players we need) are expensive. We have to find value in the transfer market - the Adams signing is perhaps a glimmer of hope that recruitment is improving, even if one swallow doesn't make a summer - see CBT.
What I hope and expect Clowes is doing is preparing the succession plan, a bit like how clubs such as Brighton always have someone to step in when their manager is poached. Whether Warne is eventually poached (hopefully as it would mean we're doing well) or sacked, then Clowes needs to already have ten coaches in mind he thinks he could persuade to come, and who would take us to the next level. Maybe Cooper and Skubala would be on that list.
 

Not all of you may know about this. But we’re hosting this event at Pride Park week on Saturday. Promotion party!! 
David Clowes, Stephen Pearce, Colin Todd, Roy McFarland, Colin Boulton, Seth Johnson, Darryl Powell, Ronny Webster and possibly more will all be there. If those of you not already booked can come would be a great evening to have a proper catch up.

Interesting reading this thread back only a few weeks later.
I'm not sure which goal technically qualifies as the one that took us up. As it was without reply, presumably Birdy's? 
But what I am sure about are the important contributions of several players, not least of whom is Sonny Bradley, with two goals previously and the all important assist for Collins to put the final game beyond doubt.
Adams didn't score, but ran the match.
You can see from the subsequent celebrations how together this team is, as demonstrated by Mendez Laing busting a gut to try and get the ball back to Collins for his 20th goal late in the game instead of going for glory himself.
I know we are a tier below, but given the circumstances I hope that these players will live in our hearts and memories just as much as van der Laan. 
Happy days!
 

I have a couple of standout games. Apologies if someone already flagged them up. 
Also apologies if I dont tell the tale exactly as it happened. Its an age thing.
1990 a game we lost but football won.
Rams 4 - Chelsea 6
The most bonkers last 20 mins of a game I recall. 1-3 down. Brought it back to 3-3 ( might have gone 4-3 up… oh memory time) lost 4-6. I think most fans from both sides left the Baseball Ground stunned at what they had just seen.
 
Aston Villa away. Dean Saunders is relatively new and cost mega bucks for the period.
Villa go 1-0 with a Derek Mountfield goal infront of us who were behind the goal opposite the Holte End
Villa fans chanting ” what a waste of money” at our new expensive signing.
Deano wasnt having much of a game and then out of nowhere scores 2 goals
Villa fans silenced and we left the stadium singing ” what a waste of money”… 
So many more to tell… 
Oh go on… Highbury away in Arsenals last second winner at Anfield season. Derby win at Highbury to take Arsenals season into high stress levels.
Deano again turning Tony Adams inside out and getting a penalty which he duly despatched and then popping up at Highburys clock end with a superby volley ( right level with my seat too) to win it.
I was on leave and in London and actually found that match ticket. 

There's lots of information out there but here's a link to a reasonable article.
Just in respect of the batteries following an accident...basically insurance companies are being ultra cautious and instead of replacing individual cells which have been damaged in an RTC,they are replacing the whole lot which is unnecessary and expensive.There are companies out there that already repair damaged batteries.It will just take time for insurers to catch up.
Also you can't really compare EV batteries to mobile devices batteries,they are completely different.
https://www.evconnect.com/blog/how-long-does-an-electric-car-battery-last

2015? The summer we wanted a young and upcoming coach, and ended up with Clement.

Great video about Tesla cars if anyone is thinking of buying one.
Quite shocked on the mega miles people are racking up in these EVs.
Just read the very complementary comments section from real life owners in the you tube video. 
New battery technology upgrades as well.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/24/tesla-expects-4680-battery-cells-cheaper-than-suppliers-end-of-year/
 

What an utterly fantastic list. And a brilliant reading effort. And including Cosmos!
I've just published a lovely new book from the current incumbent of Carl Sagan's office, if anyone wants a gentle and inspiring space fix: 
Alien Earths by Lisa Kaltenegger
It's currently Book of the Week on Radio 4, offering a free abridged audio version!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001ypyp

Me too. I actually worked in the Company's Pension Department so I always considered myself savvy with regard to my own pension.
Of course, while we bemoan the grasping hands of the current government, let us not forget that bundle of laughter, Gordon Brown. At a single stroke, in his first budget after becoming chancellor of the exchequer, he eventually obliterated company pension schemes by withdrawing the tax credits on dividends to a tune of £5 billion a year. That's £5,000,000,000. It's estimated that this has now taken about £250 billion out of company pensions, over 20 years.
Of course, what few company pension schemes are left hold hardly any British shares, so that particular cash cow has gone to the knacker's yard.

I stick to the same 4 digit pin for all bank cards, passwords, house alarm, bike locks, phone unlock etc.
 
Obviously, I ain't gonna give anything away on here.
Regards 
Mucker1884

I did a 52 book challenge last year. Essentially it was to read a book a week every week. It was an absolutely brilliant way to force yourself to make reading a habit and explore a variety of genres. Here’s the 52:
War Horse (Michael Morpurgo)
All the Horses of Iceland (Sarah Tolmie)
The Three-Body Problem (Cixin Liu)
Storm of Steel (Ernst Jünger)
Cosmos (Carl Sagan)
Behold the Man (Michael Moorcock)
The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea (Yukio Mishima)
Coming Up for Air (George Orwell)
This Is How You Lose the Time War (Amal El-Mohtar)
Klara and the Sun (Kazuo Ishiguro)
The Man Who Fell to Earth (Walter Tevis)
Leviathan Wakes (James. S. A. Corey)
We Have Always Lived in the Castle (Shirley Jackson) 
The Stars My Destination (Alfred Bester) 
Annihilation (Jeff Vandermeer) 
Starship Troopers (Robert Heinlein)
The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Leo Tolstoy)
Mortal Engines (Stanislaw Lem)
Did You Hear What Eddie Gein Done? (Harold Schechter)
Moby-Dick (Herman Melville)
The Shadow of the Torturer (Gene Wolfe) 
The Buried Giant (Kazuo Ishiguro)
The Hustler (Walter Tevis)
Why I Write (George Orwell)
The Poppy War (R. F. Kuang) 
Things Fall Apart (Chinua Achebe)
A Psalm for the Wild Built (Becky Chambers) 
The Picture of Dorian Gray (Oscar Wilde)
Blood Meridian (Cormac McCarthy)
Earthlings (Sayaka Murata)
Lapvona (Ottessa Moshfegh)
The Chrysalids (John Wyndham) 
The Only Good Indians (Stephen Graham Jones)
The Story of Kullervo (J. R. R. Tolkien)
All the Pretty Horses (Cormac McCarthy) 
The Word for World is Forest (Ursula K. Le Guin)
One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
South of the Border, West of the Sun (Haruki Murakami)
The City and the Stars (Arthur C. Clarke) 
The Talented Mr Ripley (Patricia Highsmith)
Island (Aldous Huxley)
Tokyo Express (Seicho Matsumoto)
Interview with the Vampire (Anne Rice)
The Centauri Device (M. John Harrison)
Where the Wild Ladies Are (Matsuda Aoko)
Stardust (Neil Gaiman)
The Crossing (Cormac McCarthy)
Doomsday Clock (Geoff Johns) 
Blind Owl (Sadeq Hedayat)
The Setting Sun (Osamu Dazai)
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (Haruki Murakami)
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (Gabrielle Zevin)

We’d get absolutely rinsed for doing this.
I personally think it should be reserved for winning the league or a cup. Saturday was fun enough.

B4 is ours, and we will always hold him close to our hearts.
But when you see the sheer numbers of names on the Rams remembered tribute at Pride Park twice a season, you see the scope of Derby County fans who die each season.
They are each and every one of them someone else's B4. 

Morgan Spencer was one of the triallists. They announced his name when he was substituted. Looked impressive in the 10 role first half, dropped him deeper second, not so good.
Harry Evans was excellent in goal. Early second half Everton had a spell and he made some superb saves. Kept us in it and we went on to score two quick goals on the break. 
Well worth our win.
The Central League Cup final will be at Pride Park next Tuesday.
Match report up already - https://www.dcfc.co.uk/news/2024/04/u21-match-report-derby-county-vs-everton-april-2024-premier-league-2

I think this underestimates AI and how it will advance. Soon it will be able to bring up children here, so in decades/centuries it would be far more capable of doing this for a new space colony. If Human and machine minds work together, we'll be able to start spreading across the Galaxy (and beyond according to some work).
[And, on one weird evening, a very friendly Anne Hathaway pulled me out of the audience in her one-woman New York Theatre play (she was playing a remote drone pilot in the USAF) and we had simulated sex before she went on to be pregnant and then had our baby! Very happy to oblige 😂😂 Maybe there'll always be a friendly Anne Hathaway to bring up children?] 

Been in America for a few days, including a bit of work at the Carl Sagan Institute - even got to sit at the desk in his Cornell University office. They're searching for Earth-like worlds beyond the solar system, which we might one day travel to. The hardest step is this first one, becoming a multiplanetary species, building a self-sustaining civilization on Mars. Once we've done that it will have led to so many new technologies, especially around automation, life support and terraforming, that the next steps become far easier.

Silverware would be nice, Brian Clough trophy 🤷🏻‍♂️

I love that Wildsmith is impervious to embarrassment. Which means he is our best asset in game management. If it's 0-0 on Saturday and we're under the cosh, he will find a way to take the sting out of the game and allow us to regroup. A vital part of the modern game but not anything our keepers have embraced before. 

Its a big thank you, Paul, from me! Surprise, surprise! You did what you were asked to do, and have grown and developed as a manager throughout the season. I hated some of the football we had dished up, and the stubborn intransigence at times, but in the end not only have we managed to drag ourselves out of this hell-hole, we have had a record number of away wins, best defensive record, and load of other "bests", so in the end, your football was effective. It might be that it was a deliberate choice for effective football", and the real "Warne-ball" will surface from now on - who knows? Right now, it doesn't matter. We are up!
Enjoy your summer, Paul!

My grandson is doing it, so proud.

On the train back to London reading this thread and getting weird looks because it's so emotional. And I'm so sorry he's not here to share it with us and say "I told you". He kept the faith when many of us doubted. Be more B4! 🐏🐏🐏🐏

On the train back to London reading this thread and getting weird looks because it's so emotional. And I'm so sorry he's not here to share it with us and say "I told you". He kept the faith when many of us doubted. Be more B4! 🐏🐏🐏🐏

On the train back to London reading this thread and getting weird looks because it's so emotional. And I'm so sorry he's not here to share it with us and say "I told you". He kept the faith when many of us doubted. Be more B4! 🐏🐏🐏🐏