Bob The Badger

Oh well, if you *think* you know a threat when you hear one, let's just shut everything down and you can let us know because I didn't hear a threat and that report was from 9 days ago and nothing has happened on the threat front.
I'm not in favour of vaccinating dogs with rabies, or wasting time on teaching smokers that it's unhealthy....but ya know....there was a time when both were possibly a good idea.
You do realise that wars with France are far more common than worldwide pandemics - right?
 

Oh well, if you *think* you know a threat when you hear one, let's just shut everything down and you can let us know because I didn't hear a threat and that report was from 9 days ago and nothing has happened on the threat front.
I'm not in favour of vaccinating dogs with rabies, or wasting time on teaching smokers that it's unhealthy....but ya know....there was a time when both were possibly a good idea.
You do realise that wars with France are far more common than worldwide pandemics - right?
 

The stories people come up with to avoid spending Christmas with David. 

I have this ready to go. LOVED the first 2 seasons and I hear the finale for this season was standout.
I know I said it before, but the scriptwriting is so clever and the acting is top-drawer whilst reaming deliberately tongue-in-cheek.
But much as I love it, I really cannot wait for this to drop on Saturday!
 

Same.
My sister and fella have tested positive this week, they are out of isolation on the 23rd but with 3 kids in the house, matter of days now until one of those tests positive and pushes the isolation period over Christmas.
Looking like me and the missus will be staying at home again this year.

Fauci warned of variants way back at the beginning and the need to build herd immunity through vaccinations QUICKLY.
But that horse has left the stable, settled down with a hot filly, had foals and is now looking to retire.
It appears that with each variant  the vaccine has proved less effective in fighting off the virus entirely.
To the point now, with omicron, where it seems to be posing little resistance to catching the virus, but *appears* to be effective in reducing the seriousness.
So it's still important, but this variant is coming to get us all I think.
From my understanding, the vaccine absolutely did massively reduce your chances of catching Covid when it was rolled out, just that every subsequent variant has reduced its efficacy.
The early variants struggled in getting past the vaccine more than a drunken Dalek struggled to get up a flight of stairs.
Delta bought a chair lift, but Omicron be like 'dude hold my beer I've got this, there's a backdoor they left open - follow me"
I will go on record as saying the vaccine now appears to be useless in slowing the spread. It's still valuable in stopping people dying and helping the NHS though.
My views and opinions tend to change as science and new information changes.
Get this guys - I think vaccine passports are largely window dressing. I do think they can have value (can't be arsed to explain why as I have a client in 15 minutes).
This is aimed at @G STAR RAM rather than you @TexasRam - I look for information that contradicts what I already believe from reputable sources.
I then make the best judgment call I can as a layperson.
As such, my opinion fluctuates with new information .
That's why I think there may now be a case of just letting this thing rip IF they unequivocally can show the NHS wouldn't be more seriously impacted than it would with this dragging on year after year. 
Most people (me included when I'm posting here) in this thread are looking to persuade rather than learn. If we all  were told that we'd be given £5,000 if we could create a compelling argument for the position we currently do not hold, most of us probably could.

Fauci warned of variants way back at the beginning and the need to build herd immunity through vaccinations QUICKLY.
But that horse has left the stable, settled down with a hot filly, had foals and is now looking to retire.
It appears that with each variant  the vaccine has proved less effective in fighting off the virus entirely.
To the point now, with omicron, where it seems to be posing little resistance to catching the virus, but *appears* to be effective in reducing the seriousness.
So it's still important, but this variant is coming to get us all I think.
From my understanding, the vaccine absolutely did massively reduce your chances of catching Covid when it was rolled out, just that every subsequent variant has reduced its efficacy.
The early variants struggled in getting past the vaccine more than a drunken Dalek struggled to get up a flight of stairs.
Delta bought a chair lift, but Omicron be like 'dude hold my beer I've got this, there's a backdoor they left open - follow me"
I will go on record as saying the vaccine now appears to be useless in slowing the spread. It's still valuable in stopping people dying and helping the NHS though.
My views and opinions tend to change as science and new information changes.
Get this guys - I think vaccine passports are largely window dressing. I do think they can have value (can't be arsed to explain why as I have a client in 15 minutes).
This is aimed at @G STAR RAM rather than you @TexasRam - I look for information that contradicts what I already believe from reputable sources.
I then make the best judgment call I can as a layperson.
As such, my opinion fluctuates with new information .
That's why I think there may now be a case of just letting this thing rip IF they unequivocally can show the NHS wouldn't be more seriously impacted than it would with this dragging on year after year. 
Most people (me included when I'm posting here) in this thread are looking to persuade rather than learn. If we all  were told that we'd be given £5,000 if we could create a compelling argument for the position we currently do not hold, most of us probably could.

For those of you that like dark humour, Barry is excellent. Henry Winkler was outstanding.
I also liked The Kominski Method with Michael Douglas and Alan Arkin which is on Netflix. 
And from the early 80s' Police Squad was genius.
 

I'd agree with almost all of those.
I hated Sorry, I mean really hated it. It would be in my list of worst popular comedies of all time. And I didn't like Vicar of Dibley, but that's probably just because I don't care for Dawn French.
And the very last Black Adder had me in tears too. I don't think it was OTT, just really brilliant writing. A bit like After Life. You laugh you cry.

Nope, never heard of it. I'll take a gander. Cheers.
 

You guys watched L'Immortale. It's a feature released between S04 and 5 as a bit of a placeholder. Worth a watch if you love the shows - doesn't quite scale the same heights, but it's a petty handy place setter.

The Fast Show
Not the Nine Oclock News
Monty Python
 

Are we just listing Britain’s, or are American ones allowed. 
I find the difference between American and British sitcoms to be fascinating. Americans ones are written by a team, so they have a much bigger well to draw from, so they can go effectively forever, we’ll beyond the point at which they’ve jumped the shark. Whereas British sitcoms are normally written by just one or two people, and tend to just go for 2 or 3 seasons, which I think allows them to sit in the memory as a small but perfectly formed entity, all killer, no filler.
both approaches have merit I think. People often get all uppity about the American approach, but you can’t deny, that when you have a room full of writers, they are usually able to perfectly craft their jokes, and you get some iconic moments.
Modern Family was great, and ran for a lot longer than I realised. Maybe didn’t get quite as mainstream as something like Friends as it was exclusively on sky. 
Arrested Development was always great too. I loved how every episode was like one long build up with a massive punch line at the end.
From a Britcom point of view, I loved the IT Crowd. That was the last great one for me.

I have this ready to go. LOVED the first 2 seasons and I hear the finale for this season was standout.
I know I said it before, but the scriptwriting is so clever and the acting is top-drawer whilst reaming deliberately tongue-in-cheek.
But much as I love it, I really cannot wait for this to drop on Saturday!
 

Yep, it's up there for me too. Totally oustanding.

Get in, probably my favorite ever series Gomorrah.  Can't wait.

Former Denver Broncos receiver Demaryius Thomas dies at age 33 - wow

Clearly.
Here is what @GboroRam said:
The vocal posters in this thread probably are a minority. Most people are quietly just dealing with it and not arguing, aren't happy but are putting up with the disruption and pain.
I've been in M & S and Tesco in Truro and both Asda and Tesco in St Austell this week as well as B & Q.
Here's what I have observed.
The overwhelming majority of people wearing masks. I only saw more than 2 people not wearing a mask in one place and that was Marks, where I saw 3. I only saw 1 person in Asda (the biggest of all the stores) other than an older guy in a wheelchair on oxygen.
I'd say the figure was around the 2% of people not wearing masks.
That's kinda self evident, but I know you and @Norman will probably come back with some devastating retort pointing out that that is just anecdotal, which would be true.
But self evident truths are anecdotal, because ya know, they're self evident. Meaning you can clearly see for yourself.
A self evident truth would be that the M25 appears to be busier on a Friday at 5 pm than on at 4 am on a Sunday morning to anybody who drives on it. Few people would want scientific data to believe such a statement.
My self evident truth is local, so if I lived in a bubble there could be an argument for suggesting this area of Cornwall is an outlier.
But it isn't.
There are no stories of riots. No media reports of massive problems with people refusing to wear masks on public transport. And no social media buzz about an imminent uprising.
Of course there are many people unhappy with the situation as GB pointed out, but it's self evident that most are just getting on with their lives.
NOW, if there were hundreds of posters in this thread as there are members, you could make a case for saying it's self evident that most people are indeed arguing and highly vocal.
But as there are less than 1% of members (figure plucked out my ass tbf, but I doubt it's more) that adds more weight to it being self evident that @GboroRam was on the money.
You can hold your hands up to being wrong again although I fear you're going to get repetitive strain injury at this rate.

https://www.ajpmonline.org/article/S0749-3797(21)00557-2/fulltext
Conclusions
This study's significant results show that face mask mandates were associated with lower COVID-19 deaths rates compared with countries without mandates. These findings support use of face masks to prevent excess COVID-19 deaths, and should be advised during airborne disease epidemics.
Next time some one says there's no point in wearing a face covering, please remind them of this real world study. 

Clearly.
Here is what @GboroRam said:
The vocal posters in this thread probably are a minority. Most people are quietly just dealing with it and not arguing, aren't happy but are putting up with the disruption and pain.
I've been in M & S and Tesco in Truro and both Asda and Tesco in St Austell this week as well as B & Q.
Here's what I have observed.
The overwhelming majority of people wearing masks. I only saw more than 2 people not wearing a mask in one place and that was Marks, where I saw 3. I only saw 1 person in Asda (the biggest of all the stores) other than an older guy in a wheelchair on oxygen.
I'd say the figure was around the 2% of people not wearing masks.
That's kinda self evident, but I know you and @Norman will probably come back with some devastating retort pointing out that that is just anecdotal, which would be true.
But self evident truths are anecdotal, because ya know, they're self evident. Meaning you can clearly see for yourself.
A self evident truth would be that the M25 appears to be busier on a Friday at 5 pm than on at 4 am on a Sunday morning to anybody who drives on it. Few people would want scientific data to believe such a statement.
My self evident truth is local, so if I lived in a bubble there could be an argument for suggesting this area of Cornwall is an outlier.
But it isn't.
There are no stories of riots. No media reports of massive problems with people refusing to wear masks on public transport. And no social media buzz about an imminent uprising.
Of course there are many people unhappy with the situation as GB pointed out, but it's self evident that most are just getting on with their lives.
NOW, if there were hundreds of posters in this thread as there are members, you could make a case for saying it's self evident that most people are indeed arguing and highly vocal.
But as there are less than 1% of members (figure plucked out my ass tbf, but I doubt it's more) that adds more weight to it being self evident that @GboroRam was on the money.
You can hold your hands up to being wrong again although I fear you're going to get repetitive strain injury at this rate.

Here we have the ones who think they had the right to party when we were ordered to stay within the Law.
Tory HQ in Westminster December 14th 2020

 

Well, what can we say?
The vaccine certainly seems to prevent serious illness from the Alpha-Delta variants. Worth getting for that alone. The vaccine seems to be of limited benefit against Omicron, but we can be optimistic that it's a milder form that perhaps isn't causing as many serious illnesses as the previous versions. Maybe we won't need to vaccinate against it but it's early days to be 100% sure. 25k-75k deaths from Omicron wouldn't be far from the vicinity of annual deaths from flu, and it's thankfully a long way from the 150k+ we've got from the first waves. The Government are happy to preach one rule but do their own thing, showing their failure to actually lead by example. Vaccine passports aren't a good thing.  Lockdowns aren't fun, nobody wants them. But most people don't want a virus spreading unrestricted through the population. There's been a failure to convince certain sections of the population that the vaccine is safe. Medical professionals preferring to lose their jobs than take the vaccine is tragic but utterly avoidable (I mean, it's been rolled out to millions, how much more testing do you need?). It's not like the profession doesn't already mandate some vaccination already. How many doctors are refusing to get vaccinated? Most people probably are prepared to do whatever they can - masks, vaccines and social distancing are a small price in the grand scheme - to maintain open shops and a semblance of normal life. The vocal posters in this thread probably are a minority. Most people are quietly just dealing with it and not arguing, aren't happy but are putting up with the disruption and pain.

There are occasions when you don't need to survey people because something contrary would be obvious. It's called a self evident truth.
Most people are breathing just fine, most people stupidly don't support Derby and most people are indeed getting on with it. If they weren't, in a country of 70 million it would literally be anarchy. 
Im not sure if most people know what a self evident truth is though. You clearly don't, so that lowers the odds somewhat. 

What's green and not heavy? 
Light green.