The grumpy thread

[Cavcraft]

National are absolute robbers (price wise) these days, amazed they're still in business to be honest.

[cobblers]

The story that a fiat 500 has a rare size of tyre and they just have one at an astronomical price that they were going to return is 100% complete bollocks, they've had your pants down big time man. He was probably leaning with his hand covering the tyre label of a suitable linglong £40 job while telling you that

A 500 has got to be one of the most popular cars on the road, even if its got alloys etc, there's no way any tyre is genuinely £200 unless it's a foot wide.

[wuvvum]

13 hours ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

If you've ever tried to solve a Bach chorale then you'll understand how music (for instance) teaches skills that can be applied to a wide range of other areas.

How does one go about solving a Bach chorale?? 

[High Jetter]

Maths, pure maths.

[anonymous user]

26 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

How does one go about solving a Bach chorale?? 

More to the point, how do you solve a problem like Maria?

[GrumpiusMaximus]

34 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

How does one go about solving a Bach chorale?? 

https://vandykemusic.weebly.com/uploads/4/3/4/1/43415261/guide_to_bach_chorales.pdf

http://www.choraleguide.com/

Dozens of simultaneous 'rules' to follow to harmonise in the style of JS Bach.  It's difficult and you can find yourself cornered very easily.  It's part of the A-Level music syllabus and a very standard part of formal musical learning (and most Universities will teach it too in the first year), as JS Bach is where most of the study of Western Common Practice music really gets going (i.e. early Baroque rather than Renaissance) in these contexts.

I've always been pretty crap at it.  But if you look at the sheer number of simultaneous factors that you have to take into account to harmonise the Chorale and then how there is a 'rule ordering' if you can't follow them all, it's absolutely nuts.  It's high-level, methodical problem-solving and a process of logic and if you're really, really good you can make it sound nice, too.  It's mathematics with a touch of aesthetics and if you can manage it, you can manage a lot of similar processes as it's a highly relevant general skill across a number of industries (as I'm sure you know).

 

[High Jetter]

Musical, or black?

[GrumpiusMaximus]

22 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Maths, pure maths.

Every time you write a parallel fifth, Bach kills a kitten.  And remember the sodding leading note to tonic...

[High Jetter]

...and gin. The 7th tho...

[wuvvum]

I wonder if Bach consciously came up with all those rules for harmonisation, or whether they were an unintended consequence of his composing?

[GrumpiusMaximus]

5 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

I wonder if Bach consciously came up with all those rules for harmonisation, or whether they were an unintended consequence of his composing?

Just his style, not particularly conscious.  Not that I can cite examples (I know people that can...) but he breaks the rules quite often (hence the rule ordering) as it wasn't a conscious choice as such.  It's just that people have sat down over the years, analysed the chorales and ascertained the general principles which apply the vast majority of the time.  The standard Riemenschneider edition has 371 of them - but there are more:

http://www.bach-chorales.com/

Quite a famous one...

http://www.bach-chorales.com/BWV0303.htm

Yeah.

[wuvvum]

I'm not going to climb too far down that particular rabbit hole - I enjoy listening to Bach at "face value" for want of a better term, and I think it'd spoil the enjoyment if I started analysing it too much.

[GrumpiusMaximus]

There are a lot of musicians that agree with you!  And I'm not trying to say that you can't be a musician without studying them, either - unlike some of the elitist twats out there.  I studied them as part of my degree but I was always crap at them.  It's how my dyslexia got picked up in the end.  Which I'd been masking for years and years without realising.

[myglaren]

11 hours ago, cobblers said:

The story that a fiat 500 has a rare size of tyre and they just have one at an astronomical price that they were going to return is 100% complete bollocks, they've had your pants down big time man. He was probably leaning with his hand covering the tyre label of a suitable linglong £40 job while telling you that

A 500 has got to be one of the most popular cars on the road, even if its got alloys etc, there's no way any tyre is genuinely £200 unless it's a foot wide.

It was needs must, she can't be without her car and of course it cleverly comes without a spare wheel.

Not a Fiat 500, a Megane C+C.

She has no way of getting to work without it.  If it had happened at work she could have used one of their cars and had  someone up there do it.

Not sure now what the size was.

I never use those places now.  Buy Sailun tyres from Oponeo and the garage I use fits them.

[The Moog]

National are absolute robbers (price wise) these days, amazed they're still in business to be honest.

Interestingly had the motorhome in for a pair of new front tyres this morning.

All booked and paid for.

Turn up and first thing was a complaint that it wouldn't fit in the bays.

Then muttering about his jack's only went up to 2.5 ton (which I don't believe)

Finally he couldn't find the torque settings for the wheels so couldn't fit them.

Came home with no new tyres and phoned up to cancel order.

Would not recommend.

[Cavcraft]

Have you got an F1 Auto Centre near you, @The Moog? They're usually very cheap and you can pre-order.

[GrumpiusMaximus]

15 hours ago, BorniteIdentity said:

You’re possibly listening to the wrong stations. 

I would say FIP from Radio France is the greatest station on the planet. It’s eclectic, engrossing, enriching and other things beginning with E. It’s stunning, and to my mind exactly what The BBC should be doing as a mixed effort between Radios 3 and 6. 

I don’t think anyone’s listening to Heart to feed their soul. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have its place though. 

Maybe - but I can't say that I miss the adverts, the audio compression, the lack of agency on the playlist or the inane chatter of most DJs (and I'm not saying that's the case for you!).  I have a music collection that I could spend a lifetime picking over that spans a wide range (Balinese Gamelan is, sadly, underrepresented...) and I only usually bother listening to Radio 4 for the documentaries.

There absolutely is a place for commercial music radio, just not for me.

[strangeangel]

17 hours ago, sierraman said:

At work we’ve got a WhatsApp group, I’ve left it today because I’m absolutely sick to death of the constant news feed about what’s not working for someone or ‘how do I do this’. It’s boring and adds nothing to my life whatsoever, I’ve got WhatsApp to keep in touch with friends and family not a constant ticker of boring work updates. 

 

I have to have a work mobile, and I'll be fucked if I'm carting two handsets around so I put the work SIM in the second slot of my latest Chinese wonder phone. This is great, except for the reason you state - work WhatsApp, one group being compulsory... anyway the Xiaomi came up trumps. It has a feature called Dual Apps, where you can run separate instances of the same app for each phone number. So work WhatsApp doesn't turn up as a thread in mine, but in it's own separate instance of the app, where it gets muted and I can check it at my leisure (about once a month - just done it now and there were 335 posts 🤣). I've assigned different ring and text alert sounds to the work SIM, so these can also be ignored as required. Defo recommended.

 

[HillmanImp]

22 minutes ago, Cavcraft said:

Have you got an F1 Auto Centre near you, @The Moog? They're usually very cheap and you can pre-order.

They fit Blackcircles tyres too as one's just opened up near me. I need to get the Legacy sorted for a couple of tyres and an alignment and they popped up as my nearest fitting place

[The Moog]

Will have a look - I booked them as they had a slot.

It's not so much of a rush now, as not heading up to scotland.

[Saabnut]

Just postponed (again) my trip to France due to the closed borders - just have to hope there is not too much rain in my area of France until I get there. I have gone for mid January for now in the hope the border situation will have settled a bit by then, I can always move it either way. At least the insurance company have accepted I can do nothing about the work required as it is out of my control so will continue the insurance until I can get there.

Better unload the digger off the trailer then.....

[iainrcz]

Wasted another day with "can't be arsed with anything"

So the car is still filthy despite it being reasonably pleasant out.

No point starting now, it'll be dark in a couple of hours. So I may as well carry on wasting time on YouTube..

[Jamie]

1 hour ago, The Moog said:

Will have a look - I booked them as they had a slot.

It's not so much of a rush now, as not heading up to scotland.
 

I always use Bolton Road tyres (on bolton road would you have guessed, in Darwen) Really good guy always has very good part worns and cheapest around for new stuff aswell

[sierraman]

National Tyres are cheap if you book ahead through the website. If you just turn up they are expensive. I don’t know if they are expensive for premium tyres cause I only fit their chinese ditch finders.

[Spiny Norman]

Last time I was in a National Tyres in Glasgow the staff had their junkie mates in smoking weed in the workshop and they left huge oily footprints all over the car's pale grey carpets. 

They make Kwikfit look like a professional organisation.

[beko1987]

I've always been fine with national tyres either in branch or mobile. Been the High Wycombe one always though so maybe it's like my very good experiences with Mr clutch maidenhead in that it's all down to the staff in the branch

[GrumpiusMaximus]

I live quite near to Dover and drove the other way up the A2 home earlier.  Tailbacks on the A2 going back at least eight miles and cars still joining the back.  And nowhere to turn...

[artdjones]

6 hours ago, The Moog said:

Then muttering about his jack's only went up to 2.5 ton (which I don't believe

Was he planning to lift the entire vehicle with one Jack?

[The Moog]

Was he planning to lift the entire vehicle with one Jack?

Flip knows. When I opened bonnet to show the vin plate that showed front axle was under that then it was torque settings.

They were having a moan when the phone was ringing at 8:28 saying weren't open till 8:30.

There were also two customers who turned up just after me so they weren't exactly desperate for work, just one of those having to do it outside on jack's in the drizzle jobs they didn't want.

ATS have got them for same price and they are really sound in Accy.

[MikeR]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9078525/British-film-censor-puts-warning-1980s-movie-Flash-Gordon.html

FFS ... not Ming the merciless !!!