h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

life! been a while. good to hear that mrs. life is doing well, and little life is about to make an entrance...

Welcome back, life. I am not sure if we have 'met' here, but it is good to see you anyway.

I was prompted by a repitition of the old myth that America won WWI and WWII for us, when we were licked to check out the statistics on the numbers of war dead.

This is what I discovered: A2251108

I found it oddly interesting.

Ben

What a bizzarely punctuated sentance:

"I was prompted by a repitition of the old myth that America won WWI and WWII for us when we were licked into checking out the statistics on the numbers of war dead" reads a little better.

B

PS - Comments in the PR thread will be welcome.

[GDZ]

[MTG]

Welcome back, life

We moved every three years if not more frequently, countries as well as towns. The Army is a little different, but still a community and a new set of people to get to know with each posting. It stood me in good stead and I learnt how to mix with people, as a shy child it wasn't easy but it was a case of sink or swim.

I would have to say that living here in suburbia where a large proportion of the local population commute to Nodnol there isn't as large a community spirit as in the surrounding villages. But when it comes to planning applications such as our local threat as well as the huge incinerator we fought a couple of years ago, we did all pull together. There are the Residents Associations, WI and Ladies' clubs, none of which I belong to as yet, but should.

Fascinating article, Ben - quite a few surprises. I worked a lot in Germany during the '80s, and the 'losers' view of history seemed generally to be that the war was won and lost on the Eastern front, but that's probably an over-simplification.

Village life !

I've foisted Mrs Seth onto my mother while I'm out here in Iraq. I was a bit nervous about it as the local gene pool (not far from York) hasn't evolved much since the Anglian invasions. Like Ben, my family moved there from well within 10 miles away the thick end of 50 years ago, and we're still regarded as incomers.

The old biddies in particular, though have really warmed to her and taken her in. We invited a bunch of them to our civil wedding (it was my mother's birthday a couple of days later, so we had a joint celebration). Since then it's been a whirl of engagements - coffee mornings, Church jumble sales, keep-fit, Women's Institute day-trips - the works. A lot of it is down to attitude as you say Lil; Mrs Seth's vivacity and humour basically overwhelm any negative first impressions some people would have based on her 'foreigness'. If you keep your distance from the community, that seems to be when you have problems fitting in.

Well the stats demonstrate that the Eastern Front was far far worse than any of the others, so I think that your impressions are probably right, Seth.

Glad you like it.

I *hate* fuzzy thinking, (though I *love* fuzzy logic - which reminds me, I must find a good fuzzy logician to teach it to the Stepson), and so few people argue fheir cases from facts. Mind you, that is because they then would have no cases.

Weapons of Mass Distruction. War in Iraq. Need I say more?

*sigh*

Ben

Big shout when I was back in the UK that the coalition had unearthed a big stash of nerve agent mortar rounds.

Any headlines yet about it being plain old white phosphorus ?

[p]

[{Courtesy}]

Seth

Strangly enough it does seem to have gone a bit quiet about that.

[GD]

I was born in the town I currently live in. My mother's family has been here for nearly 130 years. So although I lived away from this area for over 20 years, I was immediately accepted when I moved back. And I have absolutely no doubt that if someone who did not have those ties had attempted to get the city to build a new library, they would have gone down in flames.

Interesting stats, Ben. And chilling.

Eye-opening article, Ben. The numbers are incredible. The USSR deaths were greater than the entire population of Canada at the time. Hard to imagine.

Regardless of what they say about village idiots, it seems that every small village also has its busybody, someone who sticks their nose into other people's affairs whether warranted or not, and causes more trouble than they realise by dint of being thick-skinned.

We have one in Lincoln who seems to consider himself the center of the universe, and a terrible bore he is, too. Any consideration that he might mean well has long been washed over the dam by his inability to read directions or remember things. He over-chlorinated the town water supply this summer, and nearly got us in trouble with the commission by deciding to go down and say something about the highway project, completely unaware that the town board had already formed a committee to do that.

At least in a village one can isolate and monitor such a problem personality. We can't stop him from attending meetings and standing up and running on and on and on, but when he's finished talking we can at least move on and get something accomplished.

for Lil. And a laugh of painful recognition too.

Ben

[MTG]

Hello, everyone! Welcome back, life !

One of the things I like about where I live now and my job is that there is almost a small town atmposphere. I know many people in the neighborhood because they are regular customers. People here are friendly without being too nosy or judgemental. For the first time I feel really a part of my neighborhood. I lived in one fairly nice suburban community on the west side of the Salt Lake area a few years back, and found the neighbors most unfriendly. It got so my roommates and I would see people peeking at us from behind their curtains, but they would never talk to us openly any more than was absolutely necessary. It was an eery feeling. Fortunately this neighborhood is more friendly. People look out for each other.

I've been up all night ( I worked graveyard shift last night) and am getting a little tired, and so I will have to post later.

[ Grabs orange cat, and prepares for bed]

I cross myself when I pass some of the folks around here.