Se7en

Agree he comes across as a bit of a wanker. Yet I also think it's more likely that I'd take the opportunity sit down for a beer with Mike than with you. (And you and I live in the same city) Occasionally he has made me think. Mostly, after thinking I decide he's full of shit - but that's a lot more than I can say for most in PA.

Boat is 37ft and 7000 kilos. Non planing. 7/8ths fractional rig with bendy mast. What hasn't been mentioned is sailing for different purposes / with different people on board. Racing, with competant crew, we didn't need to reef until mid 20s knots. Would start to round up at high 20s gusts. More backstay and flatten the main as wind gets up. Cruising with family, we'd go for 1st reef at 14 knots and second reef at 18 knots sustained (apparent wind speed, reefing later downhill of course). Only dropped about 1/2 knot boat speed, but stood the boat up and kept everything nice and calm. Sailing overnight with family we used the third reef a few times in 20 ish knots - particularly if I was sleeping and my wife was on watch. Actually, our reefing process was normally than my wife would put them in on her watch and I'd shake them out again on mine. She isn't much of a sailor, but can tuck in a reef like no-ones business. (I set the reefing lines up with dyneema for low friction, and used single line reefing with everything obviously marked. Halyard on one cabin top winch, reefing line on the other)

Now now you two. I'm sure there is enough of Warbird's sister to go around, neither of you need to do yourselves. And my kids are allowed to taste wine from my glass either at home or out in public. The boy child knows to shout his round in turn at the bar.

All good, but missing my point. Flu vaccine has low effectiveness due to regularly targeting the wrong strain(s). Hopefully Covid 19 vaccines can target all currently know strains as the number is low. A vaccine might be 95% efficient against H3N2. But is zero percent efficient against another strain. Hence overall, the flu vaccine isn't particularly effective. Hopefully, due to the low rate of mutation, Covid 19 does not have this problem.

How many strains of could 19 are there? How many of influenza? I understand, without much research, that is is about 3 of the first and hundreds of the second. Indeed, here in AU, we keep hearing that our cases come from the US. Trumpian virus, as it were. So perhaps that's why a vaccine for could can be more effective than the "guess which strains of influenza will be active this year" approach that is taken with the flu. Oh, I won't quibble with your usage of anaphylaxis. I understand it to be the body's immune system massively overreacting to a foreign substance. So an allergy causes an anaphylactic reaction, with anaphylactic shock being the bad reaction we really don't want. Red wine makes me sneeze, so I only drink wine that is worth the price. Unfortunately I've managed to collect 1000 odd bottles that meet that criteria, and I'm not leaving any of them for my kids. Ah choo

I thought that is why they are called 'tree nuts', rather than just nuts? Cashews and Pistachios were two that he was allergic to, with the worst alergy being to peanuts. And yes I know that peanuts are not nuts either. We have a bunch of stickers left over from when we were in vietnam that say "If I eat peanut oil I will die" in vietnamese. Or perhaps they say "Give my Father BaBaBa and he won't care what you feed me" as that is what seemed to actually happen. I was tempted to respond with "I didn't say they were nuts, I said they are fucking Goofy", but it's too early to be drinking here.

Yeah cheap shot. You guys have some great craft breweries now. I pretty much drink IPAs or Porters, depending on the temperature. 'Polygamy Porter' from Utah was one I remember really liking.

Why would I buy mixed nuts when I just want the cashews? It'd be like buying american beer for the alcohol content.

The actual cost price in Australia is about $80 each - so around $50 US. In most cases the government covers part of that, bringing it down to $25 US for most punters, and free for those who need the support. And Mikey, your daughter only 'has anaphylaxis' when she is actually suffering a reaction. The rest of the time she is just at risk of anaphylaxis due to an allergy. Words matter. They enable clear communications and demonstrate that someone knows what the fuck they are talking about. FWIW, I do empathise with what you have gone through. My son also had a tree nut allergy and was at risk of anaphylaxis for the first 8 or so years of his life. We had epipens pretty much everywhere. Now the little fucker steals my cashews.

Sorry, but I cannot forgive him for transformational grammar. It destroyed a year of English study for me, only for Chomsky to later come out and say it was a load of hogwash anyway.

OK MIke et al Now you have some data you agree on, how about doing some analysis of that data to turn it into information? I'll start, feel free to play along; As Mikewof says, the mean mortality rate for the years studied is 0.73. The standard deviation (ie the measure of how much the mortality rate varies by year) is 0.03% if you include 2020, and 0.02% if we don't. And in this instance I'd suggest we shouldn't. (You can use the STDEV function in Excel to calculate the Standaed Deviation of a group of figures) So if we look at out standard normal curve from stats 101, we know that; 68% of all years should fall within one standard deviation of the mean 95% of all years should fall within two standard deviations -> this is the 'standard' level where we judge a value is significant or not. 99.74% of all years should fall within 3 standard deviations from the mean. So looking out your numbers with a mean of .73% and this year being .83%, we can see that this year is 5 (five!) standard deviations from the mean. That equates to a 1 in 2 million chance that this years score is the result of chance. This is the '5 sigma' level of certainty that is the gold standard to accept you have discovered a new subatomic particle. 3 Standard deviations above what is normally considered proof in population statistics. So Mike... if you are keen on data, the data shows pretty clearly that this year something other than random chance has driven the mortality rate up by ~12.5%. What is your hypothesis as to what might have caused that? If it was me, I might start looking at the avalanche of anecdotes that say it's covid 19.

Problem with the spider is that once you sort tyres, wheels and suspension, the chassis starts to flex too much. You really need to seam weld it and add some stiffening under the doors. I had a bit over 140hp, and it was adequate. You don't have "enough" power until you can lay rubber from the exit of one corner to the braking marker of the next. Then you have a traction problem. I only got rid of my spider as I had two 2 seater sports cars, and a son on the way. The clubman is a heap faster than the spider, so it got to stay.

I do agree with you on the alfa 105. Great cars, unfortunately their price reflects that. Like a fiat 124 for someone with style and taste. I'm a much better driver than rider, so while I've had various bikes, I've never really pushed any of them that hard. Favourite was probably a SV1000S - 1000cc V-Twin. Enough torque that you could leave it in third all day and ride it like an automatic. Also had a softail for a while, which I just couldn't develop any great liking for. While it is just a toy now, I did have my clubman (lotus 7 style thing) as a daily driver for a couple of years, and it still spends the majority of it's life on road. Ticks most of your boxes - 4 cylinder, 1600cc, 180ish hp, 5 speed CR gearbox (I also have a 4 speed dog box, but that's too much for the road), 4 wheel disks but live rear end. Doesn't have chrome plated wiper arms... some things need to be sacrificed to stay under 520 kilos. Most fun car I've driven was another clubman that had the 1300 hyabusa engine and sequential box. Flat changes are addictive, and at under 460 kilos weight, it went quite well.

When did they start coming in colours other than beige? Or do they catch beige from their owners?

Ditto the lack of bird life in Tasmania... you'd need to be clumsy as a pregnant hippo to not hear constant birds and other wildlife. Only place I have been spooked by lack of any life was Island head creek in Queensland. Seriously freaked the whole family.