What Annoyed You Today? (4 Viewers)

fubar57 · May 9, 2020

Oil prices dropped yesterday and yet because it's Mother's Day tomorrow, the oil companies raised the price by .20¢ a litre.

Airframes · May 12, 2020

Beer !
Yes, beer annoyed me today.
Since the start of lock down, I haven't had a beer for 8 weeks, so decided to grab a four-pack and enjoy a movie this evening.
Went to remove the stupid, over-done plastic harness thing that holds the four cans together and, hardly touching the darned can, pierced it, resulting in a high-pressure jet of beer spraying across me, and the room.
Apart from losing half a can of beer, the spray hit the windows of one of my display cabinets 12 feet away, and drenched the F-5E model on a table next to the cabinet !
Just spent almost half an hour carefully drying the model, and I hope there aren't lasting stains !!
Now i know why pubs were invented !

Greg Boeser · May 12, 2020

Mailed my vehicle registration in 6 weeks ago. Still no response. As of yesterday I'm now illegal.

fubar57 · May 12, 2020

Brutal Greg. At the other end of the spectrum, I renewed my car insurance over the phone today in 15min. Last year however, I drove around for almost two month before I remembered to renew. They have a bad habit of mailing out renewal reminders almost a month early

Greg Boeser · May 12, 2020

I checked with the bank and the check hasn't cleared, probably swallowed up by the coronavirus.

Airframes · May 13, 2020

Fortunately, in the UK, we can register / tax our cars online, which is quick and easy.
That said, as I've just bought another car, i needed to change the tax class to Disabled, which can only be done at a Post Office. Went yesterday - around 5 minutes to get it done, but over 40 minutes waiting in a cold wind outside, due to social distancing.

Greg Boeser · May 13, 2020

Called DVS this morning, got through on the second try, 30 minutes on hold. They are processing renewals received April 2nd, so I should see my new tabs sometime in June.

at6 · May 13, 2020

Greg Boeser said:
Called DVS this morning, got through on the second try, 30 minutes on hold. They are processing renewals received April 2nd, so I should see my new tabs sometime in June.

Welcome to California.

Greg Boeser · May 13, 2020

People's Republic of Minnesota.
My wife had to make nearly a dozen trips to the license renewal office because when the state updated their database they misspelled her name. It took that long for us to figure out why her license kept getting rejected. Now, you wouldn't notice that her name had been misspelled because it looks normal on the forms, but the programmer had included part of her last name in the "middle name" field.

RW Mk. III · May 14, 2020

Every day I am annoyed by "Me109." Not in terms of people during the war using that term. But in a historical context it's just wrong. John Nichol seems to go out of his way to use it in his book Spitfire. Very frustrating.

Airframes · May 14, 2020

Depends which way you look at it, and the period, and country in question.
The term was once 'Me' in Germany, and also 'Bf', when the production came under the control of Bayersische Flugzueg Werke,
The RAF normally used the term 'Me'.
It could therefore be argued that both are correct.

Snautzer01 · May 14, 2020

Airframes said:
Depends which way you look at it, and the period, and country in question.
The term was once 'Me' in Germany, and also 'Bf', when the production came under the control of Bayersische Flugzueg Werke,
The RAF normally used the term 'Me'.
It could therefore be argued that both are correct.

That would be true for amateurs, not ones that wright aviation books. One could argue they should know better. If that little detail is not correct, what is the rest of the book worth? It is not that hard to get 2 letters correct with the smallest amount of research.

RW Mk. III · May 14, 2020

Airframes said:
Depends which way you look at it, and the period, and country in question.
The term was once 'Me' in Germany, and also 'Bf', when the production came under the control of Bayersische Flugzueg Werke,
The RAF normally used the term 'Me'.
It could therefore be argued that both are correct.

Yes but what did the dataplates on the airframes say? I realize it's splitter hairs. I just don't like the grey areas in life. And this one seems open and shut to me.

Snautzer01 · May 14, 2020

That is, i think not the point Airframes is making. I understand what he is saying history wise, dont agree for writers, but understand.

RW Mk. III · May 14, 2020

Snautzer01 said:
That is, i think not the point Airframes is making. I understand what he is saying history wise, dont agree for writers, but understand.

Oh no I totally get it was common vernacular at the time. And in cases of direct quotes etc. absolutely use the parlance of the time. I'm just with you on this about writing books etc. for posterity, through the lens of history one can, and should, be more accurate.

Airframes · May 14, 2020

I agree.
I have the book in question (by John Nichol, former RAF Tornado nav), and although overall it's reasonably good, I get a very strong feeling that a high proportion of the book was provided by researchers who did not have a strong grounding in aviation, or aviation history, if in fact, they had any knowledge at all. This is evident in various passages in the book and, whilst perhaps not acceptable, especially to aviation / history "enthusiasts", is, to an extent, understandable.
The book appears to be aimed at the "layman", more a "cover-all background history", and in this context it seems to do the job. The average reader would not know, and probably wouldn't care, about technical aberrations in descriptions - to this type of reader, a Messerschmitt is a Messerschmitt, whether '109E, F, or G, and the difference between 'Me' and 'Bf' would mean little to them.
Rather like the correct description of a Spitfire - is it Supermarine Spitfire, or Vickers - Supermarine Spitfire ?

RW Mk. III · May 18, 2020

Airframes said:
I agree.
I have the book in question (by John Nichol, former RAF Tornado nav), and although overall it's reasonably good, I get a very strong feeling that a high proportion of the book was provided by researchers who did not have a strong grounding in aviation, or aviation history, if in fact, they had any knowledge at all. This is evident in various passages in the book and, whilst perhaps not acceptable, especially to aviation / history "enthusiasts", is, to an extent, understandable.
The book appears to be aimed at the "layman", more a "cover-all background history", and in this context it seems to do the job. The average reader would not know, and probably wouldn't care, about technical aberrations in descriptions - to this type of reader, a Messerschmitt is a Messerschmitt, whether '109E, F, or G, and the difference between 'Me' and 'Bf' would mean little to them.
Rather like the correct description of a Spitfire - is it Supermarine Spitfire, or Vickers - Supermarine Spitfire ?

This book strikes again. I agree this is definitely a book for the average reader and not an aviation enthusiast necessarily. Or at least a picky one. So I am glossing over quite a few things that raise my eyebrows as storytelling and a function of the lens of memory.

BUT

Here is a quote from the book:

"... Japanese Mitsubishi Zeros and the swift Nakajima 'Oscar' fighters. Although the Oscars only had a top speed of 333mph, they were light and highly manoeuvrable. But they did not have armour or self-sealing fuel tanks and carried just two 12.7mm heavy machine guns. Worse, the Japanese aircraft, being mostly constructed of wood, made them easy 'flamers.'"

Am I crazy? This book was published in 2018 didn't anyone google anything? I'm sure someone is going to jump in and point out where some wood was used on the Ki-43 or Zero but the word there mostly making that a real porky in my eyes.

Edited for clarity of point

Greg Boeser · May 18, 2020

Must have been quoting 1941 US intelligence sources. The pilots were also known to wear coke bottle glasses, and have excessive overbites.

Snautzer01 · May 18, 2020

T Bolt · May 19, 2020

Not saying it was the correct usage but my father spent spent 1943-44 in Texas as a gunnery instructor and 1944-45 in a B-24 shooting at them and he called them Me-109s. I know it isn't the correct term but a lot of the guys around at the time used it.

What Annoyed You Today? (4 Viewers)

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