virtual crazy gang, part II

[tweediekiwi]

Being an NZ inland isolated ex-Northern Hemisphere person, all this talk of the fish of my homeland is making me drool. Halibut cooked in milk, Ruskolene crumbed lemon sole, haddock and chips, oh how I miss them all. Here, it's snapper ($40NZ/Kg), orange roughy, gurnard, hoki, blue cod, tarakihi, kingfish. All very nice but warm water species don't taste the same.
Sealord is the big fish(ing) company here and we normally buy their fish fingers, fish cakes etc. We don't buy imported stuff from China and other such places as it's all stew-pond tilapia and other such strange things.
Ok, who do you have to kill to get a drink around here?

[rustytrawler]

Eyup tweediekiwi, did you know that sealord are using a Hull trawler called ST BENIDICT and the trawler is catching very well for them. rgds rustytrawler.....ST BENEDICT was built at Ferguson bros port Glasgow 1973, now in NZ she is called WILL WATCH they obtained her in 1986 and runs out of Nelson, last year they had trouble with the British Polar engine with parts hard to find but she is now fishing well again.

[billyboy]

Originally Posted by tweediekiwi

Being an NZ inland isolated ex-Northern Hemisphere person, all this talk of the fish of my homeland is making me drool. Halibut cooked in milk, Ruskolene crumbed lemon sole, haddock and chips, oh how I miss them all. Here, it's snapper ($40NZ/Kg), orange roughy, gurnard, hoki, blue cod, tarakihi, kingfish. All very nice but warm water species don't taste the same.
Sealord is the big fish(ing) company here and we normally buy their fish fingers, fish cakes etc. We don't buy imported stuff from China and other such places as it's all stew-pond tilapia and other such strange things.
Ok, who do you have to kill to get a drink around here?

I had some Hoki a few years ago when Cod was scarce. Nice, enjoyed it.

[tweediekiwi]

Yes Rusty, she was one of the Orange Roughy boats, deep trawling and scraping the bottom clean. We still get roughy now, but it's expensive as they are harder to catch. They are a long living fish and the fishing industry just about decimated the breeding stock. Almost went the way of the cod up north.
That St Benedict, the last time it was mentioned on this site, was in Mauritius and fishing well there. They were waiting for spares for their Caterpiller generator, but why they're generating caterpillers at sea, I'm not sure. Maybe groundbait?
You learned men can answer this question. Why do some ships last 50+ years, Like the St. Benedict, and some only 12 or twenty years? I came out here on the TSS Northern Star during her short life of 13 years and I don't understand why they wrecked her. Seems like a waste.
And billyboy, hoki is nice. Sealord package up frozen Hoki Crumbed fillets and they are great.
What the biggest selling fish in the UK now?
Alright, time to shut up, slam the deadlight and try not to get my finger caught this time.

[rustytrawler]

Eyup tweedi, over hear in the fish and chip shops it is cod and haddock mostly from Iceland, burt i think we are still buying from Russia. On the 28 nov 1985 my Dad took the Hull trawler CORDELLA to NZ SKEGS had bought her but they did not keep her long, and J MARR SOON got her back to Hull, Cordella was a great trawler and dad was on her for quite a few years she was used by the navy in the Falkland's war.

[tweediekiwi]

You all have an amazing amount of interesting info' about shipping history. You should organise yourselves and write a book about it all, chapters on each dept on the ships, the pranks, the engineering cockups. Could be an interesting read.
Me? I'm too busy doing oil changes on all these fairleads, changing the water level of the plimsoll line and packing the stern glands.
All the Best, Doug.

[Engine Serang]

Be advised my young apprentice, that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Do Not go around the ship talking about stern glands and stern tubes, you may be elated with your grasp of engineering detail but all our deviants will view you as fresh meat. Kiwi chaps should talk of little, in their first year, other than blue tongue in sheep..

[Varley]

It is a little learning, as oft betrayed by misquotation, that is said to be dangerous (as oft as it is misquoted that pride goes before a fall). Knowledge stems from learning (an example. A colleague, even fatter, had not the knowledge that connecting the excitation feed of all three alternators to the automatic flashing supply permanently would affect the behaviour of their modern voltage regulators. He learned this when a call was sent when the Chief and Master declined to proceed further than Falmouth until one or other of the machines could be taken off the board without 'browning out' (a term where the voltage is inversely proportional to the demand for fresh laundry).

Now, after all this urban agitation (obviously there has been a lot of cousin on cousin canoodling amongst in the extremist fraternities as well as insufficiencies of Nanny bringings-up), we are asked to admire Willi Watcher.

I fear that would turn the rioters against at least one cottaging industry. Better, I suppose, than setting fire to libraries or performing l'osculation francais amongst the loaghtan ladies' antipodean relatives. Any hint of the latter and we'll have the good ladies' Band of Virtue over us like a rash. Again.

(Nanny was strictly against canoodling when underage or if any part of the canoodlers had turned blue - especially were a wake to be involved).

[rustytrawler]

Eyup Varley, we have rioters in this boat too, did you know that at this very minute the NZ boys are in the bar singing ode to a sheep and the UK lads are ashore watching football singing that well known song' "lets go fking mental lets go fking mental da da da da, da da da da"

[Varley]

That is why the fwd cocktail lounge is so useful (or was until someone tried re-attaching it with glue). Up there they don't interfere with the zs of the watchkeepers (not the same as Willi Watchers, or not usually). Ode to Sheep. Not Beethoven. Joseph Lamb or John Shepphard perhaps?

Even if those damned foreigners do have to have odd morse code like that i still don't think we should inflict our hooligans on them.

[tweediekiwi]

Dear ES, I'm sorry, I won't play around with things again. I did sit beside my Dad, in the bowels of a trawler (in Dry Dock), holding a lead-lamp on the job whilst he stuffed Walkers Lion Packing into a stern gland one Saturday morning. The rep from Walkers, one Gilbert penrice, gave me a propelling pencil with the company name on it. Happy memories. I shall stick to learning my knots and splices and stop upsetting the deviant members of the crew. They're the plasticos aren't they? I saw two of them the other day in the cocktail bar and one was asking the other, "Can I push your stool in?"
Ode to a sheep? Never heard of it. Down here we have the Song of The Lonely Shepherd, as sung by Karen Carpenter back in the day - "There will never be another ewe."
And what is with all the rioting and stuff over there? Another Civil War starting? We don't need any of that. Football seems to bring out the worst in some fans.
Varley, your knowledge of the deadly electricity is amazing and I'm very pleased that you are on board to keep us all safe. Although ES will harangue me again for singing your praises, so I'd better get back to my knots and polishing brass things.

[Engine Serang]

We all agree that if one wanted to be lectured on star-delta starting or 3 phase, 3 wire installations one would be slow to by-pass the Noble Lord. But one must make allowances for the fact he came late to big boys electricity, after years of Marconi brain washing, even after a hesitant start he blossomed because he had the fundamental underpinning of theory. He never was a house wirer or a shipyard cable puller, he's our man and we are keeping him.

[Varley]

It is said every man has his price. But a propelling pencil?

It might well have been a Plastico helping you with your seat. You might also find them serving behind the bars when there are guests (at other times we do that ourselves, a Plastico doing it for you incurs too much in overtime). The deck crowd are Cardboard Cut-outs from the pressed paper sea school - hear them singing chanties as they happily single-up the entendres. Tmac and E-S prefer furry friends to assist them below.

Steady on E-S - that's the sort of thing I write about myself.

[tweediekiwi]

Hey, I was 9, and a new shiny propelling pencil was a big deal in 1963! I still have it! I guess that was the price of child labour back then. The Walkers man, Gilbert Penrice, used to come round to our place and he and my Dad would get out my Mamod Steam Engine that I had made up into a model Traction Engine with my Meccano set. Tins of Tennents Lager, sitting at either end of the lounge, two grown men sending the toy backwards and forwards and steaming up the windows. They'd do it 'til the methylated spirits for the burner ran out.

I think I like furry things assisting me down below. Prefer a purr to a squeak though. I'm sure the paper cutouts would be singing shanties though? A chanty gazunder the bed.

Talking of meths, where's my brasso?

[170 Driver]

Shirley you can`t make Tennents tins out of Meccano ???

[rustytrawler]

Eyup tweedi, there is a young lady on the dockside holding two sprogs and asking for you, she also asked if we have a complaint's dep?... Has your wick been dipped.

[tweediekiwi]

Not mine. I haven't been out of NZ since 1966 and been firing blanks for the past 25 years!
Interesting though, Dad was accused of a random act of casual fatherhood whilst he was away down at South Georgia, on a tanker, at the whaling. It turned out an Army buddy of Dads had used in name whilst coupled to the young lady. But, the dates didn't work out and she didn't recognise him from a photo, and he of the loose wedding tackle was caught up with with by the thin blue line.

I've still got my Meccano, boxes of it, it was about the only 'toy' of that I was allowed to pack when we emigrated. My younger brothers had it then I got it all back, except for the Mamod steam engine, as my brothers had girls and a boy that wasn't interested in it. I've tried getting grankids interested but they're either too sports oriented or a glued to little screen that go beep.

Ok then ES, all the brass is bright and I've put a shine on the plastico's, what's next boss?

[YM-Mundrabilla]

Have you polished the Brass Monkey's?? .......

It's going to be 20° C here today!!!!

[tweediekiwi]

No cannon balls on the GD is there?
I'm in Auckland at the moment, looking after my 87 year old Mum whose just had a knee replacement, so we're basking in 13C here with sunshine, whereas it's 9C at home. I must admit, 20 sounds better.
So, if you want the brass moneys shiney, is it alright to sandblast them?

[YM-Mundrabilla]

If they're like me, the brass monkeys only seem incomplete in the winter.

Sandblasting is not permitted, although a gentle polishing by the right polisher is OK at the right time.

[Engine Serang]

We don't sandblast on ships, leave that to Ed China, we shotblast. We blast in drydock, the brassers and the golden rivet are safe

[Engine Serang]

Steady on E-S - that's the sort of thing I write about myself.

I know, but it had to be said.

We need a Father Figure to guide the young whipper snappers who joined recently and your The Man. Talk about having greatness thrust uopn one.

[billyboy]

If we are to employ young deck boys for training up to AB's I would suggest that Mr Varley would be in charge of them. For he has great knowledge and wisdom to impart to them.

[tweediekiwi]

It's an honour to be associated with you fine learned men of the sea.
Tell what and where the right polish is? I know of Brasso, Silvo and Goddards. I asked the cutouts but I might as well talk to a Samson Post. I'm going to have to put the sand blaster on Ebay now.
It's a bit bumpy here - has anyone seen my sea-legs?

[Varley]

I fear such an appointment would put me in the Plasticos' bad books. There are some registers one simply should not want to join. Even Mimco lad looked a little apprehensive when I produced the Vaseline until I told him to do the battery routines.

I can never remember what the gourmets say. Is it Brasso with fish and Silvo with red meat or the other way around? All I know is that one cannot uses sour dough when decanting either - it goes straight through the big holes.