February 9, 2022: Reader Tips

Reader Tips 44 Comments

This evening we learn about the Silver Bridge disaster in Point Pleasant, West Virginia and why similarly designed bridges in Pittsburgh never suffered such a fate.

That’s just over Cdn$9 Million!

Your best tips of the past day are much appreciated!

Bonus: Thanks to SDA commenter `Exasperated`, here are the first two of eighteen Faces of Protest portraits taken by Dan Aponte (on Facebook) and shared by Heather Heying:


44 Replies to “February 9, 2022: Reader Tips”

  1. Ever wonder what George Lazenby did after On Her Majesty’s Secret Service? His next movie was Universal Soldier:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1Wd1qWaLns

    and I can see why his run as Bond was shorter than Timothy Dalton’s. I found it rather bland, though its look reminded me of the Michael Caine flick Get Carter. The music was by Philip Goodhand-Tait, who sounded a bit like Rod Stewart.

    2. Another movie pick. This one’s a gritty British crime drama made about 40 years ago, a good example of what one might consider modern film noir, The Long Good Friday:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RayNBSw9HCo

      It stars Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren, with Pierce Brosnan in a bit role before he was in the TV series Remington Steele. There are scenes that are NSFW, so you will be required to sign in.

    3. Just watched Universal Soldier, completely flat, enjoyed the contemporary guns and cars though.

    4. Thanks for all your movie suggestions. I recently watched and enjoyed the TCM movie from 1988 with Edward James Olmos, Lou Diamond Phillips, Andy Garcia called “Stand and Deliver,”  about L.A. teacher Jaime Escalante. I was reminded of this story I recently read. Thought you and many here might like it. It’s about how teachers gotta teach. One can guess what the kids got on their exam.

      Can you guess what grade the Professor gave them?

      This story’s called:
       “Four Friends”:

      Four friends have been doing really well in their Calculus class: they have been getting top grades for their homework and on the midterm. So, when it’s time for the final, they decide not to study on the weekend before, but to drive to another friend’s birthday party in another city – even though the exam is scheduled for Monday morning. As it happens, they drink too much at the party, and on Monday morning, they are all hung over and oversleep. When they finally arrive on campus, the exam is already over. They go to the professor’s office and offer him an explanation: “We went to our friend’s birthday party, and when we were driving back home very early on Monday morning, we suddenly had a flat tire. We had no spare one, and since we were driving on backroads, it took hours until we got help.” The professor nods sympathetically and says: “I see that it was not your fault. I will allow you to make up for the missed exam.” When they arrive early on Tuesday morning, the students are put by the professor in a large lecture hall and are seated so far apart from each other that, even if they tried, they had no chance to cheat. The exam booklets are already in place, and confidently, the students start writing. The first question – five points out of one hundred – is a simple exercise in differentiation, and all four finish it within ten minutes. When the first of them has completed the problem, he turns over the page of the exam booklet and reads on the next one: Problem 2 (95 points out of 100): Which tire went flat?

      1. Good story. Thanks for an early morning chuckle.

        With regards to the story behind Stand and Deliver, apparently the school in question declined to its earlier poor academic status after a few years. From what I heard, Jaime Escalante was hounded out of his job by colleagues.

        As I found out while teaching at Armpit College, educators can sometimes be quite a nasty lot.

          1. Edward James Olmos was a wonderful in this. The costume in class took guts.* No one questioned the outfit! One could see how the kids really got into Calculus. I particularly enjoyed the authentic Latino accent that he occasionally did when giving the kids a light scold about lifting themselves out of a potential lifetime of poverty that they would have without an education. (paraphrasing: “hey man, choo wanna work at a fast fud alla you life?”)

            The establishment didn’t like Escalante’s success because he showed them what dedication was all about and they were jealous. Maybe some were lazy. Perhaps some were underpaid and had second jobs. Those times were very different from today.

            * My Chemistry teacher literally BOUNCED OFF the walls once to demonstrate how molecules did!

  3. “The only way out of this now… is going to be through a careful but strong show of force.”

    Not just any jack-booted thug is saying this.

    Former RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli thows in his two-cents
    (the same guy who faces accusations that he was involved in a cover up of alleged irregularities, fraud and abuse involving the RCMP’s pension and insurance plans)

    Zac goes on… “The trucks, which have created physical and auditory disorder in Ottawa for a week, must be moved – if not by their owners, then by heavy machinery or, if necessary, police-contracted and protected drivers, no matter how difficult it may be.”

    https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-after-a-week-of-tightrope-walking-police-in-ottawa-must-actively/

    1. Blood in the streets. I say go for it. There are a hell of a lot more of us than “them”, the Nazi bastards.

  4. People may find some interest in this analysis of MP Lightbound’s remarks of this morning (Tuesday). It also contains detail regarding Lightbound’s background.
    It’s written by Paul Wells and the link goes to Macleans. Wells, for a time in 2015 was a Trudeau fan boy of sorts. Like Conrad Black, I think he has come to discover who the man really is.

    But, this column is mostly about Lightbound. Should you be so inclined —

    https://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/the-joel-lightbound-crisis-in-the-liberal-party/

  5. Regarding the failure of the Silver Bridge, during my senior undergraduate year, I took a corrosion course. I recall that it was mentioned as an example of stress corrosion cracking, the mode which was believed to have been the cause.

      1. The bridge over the Peace River at Taylor, B. C. is also in serious need of replacement. It’s made of steel and it’s more than 60 years old. It seems now that every spring, overnight traffic has to be restricted so that crews can fix it. The local MLA has been pushing Victoria to do something, but, since the bridge is in flyover country as far as Lotusland is concerned, nothing’s been done.

        It was a replacement for the earlier suspension bridge, which collapsed a few years before my parents and I moved to Fort St. John. I remember seeing one of its anchor points on the south side several years after the incident.

        Its sister bridge could be seen further up at the Liard River about 50 years ago. I don’t know if it’s still there.

        1. Apparently the Taylor bridge was build on “soluble” bedrock. Built by the same folks that brought us the Tacoma Narrows bridge. This stuff must give engineers woodies.

          3. Chris:

            Thanks for the info.

            Every time I drive across that bridge, I focus on getting to the other end and hold on to the steering wheel extra tight.

            I used to work at Taylor Plant during my undergrad summers in the 1970s. Back then, there was the original gas plant, which is still there, with the rest being a refinery and tank farm. The refinery was apparently sold and, from what I heard, is now somewhere in the Middle East. The tank farm’s a lot smaller now.

            Just upstream from Taylor is the mouth of the Pine River. It had its own weather system and we often had storms which were real doozies as that system combined with what came down the Peace valley. That, plus the plant being near the river, is why it’s often foggy there.

    2. When I was in my pre-teens, my father read all of the Nevil Shute novels which he then passed on to me. Nevil Shute was a mechanical engineer (I think?) and in one book, wrote about the dangers of Stress corrosion cracking. I try not to think about it when I fly.

  6. I’m so glad Trudeau, instead of negotiating with the truckers to hear their concerns, pulled out the Nazi, racist rhetoric.

    Because now he’s toast.

    1. Mares eat oats and does eat oats
      And little lambs eat ivy
      Homophones and homonyms, rejoice!

  11. The headline this morning was “Putin assures Macron of no more escalation” [in Ukraine].

    The headline did not read “France assures Russia it will allow more Russian natural gas into the EU”.

    1. And of course Macron lies to the gullible Western public. He left Moscow falsely claiming that Putin promised him that Russia would not expand its buildup. But in the past few days Russia has moved assets into Belarus and into the Black Sea.

      And Macron’s lying is working. The past two days the price of oil and natural gas has fallen, with stock markets up. The Macro-Putin meeting has made people happy and content.

      1. “Peace for our time!”

        Macron is facing an angry French population this year in an election. He needs all the misdirection and high-profile coverage he can get. Too bad he is looking more like a Gaullic Neville Chamberlain.

  15. Tom Blackwell writes in the National Post on how police have become more tolerant of civil disobedience over the last 30 years. Until the Freedom Trucker protest in Ottawa, all of the examples from the last 30 years have related to protests and blockades by left-wing and aboriginal groups:

    “Not only has the OPP itself officially adopted a more cautious handling of Indigenous “critical incidents” but police elsewhere have tended — with notable exceptions — to let protests that block roads, rail lines and construction sites play themselves out peacefully.
    Officers in Ottawa seem to be following a similar non-confrontational approach to the trucker-led demonstration in their city, even as local residents seethe about the tractor trailers blocking major roads, the incessant horn honking and harassment.”

    https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/how-police-have-become-more-tolerant-of-civil-disobedience-in-canada-for-good-or-bad

    1. I have just checked the legacy media’s Ottawa websites. There have been no updates on the alleged arson incident. That must mean the legacy media and the Ottawa Police could not find any evidence of arson, or more likely, they discovered that the incident was staged by anti-trucker-convoy provocateurs.

  21. 10.2 million Canadian. Back to where they were before the leftist donation fraudsters stepped in to steal the money. The truckers are well funded again Watson/Sloly. Got any other good ideas?

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