c4countdown

Kevin Thurlow

30 years ago, some Canadian relatives took me and other family members on an awesome 7 week trip through USA and Canada. The US leg was N Dakota, S Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Idaho and Montana... Highlights were Mount Rushmore, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Arches Nati...

Kevin Thurlow

The explanation looks pretty good. I think a few magicians will be slightly concerned about the use of trick photography - it is not really considered "the done thing". But I suppose Blaine and Copperfield have done it as well... And DB is honest about being dishonest - he doesn't claim to...

Kevin Thurlow

Any "prediction" that is only revealed after the event has happened is going to be some sort of conjuring trick, usually sleight of hand. (But I'm sure he's use technology if he thought it best.) I didn't watch the programme, but did video it so maybe I'll spot something... I have seen his...

Kevin Thurlow

"My walk on would be the same as my darts walk on which is Kylie Minogue's The Locomotion with me dancing the moves, swinging my hips, jumping up and jumping back as appropriate." What, no YouTube link...? I would like the shower-scene music from Psycho and I would be "The Ripper"

Kevin Thurlow

"Paul does a card trick that makes Susie go "Wow!" with a boxing glove."

Susie went "wow" with a boxing glove?

Kevin Thurlow

Dinos said "Bucky Ball for me "

Yes - me too! Just try naming it though.....

Kevin Thurlow

"Kevin, as we discussed on here for most of last of week, it is the correct Countdown spelling. It may not be the correct scientific spelling, but ESTROGEN isn't allowed on the show, as the dictionary defines it as the American spelling" I have now looked it up - that is true, but will be ...

Kevin Thurlow

"We all wanted some OESTROGEN!!! P.S. That's the correct spelling!" Er, no it isn't. The correct scientific spelling is now "estrogen", but I don't recall if Oxford draws attention to that. It does with the analgous sulfur/sulphur problem. It isn't really "oe" - it's th...

Kevin Thurlow

"If the motorway overhead gantries are warning me of impending doom (well, a queue/accident/closure) up ahead - should I stay on the motorway and hope a decent diversion has been set up, or hope it will have miraculously cleared by the time I get there or it maybe hope it just mightn't be too b...

Kevin Thurlow

The Chessbase (providers of databases for chessplayers) website recently advertised a competition where the many readers were asked to select a number between 1 and 100 where the winner would be the person who got closest to 2/3 of the average of ALL the guesses. They also asked you to give your che...

Kevin Thurlow

Thanks Dinos

(for LEITMOTIV)

Kevin Thurlow

Well done Jon! Very tenacious, I think after a while you think, "I've started so I'll finish" I tend to agree with Phil about correcting the waiter's error etc., if the service/food has been awful, they don't deserve the correction, but if it's been good or somewhere you go a lot, you poin...

Kevin Thurlow

That is interesting... So when I got "Neighbour", it was doubly interesting as it starts with "N" and the ING is mixed up... Perhaps someone who's more alert than me at the moment can say what ended with "V"?

Kevin Thurlow

Ronnie Dunn, one half of the legendary Country act Brooks and Dunn, who have won more CMAs than anyone else apparently.

Right date wrong year include Marilyn Monroe, Frank Whittle, Nigel Short and Bob Monkhouse....

Kevin Thurlow

"'I Believe' by Frankie Lane was my No.1 on 31st August 1953, so it really dates me. It was something of a classic and was top of the charts for a record 18 weeks (not consecutively). I am happy to be associated with it. " Yes me too - he specialised in ballads, so his absolutely brilliant...

Kevin Thurlow

Those yet to post might find http://www.everyhit.com/dates/index.html useful.....

Kevin Thurlow

"I have a general aversion to IQ as a concept because summarising one person's intelligence as a single number seems obviously bullshit to me (Gödel numbering notwithstanding)." Quite agree (and would also have been annoyed by their snooty attitude and by their junk mail) Doing the puzzles...

Kevin Thurlow

The Magic Roundabout!

Kevin Thurlow

It did bother me that it took these geniuses a very long time to work out what the weakness of the aliens might be, when it was pretty obvious from their name! Cabinet meeting was good - the one about starting the Iraq war might have been similar (except Blair didn't have cabinet meetings in case an...

Kevin Thurlow

Hard luck Philip - it's certainly unfortunate to have an audition scheduled and then have it snatched away. Nice avatar. I did have my doubts about people getting a second go - there might be ill-feeling from the large number of people (every octochamp is responsible for at least 7 people losing the...

Kevin Thurlow

Did anyone else think Jon's comment was a bit over the top? If I were a moderator I might look at what he said and whip it out or blue pencil it. We don't want to corrupt young Kai so he starts making unseemly or suggestive comments, do we?

Kevin Thurlow

"I liked my Fuego too, especially its quirky "European" (ie odd) features like the hidden door levers (hardly handles), the hatch release in the door jamb and the bonnet release in the glove box. Or was it the other way round? " That sounds familiar - the other good thing was the...

Kevin Thurlow

"No not a all, just saying you seem to be there quite a lot. Do you live nearby?"

There might be a clue in his "location"!

Kevin Thurlow

BUTANOLS would be ok, as there's butan-1-ol and butan-2-ol; but there's only one isomer of each of methanol, methanal and ethanal so they should be mass nouns.

Kevin Thurlow

Hmm, PROPANOLS? There is a propan-1-ol and a propan-2-ol, so I suppose they are propanols! And I missed bentonite as well.

Kevin Thurlow

It's a long list..... Morris 1100, Hillman Minx, Ford Capri, Renault Fuego, Rover 216, Volvo 340, Austin Metro, Audi 100 (inherited from my father), Audi A4..... so I have bought a different make each time. The Rover by coincidence had the registration C480LGC and I work for a company called LGC, sa...

Kevin Thurlow

"Also ADENINE is a mass noun so ADENINES is dubious. I wouldn't accept."

I agree - you might use a plural informally, e;g; "There are 27 adenines in this fragment of DNA", but technically that's wrong. We have had this argument many times about other chemicals....

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

Well done!

Kevin Thurlow

Chris Wills and I did Brainteaser as well (luckily on diffeent days). Also, Dave Ledger won £3K, having previously had one appearance on Countdown....

Kevin Thurlow

Oh dear - they thought the Battle of Culloden was when?!

Kevin Thurlow

"Haha, should I go on there and post that line which has now been removed?"

Maybe not - but you could post an appropriate moving graphic you have used before...

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

Accusing Jon of having a dodgy shirt is a bit cheeky from someone who only watches the programme to perv on Rachel....

Kevin Thurlow

Equally brilliant......

Kevin Thurlow

"I learnt about basilisks reading Harry Potter 2 but I must have missed a chapter because Susie says a basilisk has lethal gays "

Brilliant!

Interesting that "gaze" and "gays" are homophones...

Kevin Thurlow

"In some ways I wish they'd adopt the same approach with the letters, at least for the first 7 (which are forced, albeit in some permutation, to be CCCCVVV) but I suspect changing something so visible would activate far too many Disgusteds of Tunbridge Wells." A good point - I wonder if th...

Kevin Thurlow

Where do we start? One of my former colleagues has a black and white TV, and got a visit from the TV Licensing Nazis, who said he only had a B&W licence, so he said, "I have a licence appropriate to the equipment used", then they demanded to see the TV. He slammed the door in the bloke...

Kevin Thurlow

I just bought the Hodges biography of Turing (having got it from the library ages ago). I can't help feeling the "suicide" verdict was due to bias..... I work close to the National Physical Laboratory and can just imagine the looks on the faces of the management when he proposed building a...

Kevin Thurlow

The Polgar experiment was interesting. I suspect many girls/women don't play chess because of the appalling attitude of a lot of organisers and other players. I have heard organisers saying that we must encourage more female participation, and then they say they are organising female-only events, wh...

Kevin Thurlow

...And did they live up to their name?

Kevin Thurlow

Many years ago, there was a funeral director in Hull called Boddey or Boddy...

Kevin Thurlow

Really interesting Dinos

but I think you meant RAF was the youngest not the oldest!

Shame you didn't win

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

I should have looked it up first! It was Red Ingle and the Natural Seven, but he did perform for some time before that with Spike Jones and the City Slickers, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Ingle so that would explain it. A Google search revealed a Youtube hit as well which might be w...

Kevin Thurlow

I had wondered about inhaling all the smoke from the engine, but obviously inhaling smoke deliberately and deeply from a cigarette is worse than coal smoke when you have a reasonable source of oxygen! I may be wrong, but I think it was "Red Ingle and the Natural Seven"? I have the record s...

Kevin Thurlow

Phil is right - it goes back a long time. I recall a BBC interviewer, wearing a suit and speaking in a plummy accent, talking to a young person, who said "y'know" or "y'know what I mean" at least once a (short) sentence. The BBC man even said "yes" a couple of times. It...

Kevin Thurlow

Street View is giving great entertainment... One woman is filing for divorce, having looked at her best friend's house and noticing her (the first woman's) husband's car outside. A driver of one of Google's vans got upset when people started taking photographs of him, which he called an invasion of ...

Kevin Thurlow

Sorry I missed it - jetted off (or in this case propellered or pistoned off) to sunnier climes for a few days...

I think the spelling rules are ok as they stand - it doesn't seem a great hardship to spell correctly in a word game!

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

Great stuff George - and I would think that many organisations have similar problems...

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

Suddenly it was racing again. And you saw all the race, no more "while you were watching the adverts, this happened!"

However, I think those that did well may get disqualified over this row over diffusers, or whatever it is. FIA don't like straightforward racing...

Kevin Thurlow

I note that Michael Wallace and Charlie Reams are now sporting small furry animals as avatars... I am sure there is a good reason for this. I was thinking of heading the topic Pet Shop Boys, but in these days of "Political Correctness" you can't joke like that... Hopefully I won't be hound...

Kevin Thurlow

"Fill in" a form is correct as you are completing the form. People "fill out" if they get heavier. "Fill out a form" is an Americanism, which should be sufficient reason not to use it! You use "fewer" for numbers, so "8 items or fewer" is right (as u...

Kevin Thurlow

Thanks - I'll try to remember to watch it... Or I could just contact the chessplayer!

Kevin Thurlow

Any idea where the challenger came from? There is a Krishna Mehendale who plays chess in Surrey...

Kevin Thurlow

Jon Corby - Pete Sampras

although less so nowadays, probably a conscious effort from one or the other...

Kevin Thurlow

Indeed - but it does remind me of the chap on TV a few years ago who got carried away with the drama of whatever he was talking about and said,

"It wasn't just a long time - it was an entire equinox."

Makes you think.

Kevin Thurlow

I was a bit worried today that Kirsty was doing an Anne Robinson - i.e failing to pronounce words correctly. e.g. "Mendeleev" was given as "mender-leave" rather than "Mender-lay-eff". Of course they could have given her the Mendeleyev spelling to make it obvious! But be...

Kevin Thurlow

Completely missed "olefinic" - it is an archaic term, but I still kicked myself! Not sure I would have risked "partaker", as I have never seen it used.

Kevin Thurlow

Feel free to bring in sexism as well! And ageism..... The trouble with comparisons is that they don't work 100 % of the time. "Afro-Caribbeans" tend to run faster than "Europeans", "Europeans" tend to swim faster than "Afro-Caribbeans", and men generally play ...

Kevin Thurlow

George makes a valuable point - the whole "equality" industry is based on discrimination. According to its adherents, you have to treat non-white people better than white people or you have to treat women better than men. If you take an honest approach you treat people equally. We had a Un...

Kevin Thurlow

"Barbie is a male stereotype of women."

Er no, Barbie was designed by Ruth Handler 50 years ago. Barbie is not just a model, she has been doctor, teacher, soldier etc. It could be argued she empowers women...

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow

"A racist cuddly toy..." It seems to be the perception now... I think the original comment was no worse than saying Boris Johnson looks like a Teddy bear, or some vacuous starlet looks like a Barbie doll. Of course, Barbie has a black friend (Francie), so I guess if you were talking about ...

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