DaveG38

Why, thank you, kind sir.

Its now a sixpence!!

Here's another one of my compositions, sung by Mrs G. https://soundcloud.com/user-57587141/fire-in-the-water

I always assumed that this is precisely what was meant. Either that or the wood that the gavel lands on!

This is the seller, 'lionellancs' with whom I had a run in a few years ago, on eBay over a 1882 no-H penny. Steer well clear.

Perhaps Shelley should go to Specsavers!

Of course there is. Nobody is going to sell an EF 1911 penny on a buy it now for £3.99. The photos (why a run of the duplicates of the reverse only, I wonder), therefore, are there to make the buyer think they are getting a coin like the one illustrated, whereas in reality they will be getting a worn out washer. He has 7 available, but I bet they are not anything like the one shown.

Although Derek's book covers coins minted from 1797 through to 1970, you should be able to take the broad principles that he has identified and extrapolate them to earlier types. It won't be an exact science, but it should still give you a good feel for grading of earlier coins, especially since there is no definitive agreed guide for determining grades anyway. On this basis I would keep the book.

Also, on the 1927 coin Britannia's right thumb on the shield appears to be a shade thinner.

My earliest (at work), was an ICL DRS 8801 Word Processor. It used huge 11" floppy discs and you had to load the operating system each time it was turned on. How quaint by the standards of today, yet it wasn't that long ago really.

I worked for BT plc pretty much all my working life after I left College. Retired at 56 and never looked back. For 25 years of my time with BT I was their Emergency Planning Manager, covering both internal and external disasters. Think exchange fires, floods, explosions, cable damage etc plus civil emergencies like Lockerbie, Dunblane, Deal Bombing, Zeebrugge Ferry, 9/11, 7/7 and these are where my expertise lies (apart from 20th Century Bronze and Silver varieties!!). Coins were an interest from the age of about 16, but my serious collecting re-started in 1995, and has continued ever since. The mention of Fortan and punch cards reminded me of my early programming as part of my of my research work at College. Stacks of punch cards, weighted down and fed through a scanner, leading to activity somewhere in a huge mainframe computer behind glass, looked after my lab technicians in white coats tending to its every need. All this to show that FeCl3 is a flat triangular molecule. Nowadays I expect the PC I'm typing this on has more power than that huge mainframe. Happy days though.

According to FIFA England are ranked above Croatia, Columbia and Sweden, although not by much. Sorry, but I had to laugh at your comment about England's drawback being their inability to convert chances. The whole point of the game isn't to play well or have a good goalie/defence, its to score goals and that means converting chances. Its the key drawback - and as I said England failed, as they always do.

Surely losing in sport IS failure? It sure isn't succcess is it? I don't agree with your comment about fairness regarding whether England would have gone out had they met other teams. Its simply not about whether the comment is fair or not, although I would argue that it is if based on a realistic assessment of England's play in the tournament, its just an opinion, with as much value as anybody else's.

Yes, other 'good' teams did poorly in this World Cup, but that is not relevant to how well England played and the results they achieved. Arguably, if some of those other teams had done better and England had to play them then they would have gone out at an earlier stage. As it is the only quality side England played was Croatia and they failed.

I think we need to inject a dose of realism into assessing England's performance. Yes, they reached the semi-finals, and that represents a pretty fair achievement, until you start to look at the manner of their progression. Firstly, the win over Tunisia, a very average footballing nation, was close and not very convincing. Then there was Panama. Yes, a good thumping great score, but scarcely unexpected against such a third rate team. Next Belgium - the battle of the second teams. Even so, a 1-0 loss wasn't exactly a great result, but it did put England into the 'easier' half of the draw. From the group stage, England managed a pretty poor performance against Columbia, scraping through on the penalties - again hardly a convincing win. The Sweden match was better and the 2-0 win was deserved, but England weren't exactly playing a top team in Sweden, so winning was not a great achievement. When they did come up against some decent opposition, as they did for the first time in Croatia, they failed. Their second half performance was woeful, as was their play during extra time. Basically, they were outplayed by a very mediocre team. In the Tunisia, Columbia and Croatia games they managed to turn a winning position into a losing or drawing one by slackening off and giving the appearence of thinking that the games were won. So, they did well to get where they did, but it was the easiest route with no real challenging teams to have to overcome. Based on this, I don't share the euphoria about the England performance as everyone else does. I don't think they were any better than earlier England teams - they just had an easier ride and a bit more luck. As I said in an earlier post, England never fail to disappoint, and this World Cup was no different really.

Losing a game is never a good outcome, whatever the apparent benefits. Personally, I doubt that England will be able to beat Columbia. All the early hype about England was on the back of two decent performances against relatively poor sides - hardly a real test. Up against Belgium, England looked their normal second rate selves.

Normal service has resumed. England back to their predictable best.

At least we can't lose to the Germans on penalties, although I've no doubt we will manage to lose to somebody else.

Well they are half way there after 30 or so minutes.

History tells us that England never fail to disappoint. I'm not expecting much in this world cup from them. Just the same old same old. The Tunisia match wasn't anything to write home about. For the first ten minutes England looked OK, although woeful in front of goal. After that very pedestrian.

I bought a 1703 plain Queen Anne halfcrown. Totally satisfied.

As the saying goes - fools and their money........

I have no sympathy - the 'coin' has COPY written on it quite clearly. If people want one to fill a gap in their collection and can't afford the highly inflated price for a real one, then I guess wasting £22 for a copy is OK. Seems a bit pointless though for something that isn't genuine. Even with just £22 they could buy some very nice Elizabeth II predecimal real coins.

The best old-fashioned term I can think of for her is splendid.

Nice though Penny is in 'Are You Being Served' Candy Davies is simply spectacular!!