Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[tonyalbus]

60 Years old.... but not recap-ing.. why... its not needed... some fine Dutch quality



Needed a big cleanup... but it was worth it.

[0culus]

I could write an extremely long list of good US comedies, both film and TV.

Just because there may not be anything of note being produced at the moment, doesn't mean there never has been.

It's also worth noting that humour is a highly subjective thing, regardless of nationality.

Certainly not, but I would say no good comedies have been made here for a long time. Late night TV, for instance, died with Johnny Carson retired IMO.

[mnementh]

60 Years old.... but not recap-ing.. why... its not needed... some fine Dutch quality    https://youtu.be/Vsb39RPvHm4   Needed a big cleanup... but it was worth it.

Needs a visit from med with a can of his favorite smurf-squeezins.

No, seriously... looks good. I agree on the amber LED; that thing probably came with either a NE1 neon in there, or a really undervolted incandescent bulb which would also have looked pretty yellow/amber.

mnem

[tggzzz]

Let's not pretend that British comedy isn't often lowbrow...Benny Hill for instance, Mrs. Brown's Boys, etc. But they still manage to be much funnier than 99% of the swill that US comedians do (and I say this as a dyed in the wool American). It's like people have forgotten how to be funny without using very lowbrow humor that well, isn't even funny. Mrs. Brown on the other hand will have me rolling on the floor dying of laughter no matter how many times I rewatch it. 

A problem with the US system is that it is a sausage machine geared to producing as many episodes as possible. That tends to result in each episode having the minimum number of jokes to avoid viewers turning off. We are not entirely immune to that process.

Similarly US food tends to expand the produce as much as possible, even though the number of flavour molecules is the same.

[mnementh]

   Had to knock together a little corntact board to connect to the iPud batteries; that way I can use my LiPo balance charger to charge them. Only slightly overkill....

Finished charging this morning; took ~6200mAH in two sessions as my charger timed out at 5000mAH for over-capacity.

Time to reassemble and test.

mnem
 

[Robert763]

60 Years old.... but not recap-ing.. why... its not needed... some fine Dutch quality



Needed a big cleanup... but it was worth it.

You used pliers on the front panel nuts Andy? Really, Pliers!? Don't you have spanners?
The knurled nuts on the front of the toggle switches should not be tightened with any tool. They should be finger tightened to th correct postion (flush with bushing) and then the hex nut on the back of the panel tightened with a spanner.
I actually keep a set of spanners Just for panel work and connectors. They are not expensive ones but have smooth chrome finish and have never been used for heavy work so ther are no nicks or burrs to mar the finish of the panel or connector. I have some cheap flat stamped sheet spanners too. They are to get in tight spaces and some connector bodies.

[Specmaster]

Let's not pretend that British comedy isn't often lowbrow...Benny Hill for instance, Mrs. Brown's Boys, etc. But they still manage to be much funnier than 99% of the swill that US comedians do (and I say this as a dyed in the wool American). It's like people have forgotten how to be funny without using very lowbrow humor that well, isn't even funny. Mrs. Brown on the other hand will have me rolling on the floor dying of laughter no matter how many times I rewatch it. 

Regarding Mrs Brown's Boys, totally 100% agree with you, I can actually ache from laughing sometimes when watching it. The rest of the family just do not get it I'm afraid.

[bd139]

It doesn't compute with me. Neither does Benny Hill etc. Both are just embarrassing I find.

Some good British things worth watching:

1. Father Ted
2. IT Crowd
3. Mighty Boosh
4. Nathan Barley
5. Blackadder
6. Bottom
7. Absolutely Fabulous
8. The Day Today
9. Black Books
10. Spaced
11. Peep Show (probably my favourite)
12. Inbetweeners
13. People Who Just Do Nothing (which is set around where I live )

[Cerebus]

I'm hoping I can get him to watch the Beeb's HHGttG; might need to get BritBox just for that. 

NO! Get him to listen to the original radio series. For a start, the pictures are better.

If nothing else, the miscasting of Saaaandwa Dickinson as Trisha McMillan was one of the great crimes of the 1980s.

[bd139]

Radio version is definitely better. I'm actually rereading the first book at the moment. One of the few books you can reread and discover something new and/or interesting in it you missed the last time.

[Cerebus]

It doesn't compute with me. Neither does Benny Hill etc. Both are just embarrassing I find.

Ditto. For the Benny Hill era you can abandon Hill and substitute Dick Emery. Although he's somewhere in the same space as Benny Hill, his show had more taste, subtlety, and had the principle advantage of actually being funny rather than just puerile and rather weak. I'm not sure if there's anything contemporary and good that you could put in the Mrs. Brown's Boys slot and still satisfy the same punter the way you could have done with Hill and Emery.

[tonyalbus]

60 Years old.... but not recap-ing.. why... its not needed... some fine Dutch quality



Needed a big cleanup... but it was worth it.

You used pliers on the front panel nuts Andy? Really, Pliers!? Don't you have spanners?
The knurled nuts on the front of the toggle switches should not be tightened with any tool. They should be finger tightened to th correct postion (flush with bushing) and then the hex nut on the back of the panel tightened with a spanner.
I actually keep a set of spanners Just for panel work and connectors. They are not expensive ones but have smooth chrome finish and have never been used for heavy work so ther are no nicks or burrs to mar the finish of the panel or connector. I have some cheap flat stamped sheet spanners too. They are to get in tight spaces and some connector bodies.

Thanks for your worris... but...
its not hex.... and my pliers has paper tape on it.....

[bd139]

It doesn't compute with me. Neither does Benny Hill etc. Both are just embarrassing I find.

Ditto. For the Benny Hill era you can abandon Hill and substitute Dick Emery. Although he's somewhere in the same space as Benny Hill, his show had more taste, subtlety, and had the principle advantage of actually being funny rather than just puerile and rather weak. I'm not sure if there's anything contemporary and good that you could put in the Mrs. Brown's Boys slot and still satisfy the same punter the way you could have done with Hill and Emery.

The 2 minutes hate?

[tggzzz]

I'm hoping I can get him to watch the Beeb's HHGttG; might need to get BritBox just for that. 

NO! Get him to listen to the original radio series. For a start, the pictures are better.

If nothing else, the miscasting of Saaaandwa Dickinson as Trisha McMillan was one of the great crimes of the 1980s.

Even worse was Zaphod's second prosthetic head; dire even by the standards of the day. A much better version was seen in Ken Campbell's stage play at the Rainbow: they had two actors in one jump suit, effectively a less uncomfortable version of a pantomime horse.

The TV graphics to the book's entries were too good: they distracted from the wonderful Peter Jones's audio.

So yes, the original audio is the definitively wonderful version.

[0culus]

My top five choices for comedy coming from the British Isles, in no particular order:

Mrs. Brown's Boys
Last of the Summer Wine
Keeping up Appearances
The IT Crowd

...and now for something completely different...

Monty Python (especially Flying Circus for the just straight up bizarre, yet mostly hilarious, situations but also timeless classic sketches like the Spanish Inquisition, the cheese shop, the dead parrot, argument clinic, etc.)

and I suppose I'll give an honorable mention to Fawlty Towers. I just enjoy John Cleese.

[tggzzz]

It doesn't compute with me. Neither does Benny Hill etc. Both are just embarrassing I find.

Some good British things worth watching:

1. Father Ted
2. IT Crowd
3. Mighty Boosh
4. Nathan Barley
5. Blackadder
6. Bottom
7. Absolutely Fabulous
8. The Day Today
9. Black Books
10. Spaced
11. Peep Show (probably my favourite)
12. Inbetweeners
13. People Who Just Do Nothing (which is set around where I live )

The Day Today is superb. It originally played at 10pm, and it was some difficult to be sure when it had ended.

I suspect it isn't seen much because Chris Morris went on to skewer the Great and the Good in a subsequent series demonstrating that many were rent-a-quotes that didn't think about what they were saying.

[Saskia]

well, when mentioning british vs murican humor, I certainly did not expect this kind of spanish inquisition ...

[0culus]

It doesn't compute with me. Neither does Benny Hill etc. Both are just embarrassing I find.

Some good British things worth watching:

1. Father Ted
2. IT Crowd
3. Mighty Boosh
4. Nathan Barley
5. Blackadder
6. Bottom
7. Absolutely Fabulous
8. The Day Today
9. Black Books
10. Spaced
11. Peep Show (probably my favourite)
12. Inbetweeners
13. People Who Just Do Nothing (which is set around where I live )

Oh don't get me wrong, I really don't like Benny Hill at all. The only funny thing he ever did was one sketch where he and some other guy bust out of prison and they come across one of those mall signs with the star that says "you are here", and of course they proceed to misunderstand.  "THEY KNOW WHERE WE ARE!!!!!"

Mrs. Brown on the other hand, is fecking hilarious through and through. I especially love that the show has no respect for the fourth wall.

[bd139]

Perhaps I just had enough or Irish men with tits when the gypsies moved into the company car park 

[Cerebus]

Even worse was Zaphod's second prosthetic head; dire even by the standards of the day.

I was trying to forget that. Some things are traumatic enough that they belong undisturbed in the dustier recesses of memory, only to be recalled at the moment when your life flashes before your eyes to comfort you with the thought that there are things worse than dying.

A much better version was seen in Ken Campbell's stage play at the Rainbow: they had two actors in one jump suit, effectively a less uncomfortable version of a pantomime horse.

Knowing the perversity of Ken's mind, I wouldn't be surprised if he had two actors naked in the same suit to "give it a bit of edge". 

[mnementh]

   Had to knock together a little corntact board to connect to the iPud batteries; that way I can use my LiPo balance charger to charge them. Only slightly overkill....

Finished charging this morning; took ~6200mAH in two sessions as my charger timed out at 5000mAH for over-capacity.

Time to reassemble and test.

mnem
 

Qa-PLAH!!!

Well, some measure of success, anyways. 

Battery shows ~80%, home button works and it isn’t bitching about the fingerprint scanner not working, and I’m writing up this post on it, so the digitizer still works.

 

So it would appear I have indeed fulfilled the “Fixers’ Hippocratic Oath” : ”First, do no damage.” 

Now all that remains is the long, long wait for parts...

mnem
No matter how fast they get here, it’s never fast enough...

[McBryce]

I'm no fan of Mrs. Browns Boys, but it is anything but British: Irish writer, Irish Director, Irish Producer, Irish cast. Other than the fact that BBC Scotland got involved later there was nothing British about it. Equally so with Father Ted, Irish writer, Irish Director, Irish cast, Irish location.

IT Crowd was also written by an Irish writer, but I would consider it British as (almost) everthing else about it came from Britain.

I've nothing against British stuff or people, but could you please learn that there's a difference between Irish and British. We didn't call Friends a Canadian series.

McBryce.


 

[Cerebus]

and I suppose I'll give an honorable mention to Fawlty Towers. I just enjoy John Cleese.

One of the few moments in life where I've laughed so hard that I began to fear that I might die from asphyxiation, is the moment in Fawlty Towers where Basil, in one room, put his hand back through the door and tries to use the Australian girl's nipple as a light switch while Sybil is, unbeknownst to Basil, watching on.

This moment:

[bd139]

Back on TE. Decent price here. 34401A. Good condition. 2012 dated £300

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/274603239477

[mnementh]

I'm hoping I can get him to watch the Beeb's HHGttG; might need to get BritBox just for that. 

NO! Get him to listen to the original radio series. For a start, the pictures are better.

If nothing else, the miscasting of Saaaandwa Dickinson as Trisha McMillan was one of the great crimes of the 1980s.

Even worse was Zaphod's second prosthetic head; dire even by the standards of the day. A much better version was seen in Ken Campbell's stage play at the Rainbow: they had two actors in one jump suit, effectively a less uncomfortable version of a pantomime horse.

The TV graphics to the book's entries were too good: they distracted from the wonderful Peter Jones's audio.

So yes, the original audio is the definitively wonderful version.

While I do appreciate the purist ethic displayed here, and I have even gone so far as to torrent and listen to every ep of the radio show I could find... no.

This is just as much aboot sharing part of my youth with my son, and the BBC HHGttG on PBS was my first exposure to Douglas Adams.

Up to that point, my exposure to Brit humor was mostly Dave Allen (I know, not a Brit) and Benny Hill; for me it was a      moment, a seminal part of my own personal enlightenment.

The papier-mâché Zaphod head is part and parcel of that experience, and I love it in its own right. I have kept him away from the movie version, even though I do still quite frankly and shamelessly love Alan Rickman's voice acting as Marvin. After I've watched the TV serial with him, we will also enjoy the movie together for its own good contributions to the HHG Universe, and the boi and I will discuss the two, just as I did with my mum.

And when he grows up to such a point as we can actually enjoy things like radio shows together, then I will share that with him as well... or encourage him to seek them out on his own as I did.

mnem
And it didn't hurt that the theme music was the Eagles' "Journey of the Sorcerer".