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'Six Degrees Of Separation'

rynner2 said:
Mythopoeika said:
Swifty said:
...nodded downwards at my old fella and said "Can you tell what it is yet?"
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What did he mean by that? :confused:
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It was one of Rolf's catchphrases, used when speed-painting.
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(thanks rynner) ... which Rolf didn't say to me that evening. I can't believe I'm sticking up for Rolf Harris here ... so I nearly pee'd next to someone famous.
 
Oh jeez. I was joking when I speculated the pee story had something to do with Rolf Harris...maybe I am psychic after all. :lol:
 
A friend of mine (actually more than one) used to go out with a young lady who, whilst studying in Manchester, worked briefly for Dr Harold Shipman as some kind of secretary or assistant. I don't think she was his receptionist or anything, just temporarily drafted in via a temp agency to deal with admin as he, er, needed some extra help sorting out his records at the time...which is probably worse, the more I think about it.
 
Andy_X said:
A friend of mine (actually more than one) used to go out with a young lady who, whilst studying in Manchester, worked briefly for Dr Harold Shipman as some kind of secretary or assistant. I don't think she was his receptionist or anything, just temporarily drafted in via a temp agency to deal with admin as he, er, needed some extra help sorting out his records at the time...which is probably worse, the more I think about it.
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o_O ..... bloody hell, that must have bothered her afterwards ....

Our local vet I used to take the family dogs to was wrongly imprisoned then cleared for murdering his wife .. the details were like something out of a badly written soap opera, in brief: His wife was dying, he was having an affair at the same time, she was found to have horse tranquiliser in her system, he was sent to prison accused of speeding up her death and then a suicide note was sensationally found hidden in a vet magazine that cleared him of murder .. hell hath no fury like a scorned woman and all that ...

http://netk.net.au/UK/DavidJames.asp
 
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I attended a lecture by Andrew Strominger and we had a drink and a chat. He's one of the leading physicists in his field but what got me excited was learning recently that him and Hawking are collaborating on a theory on black holes.
 
I used to do voluntary work with a lady whose husband, when a doctor in India, gave medical examinations to the Dalai Lama and his family not long before they fled Tibet. I've seen the thank you note typed on very thin paper and the accompanying gift of a Tibetan rug.

On a counselling course I became friendly with a women who did a couple of prison stretches for drug offences. For a short while she shared a cell with Myra Hindley.

An actor friend had a director friend who back in the 60's had a fling with Clay Shaw (played by Tommy lee Jones in the movie J.F.K.)

Another theatre friend (died over 20 years go) knew Julian Slade (Salad Days) who apparently used to get invited to Sandringham for the weekend and play the piano for royal sing-songs. The same friend had also worked with John Osborne, Kenneth Williams, Patricia Routledge, Fenella Fielding, Albert Finney.... and lot's more I can't be bothered to try and remember.
 
Heard a tale from my youngest, who lives in greater Brum near Robert Plant.

Planty is often seen shopping locally and taking a bevvy like any ordinary mortal. However, he hates being recognised and approached. A friend of my youngest Snailet recently spotted him in a pub and told his mates that he was going to ask him to autograph his guitar case.

The starstruck young man's friend strongly advised against it. He took no notice and went off to Planty's table with his guitar case and a marker pen. His mates watched in admiration as the great man did indeed write on the case!

On his return they gathered round to witness the great man's signature, which actually read

BOLLOCKS

:D
 
rynner2 said:
And Who The F*ck is Robert Plant anyway???
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He was a member of a popular beat combo in the late 60s & 70s called Led Zeppelin m'lud. Biggest band in the world for a few years...
 
hunck said:
He was a member of a popular beat combo in the late 60s & 70s called Led Zeppelin m'lud. Biggest band in the world for a few years...
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Some of his solo stuff in the last decade has been pretty good I thought.
 
escargot1 said:
Google is your friend here.
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Google is evil!

But I could have done a web search if I'd wanted to know - but the thing is, I didn't want to know.
There's just too much ephemeral trivia to keep up with. Now, I reckon, if I'd needed to know something, I would already know it. But as I don't do pub quizzes any more I can let go of stuff about whatisface, and hundreds of others! :evil:
 
This bulge should jog yer memory.

Robert Plant.jpg
 
I just went to the funeral of my uncle who was a premier in Canada, like a state governor in the USA. He had pictures of himself and the queen, him and the pope, him and George Bush 1 etc. I am probably less than 6 degrees from anyone famous just because of him.
 
paranoid420 said:
I just went to the funeral of my uncle who was a premier in Canada, like a state governor in the USA...
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One of my dad's family side claims to fame is some kind of great uncle who was a premier of British Columbia early in the last century. It's quite odd, because generally speaking everyone else seems to have been either a barely making ends meet hill farmer, or a soldier, there's no middle ground to the spectrum: they were either shearing it or shooting it, or sat in a big comfy chair signing things in Parliament. (There's a mountain named after him - which I quite like the idea of.)

The other day, due to various cock-ups, I was forced to get a taxi from Macclesfield station over the hills to Buxton. The cab driver told me that he'd picked up a fare to Jodrell Bank once, a man and wife - as a way into conversation with his passengers he had opened:

'Jodrell Bank? You'll know Alan Garner then. I believe he's a bit of a grump.'

'I am Alan Garner', says the man.

'And he is a bit of a grump', says his wife.
 
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Spookdaddy said:
One of my dad's family side claims to fame is some kind of great uncle who was a premier of British Columbia early in the last century. (There's a mountain named after him - which I quite like the idea of.)
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Not John Robson was it? That's the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies.
 
paranoid420 said:
Not John Robson was it? That's the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies.
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No, Mount John Oliver - in the Cariboo Mountains.

Apparently in the early days of his career he was the object of some derision amongst his political colleagues as used to turn up to meetings straight from work in work boots and overalls. Sounds cool to me though.
 
Most of my close degrees are up to family. My mom was friends in High School with Liz Sutherland, who grew up to be Liz Carpenter, Lady Bird Johnson's press secretary. I can do Hitler in six from that. My FIL ran off to Hollywood in the 60's when he was in his fifties. He was an extra in A movies and an "Also starring" in some Z movies so there are some interesting degrees there. On my own, in the 80's, my work supervisor was Speaker of the House of Representatives Jim Wright's niece. I can do a few past world leaders with that, and probably Prez Obama. Still thinking if I can do a Beatle or the Queen, those would be biggies.
 
I have a Bacon number of 3.

I can get to the queen via one connection, twice. But surely that's nothing to boast about: her maj must have met millions of people in her time. I understand that in the flesh, she seems very small and bewildered (and this was 20 years ago), which saddens me, for all my Republican leanings.
 
Krepostnoi said:
I have a Bacon number of 3.

I can get to the queen via one connection, twice. But surely that's nothing to boast about: her maj must have met millions of people in her time. I understand that in the flesh, she seems very small and bewildered (and this was 20 years ago), which saddens me, for all my Republican leanings.
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I have several connections with the Royal family, although I have never met a member of the Royal family myself.
Last year, I met the Queen's Lord Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire.
Two of my best friends at school lived on the Royal estate, and the father of one was the Queen's personal secretary (I met him once).
My Mum was a dinner lady at a school where the very young Andrew and Edward were pupils. On one occasion, I went with her to the school and stayed in the staff room all day (because I was off school and my Mum couldn't find a babysitter, I suppose). I didn't meet anybody Royal, but I did meet their bodyguard (who was completely bored...I didn't bother him - didn't want to get shot).

Unfortunately, I have no idea what my Bacon number might be.
 
My royal connections are already on this thread somewhere. In short, my father in law (now deceased) taught Prince Charles and Princess Anne to sail (in, I believe, the Dragon class boat "Bluebottle").
 
I thought I had long ago contributed these but it seems not . . .

Anyone meeting the Queen in person is, I suppose, just one remove from all the people she has met. Though I have seen her at close quarters - likewise Princess Anne (albeit through a window) - neither could be called meetings.

I have, however, shaken hands with the Duke of Kent but not, alas, in a Masonic manner he recognized.

Sometimes our humbler connections pay off better in the connection stakes. My Grannie used to get Christmas cards from Frankie Vaughan: their shared Liverpudlian background had endeared her to him in the days he regularly performed in Southport. She was working in the Prince of Wales Hotel.

Now Frankie Vaughan's star has faded somewhat but he starred in Let's Make Love with Marilyn Monroe and is said to have resisted her charms. More than JFK managed to do.

I see way back in this thread, Evilsprout also reached JFK in 4 moves via Frank Sinatra, no less! :)
 
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