[QUOTE=Nick;541074]The BBC just published a photo of Queen Elizabeth using a rotary dial phone
(turned away from the camera so that you cannot read the number).
Is pulse dialling still supported in the UK or have they just kept 1 old branch exchange
for the town of Windsor?[/QUOTE]
No, it is not. Some rich people still keep old fancy phones in their house. The IC to change from pulse dialing to tone dialing costs $0.20 (you can google "pulse to tone dial converter IC" or similar. But anyhow, you can easily try by knocking on the fork of the phone, try an easy number like 112 (here in Thai used to order pizza or so).

Edit: reading the rest of the thread, what the other people said about the close circuit could be also true. Most probably, the palace is not directly exposed to the open sky... (Asimov, "Caves of Steel").

[QUOTE=LaurV;541127]you can easily try by knocking on the fork of the phone, try an easy number like 112 (here in Thai used to order pizza or so).[/QUOTE]
Don't try that number in the UK or anywhere in the EU!
It's the emergency number (our version of 911 in the US ).
While most people in the UK would call 999, 112 works there as well because of their
recent EU membership.

[QUOTE=Nick;541142]Don't try that number in the UK or anywhere in the EU!
It's the emergency number (our version of 911 in the US ).
While most people in the UK would call 999, 112 works there as well because of their recent EU membership.[/QUOTE]In some areas 911 works too. The neighborhoods[sic] of USAF airbases are the principle examples.

[QUOTE=xilman;541091]Latex puppets, actually, but still a superb TV programme.

I hear that it is going to be revived RSN. Can't wait to see what the Trump puppet will look like.[/QUOTE]Ah, yes, latex puppets it was. Fits the images rattling around in my brain perfectly. Can't imagine why I was thinking claymation.

I remember skits featuring the then (late 1980's) Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson. In one of them, PM Margaret Thatcher was reciting a litany of declines in the value of the Pound. Lawson replied, "But you said you wanted to [i]abolish[/i] the Pound." To which PM Thatcher retorted, "I want to abolish the Pound [i]note,[/i] not the Pound Sterling!" Whereupon all the Ministers started chorusing, "Nigel made a balls-up! Nigel made a balls-up!"

Update as reported in the [url=https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/03/28/coronavirus-in-russia-the-latest-news-march-27-a69117]Moscow Times[/url]:

03/27/20 Russia confirmed 196 new coronavirus infections on Friday, bringing the country's official number of cases up to 1,036

03/28/20 Russia confirmed 228 new coronavirus infections on Saturday, bringing the country's official number of cases up to 1,264

That Anthony Fauci has gotten to be a real pain, contradicting Our Great Leader in public!

Not to worry, though. Good ol' Peter Barry Chowka has been rallying the troops! [url=https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/03/anthony_fauci_the_nihs_face_of_the_coronavirus_is_a_deepstate_hillary_clintonloving_stooge.html]Anthony Fauci, the NIH's face of the coronavirus, is a Deep-State Hillary Clinton–loving stooge[/url][quote]Anthony Fauci, M.D., the 79-year old head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has become the #1 point man on the government's role in the coronavirus crisis.

Fauci has worked for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) his entire professional life. In the past, for more than two decades starting in the mid-1980s, he was the medical establishment's face of HIV-AIDS — omnipresent on television when AIDS was hot and ever present at international AIDS conferences well into the 21st century.

Always, he was an enthusiastic advocate of throwing more federal money at the problem of AIDS.

He's widely praised in the press. He's also held in high esteem by his medical peers.

In 2008, President George W. Bush honored Fauci with the nation's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

A look back at what Fauci and his colleagues did during their decades of pushing fear and the spending of billions of dollars of funding for HIV-AIDS is instructive.[/quote]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;541149]Ah, yes, latex puppets it was. Fits the images rattling around in my brain perfectly. Can't imagine why I was thinking claymation.

I remember skits featuring the then (late 1980's) Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson. In one of them, PM Margaret Thatcher was reciting a litany of declines in the value of the Pound. Lawson replied, "But you said you wanted to [i]abolish[/i] the Pound." To which PM Thatcher retorted, "I want to abolish the Pound [i]note,[/i] not the Pound Sterling!" Whereupon all the Ministers started chorusing, "Nigel made a balls-up! Nigel made a balls-up!"[/QUOTE]Another famous Thatcher appearance was when she and her Cabinet were in a restaurant together. Maggie was asked what she would like to eat. I forget the exact answer but it was something like "roast beef". To the follow-up question, "what about the vegetables" she replied "they will have the same as me."

[QUOTE=xilman;541143]In some areas 911 works too. The neighborhoods[sic] of USAF airbases are the principle examples.[/QUOTE]I have heard that: if you travel to a foreign land, that if you use your local distress number on your mobile, it will get translated by the magic of the system into the local number. A limey could call 999 while in the states, and so forth.
I don't know of any first hand tests of this personally.

[QUOTE=xilman;541155]Another famous Thatcher appearance was when she and her Cabinet were in a restaurant together. Maggie was asked what she would like to eat. I forget the exact answer but it was something like "roast beef". To the follow-up question, "what about the vegetables" she replied "they will have the same as me."[/QUOTE]
Yes, I remember that one too!

There was one where she was talking to one of her Cabinet Ministers -- while using the urinal next to the one he was using.

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;541158]I have heard that: if you travel to a foreign land, that if you use your local distress number on your mobile, it will get translated by the magic of the system into the local number. A limey could call 999 while in the states, and so forth.
I don't know of any first hand tests of this personally.[/QUOTE]|Not heard that one.

The 911 version works for anyone, including landlines. Some Brits have taken to using it because it supposedly gets a faster response. Personally I very much doubt that claim.

It all makes perfect sense as long as the foreign code isn't already in use for any significant local purpose. I'd hope 112, 999 and 911 were universal distress signals in line with SOS and MayDay (the latter being the English phonetic spelling of the French term) m'aidez.

The Craziest Things About America Highlighted by this Virus
 

-by Caitlin Johnstone

[url]https://consortiumnews.com/2020/03/27/covid-19-the-craziest-things-about-america-highlighted-by-this-virus/[/url]
[QUOTE]The corporate cronyism of America’s political system has been highlighted with a massive kleptocratic multitrillion-dollar corporate bailout of which actual Americans are only receiving a tiny fraction. Instead of putting that money toward paying people a living wage to stay home during a global pandemic, the overwhelming majority of the money is going to corporations while actual human beings receive a paltry $1,200 (which they won’t even be getting until May at the earliest) at a time of record-smashing unemployment.

America’s capitalism worship has been highlighted by The Wall Street Journal headline 15:47:02 running at the exact same time as “Record Rise in Unemployment Claims Halts Historic Run of Job Growth — More than 3 million workers file for jobless benefits as coronavirus hits the economy.” Stocks are booming, Amazon is surging, and mountains of wealth are being transferred to sprawling megacorporations, while actual human beings are terrified of what the future holds.[/QUOTE]