Is this the best silly British story you have ever heard?

When British people say they are “less paranoid” than Americans, what are some examples of what they mean?

This is a good example:- "I was staying on a campsite in rural Surrey. After coming from work I got off the train and headed out of the village into pitch darkness. Another chap followed me, so I turned to him and asked “Sorry, I forgot. Is it my turn to be the serial killer or yours?”. And so we walked home together that night."

Xmas letter - 2023

This year has not been easy although I have survived. I am getting old. On the good side, I am still walking 5 to 7 km every day. There are three walks that I do regularly. To the south east, I can walk through Lord Reserve and Koornang Park and then via the beginning of the Rosanna Street Reserve to Packer Park. To the south west I can get to the Rosstown Reserve. Ross was a complete idiot who build a factory at one place and a storage building at another place quite a distance away, and then a railway between the two, before going bust. The railway is now the Rosstown Reserve which is a lovely walk. I often walk it to Princes Park, which is quiet a large park. To the north west I can get to the Caulfield Racecourse, which is open to the public in the morning, but not the afternoon when the horses are exercised. There is a nice small park just to the south of the racecourse. You can also walk though a tunnel to the middle of the racecourse, where there are two small lakes.

However, my memory is clearly not as good as it was. I am still spending quite a time on Wikipedia, but not creating new articles. I check my watch list, which shows edits to articles I an interesting in, many times a day. I then revert nonsense that many add to Wikipedia. It is amazing that it actually works, but it certainly does. It works because of hundreds of people like me that quickly revert nonsense. While editing Wikipedia, I learn quite a lot. Posted to family and friends on 20 December, 2023.

2024

Hi all, I hope you had a lovely Christmas and a Happy New Year. At 84 I am beginning to think I am getting old. My memory is not what it was. However I am still able to do a walk every day, usually of 5 to 7 km and sometimes more. There are three nice walks to the east, west and north. My son, James, and his wife, live a bit further into Melbourne and I see them at least once a week and we chat every day by Facebook or phone. My son, Michal, who lives in New Zealand, phones me every couple of days. I have a zoom chat with them and my two daughters, Barbara and Alison who live in the UK, every week.

However, my memory is not getting better, so I am investigating moving into an aged care home which is not very far from where I live at present. I have now visited it and it is a nice place and near where I often walk. I will be allowed to go out everyday for a walk. Recently I have not been going to various events unless I go with Jim and Guia and it will be nice to be chatting to people much more frequently than I do now. I am still not sure when I will actually move in. I will keep you informed.

I should have dated the 2 paragraphs above. It was a few weeks back from today. I am still uncertain about what is happening. However, I gather I will still have my computer in the care home. Bduke (talk) 03:07, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

I am now living in Arcare Carnegie - Aged Care Facility. As you see I do have my computer here working well and I spend quite a time on it. Bduke (talk) 05:21, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

Reminder to vote now to select members of the first U4C

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to other languages.

Dear Wikimedian,

You are receiving this message because you previously participated in the UCoC process.

This is a reminder that the voting period for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) ends on May 9, 2024. Read the information on the voting page on Meta-wiki to learn more about voting and voter eligibility.

The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is a global group dedicated to providing an equitable and consistent implementation of the UCoC. Community members were invited to submit their applications for the U4C. For more information and the responsibilities of the U4C, please review the U4C Charter.

Please share this message with members of your community so they can participate as well.

On behalf of the UCoC project team,

RamzyM (WMF) 23:17, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

Seventy years ago

Today, 15/05/2024 is the 70th anniversary of Roger Bannister running the first 4 minute mile. Only a few years after that I lived as the Senior Student in an annex of the Queen's College, Oxford University, opposite to the Oxford University Running track. The staff there had watched the race from the room I lived in. For those who now think a 4 minute mile is no big deal, it was a massive deal until Roger did it. After that many others did it.

Lookwide Camp

Want to look at Lookwide Camp? Thanks! --evrik ^(talk) 05:25, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

A nice article that I see is mostly written by you. Well done. Bduke (talk) 10:58, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

WikiProject Scouting Newsletter: May 2024

WikiProject Scouting | May 2024 Notes for May: Looking for something to work on? Try looking at, Category:Scouting articles needing attention. Some important articles that need help: The Scout Association, NAYLE, Philmont Training Center, BSA Leadership Training, COPE We are working to develop a featured portal, look here if you want to help. Looking for a new project? perhaps authoring an article on Aids to Scoutmastership Other ways to participate: Join the conversations on our talkpage | Help us plan future events Become a member | Opt-out of notifications | watch

--evrik ^(talk) May 22, 2024

2023-03-01

A barnstar for you!

The Original Barnstar

I was down Wikipedia rabbit hole, looking at elections - as you do - and I decided why not go into the talk pages and discover the Wikipedia projects (never done it before, I've only made like 10 contributions to Wikipedia). Long story short after about an hour I discovered the page WikiProject_Elections_and_Referendums/Members and decided to click on a random name that had Australia in the description, since its the country I live in. And I fell upon this gem. This is probably one of the best User pages in the whole site. I am greatly satisfied with my discovery and this has made my day. I wish you well into the future and thank you for your contributions to this lovely site. -Sam Samsam21amb (talk) 10:36, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

African Legislators in Red Contest 2024

You're invited to join the African Legislators in Red from 9 December 2024 to 9 January 2024.

Join African Legislators in Red, an initiative dedicated to creating and editing Wikipedia articles on African legislators to ensure their legacies are preserved and celebrated.

Sign up for this contest by listing your username under the participants section.

The following prizes will be awarded at the end of the contest.

• Overall winner - ₦100,000
• Runner-up - ₦70,000
• Second runner-up - ₦50,000

For more information concerning the contest and how to fully participate, visit the contest page by clicking here.

Together, let’s amplify the voices of African legislators on the global stage!

If you wish to opt-out of future mailings, please remove yourself from the mailing list.

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:11, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

Molecular Editor Software

Dear @Bduke, I'm contacting you as I'm not extremely expert of Wikipedia procedures, however a significant portion of important information from the page Molecule editor is being removed as it has been deemed not relevant since such software does not have a Wikipedia article associated. Could you please take a look at the talk page and see if such removal is justified and how the problem may be fixed? I'm writing to you just because you're listed in the Chemistry project, I'm not sure whether this is the correct approach to take. Thank you Davidoskky (talk) 20:53, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Done and replied to Davidoskky. Bduke (talk) 02:28, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Happy First Edit Day!

Hey, Bduke. I'd like to wish you a wonderful First Edit Day on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee! Have a great day! DaniloDaysOfOurLives (talk) 05:15, 31 October 2025 (UTC)

Hey @Bduke. Your wiki edit anniversary is today, marking 20 years of dedicated contributions to English Wikipedia. Your passion for sharing knowledge and your remarkable contributions have not only enriched the project, but also inspired countless others to contribute. Thank you for your amazing contributions. Wishing you many more wonderful years ahead in the Wiki journey. :) -❙❚❚❙❙ GnOeee ❚❙❚❙❙ ✉ 07:46, 31 October 2025 (UTC)

Articles for Creation backlog drive

Hello Bduke:

WikiProject Articles for creation is holding a month long Backlog Drive in August!
The goal of this drive is to reduce the backlog of unreviewed drafts to less than a month of outstanding reviews from the current 3+ months. Bonus points will be given for reviewing drafts that have been waiting more than 30 days. The drive is running from 1 August 2026 through 31 August 2026.

You may find Category:AfC pending submissions by age or other categories and sorting helpful.

Barnstars will be given out as awards at the end of the drive.
There is a backlog of over 5000 pages, so start reviewing drafts. We're looking forward to your help! MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:36, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

• If you wish to opt-out of future mailings, please remove yourself from the mailing list or alternatively to opt-out of all massmessage mailings, you may add Category:Wikipedians who opt out of message delivery to your user talk page.

Guild of Copy Editors – September 2026 Newsletter

Guild of Copy Editors – September 2026 Newsletter Hello, and welcome to the September newsletter, a quarterly digest of Guild activities since June. Election news: Project coordinators play an important role in our WikiProject. Following the mid-year Election of Coordinators, we welcomed TNM101 to the coordinator team. Dhtwiki remains as lead coordinator, and Miniapolis, Mox Eden and GoldRomean return as coordinators. We said goodbye to Wikieditor662 and thank them for their service. If you'd like to help out behind the scenes, please consider taking part in our December election – watchlist our ombox for updates. Information about the role of coordinators can be found here. Reviewing system: The Guild is adopting a new system of scoring copy edit reviews. A point will be given for each review, and barnstars for reviewing will be awarded. These changes will take effect from this month's drive, and we encourage experienced copy editors to sign up for reviewing. For more details, see here. June 2026 blitz: 18 of the 20 editors who signed up for the June 2026 Copy Editing Blitz copy edited a total of 69,606 words comprising 30 articles. Barnstars awarded are here. July 2026 drive: 30 of the 44 editors who signed up for the July 2026 Backlog Elimination Drive copy edited a total of 531,346 words comprising 252 articles. Barnstars awarded are here. August 2026 Blitz: 13 of the 16 editors who signed up for the August 2026 Copy Editing Blitz copy edited a total of 192,712 words comprising 64 articles. Barnstars awarded are here. September 2026 Drive: Sign up here to earn barnstars in our month-long, in-progress September Backlog Elimination Drive. Progress report: As of 23:47, 13 September 2026 (UTC), GOCE copyeditors have processed 207 requests since 1 January, and the backlog of tagged articles stands at 1,511 articles. Thank you all again for your participation; we wouldn't be able to achieve what we do without you! Cheers from your GOCE coordinators. To discontinue receiving GOCE newsletters, please remove your name from our mailing list.

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:54, 13 September 2026 (UTC)

The Signpost: 16 September 2026

This Month in Education: September 2026

Richard Thwaites

6:46 PM (22 minutes ago) to me

Hi Brian,

Thank you for your very kind words. It is always enjoyable to spend time with you.

I suggested MONDAY OCTOBER 12th for our next lunch. I hope this will be OK with you. (I’ll contact Bill and see if he is back by then, but I think you and I can meet then even if he is still away.)

Regarding the next OUSV gatherings, we have the Society’s AGM and Dinner (with Prof John Dewar as the guest speaker: he is Vice Chancellor of La Trobe University, an Oxford law graduate, and used to work at Lancaster University in the UK (among other places). The dinner and AGM are on Wednesday October 21st at the Kelvin Club, from around 6-30 onwards.

Our next OUSV lunch is on Wednesday November 18th when the guest speakers will be Profs Brendan Abrahams and Stuart Batten (from Melbourne and Monash respectively) who were both post graduate students working for Prof Richard Robson at Melbourne Uni in the 1970s. Richard Robson was one of last year’s Nobel Prize winners for chemistry, and did his undergraduate and postgraduate work at Oxford (he attended Brasenose College and did his DPhil in the Dyson Perrins Lab). After a couple of post-doctoral fellowships in the USA, Prof Robson came to Melbourne in the mid 1960s and did the very early work on Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) at Melbourne in the 1970s. Brendan and Stuart are going to explain what MOFs are, what they do, why they are useful, and what it was like being in Stockholm at the Nobel prize giving ceremony.

If Jim is around, he’d be very welcome to come to the dinner and/or the lunch.

Cheers, Richard

WikiProject Yorkshire Newsletter - October 2026

10:27, 1 October 2026 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2026

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2026).

Administrator changes

• Cleared as filed
• Dante Alighieri
• Doug Weller
• Gentgeen
• Vacant0

Oversight changes

• Doug Weller
• ToBeFree

Guideline and policy news

• Following an RfC, the good article criteria have been amended to add accessibility requirements.
• Following an RfC, late signatures added to administrator recall petitions after 720 hours from opening are reverted or struck and do not count towards the threshold, even if the petition has not yet been formally closed.
• The post-May 2026 administrator elections RfCs concluded with consensus for election monitors to curate blatantly inappropriate questions after posting, and to remove or merge true duplicates, clearly marking merged questions. Calls for candidates will include advisory guidance that users with less than one year’s experience or 5,000 edits generally lack a realistic chance of success.

Technical news

• Interface administrators no longer need to specify the ResourceLoader option in the definitions for gadgets on MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition as gadgets are always loaded through ResourceLoader. (T298199)
• The list=abusefilters API module now supports formatversion=2 and includes breaking changes to its responses. In particular, the actions property is now a JSON array rather than a string, regardless of the format version. Maintainers of user scripts and other code using this module should check compatibility and update their code as needed. (T435828)

Arbitration

• The arbitration case Gun control 2 has been closed.

Obituaries

• Doug Weller passed away on 30 September 2026. Doug Weller began editing Wikipedia in 2006 and became an administrator in 2008, making nearly 275,000 edits over two decades. He served on the Arbitration Committee from 2015 through 2018 and was also a longtime CheckUser and Oversighter.

Miscellaneous

• The October 2026 administrator elections are scheduled to run from September 29 to October 19. The call for candidates ends October 5.
• Self-nominations for the electoral commission for the 2026 Arbitration Committee elections is opened and closes on 8 October.
• The Good Article Nominations backlog drive has begun and is scheduled to end on November 3.

New cross-language page link: Quantum chemistry composite methods

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