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I'm ex-Army and in general terms have a very jaundiced view of some aspects of civil society and I'm afraid I do believe that some people are utter scum. I usually keep that to myself because there are loads of people who are perfectly decent (I hope they are in the majority) and in any event...

I hope that two things fall out of this current crisis: a. A review leads to a really robust and comprehensive contingency plan for the next outbreak of a (potentially much more deadly) disease. The lessons are piling up now and we just need to learn from them. IMO the plan needs to cover...

And the antidote to that is careful selection of recruits and training of the highest quality, so that you end up putting the right kind of people in uniforms.

Garno, here's one take on doing a halving joint: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkFrS7Ah5GY It's worth a watch because it shows that the sawing need not be the critical part of the work.

This is from today's Daily Telegraph: Scientists studying the town at the epicentre of Germany's first major outbreak said they had found antibodies to the virus in people who had shown no symptoms and were not previously thought to have been infected. Initial results released on Thursday...

My first reaction to your post was to think that it never occurred to me to rotate the wood but then I remembered that when for some reason (forgotten) I had to saw some 4" x 4" pieces, that is precisely what I did. I'll give it a bash with smaller pieces, to see if it gives me better results...

I wouldn't worry about your saw cuts all leaning a bit off. I tend to cut a bit to the right so I always make sure the waste is on the right. You can easily practice to reduce the amount of drift. I've found that the following helps a lot (assuming you're doing a cross cut): a. Mark the upper...

Apparently in the debate about the figures all bets are off until reliable data have been gathered about the number people who have had it but who have displayed few or no symptoms. These data may have a huge effect on how we view the virus. If, say, 50% of the of the population who had it...

Garno, people have made good internet recommendations. What helped me enormously was some of the paying projects on the English Woodworker website: https://www.theenglishwoodworker.com/premium-videos/ The spoon rack one really helped me. There's also a Christopher Schwarz DVD called the...

Garno, have a look at Derek Cohen's blue tape method for cutting dovetails.

I would bet that that and Woody's "twitten" are related to the word "twixt" meaning "between" and so it would make sense.

In that case it may well be a sensible policy. It's also probably relatively easy to achieve complete isolation in a Himalayan country. One or two places, like Bhutan, already strictly control the number of visits by foreigners so as to preserve their cultures.

That's fair, real world comment. If I had to cough up a tenner for every time I've said something like, "X should be shot" where X = a leading politician, sports commentator, footballer, arts type, crook or Elton John, I'd probably have had to take out a loan.

Droogs, that is interesting and to me it sounds a little severe just for breaking a curfew. Maybe a warning for a first offence and then the stocks for a second. Of course we don't know what the conditions are in Nepalese cities. His policy could conceivably be justified.

What a wonderful bit of design and execution! I daren't think what that would cost if it were to appear in one or two specialist lamp shops I've seen.

I presume that's not directed at me as I don't remember having that discussion with you.

On much of the continent an alley or allee is a tree lined country road.* In wide parts of the north of England they are called ginnels. Which reminds me of the old joke: Q. Why do the French plant trees on both sides of their country roads? A. So the German Army can march in the shade. Boom...

I think the problem is that we in the western world generally have, in material terms, soft and easy lives. Our justice system has also become very soft. A couple of centuries ago you would receive the most dire punishment for e.g. theft. This was rightly recognised as being too harsh on people...

I can see me coming to regard them as complementary to Western saws but I can't imagine ditching the latter in favour of the Japanese ones. Perhaps I'll come to prefer them for certain tasks e.g. cross-cutting biggish pieces of wood accurately to length.

There's one thing to be wary of with viral infections and that is that you may feel generally recovered but there may still be dangers. A former colleague of mine had a bad cold. Once he felt OK again he went for a run with one of my mates and unfortunately after a couple of miles he dropped...