If they had been Canadian troops Art they would have got a container and filled it with sand. Then they would pour some gas in and then light it. My father showed me one day at the old farm so that he could boil water for tea for us both.

Do you know how many ships and lives were lost just trying to get that ammo across the North Atlantic and your troops were just wasting it? Hearing this now maybe we shouldn't have bothered.

Well tea time is important to the Limeys. Everyone knows that, but Pete makes a point. 

Early Spanish colonizers were especially good at massacres. 

A lot of soft mud to land in, but I wouldn't like to try it out, even in a crinoline.

A lot of soft mud to land in, but I wouldn't like to try it out, even in a crinoline.

Wow, that is one hell of a plunge. 

A lot of soft mud to land in, but I wouldn't like to try it out, even in a crinoline.

Wow, that is one hell of a plunge. 

That bridge was Isambard Kingdom Brunel's first major project.

A lot of soft mud to land in, but I wouldn't like to try it out, even in a crinoline.

Wow, that is one hell of a plunge. 

That bridge was Isambard Kingdom Brunel's first major project.

That is a curious name. 

A lot of soft mud to land in, but I wouldn't like to try it out, even in a crinoline.

Wow, that is one hell of a plunge. 

That bridge was Isambard Kingdom Brunel's first major project.

That is a curious name. 

His father was French, Marc Isambard Brunel and the Kingdom part was his mother's maiden name (Sophia Kingdom) Isambard is widely regarded as the greatest engineer of all time and if you ever read his CV you'll know why. Although the Clifton suspension bridge was his first major project it just happened to be the widest span one earth at the time and he would go on to have numerous 'firsts.' He did nothing by halves. His father Marc was a refugee from the French revolution, having royalist sympathies he escaped to the US to keep his head on his shoulders. Marc was also a brilliant engineer and became chief engineer of New York city and d'you know, he designed your capitol building but it was eventually rejected on monetary grounds for the White House. He was the man who invented mass production and his employer was none other than the scourge of France, the Royal Navy. The navy used rope and blocks by the hundreds of miles and thousands. Marc had an idea for making blocks in stages using machines and mass production was born. He contributed handsomely to the defeat of his patriots. Amongst his other inventions were machines for mass producing boots, knitting machines and even printing. Many however think that his invention of the tunnelling shield was his greatest. It was a round frame that was sectioned to carry tunnellers, navvies who dug their own sections out and when all had been dug, they mover the shield forward and started again. It is still the method used to this day. Comically, despite all of this he found himself in debt and embarrassingly ended up in debter's prison. He was released when he announced he was going to emigrate to Russia and work for the Czar. The British government shat themselves at the news and paid off his debt but he had to sign up to Britain for life. So you see, Isambard had BIG boots to fill but he is the one everybody knows and poor ol' Marc is fairly unknown.

This is probably the most iconic picture of Isambard. Those are Brunel type chains behind him, the word small was not in his dictionary.

Is this taught in US schools? I suspect not.

A phrase we're unfamiliar with over here.