Two minutes silence
 

Many thanks to the council workers who were resurfacing Paradise Street today. Not only did they fail to observe the two minutes silence, they also ruined it for me by digging up outside my office window at 11 o`clock. What a shame we could`nt reorganise the silence to coincide with their teabreak at 10:30. Also why was the town hall flag not flying at half mast?

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Perhaps they'll do it on Sunday. I do like the idea of keeping the silence on the actual 11th as well though.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Everyone at Moorhead payed respect with a 2 minute silence......

Re: Two minutes silence
 

my son who was in the army & lost some good friends in the gulf war paid his respects too today as will my grandaughter & all the girls & boys brigades & other sevices on sunday .

Re: Two minutes silence
 

I work in a primary school and even the reception class managed two minute silence so it is annoying to read that the council workers couldn't.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

I forgot to ask my daughter, who goes to Moorhead, what she did because they went on a school trip this morning.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Has the town hall flag ever flown at half mast on Remembrance Day? Maybe it should, but I don't think it ever does.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Even in the depths of darkest Deutschland I kept 2 minutes silence at 11:00.

Mark of Respect....HBC?

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Surely it wouldn't take a great deal of effort for them to be able to do that. Don't they even lower it on Remembrance Sunday? I've never looked before but maybe I should look this weekend.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

So did we, although it did feel strange doing it in Germany..

Re: Two minutes silence
 

Well I've got to admit that this year the 11th November crept up on me so quickly that I found myself without a poppy for the first time ever - and I also missed the 11th hour. I was gutted when I realised it had passed.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

There's always Sunday (tomorrow) Shortstuff.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

On Thursday I happened to be in the Reference Library when it came time to observe the Silence. There is in there an enormous photograph of The Pal's Battalion, taken in the Argyl Street Drill Hall, before they left Accrington, many of them, as we now know, for the last time. Looking at all those bright young faces staring down at me from the wall, I couldn't help thinking of the young men who are now posted to Iraq. And I remembered all the explanations that we have been fed over the past year to justify our participation in this war.
It astonished me to realise just how little we have learned from the sacrifices made for us ninety years ago. Oh certainly, the killing is now more efficient, clinical even. But people still die, mothers still grieve and politicians still lie.

In common with Wilfred Owen, I wonder if we can still say with such certainty; "Dulce et Decorum est, Pro Patria Mori"

______________________________________________

Wilfred Owen


Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Re: Two minutes silence
 

i managed to somehow end up wiht around 7 poppies on various jackets/tops

i was sleepin at 11oclock...