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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 1st, 2023

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  • I’m in the same boat. My other half has been stuck with me for nearly twenty years now and bigger and better things have come up that have needed the money spent on it.

    The bit of paper will come in handy if one of us kicks the bucket though, or even when it comes to claiming certain tax allowances in the UK. I just want to make sure they’re sorted financially when I end up brown bread, and proving their connection to me is going to me one of the last things on the list in the immediate aftermath of a bereavement.

    I’m not arsed one way or another about it though.


  • I’ve been threatening to do this for years. Irregular hours have meant that I’ve skipped this idea, and rugby. I guess I’d love to go just for the workout and for the extra circle of friends, but I don’t want to be wasting folks time when I’m not going to be able to make games consistently.

    I enjoyed playing roller hockey when I was younger and I know getting the skates back on after thirty years will be a challenge, maybe I’ll give this a go again.



  • Ameeeericaaaaaaaa

    DFBs early stuff was much better than Skibidi Toilet.

    But yes, every country will have differing approaches to education and it’s priority in the grand scheme of things. My personal opinion is that education and healthcare should be top any country’s list but I’m not naive enough to think there’s not… “competing pressures” on where to spend taxpayer money.


  • I think it’s easy to get caught up in the negative news that naturally floats to the top of most algorithms these days.

    Primary and secondary schools are doing a lot more than they used to, and with an ever decreasing budget too. The quality of teaching is largely better, and the teaching career is becoming more “professionalised” by the year, for better or for worse - the constant wave of bureaucracy surround evidencing decision making and CPD is driving loads of great teachers away from the profession.

    I’ve gone back to higher education and I’ve been surprised at the sheer range of support networks and services available to those who need them. I’m lucky enough to largely have my shit together (even if it is held together with sellotape, chewing gum, and prayers) - but there’s not many places quite like this establishment where I could turn and access such a range of guidance and support nowadays. As usual though, most of these ideas and developments have been written in blood after failings have been exposed in the past, which is a huge shame. Even socio-economic barriers are starting to be broken down - I’m getting spanked monthly for tuition fees but I’ve applied for grants that I’m ethically not entitled to and I’ve been given them no questions asked.

    That said, the problems are outside the school these days. Mobile phones and social media are the big driver of this - in my day (and I’m decidedly middle age - not young, not old) if you were having a hard time; getting grief off bullies; or made an embarrassing fuckup… that was it, it stopped at 3:15pm and it would have been old news by 9am. Now, shit follows you home and shit sticks when digital media exists of it. It’s fucking horrendous from that aspect and I think now the genie is out of the bottle, only education and common sense can mitigate it - both of which are bottom of your interest list when you’re in your teens!

    In short, school experiences seem to be trending upwards, but outside of school is a lot more hairy.

    As always, YMMV and I’m in the UK.








  • A bit of both for me. Whenever I dropped a bollock in work or whereever, my head used to go down and I’d be waiting for the hairdryer treatment like I was waiting outside the headmaster’s office.

    Now, if some cockwomble decides to mass-email someone with a passive aggressive email about “could the person who…” and it’s quite clearly my mistake, I take great pleasure in absolutely owning it, smashing that reply-all button, and explaining in painful detail how yes it was my fuck up; yes I did do it with good intentions but hey things go sideways sometimes; and yes abso-fucking-lutely thank you for your shitty email that has had all the effect of a silent fart.

    I think the best part of adulting is that you can make no mistakes and still lose (yeah Picard boiiii), and realising that nobody’s going to care about it in a week’s time.


  • Awesome. I am - at best, out of the loop in entertainment news: and at worst, culturally retarded - so I was sat at LCY with a colleague and he was pointing out famous chefs, golfers, public figures every five minutes.

    I was still trying to figure out how anyone affords either to eat or drink at the airport without being on business expenses.


  • For celeb-spotting and transit links: London City Airport. It’s nice being able to check your bags and fuck off into Stratford for a few hours. It’s super expensive though.

    For a chill experience: London Southend Airport. Not in London, but loads of seating, decent views across the tarmac, and loooaaads of room.

    For getting lost: Washington Dulles. Christ that place was designed by Stevie Wonder in a house fire. The sheer number of destinations is wonderous though fair play, a great place to feel like a tiny cog in a huge machine.





  • I love modern printers.

    We have a super fancy one in work that requires one to log in (or fob in with an NFC-style tag), to enable access to their own virtual print queue or printer services.

    Weirdly, if it doesn’t shut down correctly (software failure, power cut, flicked at the wall switch etc), it reboots but with some quirks like not enabling the 10 second auto logout.

    It’s satisfying as fuck walking up to a printer that’s still signed in, scrawling a comedy dick in red pen on a bit of A4 paper, and using the cloud scan function to scan it and have it directly emailed to the user as a PDF.

    I’m pretty sure there’s some serious security issues there but it’s funnier to hear someone’s “new email” tone, and their eyes widen when they’ve got an email attachment from themselves making a suggestion that they crudely be elsewhere, or who see a masterpiece drawing of a hairy rocket with a helium leak manifesting itself from the very top.