Alex

Aye. And they (initially) fought against our side in WW2 for that reason (ie against the Soviets). Are you familiar with this fella btw? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simo_Häyhä

…life goes on…

I do 60% in the office. Which everybody is supposed to be doing, with certain dispensations. But, as far as I can tell, hardly anybody does. Not my problem, I don’t actually manage anyone. I probably prefer going in but the balance is good. I know I am lucky in that respect. Inevitably lots of people take the piss. Which I think they get away with because the people managing them are doing the same. There’s 100 desks dedicated to our department at my place. There’s about 3-4 times that based there. Even allowing for part-time workers, sick leave, holidays, etc. you can see there shouldn’t be enough desks. But I book one absolutely no problem and it’s ‘busy’ if it’s about 80% full. To be honest I think covid and recruiting people to work remotely has caused chaos in central government with teams dispersed all over the shop. I’m the only person in my area based up here. I’m not really sure how you fix it now either. Ironically we seemed to work better (albeit in a different, covid specific role) when everyone in my old team worked remotely. What I’ve noticed is even people in the same teams come in but don’t book desks together so you don’t even have the ‘collaborative ways of working’ advantages. Sorry, I know that’s dull as fuck I just find it all very strange. Benton Park View used to be packed. People would come in at half six and sit in their cars for a bit just to get a space

It’s ridiculous, isn’t it? I think some people insist on in person meetings because they think it shows how important they are

In the post-covid, hybrid working era, an 8 hour round trip for a 1 hour meeting is about as silly as those wind speeds

Same with Liverpool fans. Who regard him as some sort of honourable socialist, saviour. To tie in with their own blinkered vision of the club itself. Which also, of course, couldn’t be further from the truth

Are they still going? I never actually saw them but used to see them advertised at places like The Archer (in Jesmond, as was), where I used to go to play pool with my mates years ago. I always thought the name was great

That’s my night / nightmares sorted out

Not the fella from the erstwhile Tyneside-based tribute act ‘Bon Geordie’?

TV presenter gets some tickets and gives one to his wife Also, I’m assuming Swift paid for the protection?

It’s mental (as mental as she is tbh) that Badenoch is even a member of parliament

I scrolled to about 10 mins in out of curiosity. Not surprised it’s on for over an hour. He makes Fish seem pithy. I don’t know what’s worse tbh, these self appointed ITKs or the people who hang on their every word

You couldn’t make it up

The possibilities of AI and this is what we get

Aye. The original is sensational. Been on a disco / funk journey lately. Which had bled into 70s and 80s funky soul / post disco. Some of the best pop music ever made

Wrong

This place?

I wouldn’t feel sorry for Everton anyway, but theirs was a ridiculous unsustainable model irrespective of the rules.

What a gargantuan load of shite

And by that I mean relatively small private gifts being received is not in anyway shape or form the same as giving away billions of pounds of public money to your mates

I do agree with you actually. I take issue with false equivalence from the press though. But there’s definitely been some PR own goals that allows for the ‘they’re all the same’ narrative. Which plays into Reform’s hands

The donations were all within the rules. You can argue the rules need changing but that wasn’t the argument being made under the previous government from those in the press. Same people made very little of the contracts awarded to Tory’s mates. The ones that had loads of red flags for corruption and amounted to billions of pounds of public funds