Best Of

I see no reductions in house prices in North Wales

https://www.savills.co.uk/research_articles/229130/382451-0

Thanks. Some pretty bad news there for housebuyers. Though have the premia on second homes actually been implemented? "The only local authority that saw an annual price fall was Ceredigion, a second home hotspot, which introduced a 150% council tax premium on second homes from April 2025." (Not North Wales obvs.)

The premium has been introduced and Estate Agents throughout North Wales have seen a rise in the number of holiday homes coming into the market and indeed our daughter bought one close to us

I am amazed at the asking prices of some of the new developments which are out of reach of our first time buyers and getting on the ladder is very difficult without the help of the bank of Mum and Dad

It speaks to the shortage of homes and the high demand that even this influx of new listing is not seeing a negative effect on pricing

Looking at Rightmove 'sold prices' in our area some are astonishing

It has to be hoped the huge second home council tax premiums will have some effect, but frankly it is unlikely to be noticed apart from possibly remote parts of Wales which generally are Welsh speaking

Labour seeks to ban trail hunting in the New Year

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9y20j259o

I can see no reason for this except spite.

In the words of the Labour manifesto 'it is being used as a smokescreen for the hunting of wild animals' and in fairness this is true. There have been so many examples. Only the other week hunt saboteurs recorded exactly this from a drone - clear hunting of a fox.

The hunts only have themselves to blame for this. It is a shame because a British tradition could have been kept if it had adapted, but they seem incapable of doing so and keeping to the law.

The original ban was done out of spite too and has made it difficult to keep fox numbers down and protect sheep and livestock and pet rabbits etc

They should do zoning for fox hunting. Focus on urban areas.

Plenty of potential demand for hunts here in the South East London suburbs. It seems there’s a fox in every back garden, and another rifling through every food caddy that’s not been tightly clipped shut.

The height of the walls and fences might be a challenge for the horses though.

We have to feed ours every night. It's a sort of protection racket they run. If you don't you end up having to pick up their crap in the back garden every morning.

Ours absolutely love ripping apart bags of compost. A hazard cycling back from the pub too, had a few close misses.

For the earthworms perhaps? Edit: I once woke up one morning in summer at sparrow-**** and looked out of the window and there as a fox on the grassy verge working its way systematically through the worms.

Labour seeks to ban trail hunting in the New Year

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9y20j259o

I can see no reason for this except spite.

In the words of the Labour manifesto 'it is being used as a smokescreen for the hunting of wild animals' and in fairness this is true. There have been so many examples. Only the other week hunt saboteurs recorded exactly this from a drone - clear hunting of a fox.

The hunts only have themselves to blame for this. It is a shame because a British tradition could have been kept if it had adapted, but they seem incapable of doing so and keeping to the law.

The original ban was done out of spite too and has made it difficult to keep fox numbers down and protect sheep and livestock and pet rabbits etc

While I don't hold strong views on the subject the defence of fox hunting here seems ridiculous. @another_richard saying they will be killed one way or another anyway defies logic. You can justify killing anything with that logic and the idea that it keeps foxes down is just bizarre. Even fox hunters in the past have claimed they rarely killed foxes. If true they never kept numbers down anyway and frankly this does seem rational. So it seems unlikely the ban has made it any more difficult to control numbers.

This is not a area I have strong views and I was only pointing out what the Labour manifesto said its reasoning was. however the pro hunters seem to be coming up with very weak arguments. Just saying Labour hates country people is pretty weak.

Labour seeks to ban trail hunting in the New Year

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9y20j259o

I can see no reason for this except spite.

In the words of the Labour manifesto 'it is being used as a smokescreen for the hunting of wild animals' and in fairness this is true. There have been so many examples. Only the other week hunt saboteurs recorded exactly this from a drone - clear hunting of a fox.

The hunts only have themselves to blame for this. It is a shame because a British tradition could have been kept if it had adapted, but they seem incapable of doing so and keeping to the law.

The original ban was done out of spite too and has made it difficult to keep fox numbers down and protect sheep and livestock and pet rabbits etc

They should do zoning for fox hunting. Focus on urban areas.

Plenty of potential demand for hunts here in the South East London suburbs. It seems there’s a fox in every back garden, and another rifling through every food caddy that’s not been tightly clipped shut.

The height of the walls and fences might be a challenge for the horses though.

We have to feed ours every night. It's a sort of protection racket they run. If you don't you end up having to pick up their crap in the back garden every morning.

Ours absolutely love ripping apart bags of compost. A hazard cycling back from the pub too, had a few close misses.

For the earthworms perhaps? Edit: I once woke up one morning in summer at sparrow-**** and looked out of the window and there as a fox on the grassy verge working its way systematically through the worms.

'sparrow-****' ??

Sparrowfart, on weekdays. Never heard the expression? The twilit time of dawn when Mr Passer Domesticus wakes up, stretches his legs and wings, and performs the matutidinal eructation in preparation for his first morning tweet.

Thanks. No, never heard that one.

Vintage Tucker Carlson:

How I was mauled by a demon whilst asleep in bed, which left me with claw marks. It was nothing to do with the 4 dogs in bed with me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDIqoPKNhgo

Context: dogs are known to run in their sleep:
https://www.reddit.com/r/goldenretrievers/comments/1frdfln/running_while_sleeping/

Do dogs dream ? Do they go to heaven ?

They have REM sleep. Surmising, I'd say that is to "process" (whatever that means for Fido) and to recover from the previous period (also, whatever that means).

I've known cats, and they do things in their sleep.

Here imo it's about Carlson going to 0.01% explanations over 99.9% explanations, and what has created that state of mind for him. It reminds me of the one or two people I have met over the years who firmly profess that God always intervenes to save a parking space in Central London for them; I have not been able to tell whether they were joking.

Haven't women (mainly) always had their nails done? One of my distinctive childhood memories is the disgusting smell of my mother's nail varnish. All that's changed is, due to increased affluence, more people are paying for a professional job rather than DIY. As I know to my cost: Mrs Al spent £37 on it this morning, although she was quick to point out that's less than I spend in a couple of days in the pub.
As for nail technicians being well paid - nonsense. It's minimum wage work, at best.

£22816 to draw blood all day in 2023:

https://www.jobs.nhs.uk/candidate/jobadvert/C9371-23-1182

Better pension, though.

Phlebotomy is a rather niche skill set. I’d imagine they are really good at doing one thing, a bit like plasterers. I cannot imagine the training is that lengthy.

I think it takes a while to get fast. The phlebotamists here were on strike recently, and nurses were providing cover. Things were going very, very, slowly...

Believe me I know the value of a good one. I was once stuck in five separate places by a resident doctor trying to take peripheral bloods. Most phlebotomists never miss.

I used to have bloods every three months as leukemia monitoring, and had the lovely experience of getting to know one of the vampires over three years, catching up every three months. There is a decent play or TV short in their somewhere. Basically I got to experience her life ‘sped up’. Three months of updates makes anyone’s life seem fast moving…

Labour seeks to ban trail hunting in the New Year

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9y20j259o

I can see no reason for this except spite.

In the words of the Labour manifesto 'it is being used as a smokescreen for the hunting of wild animals' and in fairness this is true. There have been so many examples. Only the other week hunt saboteurs recorded exactly this from a drone - clear hunting of a fox.

The hunts only have themselves to blame for this. It is a shame because a British tradition could have been kept if it had adapted, but they seem incapable of doing so and keeping to the law.

The original ban was done out of spite too and has made it difficult to keep fox numbers down and protect sheep and livestock and pet rabbits etc

They should do zoning for fox hunting. Focus on urban areas.

Plenty of potential demand for hunts here in the South East London suburbs. It seems there’s a fox in every back garden, and another rifling through every food caddy that’s not been tightly clipped shut.

The height of the walls and fences might be a challenge for the horses though.

We have to feed ours every night. It's a sort of protection racket they run. If you don't you end up having to pick up their crap in the back garden every morning.

Ours absolutely love ripping apart bags of compost. A hazard cycling back from the pub too, had a few close misses.

For the earthworms perhaps? Edit: I once woke up one morning in summer at sparrow-**** and looked out of the window and there as a fox on the grassy verge working its way systematically through the worms.

My much missed dog used to eat a particular brand of compost (mainly found at my mates house).

Labour seeks to ban trail hunting in the New Year

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9y20j259o

I can see no reason for this except spite.

In the words of the Labour manifesto 'it is being used as a smokescreen for the hunting of wild animals' and in fairness this is true. There have been so many examples. Only the other week hunt saboteurs recorded exactly this from a drone - clear hunting of a fox.

The hunts only have themselves to blame for this. It is a shame because a British tradition could have been kept if it had adapted, but they seem incapable of doing so and keeping to the law.

The original ban was done out of spite too and has made it difficult to keep fox numbers down and protect sheep and livestock and pet rabbits etc

They should do zoning for fox hunting. Focus on urban areas.

Plenty of potential demand for hunts here in the South East London suburbs. It seems there’s a fox in every back garden, and another rifling through every food caddy that’s not been tightly clipped shut.

The height of the walls and fences might be a challenge for the horses though.

We have to feed ours every night. It's a sort of protection racket they run. If you don't you end up having to pick up their crap in the back garden every morning.

I used to not mind them but now having a cat it's a slight worry.

Our cats would chase the foxes out the garden.