Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
You're probably right. I will try more.
I have a wealthy female relative who has barely been outside Europe - in fact I’d guess that Egypt (ie Sharm) and once in the USA is her entire non European travel experience
She used to blame it on kids (fair enough), and then her job (hmm, she can easily work from home, but OK). Now she is essentially retired early, is notably affluent, has a willing companion, is intellectually curious and educated and STILL she doesn’t travel
Portugal, Malaga, Greece, a spot of France, same same same. When I ask her why she doesn’t experiment and go a bit further she says “we have cats” like the cats allow her to go to the Algarve for a fortnight but forbid her from going to India or Singapore or the Arctic or Madagascar
i honestly don’t get it. Fear of the unknown? She’s not a cowardly person in my experience. Apathy? Why?
She is in her late 50s and in 15 years it will be too late
It's really simple, she doesn't want to.
Unless you are really lucky (and you are) you can't see everywhere so you may as well go to the places you enjoy going to.
Really? Is that it?
That doesn’t make sense because she is always saying Oooh, I’dl love to go there, or, Mmm, India, sounds amazing, or Wow, let’s do Vietnam
Yet it never happens. And she has four to six holidays a year. She’s rich. And she has time. So your explanation doesn’t add up
WTF is it? I’ve noticed it in others
12 hours stuck on a plane? Jetlag? Carbon footprint?
Steve McQueen is making a film for Apple TV called “Blitz”, starring Saoirse Ronan, Stephen Graham and Paul Weller.
Currently being filmed so will be a while I guess before release.
How? He's been dead for 43 years.
Eyeballs skyward. Steve McQueen is one of the best British directors currently working. Maybe the best!
He should consider getting his own name then.
Eh?
Unlike the actor his name actually is Steve McQueen it seems, not Terence McQueen. So its more his name than the actor's.
Give it time and most people will associate the name with him more than someone dead for over 40 years. How often do people actually watch Steve McQueen the actor movies?
(Though I did buy The Towering Inferno 2 weeks ago in fairness).
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
You're probably right. I will try more.
I have a wealthy female relative who has barely been outside Europe - in fact I’d guess that Egypt (ie Sharm) and once in the USA is her entire non European travel experience
She used to blame it on kids (fair enough), and then her job (hmm, she can easily work from home, but OK). Now she is essentially retired early, is notably affluent, has a willing companion, is intellectually curious and educated and STILL she doesn’t travel
Portugal, Malaga, Greece, a spot of France, same same same. When I ask her why she doesn’t experiment and go a bit further she says “we have cats” like the cats allow her to go to the Algarve for a fortnight but forbid her from going to India or Singapore or the Arctic or Madagascar
i honestly don’t get it. Fear of the unknown? She’s not a cowardly person in my experience. Apathy? Why?
She is in her late 50s and in 15 years it will be too late
It's really simple, she doesn't want to.
Unless you are really lucky (and you are) you can't see everywhere so you may as well go to the places you enjoy going to.
Really? Is that it?
That doesn’t make sense because she is always saying Oooh, I’dl love to go there, or, Mmm, India, sounds amazing, or Wow, let’s do Vietnam
Yet it never happens. And she has four to six holidays a year. She’s rich. And she has time. So your explanation doesn’t add up
WTF is it? I’ve noticed it in others
The same as people who say they'd love to come to that party next friday, but don't actually turn up. People are odd, but they don't like to upset others. You love travel, she humours you in conversation, but actually isn't bothered.
No, it’s more complex than that. She really isn’t the type to humour me. Trust me!
She is maybe deluding herself. Convincing herself that she really likes travel and expressing this loudly and saying that one day soon she will do that overland train trip to Burma or the Patagonian road trip blah blah
That is perhaps closer to the truth. She is middle class, educated and wealthy and it is slightly shameful - in that milieu - to admit that actually you don’t want to see any particularly foreign cultures because you’re not that interested, in reality, and yet another fortnight in Tavira or Mykonos is just fine and weird places are too weird
That sounds plausible to me. Some activities are seen socially as both rewarding and enviable, and they may well be both, so even unconsciously people might feel a bit weird in admitting they don't feel any interest in travelling to amazing places, they don't want to read a classic novel, etc. It's a bit like stock work questions about developing one's career, with a pretty clear implication something is wrong with an employee if they don't want to develop in their role further, when they might be perfectly content, even happy, with it and find fulfillment elsewhere.
Yes I think we are getting close to the solution. It’s socially embarrassing - if you are affluent and bourgeois - to admit you just don’t give a fuck about truly foreign parts, and it’s all too much hassle
She’s run out of excuses (kids, money, house, family) and is reduced to arguing that her cat is preventing her from exploring Greenland for 2 weeks whereas the cat is, weirdly, quite content with her spending the exact same amount of holiday time in a rented villa in Corfu
i have actual billionaire friends who show the same symptoms. Have private jets and endless time. Could go anywhere. Talk excitedly about it. Fly to Papua New Guinea! Check out Mozambique! Yet they ALWAYS go to the very same place in Bali
For some people "travel" amounts to simply going somewhere hot to lie on a beach and get drunk. My in-laws are like this. They virtually never leave the hotel complex. If that's your bag then close and cheap makes sense.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
You have the narrowest mind on PB and you never travel. Lol. This is probably the world’s biggest ever QED
Not long until the clocks go forward and here comes the Summer
Four weeks to Cheltenham and another fortnight after that before the clocks change.
For me the first big change is when the sun sets AFTER 5pm - we are already past that, it happened on Feb 7 in London
Then there’s the first crocus tips in Regents Park. Around now? Then the symbolic date of March 1, which feels like the end of the jail sentence even if you have to wear an ankle tag and you are only out on licence, and might get called in to the cop shop of cold every now and again
Most beautiful of all is the moment when you turn to the sun and and you sense REAL solar warmth and your pineal gland lights up with joy. That can happen any moment between the last half of Feb or mid March, depending on where you are in the UK, and your luck
Tho it must be said I despise the entire thing and God willing I will stay out here in indochina for another 2-3 weeks
The cross-quarter day in early February - the point at which the darkest quarter of the year is left behind felt particularly noticeable here in Ireland. I think it's because it's generally a lot milder here during the winter, and so the change in the light levels is the main signal of changing seasons that there is.
Living in the far north, either in Scotland or Estonia, February is when the lights seem to come back on. In Tallinn on the winter solstice there is not much more than 6 hours between sunrise and sunset and the sun is so low that it is still very gloomy, but now we already have over 9 hours between sunrise and sunset and on the summer solstice it goes the other way with a day length of 22 hours and the sky stays light for about three weeks either side of June 21st. I must admit I love the northern summer and the long twilight that it brings in good weather... so with cinnamon, coffee, and a lot of vitamin D I can get through the winter.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I don't know about that. If you're doing one thing then you can't do another. There's a choice between knowing the world as a whole, to a limited extent, and getting to know a small corner of it extremely well. There are a whole bunch of tradeoffs, and other good things that a person might do with their time.
I've certainly enjoyed the travel that I've done, and there's a fair few places I'd still like to get to, but everything in life is about choices, and I think that, given the choice, I'd rather aim to do a leisurely Land's End to John O'Groats cycle ride, or Mizen to Malin, rather than a coast-to-coast US road trip.
And besides that, I've never felt particularly at home anywhere, and rather like the idea of finding a place to put down some proper roots.
I buy that. There’s a shocking number of places on the island of Great Britain I’ve never been to or been only fleetingly. My knowledge of Manchester largely stems from my old firm sending me to a G4S ankle tagging depot in Trafford to deliver Equality Act training. It’s not just Leon who gets the classy work trips.
"I would liked to have seen Montana the Clitheroe-Hellifield Line."
Woke Queen Camilla will not wear the Koh-i-Noor diamond for the coronation. She will wear Queen Mary's crown instead. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64638152
It's not up to Camilla, the British answer to Mike Pence, to decide what she wears or doesn't wear at the coronation.
No surprise that nut boy won't let his wife wear a bigger diamond in her hat than he does. She'd embarrass him.
If he were truly woke, he'd return the Koh-i-Noor to where his family stole it.
But that would be opening the floodgates. There'd be much of the royal art collection for starters, robbed after the restoration from those who'd bought stuff at auction from the Commonwealth government using their own money.
I wonder whether he and his hangers-on will f*** the coronation up. Many held back at his mother's funeral, but the crowning is me me me all the way.
If the 1849 Treaty were deemed invalid, it would belong to the descendants of Ranjit Singh. I can’t see what claim the Indian government would have.
How odd, the PB trans obsessives have decided not to mention that the case is now considered to be a hate crime.
This is the reality for trans people - and yet Rishi would rather score political points.
Please stop using this poor girl's death as goading material, you contemptible little man.
Taking up valuable Tiffany Scott/Isla Bryson bandwidth apart from anything else.
You don't do her much of a service by conflating her with those two. In your worldview, are wearing blackface, and actually being actually black, much of a muchness?
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
You're probably right. I will try more.
I have a wealthy female relative who has barely been outside Europe - in fact I’d guess that Egypt (ie Sharm) and once in the USA is her entire non European travel experience
She used to blame it on kids (fair enough), and then her job (hmm, she can easily work from home, but OK). Now she is essentially retired early, is notably affluent, has a willing companion, is intellectually curious and educated and STILL she doesn’t travel
Portugal, Malaga, Greece, a spot of France, same same same. When I ask her why she doesn’t experiment and go a bit further she says “we have cats” like the cats allow her to go to the Algarve for a fortnight but forbid her from going to India or Singapore or the Arctic or Madagascar
i honestly don’t get it. Fear of the unknown? She’s not a cowardly person in my experience. Apathy? Why?
She is in her late 50s and in 15 years it will be too late
It's really simple, she doesn't want to.
Unless you are really lucky (and you are) you can't see everywhere so you may as well go to the places you enjoy going to.
Really? Is that it?
That doesn’t make sense because she is always saying Oooh, I’dl love to go there, or, Mmm, India, sounds amazing, or Wow, let’s do Vietnam
Yet it never happens. And she has four to six holidays a year. She’s rich. And she has time. So your explanation doesn’t add up
WTF is it? I’ve noticed it in others
12 hours stuck on a plane? Jetlag? Carbon footprint?
Doesn't fancy going to Third World shit-holes? Possible I guess.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
You're probably right. I will try more.
I have a wealthy female relative who has barely been outside Europe - in fact I’d guess that Egypt (ie Sharm) and once in the USA is her entire non European travel experience
She used to blame it on kids (fair enough), and then her job (hmm, she can easily work from home, but OK). Now she is essentially retired early, is notably affluent, has a willing companion, is intellectually curious and educated and STILL she doesn’t travel
Portugal, Malaga, Greece, a spot of France, same same same. When I ask her why she doesn’t experiment and go a bit further she says “we have cats” like the cats allow her to go to the Algarve for a fortnight but forbid her from going to India or Singapore or the Arctic or Madagascar
i honestly don’t get it. Fear of the unknown? She’s not a cowardly person in my experience. Apathy? Why?
She is in her late 50s and in 15 years it will be too late
It's really simple, she doesn't want to.
Unless you are really lucky (and you are) you can't see everywhere so you may as well go to the places you enjoy going to.
Really? Is that it?
That doesn’t make sense because she is always saying Oooh, I’dl love to go there, or, Mmm, India, sounds amazing, or Wow, let’s do Vietnam
Yet it never happens. And she has four to six holidays a year. She’s rich. And she has time. So your explanation doesn’t add up
WTF is it? I’ve noticed it in others
The same as people who say they'd love to come to that party next friday, but don't actually turn up. People are odd, but they don't like to upset others. You love travel, she humours you in conversation, but actually isn't bothered.
No, it’s more complex than that. She really isn’t the type to humour me. Trust me!
She is maybe deluding herself. Convincing herself that she really likes travel and expressing this loudly and saying that one day soon she will do that overland train trip to Burma or the Patagonian road trip blah blah
That is perhaps closer to the truth. She is middle class, educated and wealthy and it is slightly shameful - in that milieu - to admit that actually you don’t want to see any particularly foreign cultures because you’re not that interested, in reality, and yet another fortnight in Tavira or Mykonos is just fine and weird places are too weird
That sounds plausible to me. Some activities are seen socially as both rewarding and enviable, and they may well be both, so even unconsciously people might feel a bit weird in admitting they don't feel any interest in travelling to amazing places, they don't want to read a classic novel, etc. It's a bit like stock work questions about developing one's career, with a pretty clear implication something is wrong with an employee if they don't want to develop in their role further, when they might be perfectly content, even happy, with it and find fulfillment elsewhere.
Yes I think we are getting close to the solution. It’s socially embarrassing - if you are affluent and bourgeois - to admit you just don’t give a fuck about truly foreign parts, and it’s all too much hassle
She’s run out of excuses (kids, money, house, family) and is reduced to arguing that her cat is preventing her from exploring Greenland for 2 weeks whereas the cat is, weirdly, quite content with her spending the exact same amount of holiday time in a rented villa in Corfu
i have actual billionaire friends who show the same symptoms. Have private jets and endless time. Could go anywhere. Talk excitedly about it. Fly to Papua New Guinea! Check out Mozambique! Yet they ALWAYS go to the very same place in Bali
Paradox of choice? The jaded ennui of “1000s of channels and nothing on”?
Labour leads by 7% in the Blue Wall. In 2019, Labour came THIRD in these seats.
Blue Wall Voting Intention (11-12 Feb.):
Labour 41% (-1) Conservative 34% (+2) Liberal Democrat 17% (-2) Green 4% (–) Reform UK 3% (-1) Other 2% (+2)
Changes +/- 28-29 Jan.
So, in spite of the Lib Dem poll in Wokingham, why should labour do any deals or ease off to help them.
A blue wall by election would be fascinating. If there was one labour should go at it hell for leather.
I think Labour and the Lib Dems could tear chunks out of each other if they were so inclined. If Labour started to come for Con/Lib Dem battlegrounds, I think they would. The last thing Labour want is the Lib Dems at their Remain flank, and the last thing Lib Dems want is Labour on their patch.
That said, I don't think there's a deal, per se, just two parties that understand where their interests lie.
Not long until the clocks go forward and here comes the Summer
Four weeks to Cheltenham and another fortnight after that before the clocks change.
For me the first big change is when the sun sets AFTER 5pm - we are already past that, it happened on Feb 7 in London
Then there’s the first crocus tips in Regents Park. Around now? Then the symbolic date of March 1, which feels like the end of the jail sentence even if you have to wear an ankle tag and you are only out on licence, and might get called in to the cop shop of cold every now and again
Most beautiful of all is the moment when you turn to the sun and and you sense REAL solar warmth and your pineal gland lights up with joy. That can happen any moment between the last half of Feb or mid March, depending on where you are in the UK, and your luck
Tho it must be said I despise the entire thing and God willing I will stay out here in indochina for another 2-3 weeks
Today I reached the milestone of "can go for a walk during the day without taking gloves and not getting told I should have done". Though the local media is still talking up a Beast From The East like they have been all winter...
I went for a walk an hour ago wearing gloves. And I was wishing that I was wearing thicker gloves!
Had two days of proper warm spring sun in the South West. But back to business as usual tomorrow I fear.
How odd, the PB trans obsessives have decided not to mention that the case is now considered to be a hate crime.
This is the reality for trans people - and yet Rishi would rather score political points.
Oh, come on. Do you think nobody's going to click the link?
Police investigating the killing of 16-year-old Brianna Ghey have said they are now considering whether it could have been a hate crime.
Yes, that's "considering whether it could have been", which is not the same as "is".
This 'hate' term is just horrendous. Would this murder (about which I know nothing) be somehow less bad if it were some other sort of emotion, perhaps with less hate, or more bad if the 'hate' were somehow intensified?
This must be a proxy for something else entirely.
Well, yes, but apparently it makes a handy shorthand for "motivated by the victim's membership of a minority group".
Wiki suggests that "bias crime" is a term also used, maybe that's a better term?
It suggests that some murders are better than others in rather random ways. Both the concept and the application are demeaning and tasteless.
I’ve never liked the notion of some murders being “hate” and others “not hate” either.
Not long until the clocks go forward and here comes the Summer
Four weeks to Cheltenham and another fortnight after that before the clocks change.
For me the first big change is when the sun sets AFTER 5pm - we are already past that, it happened on Feb 7 in London
Then there’s the first crocus tips in Regents Park. Around now? Then the symbolic date of March 1, which feels like the end of the jail sentence even if you have to wear an ankle tag and you are only out on licence, and might get called in to the cop shop of cold every now and again
Most beautiful of all is the moment when you turn to the sun and and you sense REAL solar warmth and your pineal gland lights up with joy. That can happen any moment between the last half of Feb or mid March, depending on where you are in the UK, and your luck
Tho it must be said I despise the entire thing and God willing I will stay out here in indochina for another 2-3 weeks
Today I reached the milestone of "can go for a walk during the day without taking gloves and not getting told I should have done". Though the local media is still talking up a Beast From The East like they have been all winter...
I went for a walk an hour ago wearing gloves. And I was wishing that I was wearing thicker gloves!
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
You're probably right. I will try more.
I have a wealthy female relative who has barely been outside Europe - in fact I’d guess that Egypt (ie Sharm) and once in the USA is her entire non European travel experience
She used to blame it on kids (fair enough), and then her job (hmm, she can easily work from home, but OK). Now she is essentially retired early, is notably affluent, has a willing companion, is intellectually curious and educated and STILL she doesn’t travel
Portugal, Malaga, Greece, a spot of France, same same same. When I ask her why she doesn’t experiment and go a bit further she says “we have cats” like the cats allow her to go to the Algarve for a fortnight but forbid her from going to India or Singapore or the Arctic or Madagascar
i honestly don’t get it. Fear of the unknown? She’s not a cowardly person in my experience. Apathy? Why?
She is in her late 50s and in 15 years it will be too late
It's really simple, she doesn't want to.
Unless you are really lucky (and you are) you can't see everywhere so you may as well go to the places you enjoy going to.
Really? Is that it?
That doesn’t make sense because she is always saying Oooh, I’dl love to go there, or, Mmm, India, sounds amazing, or Wow, let’s do Vietnam
Yet it never happens. And she has four to six holidays a year. She’s rich. And she has time. So your explanation doesn’t add up
WTF is it? I’ve noticed it in others
The same as people who say they'd love to come to that party next friday, but don't actually turn up. People are odd, but they don't like to upset others. You love travel, she humours you in conversation, but actually isn't bothered.
No, it’s more complex than that. She really isn’t the type to humour me. Trust me!
She is maybe deluding herself. Convincing herself that she really likes travel and expressing this loudly and saying that one day soon she will do that overland train trip to Burma or the Patagonian road trip blah blah
That is perhaps closer to the truth. She is middle class, educated and wealthy and it is slightly shameful - in that milieu - to admit that actually you don’t want to see any particularly foreign cultures because you’re not that interested, in reality, and yet another fortnight in Tavira or Mykonos is just fine and weird places are too weird
That sounds plausible to me. Some activities are seen socially as both rewarding and enviable, and they may well be both, so even unconsciously people might feel a bit weird in admitting they don't feel any interest in travelling to amazing places, they don't want to read a classic novel, etc. It's a bit like stock work questions about developing one's career, with a pretty clear implication something is wrong with an employee if they don't want to develop in their role further, when they might be perfectly content, even happy, with it and find fulfillment elsewhere.
Yes I think we are getting close to the solution. It’s socially embarrassing - if you are affluent and bourgeois - to admit you just don’t give a fuck about truly foreign parts, and it’s all too much hassle
She’s run out of excuses (kids, money, house, family) and is reduced to arguing that her cat is preventing her from exploring Greenland for 2 weeks whereas the cat is, weirdly, quite content with her spending the exact same amount of holiday time in a rented villa in Corfu
i have actual billionaire friends who show the same symptoms. Have private jets and endless time. Could go anywhere. Talk excitedly about it. Fly to Papua New Guinea! Check out Mozambique! Yet they ALWAYS go to the very same place in Bali
Paradox of choice? The jaded ennui of “1000s of channels and nothing on”?
The 1000 channels and nothing on thing is surely about the lack of choice - the programs are the same formula...
Travel can get boring - if you stay in the identikit luxury hotels etc, you need to have GPS in your watch. So you can check which country you are actually in, while admiring the infinity pool and the rather bland cocktails.
For some people "travel" amounts to simply going somewhere hot to lie on a beach and get drunk. My in-laws are like this. They virtually never leave the hotel complex. If that's your bag then close and cheap makes sense.
If you only get one holiday a year and you can’t afford the time and cost for anything else then I ASBOLUTELY understand why people go back to places they know and love. You want guaranteed sun and maybe a friendly face or two at the local taverna. Sorted!
That I completely get
I’m talking about people with oodles of time and cash and freedom and a supposed curiosity about foreign parts who nonetheless never actually go to these weird foreign parts. I just wish they’d be honest. They don’t like anything too foreign, Scares them, or something. They are cultural cowards. People like @kinabalu
Tho I suspect he could be enticed by a polo watching holiday in the Argentine if it was guaranteed everyone would be wearing REALLY tight jodhpurs
For some of us, this month and next bring the best weather of the year. Convertible tops down everywhere, long walks in the park or along the beach, lazy hotel brunches outside on a Friday afternoon.
Then, around Easter, it starts to get hot, and that’s that until November.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
By the way, if you have a clear sky looking west, you can see Venus close to the horizon, and Jupiter a short distance away, a bit higher up. They will get closer over the coming days.
How odd, the PB trans obsessives have decided not to mention that the case is now considered to be a hate crime.
This is the reality for trans people - and yet Rishi would rather score political points.
Please stop using this poor girl's death as goading material, you contemptible little man.
Taking up valuable Tiffany Scott/Isla Bryson bandwidth apart from anything else.
You don't do her much of a service by conflating her with those two. In your worldview, are wearing blackface, and actually being actually black, much of a muchness?
I’d say the tweeters who immediately jumped on Ghey’s death to insist she was a bloke and had a dick were the one’s doing the conflating, but I know in Beinnyworld no one hates trans people and everyone just wants to make the world lovely (within limits) for them.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
When I went to Nepal, I recall some "I am travelling to expand my mind" types being upset that instead of staying at the hostel/hotel each night I went with the guide to the local village bar, and got wasted with the locals.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Half of American singles went on zero dates last year, and only 40% used a dating app.
Many have given up on finding a relationship.
This, too, is a paradox of choice problem.
TBF, the online apps appear to be a universally terrible experience for many. Not too surprising, given that the interests of the average user (to find a partner & get off the platform asap) are diametrically opposed to the interests of the company running the app (to keep the user on the app for as long as it takes to extract the maximum amount of $ out of them before they give up & quit).
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
You recently admitted that one reason you don’t travel much is because YOU ARE SCARED OF DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
You recently admitted that one reason you don’t travel much is because YOU ARE SCARED OF DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD
Literally, “SCARED”
lol
I was hoping you were going to bring that up again.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
I have some sympathy, but you need to start by re-examining this belief in bold.
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
When single and younger, I used to book on organised trekking holidays. You could pick the grade of walking, from gentle amble to ice climbing... meet a new group of people.
For some people "travel" amounts to simply going somewhere hot to lie on a beach and get drunk. My in-laws are like this. They virtually never leave the hotel complex. If that's your bag then close and cheap makes sense.
If you only get one holiday a year and you can’t afford the time and cost for anything else then I ASBOLUTELY understand why people go back to places they know and love. You want guaranteed sun and maybe a friendly face or two at the local taverna. Sorted!
That I completely get
I’m talking about people with oodles of time and cash and freedom and a supposed curiosity about foreign parts who nonetheless never actually go to these weird foreign parts. I just wish they’d be honest. They don’t like anything too foreign, Scares them, or something. They are cultural cowards. People like @kinabalu
Tho I suspect he could be enticed by a polo watching holiday in the Argentine if it was guaranteed everyone would be wearing REALLY tight jodhpurs
Laziness. Fear of the unknown.
Also for those whose exes are not borne by Fleet Street, there's a terrible paradox for those who can borderline afford club class. Travel steerage, feel like shit; pay for club, feel a numpty disembarking 2 grand poorer for a not great night in a pretend bed and some not great champagne.
Having said that, off to Canada to climb Mt Assiniboine with my son.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
This whole coronation malarkey - why is it needed? Charles is already king, so what difference does it make?
Not that I'm complaining about the extra Bank Holiday, mind.
I feel like a bit of over the top pagentry is part of the point of monarchy. These ones where they just hand over a sash to the new monarch feel like they are missing something - sure, we don't want to see an orgy of excess, but if you take out the silly costumes and rituals, or cut them down hugely in misconceived attempt to appear more relateable and cost cutting you might as well junk the whole affair.
Steve McQueen is making a film for Apple TV called “Blitz”, starring Saoirse Ronan, Stephen Graham and Paul Weller.
Currently being filmed so will be a while I guess before release.
How? He's been dead for 43 years.
Eyeballs skyward. Steve McQueen is one of the best British directors currently working. Maybe the best!
He should consider getting his own name then.
Eh?
Unlike the actor his name actually is Steve McQueen it seems, not Terence McQueen. So its more his name than the actor's.
Give it time and most people will associate the name with him more than someone dead for over 40 years. How often do people actually watch Steve McQueen the actor movies?
(Though I did buy The Towering Inferno 2 weeks ago in fairness).
Rubbish. The attempted motor bike escape in The Heat Escape is iconic and the film is shown virtually ever Christmas. The car chase in Bullet is also iconic.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
Weirdly, I'm the other way around.
I find that in my day-to-day life I'm absolutely surrounded by other people and required to engage in conversation with them.
Going traveling by myself removes the requirement to talk to people, which I find enormously liberating. Plus, I get to read a good book without being interruped.
And if I really want a fight conversation, there's always pb.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
You recently admitted that one reason you don’t travel much is because YOU ARE SCARED OF DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD
Literally, “SCARED”
lol
I was hoping you were going to bring that up again.
Being scared of making the mistake that many people have made, and that can result in death/injury, doesn't seem irrational to me.
The way to deal with it would be to go to a country and book some driving lessons there, perhaps?
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
That’s a shame, but it should be noted that the whole WFH/internet thing makes solo travel less daunting
Also, this is where America is great - because they are some of the friendliest people on earth and they speak English and they will confess the most insane shit off the bat
Sit down at a bar in Jackson Mississippi and within 20 minutes someone will tell you about their stage 3 anal cancer or the fact their wife is shagging the neighbour, then you tell your story and you buy each other a drink and off you go
Also: try and travel with a purpose if you are travelling alone. Maybe rediscover your roots, a weird branch of the family tree, chase up some personal obsession - music, art, history - once you have a goal then solo travel again becomes easier. And always keep moving
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
I have some sympathy, but you need to start by re-examining this belief in bold.
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
It's one thing to try re-examining it, it's another to actually manage it. I totally get kyf_100's thoughts on this. I admire people who find it easy to be gregarious, when it causes me such anxieties. But then I try to remember the words of Elizabeth Bennett.
Darcy: 'I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.'
Elizabeth:'My fingers do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many women's do. They have not the same force or rapidity, and do not produce the same expression. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault -- because I would not take the trouble of practicing
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
Find a hobby or interest of some sort, where everyone in the group has a shared conversation starter. Hell, even a political forum works for this.
Some of us here are introverted 40 year old guys who happen to live half way around the world, and are more than happy to share a beer with random acquaintances passing by or passing through.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
I have some sympathy, but you need to start by re-examining this belief in bold.
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
It's one thing to try re-examining it, it's another to actually manage it. I totally get kyf_100's thoughts on this. I admire people who find it easy to be gregarious, when it causes me such anxieties. But then I try to remember the words of Elizabeth Bennett.
Darcy: 'I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.'
Elizabeth:'My fingers do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many women's do. They have not the same force or rapidity, and do not produce the same expression. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault -- because I would not take the trouble of practicing
Striking up conversations with strangers is a skill. Like any other skill, some of us start badly at first, but almost anyone can become competent with practice.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
You recently admitted that one reason you don’t travel much is because YOU ARE SCARED OF DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD
Literally, “SCARED”
lol
Leon, you are a shit. An absolute shit. If there was a Mohs Scale for shittiness, you'd be below talc. A sub-talc being.
Everyone has something they're frightened or scared of. Even, I guess, you (or at least one of your identities).
Yes indeed, social ability is just practice. I was very bad but with practice have certainly become well above average for an engineering person which has done me very well in management roles etc!
I’m coming late to the travel vs not travel discussion.
I would put it down to habit. Same as lots of other things. I don’t go to the pub much these days. Why? No obvious reason, I always enjoy it when I do, but I got out of the habit.
I’ve recently been strong-arming the family into getting back into longer haul holidays after the regular French home trips of younger childhood, but breaking the habit takes effort.
Steve McQueen is making a film for Apple TV called “Blitz”, starring Saoirse Ronan, Stephen Graham and Paul Weller.
Currently being filmed so will be a while I guess before release.
How? He's been dead for 43 years.
Eyeballs skyward. Steve McQueen is one of the best British directors currently working. Maybe the best!
He should consider getting his own name then.
Eh?
Unlike the actor his name actually is Steve McQueen it seems, not Terence McQueen. So its more his name than the actor's.
Give it time and most people will associate the name with him more than someone dead for over 40 years. How often do people actually watch Steve McQueen the actor movies?
(Though I did buy The Towering Inferno 2 weeks ago in fairness).
Rubbish. The attempted motor bike escape in The Heat Escape is iconic and the film is shown virtually ever Christmas. The car chase in Bullet is also iconic.
Never seen either in my life. I bet a lot of people haven't.
I was being tongue in cheek, but your reaction that is impossible because they are iconic I think is based on hope more than reality. Loads of once iconic stuff is not watched much anymore.
I may not be a typical moviegoer, though I do go the cinema a lot more than the average person, and I enjoy watching older films. I've watched just recently some old John Wayne movies, some Cary Grant movies, Humphrey Bogart, and more. Yet I've never see It's a Wonderful Life, Citizen Kane, or many other iconic films.
Others will have seen those but not the ones I have seen. Lots of people will think of Kirk Douglas as Michael Douglas' dad, rather than for his iconic film roles. They won't know who Errol Flynn was. Especially if there was another modern actor or director with the same name who was really accomplished much more recently.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
I have some sympathy, but you need to start by re-examining this belief in bold.
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
It's one thing to try re-examining it, it's another to actually manage it. I totally get kyf_100's thoughts on this. I admire people who find it easy to be gregarious, when it causes me such anxieties. But then I try to remember the words of Elizabeth Bennett.
Darcy: 'I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.'
Elizabeth:'My fingers do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many women's do. They have not the same force or rapidity, and do not produce the same expression. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault -- because I would not take the trouble of practicing
Striking up conversations with strangers is a skill. Like any other skill, some of us start badly at first, but almost anyone can become competent with practice.
The main thing is to express genuine interest in what the other person is saying, And their life experience. Forget about yourself and your own anxieties. You are being given the privilege to hear about life from someone who lives in Siberia, Serbia, San Pedro de Atacama, the South Pole - so what they are saying IS interesting, because it is so different, and yet it will reveal enlightening similarities in time
This is the essence of it. Be interested. It shouldn’t be hard. And be prepared to be honest about your own life in response. Give ans receive
i agree: this stuff can be learned. Indeed it should be learned. It is a notable life skill
And as native English speakers we have a HUGE advantage over most of the world. Terrible shame to waste it
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Caelum, non animum mutant, qui trans mare currunt.
Horace innit?
Googled and ... Bloody hell as if that isn't exactly what I mean.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
Doing my first international trip for 4 years next week. Going to Madrid for the first time.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Caelum, non animum mutant, qui trans mare currunt.
Horace innit?
Googled and ... Bloody hell as if that isn't exactly what I mean.
Half of American singles went on zero dates last year, and only 40% used a dating app.
Many have given up on finding a relationship.
This, too, is a paradox of choice problem.
The problem is social media and smartphones, as usual.
For women, the problem is an abundance of choice. Women have evolved to be picky, because of the extremely high cost of mating with the wrong man. The vast choice available to them on dating apps exacerbates this sensible tendency, to the point where they can always see apparently better options out there.
For men, the problem is the easy availability of porn means their drive for sexual gratification is fulfilled in a less rejection-filled environment. App dating is incredibly bruising to the ego because of all those rejections, and their drive to overcome those rejection is temporarily filled (albeit in an unfulfilling way) with a few mouse clicks.
But that's not the fault of the Tories. That's Labour deciding to be pig-ignorant twats.
Incidentally this probably means Labour have lost any chance (which to be fair, was never very high) of retaking Ynys Môn given the current state of the road bridges and the desperate need for better road links to the mainland.
It's quite flabbergasting that anyone could say with a straight face that road improvements mustn't lead to higher speeds. No wonder they've cocked up the Heads of the Valleys.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
Doing my first international trip for 4 years next week. Going to Madrid for the first time.
Enjoy! Madrid has the best fine art holdings, handily accessible in three key museums, of any city in Europe bar Paris.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
I have some sympathy, but you need to start by re-examining this belief in bold.
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
It's one thing to try re-examining it, it's another to actually manage it. I totally get kyf_100's thoughts on this. I admire people who find it easy to be gregarious, when it causes me such anxieties. But then I try to remember the words of Elizabeth Bennett.
Darcy: 'I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.'
Elizabeth:'My fingers do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many women's do. They have not the same force or rapidity, and do not produce the same expression. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault -- because I would not take the trouble of practicing
Striking up conversations with strangers is a skill. Like any other skill, some of us start badly at first, but almost anyone can become competent with practice.
It can feel weird thinking about practicing such a thing, however much it is true we do need to develop our social skills with practice.
Makes it sound like training for sociopaths or aliens.
Hello fellow hu-man, I am come from the kingdom of united, may we speak of the kickball game last night?
If I could afford to travel anything other than economy class I might consider travelling further but trips to see the in-laws in New England are the limit of my range. Can’t abide the thought of more than six or seven hours on a plane having turned right on entry to it. Hate the whole experience.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
Penge has dinosaurs at least.
Er, perhaps a tiny bit out of date there.
The theme park at Sydenham* is a mite antiquated, especially given the competition.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
Doing my first international trip for 4 years next week. Going to Madrid for the first time.
Madrid is a fine city
The food is generally excellent. The Prado is a must. But also take in the Thyssen collection - top notch modern art. Tapas on the Plaza Mayor is grand
But for me the one world class unbeatable Madrid experience is just outside of town. The Escorial. Catholicism meets Fascism and becomes Architecture. It is astounding
Well, despite all his raving he knows that Biden is the one man who unquestionably beat him when they went head to head. For once he was unable to bully his way clear or evade responsibility or consequence for his own failures, with Biden in office the permanent reminder of that. For someone with such a fragile ego it must be maddening.
Also, I very much hope Trump's zeal for capital punishment is not related to a petty love of exercising direct power (eg I said he should die, and so he did), though the numbers are striking. The former president’s zeal for the death penalty has already proven lethal. During the final months of his administration, he oversaw the executions of 13 federal prisoners. Since 1963, only three federal prisoners had been executed, including Oklahoma City bomber and mass murderer Timothy McVeigh. In January 2021, in the final stretch before Biden would become president, Trump oversaw three executions in four days.
But that's not the fault of the Tories. That's Labour deciding to be pig-ignorant twats.
Incidentally this probably means Labour have lost any chance (which to be fair, was never very high) of retaking Ynys Môn given the current state of the road bridges and the desperate need for better road links to the mainland.
It's quite flabbergasting that anyone could say with a straight face that road improvements mustn't lead to higher speeds. No wonder they've cocked up the Heads of the Valleys.
The whole thing sounds desirable at a gross level - a shift in investment priority is surely needed - but it feels rather 'kneejerk'. Reminds me of the time in 2021 when the WG cancelled the M4 relief road after spending £135m.
Half of American singles went on zero dates last year, and only 40% used a dating app.
Many have given up on finding a relationship.
This, too, is a paradox of choice problem.
Too much easily accessible porn.
Have you seen porn lately? Absolute crap.
I dunno if you are joking but I have actually noticed a palpable decline in porn. Is it Covid??!
There hasn’t been a decent new vid involving REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED in the shower for years
I’m not joking.
I suspect PB would prefer I refrain from details, but I re-iterate: porn has gone to shit.
Yup, it has
I’m kinda glad you’ve confirmed I’m not imagining it
Purely intellectually, has porn been screwed by the paradox of choice? Too many niches and all that?
(Mandatory Gosport bit: The Submarine museum in the town has several "this is what it's like to live here" bits; oily smells and all that. Including a bunk with a 80s style gentleman's magazine.)
Life expectancy in Thailand - 77.8 - is now higher than life expectancy in the USA - 76.4
If the trends continue for another couple of years American life expectancy will, in one of history’s grandest reversals, be overtaken by life expectancy in Vietnam (right now it is 75.7 and rising, unlike the USA)
Diet? Climate?
First, yes. Hardly any obese people here, much better diet, and few fewer cars. They walk and cycle and move around a lot
Climate I doubt, some of the longest lived nations - Iceland - have hideous cold climates, some, like Spain, have great climates
Three other major factors: no terrible drug/opioid crisis here, better healthcare for the really poor (and a safety net), and of course fewer murders and gunshot suicides because fewer guns
Coming to a city near you, soon. Modal share of cycling in Central London (as opposed to Inner London or London) is now at 11%. Inner London is 8%. That's double since 2010. https://twitter.com/willnorman/status/1494567072046764050
You live in Inner London not Central (imo) - have you noticed anything yet?
And they have hardly started building the network of safe cycling routes. Being followed at a distance in certain places such as Manchester, Leicester, Nottingham.
Yes, for sure. Cycling is surging. And e-bikes are accelerating the trend (and easier for older or less fit people)
I am all for it. Get rid of every single fucking car in our cities. Sure we will lose something but the benefits are so tremendous it has to happen - and it will happen
Cleaner, quieter, lovelier, greener cities, with all that hideous infrastructure now dedicated to cars - ugly car parks, horrible urban motorways, grimy garages and workshops - suddenly liberated and freed up to become new parks, urban woods, glorious European boulevards where people WALK and STROLL without fear of being run over
We can keep a fair few autonomous e-cars that purr about the place then park themselves at night
The future of the city is carless and splendid
You don’t have to get rid of cars entirely; just give massive priority to the cyclist and (particularly) the pedestrian.
(btw I’m mildly surprised you haven’t been touched by the 15-min city conspiracy theory.)
But that's not the fault of the Tories. That's Labour deciding to be pig-ignorant twats.
Incidentally this probably means Labour have lost any chance (which to be fair, was never very high) of retaking Ynys Môn given the current state of the road bridges and the desperate need for better road links to the mainland.
It's quite flabbergasting that anyone could say with a straight face that road improvements mustn't lead to higher speeds. No wonder they've cocked up the Heads of the Valleys.
The whole thing sounds desirable at a gross level - a shift in investment priority is surely needed - but it feels rather 'kneejerk'. Reminds me of the time in 2021 when the WG cancelled the M4 relief road after spending £135m.
Shades of the ditching of road infrastructure under New Labour - to push the money to school and hospitals....
On topic, I think Haley's chances, such as they are, depend quite a bit on Sen. Tim Scott. If he decides not to run, she has some sort of chances of getting some momentum, since S. Carolina is right at the start of the melee.
Nikki Haley is THE best that the Republican Party's got, for appealing to (what's left) of Mainstream America in general, AND the 2024 presidential swing vote in particular.
For example, she is just about the ONLY GOPer who'd I'd personally rate as having as much as 5% chance of garnering my own humble vote. Which is better than the 99.46% odds AGAINST any other Republican Party Reptile getting it.
Note that Nikki means "Victory" in Greek!
Further note she comes out of a VERY tough league, politically- & electorally-speaking. Can still recall the vicious slurs & slanders spewed forth, during the final days of Haley's first campaign for Governor, by scumbag hacks who learned their shitty art at the stinky feet of Lee Atwater (remember that A-hole 1st-Class with clusters?)
As for Sen. Tim Scott, he is indeed another credible (and in more ways than one!) possible contender for POTUS - or VP - on the 2024 GOP ticket. However, think it likely that he & Nikki Haley have already come to some understanding, if NOT agreement or anything binding) on this front, and will not get in each other's way.
Keep your eye of the Great Palmetto State, from start to finish, for BOTH major US parties in 2024.
Not long until the clocks go forward and here comes the Summer
Four weeks to Cheltenham and another fortnight after that before the clocks change.
For me the first big change is when the sun sets AFTER 5pm - we are already past that, it happened on Feb 7 in London
Then there’s the first crocus tips in Regents Park. Around now? Then the symbolic date of March 1, which feels like the end of the jail sentence even if you have to wear an ankle tag and you are only out on licence, and might get called in to the cop shop of cold every now and again
Most beautiful of all is the moment when you turn to the sun and and you sense REAL solar warmth and your pineal gland lights up with joy. That can happen any moment between the last half of Feb or mid March, depending on where you are in the UK, and your luck
Tho it must be said I despise the entire thing and God willing I will stay out here in indochina for another 2-3 weeks
The cross-quarter day in early February - the point at which the darkest quarter of the year is left behind felt particularly noticeable here in Ireland. I think it's because it's generally a lot milder here during the winter, and so the change in the light levels is the main signal of changing seasons that there is.
Living in the far north, either in Scotland or Estonia, February is when the lights seem to come back on. In Tallinn on the winter solstice there is not much more than 6 hours between sunrise and sunset and the sun is so low that it is still very gloomy, but now we already have over 9 hours between sunrise and sunset and on the summer solstice it goes the other way with a day length of 22 hours and the sky stays light for about three weeks either side of June 21st. I must admit I love the northern summer and the long twilight that it brings in good weather... so with cinnamon, coffee, and a lot of vitamin D I can get through the winter.
I always wondered about that
Back in nomadic days who actually said “shit it gets dark early here. Let’s go further north!”
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
Doing my first international trip for 4 years next week. Going to Madrid for the first time.
Enjoy! Madrid has the best fine art holdings, handily accessible in three key museums, of any city in Europe bar Paris.
If that’s your thing.
That’s absolutely not true
London, Rome and probably Vienna outclass Madrid by a distance
No museum in the world can match the Louvre, but that is because the French decided to put so much of their best shit in one museum, the Louvre. The Musee d’Orsay is mightily impressive; the Pompidou is fun
London is more diverse and dispersed. The National Gallery is tiny compared to the Louvre but it has amazing masterpieces. the British Museum is OMG. Tate Modern and Tate Britain are good
London then comes up with these tiny brilliant galleries which would be world famous elsewhere. The Wallace. Dulwich. The Courtauld. Kenwood. Even the Sir John Soane
in totality it is hard to choose between London,New York and Paris as to which has the best art/artefacts . They outclass any other cities, I’d put Rome next, then Vienna, then maybe Madrid or Florence
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
You have the narrowest mind on PB and you never travel. Lol. This is probably the world’s biggest ever QED
Well I have and I plan more in due course. A Greek island maybe.
And if you feel slighted you shouldn't. I didn’t mean YOU lug your rigid world view and set of prejudices around the globe, along with your laptop, phone, credit card and a change of clothing.
But it's an interesting question - what 'broadens the mind'? It's got me thinking. Will revert.
Woke Queen Camilla will not wear the Koh-i-Noor diamond for the coronation. She will wear Queen Mary's crown instead. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64638152
It's not up to Camilla, the British answer to Mike Pence, to decide what she wears or doesn't wear at the coronation.
No surprise that nut boy won't let his wife wear a bigger diamond in her hat than he does. She'd embarrass him.
If he were truly woke, he'd return the Koh-i-Noor to where his family stole it.
But that would be opening the floodgates. There'd be much of the royal art collection for starters, robbed after the restoration from those who'd bought stuff at auction from the Commonwealth government using their own money.
I wonder whether he and his hangers-on will f*** the coronation up. Many held back at his mother's funeral, but the crowning is me me me all the way.
If the 1849 Treaty were deemed invalid, it would belong to the descendants of Ranjit Singh. I can’t see what claim the Indian government would have.
Presumably from the point when India absorbed the remnants of the Maharajahs? Although don’t know the details of that agreement
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
My trouble with travel is that as a single, introverted, forty year old guy, I find it quite lonely and isolating to travel alone. I end up sitting alone in some bar at the end of nowhere, when I could have just sat in the pub down the road with my mates. Striking up conversation with strangers, you're either a weirdo or a pervert.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
Weirdly, I'm the other way around.
I find that in my day-to-day life I'm absolutely surrounded by other people and required to engage in conversation with them.
Going traveling by myself removes the requirement to talk to people, which I find enormously liberating. Plus, I get to read a good book without being interruped.
And if I really want a fight conversation, there's always pb.
I’m reading a rather good (translation) of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables. It’s a great yarn but looks intimidating enough to the average passer-by you can either engage or not as you wish
If I could afford to travel anything other than economy class I might consider travelling further but trips to see the in-laws in New England are the limit of my range. Can’t abide the thought of more than six or seven hours on a plane having turned right on entry to it. Hate the whole experience.
Visiting family, I have just done 14 hours in Economy, with back pain. Would have been 12, but can't fly over Russia. Tip: airlines carry paracetamol, just ask for it.
I've never travelled in any class other than Economy, but I can't imagine Premium Economy offering significant relief. It would have to be a lay-flat Business seat, and that's never happening. Affording it is one thing - being able to justify spending the money rather than saving it is quite another.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
Some people enjoy travel precisely because they have a fixed mindset. Even (especially) the free-spirited "independent travellers" you find congregating together in the same bars (with the same tired hippy trail aesthetic regardless of where they are located), wearing the same clothes and wittering on about their "gap yah" or the latest untouched location they are in the process of ruining. The identikit rooftop bar seems to fulfill the same function for the older and more well-healed traveller.
I’m in Phnom Penh. You are in Penge
I've been to Sri Lanka more recently than I've been to Penge, but whatever.
You recently admitted that one reason you don’t travel much is because YOU ARE SCARED OF DRIVING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD
Literally, “SCARED”
lol
Leon, you are a shit. An absolute shit. If there was a Mohs Scale for shittiness, you'd be below talc. A sub-talc being.
Everyone has something they're frightened or scared of. Even, I guess, you (or at least one of your identities).
Leon is frightened to leave Spectator Contruct world. The best special offer under the sun wouldn't tempt him.
Anyone who doesn’t have anchoring responsibilities at home (job, kids, stupid pets) and who has money and who ISN”T travelling is an idiot
Travel is all there is, in the end, along with love and art. The new, the fascinating, the challenging, the strange. It is the best. It doesn’t just broaden the mind it enriches it in an intoxicating way, like adding wine to a sauce, like lashing burning booze on the stodgy Christmas pud
You have one life. Go see the world before your knees give out
I think travel is great but the 'broadens the mind' thing is more of a saying than the truth imo. People who travel a lot are as prone to a fixed mindset as those who don't. In which case they lug it around with them along with the rest of their luggage.
"Anything to declare?" "Yep. Two suitcases, a carry-all, and my fixed mindset"
You have the narrowest mind on PB and you never travel. Lol. This is probably the world’s biggest ever QED
Well I have and I plan more in due course. A Greek island maybe.
And if you feel slighted you shouldn't. I didn’t mean YOU lug your rigid world view and set of prejudices around the globe, along with your laptop, phone, credit card and a change of clothing.
But it's an interesting question - what 'broadens the mind'? It's got me thinking. Will revert.
What 'broadens the mind'?
IMO, talking to a variety of people; and that can be in your own street as much as around the world. Talking matters much more than reading.
I was thinking about Marxism recently. In the late 19th and early 20th century, a load of middle-class intellectuals read Marx and said: "Hey, that's what the people need!" Of course, they didn't actually go and talk and listen to the hoi polloi about their needs, because they *knew* what they needed.
A while back, someone on PB said they hated supermarkets because they had to talk to people at checkouts. I actually find that one of the more interesting parts of it, because sometimes you learn stuff. Like the one a while back who kept bees. Or the one whose brother lives on nothing but Dominos Pizzas. Or the one who was studying cosmology.
But it's actually not talking that matters; it's listening. Talk enough to open people enough, and then listen. Most people have an interesting story or three to tell.
Comments
Unlike the actor his name actually is Steve McQueen it seems, not Terence McQueen. So its more his name than the actor's.
Give it time and most people will associate the name with him more than someone dead for over 40 years. How often do people actually watch Steve McQueen the actor movies?
(Though I did buy The Towering Inferno 2 weeks ago in fairness).
She’s run out of excuses (kids, money, house, family) and is reduced to arguing that her cat is preventing her from exploring Greenland for 2 weeks whereas the cat is, weirdly, quite content with her spending the exact same amount of holiday time in a rented villa in Corfu
i have actual billionaire friends who show the same symptoms. Have private jets and endless time. Could go anywhere. Talk excitedly about it. Fly to Papua New Guinea! Check out Mozambique! Yet they ALWAYS go to the very same place in Bali
My in-laws are like this. They virtually never leave the hotel complex.
If that's your bag then close and cheap makes sense.
The jaded ennui of “1000s of channels and nothing on”?
That said, I don't think there's a deal, per se, just two parties that understand where their interests lie.
Not that I'm complaining about the extra Bank Holiday, mind.
Many have given up on finding a relationship.
This, too, is a paradox of choice problem.
Too much easily accessible porn.
Travel can get boring - if you stay in the identikit luxury hotels etc, you need to have GPS in your watch. So you can check which country you are actually in, while admiring the infinity pool and the rather bland cocktails.
That I completely get
I’m talking about people with oodles of time and cash and freedom and a supposed curiosity about foreign parts who nonetheless never actually go to these weird foreign parts. I just wish they’d be honest. They don’t like anything too foreign, Scares them, or something. They are cultural cowards. People like @kinabalu
Tho I suspect he could be enticed by a polo watching holiday in the Argentine if it was guaranteed everyone would be wearing REALLY tight jodhpurs
Then, around Easter, it starts to get hot, and that’s that until November.
Due congratulations will be due to Sunak and his NI team.
More of this, please.
Absolute crap.
Every time I go on holiday alone I feel like the titular character of Houellebecq's platform, only there's no fantasy girl to come along and save me.
Happy valentines day, folks!
Literally, “SCARED”
lol
Most people actually want to be spoken with. Especially here (US).
You'd certainly see more of a country that way.
There hasn’t been a decent new vid involving REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED in the shower for years
Also for those whose exes are not borne by Fleet Street, there's a terrible paradox for those who can borderline afford club class. Travel steerage, feel like shit; pay for club, feel a numpty disembarking 2 grand poorer for a not great night in a pretend bed and some not great champagne.
Having said that, off to Canada to climb Mt Assiniboine with my son.
I find that in my day-to-day life I'm absolutely surrounded by other people and required to engage in conversation with them.
Going traveling by myself removes the requirement to talk to people, which I find enormously liberating. Plus, I get to read a good book without being interruped.
And if I really want a fight conversation, there's always pb.
The way to deal with it would be to go to a country and book some driving lessons there, perhaps?
I suspect PB would prefer I refrain from details, but I re-iterate: porn has gone to shit.
Also, this is where America is great - because they are some of the friendliest people on earth and they speak English and they will confess the most insane shit off the bat
Sit down at a bar in Jackson Mississippi and within 20 minutes someone will tell you about their stage 3 anal cancer or the fact their wife is shagging the neighbour, then you tell your story and you buy each other a drink and off you go
Also: try and travel with a purpose if you are travelling alone. Maybe rediscover your roots, a weird branch of the family tree, chase up some personal obsession - music, art, history - once you have a goal then solo travel again becomes easier. And always keep moving
Darcy: 'I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.'
Elizabeth:'My fingers do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many women's do. They have not the same force or rapidity, and do not produce the same expression. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault -- because I would not take the trouble of practicing
Some of us here are introverted 40 year old guys who happen to live half way around the world, and are more than happy to share a beer with random acquaintances passing by or passing through.
I’m kinda glad you’ve confirmed I’m not imagining it
Everyone has something they're frightened or scared of. Even, I guess, you (or at least one of your identities).
I would put it down to habit. Same as lots of other things. I don’t go to the pub much these days. Why? No obvious reason, I always enjoy it when I do, but I got out of the habit.
I’ve recently been strong-arming the family into getting back into longer haul holidays after the regular French home trips of younger childhood, but breaking the habit takes effort.
Habit. We tend to do what we’ve always done.
I was being tongue in cheek, but your reaction that is impossible because they are iconic I think is based on hope more than reality. Loads of once iconic stuff is not watched much anymore.
I may not be a typical moviegoer, though I do go the cinema a lot more than the average person, and I enjoy watching older films. I've watched just recently some old John Wayne movies, some Cary Grant movies, Humphrey Bogart, and more. Yet I've never see It's a Wonderful Life, Citizen Kane, or many other iconic films.
Others will have seen those but not the ones I have seen. Lots of people will think of Kirk Douglas as Michael Douglas' dad, rather than for his iconic film roles. They won't know who Errol Flynn was. Especially if there was another modern actor or director with the same name who was really accomplished much more recently.
This is the essence of it. Be interested. It shouldn’t be hard. And be prepared to be honest about your own life in response. Give ans receive
i agree: this stuff can be learned. Indeed it should be learned. It is a notable life skill
And as native English speakers we have a HUGE advantage over most of the world. Terrible shame to waste it
I suspect my porn-viewing has always been well below average (but what is average???).
But one of the reasons it is, lately, essentially zero is because porn is now quite rubbish.
For men, the problem is the easy availability of porn means their drive for sexual gratification is fulfilled in a less rejection-filled environment. App dating is incredibly bruising to the ego because of all those rejections, and their drive to overcome those rejection is temporarily filled (albeit in an unfulfilling way) with a few mouse clicks.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-64640215
But that's not the fault of the Tories. That's Labour deciding to be pig-ignorant twats.
Incidentally this probably means Labour have lost any chance (which to be fair, was never very high) of retaking Ynys Môn given the current state of the road bridges and the desperate need for better road links to the mainland.
It's quite flabbergasting that anyone could say with a straight face that road improvements mustn't lead to higher speeds. No wonder they've cocked up the Heads of the Valleys.
If that’s your thing.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-death-penalty-firing-squad-executions-1234679447/
"Trump Plans to Bring Back Firing Squads, Group Executions if He Retakes White House"
Makes it sound like training for sociopaths or aliens.
Hello fellow hu-man, I am come from the kingdom of united, may we speak of the kickball game last night?
The theme park at Sydenham* is a mite antiquated, especially given the competition.
https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g293940-d20318222-Reviews-Dinosaurs_Alive-Phnom_Penh.html#
As for real ones ...
https://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/koh-kong-specimen-kingdoms-first-confirmed-dinosaur-fossil
*which is great, really - https://cpdinosaurs.org/
The food is generally excellent. The Prado is a must. But also take in the Thyssen collection - top notch modern art. Tapas on the Plaza Mayor is grand
But for me the one world class unbeatable Madrid experience is just outside of town. The Escorial. Catholicism meets Fascism and becomes Architecture. It is astounding
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Escorial
You can easily do it in a day trip
Also, I very much hope Trump's zeal for capital punishment is not related to a petty love of exercising direct power (eg I said he should die, and so he did), though the numbers are striking.
The former president’s zeal for the death penalty has already proven lethal. During the final months of his administration, he oversaw the executions of 13 federal prisoners. Since 1963, only three federal prisoners had been executed, including Oklahoma City bomber and mass murderer Timothy McVeigh. In January 2021, in the final stretch before Biden would become president, Trump oversaw three executions in four days.
(Mandatory Gosport bit: The Submarine museum in the town has several "this is what it's like to live here" bits; oily smells and all that. Including a bunk with a 80s style gentleman's magazine.)
(btw I’m mildly surprised you haven’t been touched by the 15-min city conspiracy theory.)
Back in nomadic days who actually said “shit it gets dark early here. Let’s go further north!”
NEW: Lee Anderson has said the Tories will only win if they fight the next election on the "trans debate"
FFS. These are human beings. The man is pathetic.
London, Rome and probably Vienna outclass Madrid by a distance
No museum in the world can match the Louvre, but that is because the French decided to put so much of their best shit in one museum, the Louvre. The Musee d’Orsay is mightily impressive; the Pompidou is fun
London is more diverse and dispersed. The National Gallery is tiny compared to the Louvre but it has amazing masterpieces. the British Museum is OMG. Tate Modern and Tate Britain are good
London then comes up with these tiny brilliant galleries which would be world famous elsewhere. The Wallace. Dulwich. The Courtauld. Kenwood. Even the Sir John Soane
in totality it is hard to choose between London,New York and Paris as to which has the best art/artefacts . They outclass any other cities, I’d put Rome next, then Vienna, then maybe Madrid or Florence
And if you feel slighted you shouldn't. I didn’t mean YOU lug your rigid world view and set of prejudices around the globe, along with your laptop, phone, credit card and a change of clothing.
But it's an interesting question - what 'broadens the mind'? It's got me thinking. Will revert.
I also feel like he's constantly trying to prove how Tory he is, perhaps a bit self conscious about being a recent convert.
I've never travelled in any class other than Economy, but I can't imagine Premium Economy offering significant relief. It would have to be a lay-flat Business seat, and that's never happening. Affording it is one thing - being able to justify spending the money rather than saving it is quite another.
IMO, talking to a variety of people; and that can be in your own street as much as around the world. Talking matters much more than reading.
I was thinking about Marxism recently. In the late 19th and early 20th century, a load of middle-class intellectuals read Marx and said: "Hey, that's what the people need!" Of course, they didn't actually go and talk and listen to the hoi polloi about their needs, because they *knew* what they needed.
A while back, someone on PB said they hated supermarkets because they had to talk to people at checkouts. I actually find that one of the more interesting parts of it, because sometimes you learn stuff. Like the one a while back who kept bees. Or the one whose brother lives on nothing but Dominos Pizzas. Or the one who was studying cosmology.
But it's actually not talking that matters; it's listening. Talk enough to open people enough, and then listen. Most people have an interesting story or three to tell.