It might turn out that Charles was meant to be (whatever that means), or rather his lot was to have been a great Prince of Wales and not a king of any sort.
Scottish First Minister Humza Yousef says he will not be announcing his resignation. He’s confident he can win the no confidence vote. Going by his previous predictions that means he’s toast.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
I didn’t understand the cups until I used one five minutes ago. They work, weirdly. Why?
Also: how come the cider is so much better? What do they do? Or is it one of those “in the place” things: the gastronomic equivalent of noom?
Is Quimper not going to the dogs like Paris?
Absolutely not. It feels highly prosperous and I haven’t seen a single empty shop in the main town
It surely helps that Quimper has an exceptionally lovely centre with a sequence of charming squares and covered markets, riverside walks and the cathedral plaza at the heart of it all. This is a gorgeous town
And now I’m off to buy weird old pottery and then onwards to the wilds of CROZON
Chalk & cheese then by the sounds of it. Btw I've worked out what went on between you and your organ viz the putative "Paris to the dogs" article. Slightly reprehensible but I've decided to drop it.
You really haven’t. I went to Paris. I wasn’t expecting to find a story in Paris. But I did. You and @TOPPING are free to disagree with my findings, but my emotional reaction was honest
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
It might turn out that Charles was meant to be (whatever that means), or rather his lot was to have been a great Prince of Wales and not a king of any sort.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
I didn’t understand the cups until I used one five minutes ago. They work, weirdly. Why?
Also: how come the cider is so much better? What do they do? Or is it one of those “in the place” things: the gastronomic equivalent of noom?
Is Quimper not going to the dogs like Paris?
Absolutely not. It feels highly prosperous and I haven’t seen a single empty shop in the main town
It surely helps that Quimper has an exceptionally lovely centre with a sequence of charming squares and covered markets, riverside walks and the cathedral plaza at the heart of it all. This is a gorgeous town
And now I’m off to buy weird old pottery and then onwards to the wilds of CROZON
Chalk & cheese then by the sounds of it. Btw I've worked out what went on between you and your organ viz the putative "Paris to the dogs" article. Slightly reprehensible but I've decided to drop it.
You really haven’t. I went to Paris. I wasn’t expecting to find a story in Paris. But I did. You and @TOPPING are free to disagree with my findings, but my emotional reaction was honest
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
Ah Paris. What a fantastic place. I'm still thinking about the charcuterie I bought from that little shop on Rue des Acacias.
But in hugely surprising news, Speccie readers find that there aren't enough signs in English or British "pubs" and hence deem that it has gone to the dogs.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
The cups are quite good fun, in a that's-what-you-do-because-it's-what-you-do way. But I maintain that Breton cider is not context dependent - it is utterly delicious in any circumstance and out of any reasonable vessel.
So now Humza didn’t mean to upset the Greens and wants to be friends again. You couldn’t make this up.
Sadly I think it’s clear that Humza is just making it up as he goes along. Unfortunately political leadership is the least susceptible to winging it. I suspect even if he contrives to win the confidence vote it’s not going give him much comfort.
What are disclosure requirements for such a statutory enquiry (assuming I have the correct phrase)? Do witnesses get to see the evidence before the public display, as in a Court Case?
Is "Angela van den Bogerd shown letter blaming PO for sub-postmaster's death" a potential Perry Mason moment in a forum such as this enquiry, or are they impossible?
God knows. The evidence so far from those involved seems to be fulsome apology, usually read from script, and then failure to remember anything damning.
The said apology being a pro-forma non-apology. "I am really sorry that bad stuff happened to an NPC. It was nothing to do with me or any responsibility of mine..."
Can we state, formally, that the NU10K thesis is proved? We have people who were on a million a year, who deny all knowledge of the organisation they were running.
I think this is a consequence of flatter management structures, where the business reduces the amount of senior and middle managers, and increases the scope and responsibilities of those who remain, with the tempter of a bit more money for the job. Those with any integrity recognise that they are, or will be, out of their depth with an impossible job to do, and get out when they can, leaving the less competent and/or more venal ones behind to carry on (not) steering the ship
Bollocks.
I'm pretty well a computer tech ignoramus, but it was bloody obvious a decade ago, just from reading a few Computer Weekly stories, what the problem was likely to be. To remain in ignorance of it when all this was you direct managerial responsibility, even allowing for a strong dash of plain stupidity, can really only be dishonesty.
Well, quite. As I said, anyone with integrity would have fled, or at least refused to participate in this charade. I do think it's likely that those involved were juggling many other responsibilities, and dealing with all that other stuff may well have been the attractive easy option, rather than sticking your neck above the parapet to deal with the rather obvious car crash of a situation that Horizon turned out to be. Especially when the culture of the organisation appears to be such that disagreeing with the prevailing stated opinion that there was nothing wrong with Horizon was likely to result in your removal from the organisation.
Never mind the Post Office, what does this tell us about criminal justice? What happened to "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" and "beyond reasonable doubt"? The failure by the courts and the defense teams is equivalent to a hospital amputating the wrong leg in 100 consecutive operations. Who in future is going to accept a conviction as evidence of guilt?
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
It totally did. Just happened when I least expected it. Isn’t that always the case with Noom?
I’ve come to the famous faience pottery factory on the outskirts of Quimper. Turns out there is a 10th century abbey here (possibly dating back to the 7th century). Right next to the 17th century factory - still used
It’s great. It’s bare and big and simple and - dunno - noomy. Also it would have been used by Breton locals since 700AD - singing and praying in Breton. ie Cornish. I am in Cornouaille
It has superbly bad primitive grave stones. Love these
It’s not world class noom but it’s probably the most I’ve felt on this trip by a distance. Why? I wonder if it’s the proximity of the historic factory - still going. All those centuries of workers praying, and maybe some still do
I wonder if that somehow keeps the noom going, like turning over an engine in the winter
I am completely ignoring your Mean Girls reference because I am the Brian Boru of Smarter than You
What an unedifying spectacle . Yousaf could have avoided all this by simply coming to a joint decision with the Greens to dissolve their agreement.
Instead he tried to look tough by firing the two cabinet members and then acting as if he could just ignore the fact that the SNP don’t have a majority .
Now he’s getting the begging bowl out and looks desperate .
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
I didn’t understand the cups until I used one five minutes ago. They work, weirdly. Why?
Also: how come the cider is so much better? What do they do? Or is it one of those “in the place” things: the gastronomic equivalent of noom?
Is Quimper not going to the dogs like Paris?
Absolutely not. It feels highly prosperous and I haven’t seen a single empty shop in the main town
It surely helps that Quimper has an exceptionally lovely centre with a sequence of charming squares and covered markets, riverside walks and the cathedral plaza at the heart of it all. This is a gorgeous town
And now I’m off to buy weird old pottery and then onwards to the wilds of CROZON
Chalk & cheese then by the sounds of it. Btw I've worked out what went on between you and your organ viz the putative "Paris to the dogs" article. Slightly reprehensible but I've decided to drop it.
You really haven’t. I went to Paris. I wasn’t expecting to find a story in Paris. But I did. You and @TOPPING are free to disagree with my findings, but my emotional reaction was honest
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
Hmm, is that the sequence or have you tinkered with it slightly? Any case, doesn't matter, the end result is the same. An article saying multicultural Paris has become a bit of a toilet. You and the strongly dissenting Topping can't both be Jay Rayners of Place so I'll just have to reserve judgment till somebody I trust on the left of politics visits and reports back.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
The cups are quite good fun, in a that's-what-you-do-because-it's-what-you-do way. But I maintain that Breton cider is not context dependent - it is utterly delicious in any circumstance and out of any reasonable vessel.
Have to disagree, it tastes far superior out of the cups to the point I ended up buying loads a while ago as glass just didn’t work as well. I am however weird in that I cannot stand drinking tea out of a fat mug, needs to be thin China and prefer coffee out of a thicker China cup or mug.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
Scottish First Minister Humza Yousef says he will not be announcing his resignation. He’s confident he can win the no confidence vote. Going by his previous predictions that means he’s toast.
I suggest that these outcomes suit enough Scottish politicans to be brought about:
That the SNP continue in government (because only Labour can gain from an election right now)
That Yousef continue as lame duck FM (because the alternative, Forbes or anyone else, would be worse for the rival parties).
The only thing that will alter this is in the FM resigns (which he should) because he has had enough. He won't be forced out.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
A big predictor of noom, as in numinousness, is a still existing site of former crowded significance, now abandoned. Castlerigg has it, Stonehenge not; abandoned sports stadia are a modern secular equivalent of the numinous religious sites.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
They used to fill the cabins with extra fuel tanks to give the old 727s the range to fly across the Atlantic for delivery.
On the figures you present it doesn't look like they'd have to sacrifice much room for the extra range - but this is all just one of O'Leary's daft comments to get attention which works so well for him and Ryanair - 13.6m passengers last month, compared to 10.9m in March 2019.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Noom is definitely happening because in one easy and malleable syllable it capture a complex but important concept: the experience of the sacred in place
Even if no one else ever uses it in the history of time I shall use it here and in my head. Because it fits. And also because I am the Carolus Rex of Lexical Coinery
Jay Rayner of Place is a jest. Tho you have just used it twice
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
Scotland's First Minister Humza Yousaf says ending the power-sharing deal with the Scottish Greens was the right thing to do but he did not mean to upset or anger the party. Is anyone else hearing strains of 'Jealous Guy'?
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
I didn’t understand the cups until I used one five minutes ago. They work, weirdly. Why?
Also: how come the cider is so much better? What do they do? Or is it one of those “in the place” things: the gastronomic equivalent of noom?
Is Quimper not going to the dogs like Paris?
Absolutely not. It feels highly prosperous and I haven’t seen a single empty shop in the main town
It surely helps that Quimper has an exceptionally lovely centre with a sequence of charming squares and covered markets, riverside walks and the cathedral plaza at the heart of it all. This is a gorgeous town
And now I’m off to buy weird old pottery and then onwards to the wilds of CROZON
Chalk & cheese then by the sounds of it. Btw I've worked out what went on between you and your organ viz the putative "Paris to the dogs" article. Slightly reprehensible but I've decided to drop it.
You really haven’t. I went to Paris. I wasn’t expecting to find a story in Paris. But I did. You and @TOPPING are free to disagree with my findings, but my emotional reaction was honest
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
Hmm, is that the sequence or have you tinkered with it slightly? Any case, doesn't matter, the end result is the same. An article saying multicultural Paris has become a bit of a toilet. You and the strongly dissenting Topping can't both be Jay Rayners of Place so I'll just have to reserve judgment till somebody I trust on the left of politics visits and reports back.
Have I understood your comment correctly? You think that the spectator did a hit job on Paris because it’s multicultural?
The spectator based in London, multicultural London, sent a writer who lives in multicultural London who loves travelling the corners of the world with their many cultures, to have a go at Paris for being multicultural and choosing to send him to the least multicultural part of Paris rather than sending him to the banlieus where he could get all the worst experiences on camera and noted?
Has the writer also written about places which aren’t remotely multicultural also being toilets? I’m sure he has but correct me if I’m wrong.
What an unedifying spectacle . Yousaf could have avoided all this by simply coming to a joint decision with the Greens to dissolve their agreement.
Instead he tried to look tough by firing the two cabinet members and then acting as if he could just ignore the fact that the SNP don’t have a majority .
Now he’s getting the begging bowl out and looks desperate .
They weren't cabinet members.
I can't stand Patrick Harvie, he is one of the most annoying people on the planet that I am personally aware of but his question yesterday at FMQs was spot on. He asked who of Alec Salmond or Douglas Ross would be most pleased by Yousaf's decision to terminate the Bute House Agreement and which of these gentlemen were planning to give him a majority.
Both sides seem to have calmed down a bit today and it is not impossible that Humpty Dumpty will be put back together again but it will remain another truly bizarre episode in Yousaf's premiership.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
What international law? They could refuel at Akrotiri or some corrupt shit hole like Libya.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
I suspect that a half loaded (at best) plane with next to no luggage might have a slightly longer range?
If not, Parliament could simply pass another Act declaring they have enough fuel.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
What international law? They could refuel at Akrotiri or some corrupt shit hole like Libya.
Land at Tripoli and sell the passengers to the Libyan Coastguard's Agricultural Labour division.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
What international law? They could refuel at Akrotiri or some corrupt shit hole like Libya.
Should we anticipate the "Khartoum is a perfectly safe place to refuel Bill (2024)" to be emergency legislation necessitating the recall of Parliament over the summer recess?
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
I suspect that a half loaded (at best) plane with next to no luggage might have a slightly longer range?
If not, Parliament could simply pass another Act declaring they have enough fuel.
The briefcases of non-sequential used hundred dollar bills for payment of the Rwandan government might weigh a bit.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
I've been all over the place, since 1997, my first GE.
1997 Lab 2001 LD 2005 LD 2010 Con 2015 Lab 2017 Con 2019 Con
The look for the weekend sorted lads. I'll whisper it, but you don't even have to (checks notes) spend $600 to pull it off.
The true under the railway bridge in the Saltmarket, or perhaps Glasgow Green shrubbery, ambience. Just needs some White Lightning, or for the real nostalgics, electric milk, as an accessory.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
That is a brillliant observation.
Saying I’m like “two characters in the Fast Show is a”…. *brilliant observation*?
As long as you’re all talking about me I’m happy. I’m psychotically narcissistic. But you can surely raise the intellectual bar a bit higher than that
The sun how now properly come out in the Breton countryside. 20C and gorgeous - this is spring. Spring at last!
The singer Billie Eilish (born 2001) says that she never learned to type because she wasn't from "that generation". It used to be assumed that children would always be more technically literate than their parents, but that is going into reverse.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
I've been all over the place, since 1997, my first GE.
1997 Lab 2001 LD 2005 LD 2010 Con 2015 Lab 2017 Con 2019 Con
"Woman admits murdering and burying her boyfriend in Northampton Fiona Beal, 50, changes her plea mid-trial over the fatal stabbing of Nicholas Billingham, 42, in 2021"
The singer Billie Eilish (born 2001) says that she never learned to type because she wasn't from "that generation". It used to be assumed that children would always be more technically literate than their parents, but that is going into reverse.
Listening to Shelagh Fogarty's callers on LBC are safe. There is very much the notion that Labour and the Tories are one single right wing cabal in Scotland.
The look for the weekend sorted lads. I'll whisper it, but you don't even have to (checks notes) spend $600 to pull it off.
The true under the railway bridge in the Saltmarket, or perhaps Glasgow Green shrubbery, ambience. Just needs some White Lightning, or for the real nostalgics, electric milk, as an accessory.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
That is a brillliant observation.
Saying I’m like “two characters in the Fast Show is a”…. *brilliant observation*?
As long as you’re all talking about me I’m happy. I’m psychotically narcissistic. But you can surely raise the intellectual bar a bit higher than that
The sun how now properly come out in the Breton countryside. 20C and gorgeous - this is spring. Spring at last!
Allez!
Sunny in London, too, believe it or not! Vaguely warm!
Listening to Shelagh Fogarty's callers on LBC are safe. There is very much the notion that Labour and the Tories are one single right wing cabal in Scotland.
Listening to LBC it’s mostly an SNP love-in .
Which doesn’t really correlate with current polling.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
Where I live is safe for Labour, at both local and Parliamentary level.
The last time we had any excitement was when my local councillor, Aysegel Gurbuz, was made to resign in 2016, after posting messages on social media, in praise of Hitler, and urging Iran to wipe Israel off the map.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
I've been all over the place, since 1997, my first GE.
1997 Lab 2001 LD 2005 LD 2010 Con 2015 Lab 2017 Con 2019 Con
2024 Hamas
Hamas don't stand for election, or at least not since 2006...
The look for the weekend sorted lads. I'll whisper it, but you don't even have to (checks notes) spend $600 to pull it off.
The true under the railway bridge in the Saltmarket, or perhaps Glasgow Green shrubbery, ambience. Just needs some White Lightning, or for the real nostalgics, electric milk, as an accessory.
Or watching the Jambos doon Gorgie tbf.
Yes, Edinburgh also has its share of that style, especially when the modellers were still living in the Grassmarket dosshouse, the one opposite the Connolly plaque. Though Glasgow was always much more at the cutting edge of fashion.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
The cups are quite good fun, in a that's-what-you-do-because-it's-what-you-do way. But I maintain that Breton cider is not context dependent - it is utterly delicious in any circumstance and out of any reasonable vessel.
Certainly true from my recall, too. I only visited briefly, but the cider was VERY good.
What are disclosure requirements for such a statutory enquiry (assuming I have the correct phrase)? Do witnesses get to see the evidence before the public display, as in a Court Case?
Is "Angela van den Bogerd shown letter blaming PO for sub-postmaster's death" a potential Perry Mason moment in a forum such as this enquiry, or are they impossible?
God knows. The evidence so far from those involved seems to be fulsome apology, usually read from script, and then failure to remember anything damning.
The said apology being a pro-forma non-apology. "I am really sorry that bad stuff happened to an NPC. It was nothing to do with me or any responsibility of mine..."
Can we state, formally, that the NU10K thesis is proved? We have people who were on a million a year, who deny all knowledge of the organisation they were running.
I think this is a consequence of flatter management structures, where the business reduces the amount of senior and middle managers, and increases the scope and responsibilities of those who remain, with the tempter of a bit more money for the job. Those with any integrity recognise that they are, or will be, out of their depth with an impossible job to do, and get out when they can, leaving the less competent and/or more venal ones behind to carry on (not) steering the ship
Bollocks.
I'm pretty well a computer tech ignoramus, but it was bloody obvious a decade ago, just from reading a few Computer Weekly stories, what the problem was likely to be. To remain in ignorance of it when all this was you direct managerial responsibility, even allowing for a strong dash of plain stupidity, can really only be dishonesty.
Well, quite. As I said, anyone with integrity would have fled, or at least refused to participate in this charade. I do think it's likely that those involved were juggling many other responsibilities, and dealing with all that other stuff may well have been the attractive easy option, rather than sticking your neck above the parapet to deal with the rather obvious car crash of a situation that Horizon turned out to be. Especially when the culture of the organisation appears to be such that disagreeing with the prevailing stated opinion that there was nothing wrong with Horizon was likely to result in your removal from the organisation.
Never mind the Post Office, what does this tell us about criminal justice? What happened to "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" and "beyond reasonable doubt"? The failure by the courts and the defense teams is equivalent to a hospital amputating the wrong leg in 100 consecutive operations. Who in future is going to accept a conviction as evidence of guilt?
It's clear from this debacle that if the prosecution side withhold exculpatory evidence, that only they have access to, it's very hard for a case to be defended
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
I've been all over the place, since 1997, my first GE.
1997 Lab 2001 LD 2005 LD 2010 Con 2015 Lab 2017 Con 2019 Con
2024 Hamas
Hamas don't stand for election, or at least not since 2006...
1997 being the one time I was actually in a competitive seat. Which unbeknownst to me was competitive for the Lib Dems, and they won (Oxford West & Abingdon).
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
Ah yes. Bullseye. You are the Heston Blumenthal of Astuteness.
I had a genius conversation with the creperie waiter just now
Me: “Do you have cider?”
Waiter, shrugging: “Only one”
Pause
Waiter (still shrugging): “It is the best”
And he’s right. As is @Cookie. Breton cider is fantastic. That’s possibly the best cider I’ve ever had. If we had cider that good in Britain I might actually drink it
Drinking Breton cider from one of those slightly porous-feeling cups is one of my most treasured childhood memories.
I didn’t understand the cups until I used one five minutes ago. They work, weirdly. Why?
Also: how come the cider is so much better? What do they do? Or is it one of those “in the place” things: the gastronomic equivalent of noom?
Is Quimper not going to the dogs like Paris?
Absolutely not. It feels highly prosperous and I haven’t seen a single empty shop in the main town
It surely helps that Quimper has an exceptionally lovely centre with a sequence of charming squares and covered markets, riverside walks and the cathedral plaza at the heart of it all. This is a gorgeous town
And now I’m off to buy weird old pottery and then onwards to the wilds of CROZON
Chalk & cheese then by the sounds of it. Btw I've worked out what went on between you and your organ viz the putative "Paris to the dogs" article. Slightly reprehensible but I've decided to drop it.
You really haven’t. I went to Paris. I wasn’t expecting to find a story in Paris. But I did. You and @TOPPING are free to disagree with my findings, but my emotional reaction was honest
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
Hmm, is that the sequence or have you tinkered with it slightly? Any case, doesn't matter, the end result is the same. An article saying multicultural Paris has become a bit of a toilet. You and the strongly dissenting Topping can't both be Jay Rayners of Place so I'll just have to reserve judgment till somebody I trust on the left of politics visits and reports back.
Have I understood your comment correctly? You think that the spectator did a hit job on Paris because it’s multicultural?
The spectator based in London, multicultural London, sent a writer who lives in multicultural London who loves travelling the corners of the world with their many cultures, to have a go at Paris for being multicultural and choosing to send him to the least multicultural part of Paris rather than sending him to the banlieus where he could get all the worst experiences on camera and noted?
Has the writer also written about places which aren’t remotely multicultural also being toilets? I’m sure he has but correct me if I’m wrong.
You see what gets triggered "btl" if the notorious piece gets published. PB's Leon didn't get to where he is today without knowing his market.
On the old boundaries 420 seats=losing none and adding 218 seats. The 218th target seat is Derbyshire Dales, requiring a swing of 17.43%; the majority is 18,797.
I don't think so, but it's not impossible.
17-18% is the ballpark swing we are seeing at the moment. And whilst there ought, surely, to be some swingback towards the government, we've all been saying that for a year or so and there's no sign of it yet. If anything, there is continuing swingaway.
It is crazy to imagine Labour gaining 200+ seats in one go, especially given that SKS is worthy but dull. But looked at from a different direction, it's crazy to imagine the Conservatives successfully defending 200 seats.
And something like one of those two crazy things has to happen, because the number of MPs has to total 650.
Swingback to the Government tends to occur during the months leading up to the announcement of an election. Beyond that point - during the election campaign itself - swingback has often gone into reverse. That was the case in 1959 - 1964 - 1966 - 1970 - both 1974 elections - 1987 -2001 - 2005 - 2017. 1983 also saw a fall in the Tory vote during the campaign although the Labour vote also fell to the benefit of the Alliance.Methodological Polling issues make analysis of both the 1992 and 2015 elections difficult given the general consensus that the Tories were clearly ahead throughout.
In 1997, lots of Tories could see the change was happening - and wanted to be part of what Blair was offering.
That level of enthusiasm isn't there for Starmer in 2024.
It isn't. But I'd suggest that the incumbent government is held in lower esteem than in 1997.
Which difference is the larger and more important? That's a trickier question.
How much are elections about voting for the thing we like and are enthusiastic about, and how much are they about voting against the thing we dislike, hate or fear?
I suspect that there's a lot more of the second than we might like to think. From an academic point of view, it's quite kind of the big two parties to put someone bland against someone hopeless so that we can probe what happens in that bit of the graph.
I will be voting Tory for the first time in three GEs because I fear the idea of a huge Labour majority when such a large part of that party was, until comparatively recently, the party of Corbyn.
Yet you didn't vote Tory when Labour actually was the party of Corbyn?
The ‘unaligned’ PB Tories are some of my favourites.
How dare you call me a Tory, I’ve only voted Conservative on 9 out of 11 possible occasions, and the last 2 times Jezza made me do it.
They are the country cousins of the Never Trump-Butters
Somewhat surprisingly, I've not voted Conservative since 2017. In 2019, I voted independent in the locals, Brexit in the Euros, and for Gavin Shuker at the GE. Last year, I again voted independent in the locals.
2005 for me. And that was only because the candidate was a personal friend.
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
I've been all over the place, since 1997, my first GE.
1997 Lab 2001 LD 2005 LD 2010 Con 2015 Lab 2017 Con 2019 Con
2024 Hamas
Hamas don't stand for election, or at least not since 2006...
1997 being the one time I was actually in a competitive seat. Which unbeknownst to me was competitive for the Lib Dems, and they won (Oxford West & Abingdon).
My record is: 1983: Con (Navy brat, living in Gosport, post-Falklands, what else?) 1987: Alliance (>LibDem, not the Northern Ireland one) 1992: LD 1997: LD 2001: LD 2005: LD (( was the candidate) 2010: LD (ditto) 2015: Green (ditto) 2017: Green 2019: Green
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Noom is definitely happening because in one easy and malleable syllable it capture a complex but important concept: the experience of the sacred in place
Even if no one else ever uses it in the history of time I shall use it here and in my head. Because it fits. And also because I am the Carolus Rex of Lexical Coinery
Jay Rayner of Place is a jest. Tho you have just used it twice
No I sense you were being deadly serious. You think you are the Jay Rayner of Place. I have a nose for when people are kidding around and when they're not.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
That is a brillliant observation.
Saying I’m like “two characters in the Fast Show is a”…. *brilliant observation*?
As long as you’re all talking about me I’m happy. I’m psychotically narcissistic. But you can surely raise the intellectual bar a bit higher than that
The sun how now properly come out in the Breton countryside. 20C and gorgeous - this is spring. Spring at last!
Allez!
If it's Fast Show, I think of you more as the guy who likes to announce all the wonderful things he has done.
If I should sit, and do some graffiti Then there's some bench in foreign field That is forever Cymru. There shall be On that wood some writing unconcealed By a tit Wales bore, shaped, made unaware Gave once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam A body of Wales's, mouth-breathing Wales's air But alas, the mind not, blest by sense at home
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Always worth keeping in mind that Leon is a hybrid of two Fast Show characters: the Paul Whitehouse teenager who went around saying whatever was in front of him was 'brilliant!', and the Charlie Higson one who was perfectly placid and cultured until triggered into destructive depression by a single word. There is no grey in Leon's world.
That is a brillliant observation.
Saying I’m like “two characters in the Fast Show is a”…. *brilliant observation*?
As long as you’re all talking about me I’m happy. I’m psychotically narcissistic. But you can surely raise the intellectual bar a bit higher than that
The sun how now properly come out in the Breton countryside. 20C and gorgeous - this is spring. Spring at last!
Allez!
If it's Fast Show, I think of you more as the guy who likes to announce all the wonderful things he has done.
"Which was nice...."
(Although maybe not the beige polo neck....)
Beige polo neck just says "Nice!" after each musical item.
Stop trying to make noom happen. It's not going to happen.
And nor is the "Jay Rayner of Place".
Noom is definitely happening because in one easy and malleable syllable it capture a complex but important concept: the experience of the sacred in place
Even if no one else ever uses it in the history of time I shall use it here and in my head. Because it fits. And also because I am the Carolus Rex of Lexical Coinery
Jay Rayner of Place is a jest. Tho you have just used it twice
No I sense you were being deadly serious. You think you are the Jay Rayner of Place. I have a nose for when people are kidding around and when they're not.
London to Kigali: 6,590 km B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
What international law? They could refuel at Akrotiri or some corrupt shit hole like Libya.
Adding a refueling stop makes the trip much more expensive for Ryanair to operate, though. Every take-off/landing cycle adds to your maintenance cost. Given the frequency of the flights, it would almost certainly be cheaper to just lease a 757/767 for the ride - and there are plenty of high-density/low-cost ones of them available.
Comments
That's not a bad legacy to have.
Scottish First Minister Humza Yousef says he will not be announcing his resignation. He’s confident he can win the no confidence vote. Going by his previous predictions that means he’s toast.
So I pitched my Knappers Gazette article and you know what he said? He said this: “gosh, I was in Paris last week with my family and that’s exactly what we thought. Yes please write it”
Was he lying as well? Maybe. But there you go - that’s what happened. Or maybe I am lying about that as well and I have to send you our sequence of emails and messages
https://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2024-04/politbarometer-zdf-umfrage-europawahl
AfD down to joint third in the latest euro election poll
But in hugely surprising news, Speccie readers find that there aren't enough signs in English or British "pubs" and hence deem that it has gone to the dogs.
He was always pictured chewing on one to hide the Bell’s Palsy he got from a bad oxygen connection on a bombing raid over Germany.
https://aviationsourcenews.com/airline/ryanair-ceo-will-happily-offer-rwanda-deportation-flights
I’ve come to the famous faience pottery factory on the outskirts of Quimper. Turns out there is a 10th century abbey here (possibly dating back to the 7th century). Right next to the 17th century factory - still used
It’s great. It’s bare and big and simple and - dunno - noomy. Also it would have been used by Breton locals since 700AD - singing and praying in Breton. ie Cornish. I am in Cornouaille
It has superbly bad primitive grave stones. Love these
It’s not world class noom but it’s probably the most I’ve felt on this trip by a distance. Why? I wonder if it’s the proximity of the historic factory - still going. All those centuries of workers praying, and maybe some still do
I wonder if that somehow keeps the noom going, like turning over an engine in the winter
I am completely ignoring your Mean Girls reference because I am the Brian Boru of Smarter than You
Instead he tried to look tough by firing the two cabinet members and then acting as if he could just ignore the fact that the SNP don’t have a majority .
Now he’s getting the begging bowl out and looks desperate .
mensa, mensa, mensam, mensamus, mensatis menat
Caesar had some jam for tea, Pompey had a rat...
London to Kigali: 6,590 km
B737 Max8/200 range: 6,480 km
We have to assume that as these flights are illegal under international law than any flight would need to be point to point. And Ryanair wouldn't be able to just load one of these up at Stansted (other airports are available) and fly to Kigali - its too far.
That the SNP continue in government (because only Labour can gain from an election right now)
That Yousef continue as lame duck FM (because the alternative, Forbes or anyone else, would be worse for the rival parties).
The only thing that will alter this is in the FM resigns (which he should) because he has had enough. He won't be forced out.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/rvy_rLv1QY4
Caesar adsum iam forte, Brutus aderat
Caesar sic in omnibus, Brutus sic in at
On the figures you present it doesn't look like they'd have to sacrifice much room for the extra range - but this is all just one of O'Leary's daft comments to get attention which works so well for him and Ryanair - 13.6m passengers last month, compared to 10.9m in March 2019.
Even if no one else ever uses it in the history of time I shall use it here and in my head. Because it fits. And also because I am the Carolus Rex of Lexical Coinery
Jay Rayner of Place is a jest. Tho you have just used it twice
Is anyone else hearing strains of 'Jealous Guy'?
The spectator based in London, multicultural London, sent a writer who lives in multicultural London who loves travelling the corners of the world with their many cultures, to have a go at Paris for being multicultural and choosing to send him to the least multicultural part of Paris rather than sending him to the banlieus where he could get all the worst experiences on camera and noted?
Has the writer also written about places which aren’t remotely multicultural also being toilets? I’m sure he has but correct me if I’m wrong.
I can't stand Patrick Harvie, he is one of the most annoying people on the planet that I am personally aware of but his question yesterday at FMQs was spot on. He asked who of Alec Salmond or Douglas Ross would be most pleased by Yousaf's decision to terminate the Bute House Agreement and which of these gentlemen were planning to give him a majority.
Both sides seem to have calmed down a bit today and it is not impossible that Humpty Dumpty will be put back together again but it will remain another truly bizarre episode in Yousaf's premiership.
If not, Parliament could simply pass another Act declaring they have enough fuel.
http://www.noom-home.com
http://www.noom.com
Apart from that I only voted Tory once in my life - my first GE in 1987. Never voted Labour or Lib Dem either. My most common vote has been for spoiled ballot.
1997 Lab
2001 LD
2005 LD
2010 Con
2015 Lab
2017 Con
2019 Con
There was me thinking SLab were a separate entity that made its own decisions.
NOT REALLY!
As long as you’re all talking about me I’m happy. I’m psychotically narcissistic. But you can surely raise the intellectual bar a bit higher than that
The sun how now properly come out in the Breton countryside. 20C and gorgeous - this is spring. Spring at last!
Allez!
https://x.com/rollingstone/status/1783323796306608163
Fiona Beal, 50, changes her plea mid-trial over the fatal stabbing of Nicholas Billingham, 42, in 2021"
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/26/teacher-admits-murdering-burying-boyfriend-northampton
Which doesn’t really correlate with current polling.
The last time we had any excitement was when my local councillor, Aysegel Gurbuz, was made to resign in 2016, after posting messages on social media, in praise of Hitler, and urging Iran to wipe Israel off the map.
I only visited briefly, but the cider was VERY good.
Well I'd chose Victoria over Cherie, so I think he has done so. (Neither would choose me, of course, so it's all moot.)
1997: Lab
2001: LD
2005: LD
2010: LD
2015: LD
2017: LD
2019: LD
1997 being the one time I was actually in a competitive seat. Which unbeknownst to me was competitive for the Lib Dems, and they won (Oxford West & Abingdon).
At least the English won't get blamed
1983: Con (Navy brat, living in Gosport, post-Falklands, what else?)
1987: Alliance (>LibDem, not the Northern Ireland one)
1992: LD
1997: LD
2001: LD
2005: LD (( was the candidate)
2010: LD (ditto)
2015: Green (ditto)
2017: Green
2019: Green
"Which was nice...."
(Although maybe not the beige polo neck....)
"Two British men have been charged with helping Russian intelligence services after a suspected arson attack on a Ukraine-linked business in London."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-68899130
"It’s like 2011 Fianna Fáil. The public have stopped listening and it doesn’t matter what you do, nothing is going to make a dent in the polls."
In 2011 Fianna Fáil saw their share of the vote fall from 41.6% to 17.4%, and their seats fall from 77 to 20.
Then there's some bench in foreign field
That is forever Cymru. There shall be
On that wood some writing unconcealed
By a tit Wales bore, shaped, made unaware
Gave once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam
A body of Wales's, mouth-breathing Wales's air
But alas, the mind not, blest by sense at home
'A SCOTTISH Greens MSP has signalled he will not back Labour’s attempts to topple Humza Yousaf’s government.
Green MSP Mark Ruskell responded to Anas Sarwar’s announcement that Scottish Labour would table a confidence motion against the Scottish Government.
It comes after the Tories tabled a motion against the First Minister himself.
Ruskell said: “Labour clearly don’t want this motion to pass.
“It was the poor judgement of Humza [Yousaf] in ending the Bute House Agreement that is in question, not the record of the SNP/Green [government].”'