I am often puzzled by modern life.

Saw him on the news talking about pathology when he meant symptoms. Doh! I too remember cottage hospitals and their being closed to allow bigger, more efficient specialist units centralised in hospitals with no recognition of the expertise and convenience the cottage hospitals offered.

My usual SM has two quiet periods a week with lights halved, no music, no announcements. There is also a devoted checkout for people with disabilities and pregnant mums and another for people who like to chat.

It has a decent loyalty system too and so far we are up 260€ since Jan 1st. We'll keep that for Xmas and NY goodies. We don't buy ultra or even highly processed foods apart from HP sauce for t'other pair. We eat seasonally and locally as much as possible except for avocadoes and bananas.

Given what's happened in the USA with DOGE gathering personal data for nefarious purposes I'd be quite worried about the security of any DNA or fingerprint info getting into the wrong hands but, for the purposes of finding potential tissue donors as well as apprehending criminals, I'm all for a national database as long as politicians and MI5 on current form cannot get near it.

 

Seems like Trees just can't win these days - chop 'em down, get a celeb or Royal to plant new ones, have a drought so no water for them and they die. I suppose at least they'll be in the right place for a burial tho. Mind boggles.

 

Land of hope and glory….

 

That really is a well deserved Whaaat x 10

 

We are slowly sliding into a very very unpleasant situation.

 

What a funny old world we are living in. Lamp posts dressed up as gardens.

'Living pillars' to be installed on Derby city centre lamp-posts

 

I wouldn't say we are slowly sliding towards - racing towards may be a better description

 

As ever, it seems, police education, along with their political and social awareness, is sadly lacking.

On the other hand, they are also dealing with an increasingmy unpleasant aspect of the general population. The Guardian has revealed, after a FOI request, that 40% of the rioters arrested in the wake of the attack in Southport last year have also been reported for domestic abuse which makes them the kind of people who go looking for weakness to exploit and harass.

Two in five arrested for last summer’s UK riots had been reported for domestic abuse

 

Some do. Rent-a-mobs have been happening since the Middle Ages. But these days it is really hard to say who is a genuine protestor, who is there for the kicks, who has been paid to be there by opposing groups to make it look like there is pushback, and, crucially, whether the media is giving an accurate, unbiased account or following an agenda. And who is funding that agenda? And why? And so on.

 

When I was growing up W H Smiths wouldn't stock Private Eye.

 

As for Southampton Airport I did like the comment "you cannot replace mature trees overnight"
I'd suggest that each seat had a maximum weight assigned as follows (desired take off weight -plane, crew and fuel weight)/number of seats available. Each passenger and their luggage would then have an assigned weight and the passenger would have to choose to diet and take more luggage or less luggage and travel on a full stomach.

 

When I used to travel for work, it slightly irritated me that we would have to pay excess baggage if I needed to take heavy work stuff (batches of printed reports etc, before everything was electronic), even though me plus all my luggage weighted less (sometimes a lot less) than some other passengers before even adding their luggage into the equation.

 

Martin Rowson’s take on the Alaska meeting. Marvellous.