chrisp65

Is there a Labour one? don't know, don't follow any anti labour twitter accounts

ahhh, it's a children's computer game console

**** shavages

where the **** has everyone gone?

1st October Still sunny, still blue sky. I'm out of here and off down the beach for a coffee and a cake in 3...2...1...

you really don't know the process do you, your London kind typify the lack of understanding of the real world YOU tip away all your recycling in one box, this will include TV's that were too small, motorbikes that need a new tyre, cans, vibrating adult stress relief toys and newspapers etc.. All in one box. This is taken up the M1 to 'the north'. These people in the north are each given a consignment of southern rubbish every week. They might for instance, use the tv's, pack the motorbikes into containers sent from Hull to Nigeria, read last week's news and finish the crossword and strip down the other items into their component parts which they then put in the various bins outside their houses.

So do you tactically vote for the 'least bad' candidate in your area? So in scenario A: it's a straight labour / liberal seat so you vote against the party you least want - i.e. if you are a tory, you'd vote Liberal, you know how it works Scenario B: it's a three way between liberals, tories and ukip - if your a perpetual labour voter then perhaps you should be voting liberal here. To not vote at all is understandable in some ways, but can result in things being even worse than they could have been, it stops the moderating influence. Even a spoiled ballot gives some indication of discontent, having 'none of the above' added as last option on the ballot would be lovely but I don't see that happening any time soon. I wouldn't stay away from the polling station, but I would consider tactical voting or ballot spoiling. Put it like this, I'm in a labour / conservative constituency which has switched sides regularly, so tactical voting is important here. Votes for LibDem or Plaid are perfectly valid but they aren't going to win, they are just going to take a couple of thousand votes off the Labour total in a close vote. Lefties voting Libdem or Plaid could hand the seat to the tories... High ideals, or expediency?

I've mentioned it before, I think, but it's one of my fave stories so you're getting it again. Twenty five years ago when we had our first house it was quite literally the cheapest house in town and needed a vast amount of work which we carried out every time we got together a little bit of money. One day, the powers that be decided that the gas meter had to be changed. They came along, changed it and the shiny new meter was installed, set on zeros. Later that afternoon another member of the fantastic British Gas team came to give us our first gas reading. Which by that point was something like 00000002. Later that month we had a letter from British Gas saying with a useage of 000000002 we were due a rebate of £900 so they'd credited my bank account. We presumed they'd eventually work out their own error. They never did.

Yeah, recycle, it's good for everyone. I even do composting to reduce the amount of stuff in the food waste. I've also turned a pile of timber into a frog and bug haven. Oh yeah, my pond pump is solar powered and the used sawdust from the rabbit gets dug into the allotment.

It depends what you want from the place, as Tony says St Julians for a younger clubbier holiday - if cost isn't an issue stay at the Dragonara it's truly decent and modern. If you want a bit of old school charm, stay at the Phoenicia at the entrance to Valletta. Try and use one of the ancient buses in or out of the main bus terminus, that's as good as any funfair ride. Valletta is good for a bit of cafe people watching. If you do hire a car, make it the smallest cheapest thing you can find, it'll be easier to park and you will be king of the junctions where the rules are, flexible. If the weather is half decent it's worth going over to Gozo for a look, quiet with a nice coast line. Mdina is also quite nice for a quiet walk around. Sliema promenade for cafes, chips and kiss me quick brits abroad experience. I work over there a little bit, I'm back over at the end of the month, I like it but as Tony says, no one stand out wow feature.

yep used to be radio 5, now I just can't stand it 4 all the way.....and I suspect that means that you too might be? the 'comedy' show on at the moment is some bloke doing impersonations, you know it's not very good when he has to name each of his characters and he's doing the likes of Terry Wogan and Arnie Scwarzenegger

I think I've seen some of his fake doctor videos.

I think lots of men have problems with their self image and their ability to be brave and be what they want to be. It's a genuine problem and role models and education will help it, but its a problem with perception not law or the physical environment. The problem for women for a long time was that the whole state and society, the built environment, the law etc., was all geared to prevent them not only being what they wanted to be, but giving them the knowledge that other possibilities were out there. A man can become a nurse if he wants to, the midwife at my second daughter's birth was male and did a fine job. But for a very long time the basics of education for a female to be an engineer or a mechanic or a plasterer simply wouldn't have been there. School would have taught her home economics, a decent 1980's comp might even do a course on hairdressing. An obvious example for me would be the excellent working environment at GEAES. Years ago that would have been an uber male environment. High end engine maintenenace and all about lifting filthy oily bits of steel and torqueing up bolts teetering up a ladder with a chice of swarfega or carbolic in the bogs. But times have dramatically changed. Apprentice schemes are advertised in the local girls school, the lifting is done by hoists and robots, the engines are squeeky clean and there are now male and female changing facilities that are almost like a hotel spa. The result? A well educated mixed sex workforce that massively out performs the competition. It's those basic external forces that have slowly had to change in favour of women, to a point where they too are now in need of role models and the ability to be brave and be themselves. Being themselves, of course, now including be a mum and a 'home maker' if that's the role they truly want. We don't all have to be CEO's, we just need the possibility.

Well, for one of my mates, he says he uses it for fitness and conditioning... personally, I think he bought it because he's hooked on the tech toy side of cycling like all the other mamils and having a different gear set helped him justify acquiring another bike. I have no problem with his constant upgrading, so far I've spent a total of £100 taking two of his older bikes off his hands - bikes that would cost closer to a grand if I needed them to be brand new and from Halfords.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQmqcaS5LIM

that figure on immigration looks suspect, I guess they are only counting back 1 or 2 generations I'd guess that the majority of us have an immigrant background if we care to delve in fish n chips is foreign, apparently. I learnt today that fried fish was introduced by the jewish community around 1860, chips were invented by the belgians bloody jews and europeans fiddling with our food, they'll be telling us curry isn't even ours next

How much are you going for? He's speaking in rastafarian patois. He wants to be pimped out to the sister. You have to say it using the accent.

That blister could only possibly have been on a woman. What self respecting manbloke could leave it unprodded. No way could you not just poke it and poke it all day with a finger finely coated in spaghetti hoops sauce, WD40 and general sweaty usage. Poke it until it pops, gets infected with the mix of daily dirt and turns into something you can properly boast about.

I loves a bit of Public Enemy, me. Aging, balding, white, married, employed, slightly chunky with a liking for allotment grown vegetables and Radio 4. I am their target demographic.

The official spokesman for the conservative party within the BBC, Nick Robinson, heavily criticised the Labour Party a few days ago for coming up with policies and speeches that 'only catered to their core vote' he was worried that they appeared more interested in protecting their core vote than attracting others. Days later, a speech by the tories stating that we need to cut benefits because we can't have hardworking families having smaller income rises than people on benefits gets a rapturous response at conservative conference and squinty Nick feels this has tapped into the zeitgeist. Let's gloss over the fact that most 'benefits' are paid to people in work. Let's gloss over the fact that the tory voting demographic is largely very very old and the pensions have been protected and will continue to be protected. Let's gloss over the fact that the speech actually said £25 billion of cuts of which about 10% will actually be from benefits and I'll gloss over how I cut the other £22 billion. But don't worry folks, if you're due a windfall from a rich relative with large savings and an over generous pension, that's being protected.

Legov posted this up a little while back. It's a projection, but it shows that HK is not the be all and all of China. What's more, I don't imagine the state wants uppity little HK giving those other towns any funny ideas. What matters more than money? Power. I'd imagine the sort of people that own / run China are fairly typical psychos. They'd like to be rich, yeah, but if they are rich and others have something nice then they'd rather be poor and know others are poorer. Is my guess.

any pictures?

one of the offices I work out of is on Hoxton Square area was better when the White Cube gallery was still up and running that's my total attempt at cool for the evening used up in one post