Watching Villa v Man Utd, 5 minutes to play. The ref’s headset has stopped working and we’ve had a 5 minute delay while he’s rewired. Can we not manage 5 minutes of play without electronics these days?
The Home Office said 973 asylum seekers were detected in 17 dinghies on Saturday......a record for 2024 and the highest daily total since November 2022. The arrivals bring the total for the year to 26,612........51 people have died this year crossing the channel.....one boat with 90 asylum seekers in it also had the body of a two year old boy who had been trampled to death.
There’s a lot of discussion these days about when or if children should be allowed smart phones. I heard on the radio this morning that funds are needed to preserve amongst other things a cannon given to Queen Elizabeth I - when she was 11 years old. Every child should have one.
It's just popped up on the news that HS2 WILL now run on the way into Euston and not stop short at Old Oak Common as planned (that's Version VII C I think) by the previous government. This of course makes practical sense: for a start, the Eurostar terminus at St Pancras is then within walking distance. Financially, the costs of construction in Central London are very high though and the idea was dropped on the grounds of cost. What a shambles this project is and how poorly it compares with say, the French TGV network, which was built in about two weeks at a cost of €49.99. One of the major benefits of HS2 was to increase capacity on trains between London and the north. There's now a small problem with that though. The new trains will run on high speed track as far as Birmingham and then continue on existing infrastructure on what's left of the route(s) beyond that. Some of the savings come from not upgrading stations beyond Birmingham, which means the old platforms won't be long enough for the new trains. Repeat after me: "What a shambles this project is and how poorly it compares with say, the French TGV network..."
Property had already been bought in central London....people had lost their homes and businesses and not properly compensated.
Triffic, Two right-wing loonies to be the candidates for leader of the New Conservative Lee Anderson Fan Club Party membership to choose from. That's Labour in power for 10 years at least then.
Bit of a surprise.....James Cleverly looked a shoe-in after yesterday's voting.....by far the best speech last week at the conference. Jenrick leaves me cold and Badenoch is rather extreme in some of her views.....they'll be crying out for Boris to come back and save them soon.
It’s not just her views. Her reputation is of being a very difficult person to work with: over aggressive even towards her own side. I did go and vote in the last election, largely because our Tory candidate was Gary Streeter’s son and Sunak strikes me as being a decent man. I can’t see myself voting for Jenrick or Badenoch.
Always good for me to read of your politics..we have problems here too.. Plus the American vote in November.. Will Trump continue i wonder....
Why would you vote for somebody because they are Gary Streeter's son? Doesn't make him a top bloke does it. I knew Gary Streeter when he got elected as a Social Democrate Party Councilor in Plymouth Mount Gould. I was managing Mount Gould at that time as a Senior Estate Manager. Used to have to go to Residents meetings every few months and of course he was always there. Quite a decent bloke as memory goes and he did put a lot of time in for the Ward. Then out of nowhere he switched to the Tories without restanding. Bimbled off to the South Hams as a Tory MP candidate which was almost a shoe in job. The Tories could have had a tree standing and it would have been voted in. I did sort of lose a bit of respect for him then and always thought of it as being self promoting move rather than ideology driven.
Because I met Garry Streeter on business matters and found him to be a reasonable and modest person who was supportive of local business. I also had dealings with Nick Kelly on non-business matters when he was council leader. He was similarly very approachable and helpful but was subsequently ousted by Richard Bingley, who at various times been active in the Conservatives, UKIP, Labour and then the Conservatives again. He's now got himself onto DCC, although I'm not sure what colour shirt he's wearing. Non-conviction politics seems to be rife in the lower leagues.
Good to see that the Rooney's have two earners in the household. https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/celebs-tv/coleen-rooney-signs-up-im-9629456 It comes as a shock though that someone thought Nigel Farage is worth £1.5m of anybody's money.... and the BBC gets criticised for paying people with actual talent too much.... The only explanation I can think of is that they were hoping he would actually be eaten by a crocodile, if that's not cruelty to crocodiles.
Thomas Tuchel is the new England manager. What was all that with Carsley then? I thought he was there for 3 camps. He was quite a CV: Borussia Dortmund, PSG, Chelsea and Bayern Munich winning significant trophies but perhaps not an easy character: never stays at a club for long.
I thought we would go British for this appointment. But, suppose there aren't that many to choose from these days. This is where all that promise of better things goes completely tits up then when the whole camp is lost to the sulks. Honestly, I'm not sure I care anymore.
Surprised with this choice......seems like desperation.....not keen on a German in charge.....this chap doesn't stay long anywhere.
Well, as (some) other fans are saying, if you don’t want Tuchel, don’t throw beer at the nice English guy who sings the national anthem. As we Brits have fought wars against virtually every European country at one time or another, including the Hundred Year War against the French, our recruitment options are somewhat limited. As Sir Humphrey Appleby famously noted, the British nuclear deterrent isn’t there to deter the Russians, it’s there to deter the French. Notably, we’ve even managed to get into wars with Sweden and Holland. Oh, and a minor scuffle with Iceland. There aren’t many English managers out there with the pedigree required are there? The obvious candidate is Eddie Howe, who’s done well in reviving Newcastle, albeit with the benefit of lots of oil money. But I doubt he’s available. After that. it’s Graham Potter, whose career high is making Brighton competitive in the EPL. That’s sullied by a disaster at Chelsea where Tuchel had done well. Thw ultimate ambition would have been Pep Guardiola, another foreign person, but he has the world at his feet and surely the only international job he’d be interested in is Spain. Again, we’ve been at war with Spain as recently as 1815, so that’s obviously a non-starter. A popular choice among some fans would have been Jurgen Klopp, who brought the glory days back to Anfield and who’s a PR manager’s dream. But he’s another of those damn foreigners and who’d unbelievably prefer to manage his own country rather than England.
