Steven P

Needing to drag my mind out of the gutter: ‘Ring of fire’ solar eclipse this month will be last until 2046 UK.YAHOO.COM 2023 annular solar eclipse will be visible in North and South America

I would be great if it was consistent!

One thing I found was adding me as a named driver dropped Mrs Ps quote, could be a worth a try if you haven't. Apparently if someone else could use the vehicle you are more careful of it.

I suspect "We want money" has a lot to do with that. 50 years ago the trees planted 100 years ago were still quite young, no panic, spend the estates money on other things. No new trees planted for 50 years.

I think that is the thing that will hit them... the other stuff that goes into them, the flavours or whatever.

The world of the internet in general. Rarely see anyone get riled up with simple insults Not back to the footballs making the news

Football - home grown local talent, as it should be to be honest, often reckon a team should have a good proportion of players born and raised within 50 miles of the team, 1 or 2 international stars. The millions they pump into the big names could be spent developing the locals, sponsoring local leagues, kit to schools, working in the community more but that requires a mind shift from the me-me-me attitude of the players to 'us' (but it is a team game after all)

Was that it, 3 attempts at insults? You might find we have thicker skin than them. Do try harder. Good luck for the weekend though, Friday, when you get home you'll find it to be warm and quite dry...

I just put it down to narcissism. It is a health condition and not a lot a forum can do about it. I fully expect insults to be flowing my way, rather than any continuation of any of the discussions, but sorry to say the last couple of weeks has ticked most of these boxes: The most common symptoms include: Being overly boastful, exaggerating one’s own achievements Pretending to be superior to others Lack of empathy for others Looking down on others as inferior Monopolising conversations Impatient, angry, unhappy, depressed or has mood swings when criticized Easily disappointed when expected importance is not given Always craves for “the best” in everything Has a very fragile self-esteem"

Suspect that financially it won't be 'stop spending today' but more a decline over spending for the next few (25?) years so the legal stuff for compulsory purchases, if they have to they will, if they can cancel them they will. Inflation not so sure. Ecologists I reckon can stick it out for a few more years yet 'mending' stuff and I still have no desire to go to Birmingham quickly. Let the train take the strain, let me take a book.

That's what one of the papers were saying, not a sycamore which among the reasons given that it was removed

Aha!! The message is sinking in, instead of the papers who have an agenda to sell, you are very correct, the information is all online. Glad to see you have finally taken notice! My work here might soon be done.

Trying to emphasis that whatever is written in the press, particularly the local press doesn't necessarily reflect reality. The link above is from a syndicated press site - if I searched I would find a very similar article about many towns in the UK, copied and pasted (it is what that site does). If I wanted to write a news story about rats, get paid for the week, I could go to any city and ask 100 people "Have you ever seen a rat in the city", get a quote from the one or 2 who say yes, story made. Simples. Also works for stories about litter, walk down the street 20 minutes before the bin trucks collect the trade waste, take photos "Look at the litter strewn streets", another simple story made. That is why I prefer to look at the numbers, much less subjective.

Ooh, that's a good point, never thought about cats and rats. Maybe need a catrat ratio as well? Is she a rat fat cat? (serious, fat from rats - lots of rats). She might just be a dead clever hunter. Not sure I would mess with a cat if I was a small animal, my neighbours cats often take on the foxes and so far have always won. (countryside rats of course are not eating left over chips and Greggs discarded by people generally)

Well, what what about that then.... but grubby in the North East of England too! Rat concerns raised in Amble following reports of rising population numbers WWW.NORTHUMBERLANDGAZETTE.CO.UK Calls have been made for a further investigation into rat problems in Amble.

Grrr.. I've been fact checked!!!

Was just about to say that. There are loads of examples of smaller trees and other species - such as the bonsais but hawthorn and other hedge trees, fruit trees - apples are often done as espaliered which is a kind of fan

Noted your 'leave it be tone' below. Point is from the article that was making the news yesterday, a short sentence that you take offence to (how easily offended are The Daily Mail readers!), that if you look at the numbers, there are many cities grubbier than Glasgow, your own Aberdeen being one of them! Glasgow is not a grubby city. If you can't hack that then yes, time to leave this part of the discussion.

I'll leave it up to you then, you give us a fair way to compare whether a city is actually grubby, rather than Agnus and the problems with her back passage, some sort of comparison that can fairly be applied to all cities. Until then I'll stick with the number of rats, the rat ratio if you like, as a fair way to compare places. Over to you.

At the risk of dragging on with news stories from 2 or 3 years ago, just quantifying how grubby Glasgow actually is compared other cities might help those who have never been there make a fair and honest judgement. Compared to other cities I have visited or lived in, Glasgow isn't a grubby place, the numbers show that.

So what is your metric for the streets being dirty? Is it just Agnus from 3/1 saying "My back passage is dirty, there has been a filthy animal in there all weekend and now I need to get a team of guys from the council around to give it a good going over" ? Hardly a fair comparison when I bet Agnus has never been in anyones back entrance in say Dundee or Aberdeen Anyway, I'll go with numbers. Trickier to argue with them. Rats, I reckon are a good indication of dirt on the streets - perhaps food waste and so on. Glasgow has 1.3 million rats. That is a lot. London 19.9 million (all off google this morning). I can forsee your argument, London is a much bigger city - bound to have more rats? That is reasonable from you. Perhaps rats per person? Number of people - the more the larger the city, you'd expect more rats. Hmmm, lets go with that. So London 2.26 rats per person, Glasgow 2.04 rats per person, which is comparable to other cities like Sheffield (2.08), Manchester (2.01). Liverpool does quite well for having a large dock and grain stores (1.95 rats per person, maybe they are all cat people). Edinburgh, Scotlands capital and tourist hotspot 2.25 rats per person. That is more that Glasgow! Makes me think then what about other Scottish cities - Dundee, 2.2 (doesn't surprise me), Stirling is nice (0.89 rats per person), Aberdeen... oooh, 2.5 rats per person - that is a lot more that 'filthy' Glasgow, and topping the list.... Inverness with 3.83 rats per person! Glasgow doesn't look so bad based on hard numbers, I think it is just Agnus who doesn't like them up her rear entrance.

ULEZ -> more anger from The Daily Mail (and apparently The Daily Express, but I thought their obsession was "Princess Diana, did you know she died by the way?") -> more rubbish papers sold

Now you know that numbers and analysis is hard to dispute. Rumours and stories are. 'My city is filthy' doesn't say whether it is dirtier than others, just the respondent has a lower threshold for muck than others. Google any city + "Rat problem" and guess what the results will be. Anyhow, not sure if a story from a year or so ago qualifies as 'making the news today' but here is a link with analysis based on numbers rather than hearsay. A much better way to look at the world. Of course, detracting from the 'making the news today' story into one where you can invoke your mock rage, rather than admitting some good stuff goes on in the world will only make your day an angry one. The UK's Dirtiest Homes - Buildworld Blog WWW.BUILDWORLD.CO.UK House prices are determined by location cost and condition. We reveal the UK's dirtiest areas to live.

This farmer, the evicted one, doesn't make sense for him to chop it down, though might have had some involvement on a consultancy capacity