If the early bird catches the worm then the early worm gets eaten

Oh, and there’s a blog called Dead Air at the Pulpit, which is terribly written but highlights loads of new, obscure bands in a variety of heavy genres, including power violence. Bandcamp is also really good for finding new stuff as there are tags for all sorts of things.

Never quite sure what constitutes Power Violence as a genre but I’ve seen Nails tagged with it. ‘Abandon all Life’ is a short and brutal masterpiece. I would call it grindcore but I think that’s an argument for purists, of which I’m not.

Drank rather than eaten but fermented horse milk in Kyrgyzstan. It’s like fizzy, slightly alcoholic milk and is grim to my Western taste buds.

I tried dog in North Korea. Tastes like lamb so not all bad.

Whale in Norway, it was ok.

Triodos can be used online via browser as well as app. The cheque thing is true but who on earth still uses cheques?

Having booked tickets and told my friend about it, I realised that none of us can make it. Ah well.

I just leave stuff out the front of the house if I need it gone. In the last month an old dishwasher and desk chair have been taken.

As above, Transferwise (now just called Wise). A lot easier than banks and with fewer fees and limits.

The manager of an IT department I worked in never left his office and spent all day playing Second Life. He left his wife for a Dutch women he met on there but had never actually met, who then didn’t leave her husband as promised. All very sad. I worked there for about 18mths and never said a word to him.

There was a secret smearer in a large financial services office I worked in. Covered a cubicle in the gents in (presumably) his own faeces. No one ever got caught for it.

Another guy in a local government job used to make random animal noises all day.

I really liked the style that Chappers, Osi and Jason had. I don’t like Dan Walker at all.

For my sins I am a Raiders fan

Could be worse, you could be a Jets fan. They can’t even tank properly!

Really enjoyed this season, though my fantasy team did terribly. I was rooting for the Bills but Mahomes and co put a stop to that. I’d be up for another fantasy league.

Another Poweramp user. Well worth a few quid.

I have one. Other than it being quick I don’t like it at all and much prefer my old Moto G6. The UI isn’t great, though I run a different launcher. There’s a shed load of bloatwear that you can’t remove and will likely never use, some of which you’re forced to though and is poor in comparison to my preferred options. They’re also loaded with adverts. There are a load of in built quirks that don’t make any sense at all and I’ve had trouble running widgets such as poweramp. The really useful things on the Moto G phones, shake to turn the torch on, rotate to activate camera and sound options are lacking. I wouldn’t buy another and I wouldn’t recommend one.

Priti Patel has some strong views!

“Your questions about cyclists and the law are flawed to buggery; so too the one about VED. I also wish the fearless leaders of the UK would bring back the stocks for pavement parking, so people can throw pushchairs and wheelchairs at the selfish arses that leave their vehicles in such a mindless fashion.”

damn excel and accountants, a Database with proper SQL is the way

Not far from the truth there. The figures should have been produced by head office but for some reason aren’t. This leaves muggins here faffing around with Excel formulas.

Cheers all. I’ve managed to get a working formula, albeit one that ignores leap years but the data won’t need to be accurate to that detail so I’ll figure that out further down the line.

Another vote for Slovenia. It’s pretty much the perfect country, geographically at least.

I became a dad for the first time in May. The two best bits of advice that were given to me were don’t bother reading too much as the advice is so conflicting and all babies are different. The other, really important bit, was make sure that you and your partner are nice to each other. It can be pretty stressful when you’re sleep deprived and don’t really know what to do but it really helps if you can maintain calm and provide the occasional treat.

If your partner is breast feeding then for the first few months you’re likely to be a glorified helper for her every need. It gets more fun though as they start to get more interactive.

Second hand is great if you’re on a budget. There is so much baby stuff available either cheap or free it’s madness to buy much new. We got about £600 worth of burly, off road buggy for £100 and that’s us sorted for years. Bundles of clothes can be had for not much money as well. Facebook marketplace and eBay are good.

Brendan Fraser. I just don’t like his face.

The two in Bristol I frequent both mandate face coverings unless you’re actually on the wall. One has capacity tracker and a max number of people, the other you have to book slots. Seems to work pretty well and the vast majority of people are sensible. I go late on Fridays though so it’s usually pretty quiet.

I did it about ten years ago. I ended up on a money laundering case of a guy that sold aeroplanes to Venezuelan drug traffickers. The case lasted a few weeks and we had experts from across the world and an agents from the US (can’t remember if it was CIA or FBI). I found it really interesting. The jury deliberated for nearly three days to make sure we’d covered every point. Pretty much everyone was onboard with the process of going through everything with a fine tooth comb. Might have helped that the judge instructed us that they needed a unanimous verdict. It was the opposite of the experience of others on here; a heartening inside view of the justice system and how your peers can actually be trusted. It’s sad to hear that’s not always the case though. We ended up finding the guy not guilty and I now decent knowledge of why certain aircraft are popular with drug runners. I’ve yet to make use of that particular knowledge though.

My girlfriend and I were in Lustleigh, on the edge of Dartmoor, last weekend and it was great. Tiny village, handful of locals and a few tourists. Fresh air, peace and quiet and some long walks or rides.

The police in Chengdu, China use them. They have these terrifying looking knives on their waistband but roll around on segways, such somewhat undermines how seriously you can take them. Very odd juxtaposition.

I find any pop song can be vastly improved by replacing the words ‘babe’ with ‘Dave’ and ‘Kiss’ with ‘fist’. Sixpence None the Richer’s single hit song is much better for this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N-qO3sPMjc

Isn’t the correct term ‘Cowboys and Native Americans’ nowadays?

In 25 five years of motorbike riding that was the only ever bird strike, never even heard of anyone else being hit by a bird.

I got whacked in the face by what might have been a magpie while doing 60mph on a country road. Scared the hell out of me and left a trail of blood across my visor. This was on a 100cc scooter though.

https://www.trinity-creative.co.uk/

Set up by mountain bikers to help people keep on riding. Same guys that set this up http://www.notbroken.co.uk/category/mountain-bike/

I ordered a few parts on 13 April, chased it by email on 19 April. Still no word. At least I know they’re still trading so that’s a relief. Lucky I don’t need the parts urgently.

It’s really rather good. A bit of a head funk by the end.

totally subjective, but Time Will Die and Love Will Bury It by Rolo Tomassi is an outstanding record of the last few years for me, both content and production wise. Massive.

Killer record. So, so good.

Anything produced by Matt Bayles, ISIS, Botch, Valerian Swing, Burnt by the Sun.

Terry Date productions including Deftones,Pantera, White Zombie.

I’m in IT, in banking.

The last few weeks have been mental for us – some people don’t realise the work involved to get several hundred (thousand) people working from home, and then supporting them afterwards.

Fair enough, it’s not life or death – but without IT teams all over the country, no-one would be working from home.

So true. The IT guys at our place played a blinder in getting everyone set to work from home in about a week. It went from unheard of for most of us to totally capable. We now run a skeleton crew at the office and can run an entire back with fewer than ten people in the building. Normally there are about 180 in the central office. We’re a pretty small outfit though with no high street branches.

I’m classed as a key worker (banking). We get no love! Try operating your bank accounts without us. Not all of us crashed the economy and got paid billions for it last time.

Botch. They played with Dillinger Escape Plan in London shortly before I’d heard of them. If I could go back in time and see any gig that would be it. DEP are incredible live as well so that would be a perfect show.

I’d like to have seen Guns n Roses back in their heyday as well, maybe on the tour with Metallica and Faith no More.

Cheers. Nice to hear some new techno. I’m somewhat out of touch and still listening to old Ben Klock mixes. Any recommendations for downloadable, long, live sets?

Bands make naff all from album sales nowadays so they claw it back via live shows. Add in a whole load of middle men and the fact that most of the bands mentioned above are terrible and lots of people like them, it makes for an eye-watering ticket price.

I’m off to see Blanck Mass next week for a somewhat healthier £13.20 inc booking fee. Good tunes, good people, sensible price.

https://homeavdirect.co.uk/optoma-nuforce-be-sport4-black

Very good fit and excellent sound quality.

I can’t believe no one has suggested Google reverse image Search.

Cheese, milk and other dairy products in Slovenia. They didn’t look very appetising in the heart of summer.

Ocky

stalone plays darts

That’s good.

For Lions – Misguided fundamentalists blow themselves up in the name of big cats.

Looks great, a lot fancier and upmarket than Kyrgyzstan in the cities at least. The mountains look equally amazing.