Rob85

Maybe another topic entirely but coming from NI, I don't understand why the mainland still do not routinely arm all police officers. Even with the level of potential threat over here to officers it is extremely rare you hear of an officer having to discharge a firearm let alone take it from their holster (which by law still classes it as a use of a firearm) Most officers carry it like personal equipment and never look near it, even in instances where it would be justified in its use. In the instances being talked about like the aftermath of 7/7 with de menzes, from the outside perspective this appears a targeted operations where the officers would have been following protocol. Seems most of the cock ups come from the higher ups and as fecal matter rolls downhill...the ones at the bottom get hit with it. The recent Chris Kaba case mirrors one that happened in the early 2000s close to where I live where someone tried to get past a police roadblock by driving at an officer and towards a footpath where a load of people were exiting a church. Driver got a couple in the chest and the officer that fired was still getting dragged through court appeals by the scumbags family 10 years later.

Bloody hell, the longest I have had to wait for anything with my licence was my initial grant as a first time licence holder over 20 years ago. I had to wait 6 months and that wait was put down to NI moving from hand written letters etc to filling out forms.

Would almost sound like the start of long term collectivism on the farmland reminiscent of how the communists operated in Russia after the revolution. Except this time instead of just outright taking it they will make it so unaffordable to keep that over years they will get it anyway. Some of the government land grab will go to housing, some to solar panels and eventually they could just run some as government funded farms. Pay people a pittance to farm the land and sell the goods to the plebs at rock bottom prices. Maybe I'm thinking too much "1984"

Yep pepper sauce, not homemade though, just one the butchers stocked. Tossed it into the pan after the onions and steak to add a bit more flavour

This mess was the result of taking my father in law out to buy birthday presents. He bought me and the missus a couple of steaks in the butchers. Basically any veg we found in the fridge went with it. 8oz sirloin, fried onions, couple of onion rings,spuds,peas and some sprouts. All ate on my knee tonight.

One way I found to cut down file size is to get the original photo up on your phone and take a screenshot of it. Crop the screenshot to take away your phones battery and other screen items and you're sorted

The thing people don't get about NI now is there is a strange situation where the politicians behave like they are still in a war of political ideology but in reality all the violence is between drug gangs that wear the clothes of the paramilitary organisations as a convenient badge which allows them to get government money under the guise of community regeneration funds etc. Trouble here will only get worse in the event of NI being given to the ROI when the drug gangs from dublin start to fight for control of the drug trade in NI. There is absolutely no comparison between the NI troubles and the middle east issues.

Hope his recovery goes well. I've only had one dog requiring a cone after she had to have some surgery. the cone lasted all of about 2 hours before she had it smashed and removed. Thankfully she wasn't too interested in her stitched up tail stump to need the cone anyway. Hes quite the handsome chap even with his cone!

Definitely could have been much worse, there's a drop of a good 6 feet into that field. I had heard about it on the news and then just as I got home I saw the air ambulance fly over. I was just hoping it was dispatched out of caution rather than being badly needed.

About 15 miles up the road from me, think there is only a few in hospital now and most were discharged at the scene. Seen quite a few complaints on social media about the state of the road and the driving standards of the bus drivers. A parent of one of the kids said the bus may have bumped the verge and hit some pole before going through into the field.

I have a farm local to me that does their own milk pasteurised on the farm and they do their own beef. Namely from Dexter and Belted Galloway beasts. They got that popular they had to throw some Angus into the mix just to meet demand. Its really not hard to taste and see the difference in the meat. That meal looked amazing

Beef shin is the best for making soup, beef broth cooked slow through Sunday and ate on Monday with half a crusty loaf is one of the best winter meals in my opinion

Such a unique voice. 2024 is going to have quite the end of year list of who has departed

Whilst I'm only a few months away from the ripe old age of 40 I can definitely see the benefits of a good sleep and a good Brad Pitt to set me up for a good day. I'm considering a Vitamin D supplement to see if it helps this winter. I'm up for work at 5:30am and if I work late there are days I don't see much natural light at all!

That is a beautiful piece of engineering. Such attention to detail when you go down to the very rivet spacing! I saw a red arrows liveried hawk RC jet display at an airshow when I was younger, was an amazing site...right up to the point the left aileron came off and it buried itself into the runway at high speed. I reckon the poor soul that built it probably needed counselling judging by the costs involved in the construction!