Bellend Sebastian

Presumably they'll put a more permanent barrier in, I hope so. We know that there's any number of situations in which folk can be pricks in any number of ways, but there's something really jarring about these situations where it's really obvious why you're being prevented from doing something but people just do it anyway. I'm sure entitlement, selfishness, ignorance etc all play their part but I think there's also a bit of some sort of weird habit thing going on and people can't cope with disruption to their routine. When the daft woman climbed over the tape to walk across the wet cement on the cordoned off section of pavement outside my house, she barely broke stride, and certainly didn't stop to look as to why walking across it might not be a brilliant idea. She walks along that section of pavement most days and that's that. The bloke that took down the flood barriers was apparently proper angry, to the extent that my friend that saw him do it wasn't inclined to remonstrate with him. I don't get how the response to a road being flooded would be anger; frustration maybe, it's not like it's an injustice or personal is it? How dare the police stop me from putting myself at risk? It's the whole omnipotent toddler mindset I suppose

The angry 4x4 driver who apparently tore down the signs and tape after the police closed a road near us due to flooding, drove through it ok himself but was followed by other drivers who then got stuck in the water

Bonkers. They could've probably built a suspension bridge with the value of the cars that got wrecked

Oh my god, I had no idea of the extent of the genre. Have you seen all the Rufford Ford ones? It's incredible. There's a depth indicator that shows the water is 2 feet deep, a big crowd watching and people filming and still drivers think they might as well chance it. The Range Rover whine of death is one of the saddest sounds I've heard. I think my favourites are either when they end up going up the river rather than the road, or they manage to get to the other side and then the car packs up just when they think they've made it

I don't do tons of motorway driving but what I do is spilt roughly equally between the M69, M1, M42 and M6. It's the M69 where I notice the highest number of folk driving like clowns and having been held up again yesterday after someone did something that ended up with their car facing the wrong way, minus most of its engine, I realised that it's probably where I've seen the most accidents. It's not exactly a challenging stretch of road is it?

Do you like the Ambilight? The cottage I'm staying in has got a Phillips telly with this on and I think it works quite well. I bought some LED lights for my lad's bedroom before Christmas and that site was selling kits to do the same thing for any telly. I wasn't convinced this was a good idea but having seen one in action I think it's quite effective. I've no idea how good the retrofit kits are

I had a little Samsung telly from them that was never going to be used much and this developed an area of faulty pixels not long after I got it. Pathetically I didn't take it back to the shop for about 4 years and they sent it off to be repaired, and when they concluded that they couldn't fix it/it wasn't economical they gave me an 'adjusted value' or some such as a contribution to a replacement. I cannot remember the exact numbers but I got a brand new, current (and therefore quite a bit better) and bigger replacement for about twenty quid. There was never any bother at any point, and aren't you in the manufacturers warranty anyway, as they're generally now 2 years I think? I expect they're busy with post Christmas returns - have you got a shop near you?

That's the word: cheap. It makes things look cheap. Spend a grand on a telly to make everything look like Neighbours. Distressing numbers of people in that X thread saying they live with people that cannot tell the difference or - even worse - want it turned back on when corrective action is taken

I'm away for New Year in accomodation that has a big Phillips telly with the motion smoothing very much turned on, and having just read a very long thread on X about how 99% of people seem to hate it, wondered what the consensus was on here. My personal standpoint: it appalls me. I mean, each to their own, but it strikes me as just weird that it's a "feature" that seems to be turned on by default on a lot of tellies so you have to go into the settings to deactivate it

My road has been 20 mph for ages and you still get folk driving like maniacs down it because for some reason they didn't put speed bumps on it when they did on most of the surrounding roads. In other news, Boris Johnson really looks like crap doesn't he? And to even be saying that about him after all this time is quite remarkable

Was the solution for one of your parents to poke it out with a needle? Why they did this rather than grab it with tweezers, which definitely did exist in the late 70s/early 80s, I've no idea. Also, a tiny splinter in your skin is a great thing to look at through a microscope, it looks like you've done yourself a mortal injury

I say you don't know until you try

That's better than anything at the moment that I've seen. I think Sony control it all so nothing happens until they say and then it's pretty much the same deals everywhere

Yes, that is what I would do

The outside sensor bit of my weather station

"Geoff, I know it's annoying but this is really getting out of hand now" "Corinne, I'm not backing down. I'm not giving him the satisfaction. I didn't fight in two world wars - or even any less significant regional conflicts, granted - but I will not be dictated to by someone who has farmed this land for generations." "But Mr Hollis from the solicitors says it's hopeless, Geoff, we need to settle or we might end up losing everything" . "It's a simple matter of common sense, Corinne, anybody can see this for what it is. He's simply not being reasonable!". "Geoff, you know Dr Perry is really worried about your he-' "NO CORINNE! NO, NO, NO, NO!!"

I've got friends who live in Devon and they're no strangers to this sort of stuff, and it ALWAYS involves people that have moved in from other parts of the country. My theory is that people want to start a new life as they hated their old one but the real problem was themselves all along and when they realise this they just go potty

Do Sony usually do discounts on consoles in January? The boy has decided to part with his savings and it'd be nice if his money went as far as possible. He wasn't bothered a couple of months ago so I paid no attention to what they did for black Friday but I imagine that if they did anything it'll be similar this time. At least you can actually buy them now

Does making it closer to a milkshake in consistency than ice cream count as melting it?

Latest development is that my mother in law softens up ice cream in the microwave because it's "too hard". It then goes back in the freezer. This cannot be a good thing, can it?

I don't like sprouts so I don't care but surely a full two hours before dinner could possibly be served is a bit early to start cooking them?

Who boils parsnips instead of roasting them? My mother in law's latest random tactic to undermine an otherwise very nice Christmas dinner

It's yet more wonderful work from David Shrigley. It's a while since one of his proper tickled me but this made me laugh out loud when someone unhelpfully sent it to me in the middle of the Nativity service earlier

Well I didn't plan to be wrapping stuff up on Christmas Eve as per bloody usual but if I manage to do that this morning rather than just before bed, half pissed then I will consider that progress. Did the Christmas thing at Chatsworth House yesterday, which was very nice apart from paying 36 quid for four hot chocolates and sausage rolls, Seasons Greetings one and all