Sampson

All I can think of is “How low can you go?” But it doesn’t feel right

But yes I think the main thing I would suggest @Lionator is finding hobbies and activities that give you peace of mind. I would recommend just going on Meetup.com and looking for different meet-ups in person in your area and just throw as much mud at the wall as possible and see what sticks. It’s what I did in the beginning of 2022 when we’re getting back to normal after the pandemic. I think I had 2-3 weeks where I went to a different one every evening after work, some were lousy but it still got me out the house and not just watching tv or browsing the internet, but some you’ll find yourself enjoying yourself and want to go back. It’s nervy going on your own at first, but everyone else gets that, they’re designed for that, most people who go are people who’ve hit a social or mental brick wall at some point and needed to find new things to get themselves out of it. Have an open mind and try different ones even if it’s something you’ve never considered yourself interested in before. You might surprise yourself that you enjoy something you otherwise wouldn’t have.

For me it’s playing board games, card games and tabletop rpgs. I’ve always liked them, but after covid and the lockdowns I made a commitment to try different meet-ups. I did some cooking, bbq, “speed friends” but the ones that stuck were the board gaming and tabletop RPG ones. Weird to say, but when I’m playing tabletop games, my mind goes blank of all the crap and I just enjoy having fun with my friends. It’s also analogue so it gets me offline and I can go hours playing games without even thinking of checking my mobile, which just doesn’t happen in everyday life otherwise. Plus it scratches that same camaraderie and social itch and excitement of the win that watching Leicester used to give me, but hasn’t really since the FA Cup win. Also, a big thing which very few talk openly about it is that most adults after they finish school and university find it very difficult to make friends. I think most adults deep down wish they had more friends but no one wants to say it because it seems too childish. I’ve made more friends as an adult the last 3 or so years playing tabletop games than I have since I was at university, because you have an instant icebreaker there and the game already gets over the awkward small talk for you.

I chose Huth because I misread the question. its an east answer in reality though - Maguire. He had 1 good season in which we still conceded a bucketload of goals and he bizarrely beat Vardy to POTS when Vardy getting to 20 goals in Puel’s restrictive style was an incredible season, which is probably the most unjust award of the clubs POTS in living memory. His 1 good season was not as good as Soyuncu and Fofana’s 1 good season too, both of whom I’d have over Maguire.

I mean… yes he was. We’d have finished mid table with Schmeichel or Hermansson

What Wymsey about expecting Musk to be a strong speaker confuses the heck out of me too though. When you see populists like Farage or Trump, you anssumr they are bound to be strong public speakers even if they lie a lot, they would need to be to get people on their side. I assumed Musk would be the same when he first broke through a few years back, but now I’ve actually watched him, he’s such a mumbler and very uncharasmatic, awkward and nervous the whole time and a very uninspiring speaker. Even to those who agree with him politically, I can’t get my head round how he has such a devoted following or who hang on his every word.

To me, it’s as simple as this - I don’t ever want to live in a country where the state has the power to make a decision on the involuntary killing of its own citizens, because it only takes one rogue politician to harness that power for evil. It’s the same argument I had against that vile law that Pritti Patel campaigned for to give the Home Secretary the power to shut down any protest they like, which is what led to those environmental protesters getting 5 years in prison. Just because it was a protest people don’t like they cheer it on, but once a legal precedent has been set it can be applied in a lot of unforeseen and potentially scary ways. If Farage’s mob get in, I’d hate to think what they do with those powers for example. it’s easy for politicians to use emotional cases and causes to change laws and give them self scary powers that can be used elsewhere.

I really hope you hold on chris. I know it sounds silly, but I see you posting in the wordle thread every day. Think about tomorrow’s Wordle game you’ll miss. Sometimes just focusing on the small things you’ll miss about the universe is enough to hold on one more night.

Sometimes it’s worth rewatching the classics. Can’t remember when I first saw this but still cracks me up to watch it now and again.

That’s entirely fair and I take back what I said as insensitive. I will instead say that she is simply a weirdo who spends way too much of her life pre-occupied thinking about immigrants and woke people, and seems like she’s constantly trying to overcompensate in how “hardline” “anti-woke” she is to the point it comes across as silly.

Absolutely nowhere near to the same extent though. Hatred towards climate protesters were leading news stories for ages and whipped up to such an extent that people were happy for the government to erode away checks and balances that hold up democracy and give the Home Secretary the power to shut down any protest they please and creating anti-protest laws which led to environmental protesters getting 5 years prison time. I’ve barely seen any genuine articles against these farmer protesters except somewhere way down in the opinions column or something. We’re expecting all of these farmers who blocked roads to get 5 years prison sentences now the precedent has been set, yes?

I’m not disagreeing with you tbh apart from the last bit, I think there’s plenty of Tories who come across as actual adults. But there is definitely something in her that seems like she feels like she has to massively overcompensate how strong and how much control she has, to the point it comes across as very silly and like someone who never grew out of their teenage emotions, like she’s desperately trying to fit in with secondary school cliques.

Agree with you 100%. There is a chance that if their numbers are way down and they need a big play come 2029 that Labour go all in on a pro-EU campaign but there’s an awful lot of things that will happen before then which will change the mood of the country. Not least with Ukraine and Russia, which has probably been the major factor driving British people away from America and towards Europe over the past few years.

The polls have been showing it for years. Sadly I think the political appetite from the Labour Party isn’t there. Starner bizarrely said the UK wouldn’t rejoin “any part of the EU or customs union or have freedom of movement… in his lifetime” despite the fact his parties voters overwhelmingly support it. It’s the reason he turned me off Labour I voted LibDem over Labour the last election. Fair enough in the short term it’s not going to happen but the guy is 61 and could live for another 30 years, to rule out moving even slightly back towards the EU within 30 years struck me as bizarre given his voter base - that’s a hell of a long time in geopolitics, I mean think about the difference in Japan or West Germany from 1945 to 1975 or the difference in the Baltic countries from post-recovering ex Soviet states in 1994 to some of the happiest and highest UN index countries in the world today. Russia and Turkey could’ve embraced democracy and have joined the EU by then for all we know.

Her interviews are just always so incredibly weird, it’s like something a 14 year old boy would say in the schoolyard to try and convince his friends he’s not gay. I’m pretty convinced by this point she is pretty strongly autistic, like she doesn’t seem to understand adult social conventions.

nevermind

Wasn’t it around 17mil Lab-LibDem-Green to around 10mil Tory-Reform last time round? That’s a huge margin. I think Labour could lose their majority but I can’t really see them being in a position where a Lab-Lib coalition is also gone. There’s too much ground for the Right in the uk to make up imo and LibDems are way closer to Labour than Tories nowadays unlike in 2010. Tories and Reform will split each others vote too much. Tories got power so often in the last because they had little competition and LibDems and Greens would split Labour’s vote.

The west is ****ed. Wonder if we’ll be able to hold out till the centenium of WW2 in 2039 before WW3. I don’t hold out hope. I do totally get the frustration and wanting to tear down society and start again. But voting Reform and turning everyone on immigrants to create an us vs them culture so they can anba international treaties designed to protect European citizens from their own governments isn’t the way to do that ffs. I’d have hoped they’d have learnt that Farage was a total snake oil salesman after his lifetime goal of Brexit solved nothing and only caused more problems, but still they keep going. It’s exactly the same thing, campaigning against something without actually offering what will happen afterward

I always heard it as laurel laurel kin

So you’re saying dodging taxes is a valid reason?

I think EU/EEC, Switzerland, UK and the non-EU Balkan states are probably going to need their own defence treaty if it’s clear Trump doesn’t care about NATO anymore. I think the Cold War idea of “the west” is probably nearing its end tbh.

Of course I agree with him that the Tories turned their back on the world but I think realistically we are going to have to choose between the US and EU if Trump starts an economic war and gives up on Ukraine. And to me at least the only logical option is the EU, not least simply because of our geographical location and Russia’s aggression on the borders of the EU. Geography matters a lot with regards to trade and geo-politics and your neighbours are always going to be the most important.

Yes I agree with you. What I meant is if all my loved ones are dead I’d be happier to go rather than just exist for the sake of it

Nah that’s not what I’m saying. I don’t think we should allow that. It was just a personal philosophical point on the question on whether death is worse than extreme pain, personally I think plenty of things are worse than death, but the thing that scares me about death is not getting to see my loved ones. Not for one second suggesting we should change the laws in that way but I do understand why some people say they’re ready to give up at the end if that makes sense.

I think it differs person to person. TBH I dread the end of my life if my family and friends are dead. I remember my grandma at the end. My granddad died 15 years before, all her friends died a few years before. She was too frail to really go out and meet new people, so just sat in the house and watched tv all day for the last 5 or 6 years of her life. It can’t have been much of a life. You’re know you’re going to die soon anyway at that point, what’s the point of living just to exist? I sometimes think about the the pain and boredom of the final few years and it fills me with dread tbh. Dying scares me like everyone, but mostly because I won’t be able to see my loved ones anymore, if they’re all dead or can’t live for themselves because they have to care for me, what’s the point if I’m in pain or can’t do anything?