deathrey

It has indeed been a shit year so far. I lost my uncle to cancer three weeks ago and got news yesterday that my cousin is in an induced coma as his brain tumour is giving him seizures. It doesn't look like he has long either. I dread it everytime the phone rings at the moment.

American style are the best!

I opted for American style pancakes and had them with maple syrup, greek yogurt and strawberries, raspberries and blueberries.  They were one of my cravings when I was pregnant and I've not had them since the baby was born in October, this was always my preferred topping.

On 1/23/2023 at 7:25 PM, Devon Malcolm said:

Started watching Man Like Mobeen today and it's so obviously great that I'm once again annoyed at myself for not having got round to it earlier.

I had actively avoided watching this. It looked a little bit Citizen Khan-ish to me, which just makes me cringe. It felt like a show made by brown people to make none brown people laugh. Prompted by your comments, I gave it a watch on Netflix and absolutley loved it much to my surprise. Very cleverly written and genuinely very funny. I can't wait till the next series! Thanks for the recommendation.

I used to feed in to the school reports for EHCP's, whilst you absolutley can self refer, without the schools support and evidence, you won't get anywhere. Even with the school's support it can be an incredibly difficult to get one - though some L.A's are much better than others with this.

A referral for diagnosis should still be medical I.e  through your doctor in most areas. However a referral for an EHCP and extra support will need to come through school in most instances. They will need to gather evidence for this and it can take a long time before they will make a referral. The wait list once a referral is made is generally enormous, 2 years in the last local authority I worked n and 18 months in my current one - that's just to get seen, the assessment itself also takes about 6 months. If any of you are considering getting your children assessed I would urge you to do it before they get to secondary school as the waits become a lot worse - you are usually a lower priority than primary aged kids.

I never caught the last series, I wasn't sure it was worth watching. Guess now is time to decide!

My husband went to the Manchester show on Friday, Jedi Mind Tricks came on very late and did a very short set unfortunately. They didn't come on till after 10 and a DJ had taken over by 10.40 at which point he left, though he thinks they came back for one more song after the DJ. He did get to meet Immortal Technique, RA Rugged Man and Poison Pen so he was pretty pleased.

10 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

Perfectly reasonable take. 

No it's not! The only thing the two have in common is that they are biscuits, that's it!

Malted milk is a totally different being to Biscoff. Biscoff is primarily a cinnamon biscuit and Malted Milk doesn't even contain Cinnamon, it's more of a shortbread biscuit. 

Two things, as Superbacon said - contact the police and find out if there is a Woman's Aid or something similar in your area - call their helpline, they will be able to give more specific advice.

Also, is there children under 18 in the house? If so, I would also call social services and report his behaviour and they should be able to support. Even if he has caused no harm to the children, if they are witnessing this behaviour then Children's Services should intervene 

On 2/2/2023 at 4:13 PM, FelatioLips said:

I find that problem with most store-brand crisps whether they be tortilla, hand cut, chunky or whatever they’re advertised as to look like the proper thing. Always too hard and taste 90% of potato and 10% of flavouring.

I think a lot of own brand crisps are quite good, especially the finest' type ranges. I usually get these styles but had some Walkers the other day and thought they were rubbish. Thin, over flavoured, it was like strongly flavoured paper.

That's an actual doctor's report @Hannibal Scorch?!

5 minutes ago, Carbomb said:

Along with what Pat's described, this is one of the reasons why I don't think there should be too much unification of the union movement. They should be able to administer to their sector's specific needs, and too general a membership can cause problems if it's not properly organised. My mum's a legal officer for Prospect, and they cover a very wide range of sectors, but they make sure that the union is clearly compartmentalised into autonomous sections.

 

 

I totally agree with this. I think this was the reason Unison were so shite with me when I looked for support (around breaks, lunch times and playground duties) and they seemed to have no real idea as my issue was very specific to schools and no one I spoke to seemed to have any real idea about what I was talking about or the help I needed. That resulted in the advice being 'go and talk to other people who do a similar job and just do what they do'.

My first gig was an 18th birthday gift from my cousin and was to watch Limp Bizkit at the MEN in Manchester. We got very drunk and I dont remember much of it but a great time was had.

My favourite gig is a tie, same band but 2 different gigs. Faith No More are my favourite band and I got to see them at their reunion gig in 2009 at Brixton which was honestly a dream come true for me. I also very briefly met @Chest Rockwellthere. I also saw them in Edinburgh a couple of years later and it was brilliant again. I've seen them 9 times in total but those two stand out as favourites.

The worst is actually quite hard. I saw GZA in Leeds a couple of years ago, that was a bit disappointing but not bad. This one might be a little unfair as I wasn't actually a fan but my mum made me accompany my young teenage sister and a couple of her friends to see Nightwish in Manchester many, many years ago, I didnt particularly enjoy that.

2 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

It's really frustrating. Teaching is apparently the most unionised job in the country, so if there were more consistency, this strike could be so much more meaningful. There's different unions for different regions, different types of teaching/lecturing, and so on, it's a nightmare.

I work in higher education, but I'm with Unison, rather than UCU - so they're on strike, and we're not. As with the last round of strikes at my work last year, Unison members are far more likely to be impacted by the changes they're protesting about, but we just consistently fail to get the ballot response needed. 

One of the big reason teachers are so unionised is that it's so risky working in a school and not having Union support, you are at a big risk of allegations from pupils/parents.

I used to be in Unison and honestly thought they were shite, they never really offered any support and only seemed bothered about collecting subs. NEU were so so much better.

There is differences between each Union too in regards to priorities etc. Also NEU is the only Union which accepts associate staff - without whom most schools couldn't actually function but are often forgotten about. 

I work for a child protection charity and as pointed out @BomberPatI could be earning more money elsewhere but I believe in the cause and think the work we do is important. I also wouldn't be able to cover the scope that I do at work if I was employed by social services etc.  Charities have a lot of overheads to be able to provide the services they do, we do a lot of outreach and work in the community, it's hard work. Charity employees arent stood on street corners shaking a tin, we are skilled professionals doing a much needed job and we deserve to be paid fairly for it. I have children of my own to feed and a roof to keep over my head. 

As pointed out by both, things like poor ICT hinder the work and also mean we have to take twice as long doing a task (usually less effectively) so using donations for stuff like this does make people angry but we need the infrastructure to be able to do our jobs properly and cost effectively.

Our CEO works incredibly hard and has a lot that comes under his remit, the organisation I work for does heavily influence legislation around Child Protection. He more than warrants his hefty pay, which again would be a lot more if he was working elsewhere

1 hour ago, StrongStyle said:

Ted Lasso caught me by complete surprise. I had avoided it for ages despite the universal acclaim because I thought the premise sounded naff. An American with no knowledge of football taking over a Premier League team? It sounded so 'wacky' and unappealing.

I then watched it on the recommendation of a good friend. After the initial scepticism wore off, I very quickly realised that nearly four hours had passed, I had laughed out loud, I had ugly-cried and I felt like the TV itself had given me a big, warm hug.

I honestly felt the same, but really really enjoyed it. My husband hasn't watched it yet, I might rewatch it with him ready for Season 3. I am reading that will be the last season though which is a shame

It is horrific. No one in charge really cares, it has been happening for some time and it continues to happen and nothing is done to stop it.

Feta in a salad with mixed leaves, temderstem broccoli, cucumber, watermelon and strawberry is amazing

16 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

Possibly too complex for me, but I'm happy to give it a go Any tips?

It's not overly complex - just buy filo pastry, don't try to make it. I don't have a go to recipie as I've only made it a few times but my biggest tip would be to flavour the mix well and remember that spinach let's out a lot of water so squeeze it out before putting in the pastry.

Try making some Spanakopita?

I haven't been able to stop thinking about this since I heard. He was 1 year younger than me. I was big fan back in the heyday of ROH, even met him and his brother at an ROH event. 

So, so sad. His poor family. I hope his daughters pull through. I can't imagine what his wife must be going through right now. 

I'm a bit late with this one but I've been binge watching Ted Lasso the last couple of days whilst trapped under my napping 3 month old. I've really really enjoyed it, far more than I had expected to, I've only got a handful of episodes left in season 2 and will be sad to see it end. It's such easy viewing, the characters are compelling and it's made me laugh out loud quite a few times which is something I rarely do when watching tv shows.

Any one know when season 3 will be out?

I've sailed through it a bit faster than I expected and I'll have to find something else to watch now.