Some serious beef going down today in Huddersfield's wood pigeon community 🐦

Their exploits are all very admirable, and I'm sure they're both lovely young men, but could we swap Michael Olise back for Arthur Fery?

We're reaching the part of the cycle where "What Manchesterism means for Huddersfield Town's 2026/27 promotion hopes, read my Substack..." is probably only a fortnight away. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

With my 'two Snickers a day' routine I'm going to be quids in.

It's certainly a bold move to note that 'everyone will hate this' and there are 'no easy answers', whilst providing an easy answer that everybody hates. www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

“Corruption is good when it works for us” is why we have corruption

💥New | The planned closure of Research Professional News is a loss for the sector ✍️ @cash4questions.bsky.social #ScholComm #AcademicSky #ResearchFunding

Wow, UEFA aren't messing about. "We express our disbelief at such an unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable decision." www.uefa.com/news-media/n...

[Inserts Matt Ryan / Andy Burnham joke into the chat]

I remember playing this game in a pub once. 'What's the largest city/town you've never visited in the UK?' Slightly ruined by the fact that for about three quarters of us the answer was 'Milton Keynes'.

Probably for the best, given South Africa are basically a bottom half championship team and play like one.

My timeline seems to be remarkably sanguine in the face of today's unedifying self indulgence

On the plus side, this should prevent Indiana Jones 6

When you accidentally splice Rehman Chishti with Bear Grylls

Considering muting anyone who uses the portmanteau 'Oxbridge'.

This kind of display used to really annoy me, but I just find this current team massively unlikeable, so don't really care. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricke...

There is ONE thing I am looking forward to this heatwave: Pictures of paschal candles that have melted in churches. Here's an example from a few years ago. It's my favourite phenomenon. Because, well... Look at it.

I'm in a very dark place today. But it's also 18 degrees, so there is that.

Cancelled today - due to extreme heat in London

Similarly, just received some spam from Peter van Gelder.

Update, I am instead going to spend most of the day in my cellar.

When you're an influential thought leader, but the train companies are telling you not to travel due to a 'risk to life'.

Baba Rahman

He's peaked too early. That's all I'm going to say.

I've had 2 journalists today asking if Miliband as Chancellor would be a "Liz Truss moment" and find it difficult not to just respond "are you on crack?".

My laser-sharp ability to plan work trips during London heatwaves is second only to my skill in visiting Liverpool when it's raining.

Decent game of football this ✅

Well, that was a thing of beauty ⚽

Some of the most inappropriate content I've been exposed to in the last two years has been through primary school Whatsapp groups.

⚫ Mort du peintre David Hockney : le Britannique, chantre d’une peinture figurative virtuose, immédiate et sensuelle, lorgnant un pop art empreint de gigantisme, est mort à 88 ans. ➡️ https://l.liberation.fr/KjC

This is outrageous. When I hire KPMG to validate my priors I expect to receive the wildly overconfident lies of a 23 year old MBA, not those of some stinking robot.

Same. Same.

If government mandated all departments, public sector organisations to leave X and use other platforms that take their statutory responsibilities more seriously (and whose owners don't actively promote civil war in Britain) there would be a pretty quick exodus of others.

Post disquieting images that just feel off

I’m not an expert on counter-terrorism but I feel like there’s an obvious reason why the intelligence services may be interested in having a diverse workforce.

Happy Friday!

Could the media stop being weird about this, please? No normal person spends more than about 10 seconds thinking about this in their entire lifetime.

In other news, my 'Andy Burnham for PM' T-shirt has just arrived in the post

Can we desist with this 'managers vs academics' discourse, please...

*niche Huddersfield skeet alert* I wonder whether he had enough time to go to Da Sandro's for the early bird special? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I'm not saying that I'm obsessed with the Merlin app, but locating a Eurasian Tree Sparrow has eclipsed any of my professional achievements this week.

This should be used in every REF impact case study workshop as an example of how activities, engagement and knowledge exchange are too often sold as substitutes for measurable and demonstrable change.

Until I've heard Shigeru Miyamoto's take on the UKRI 'buckets' realignment, I'm not going to engage in this debate.

Oh well if the candy crush guy says it,

Exit (The Wrong Way) by Marsheaux youtu.be/WN1b8xH8ZPY?...

There is no moral high ground here, just various levels up a pyramid of shite. Knowing how far you're willing to climb matters.

I have two syllables for that suggestion

916 at Parkrun this morning, and a whole load of randomness

“Still or sparkling?’ The correct answer is neither. You both know that you want the perfectly adequate, perfectly free tap water.” - excellent (and correct) column this: