Last time I got back home from abroad it basically didn't rain for five months. It's looking like the same thing might happen again. (This is probably bad, but it feels good right now.)

Didn't know this existed, but (a) lol, and (b) most stuff I like went out in the first round, and I'd probably have bailed by day 3. [am I out of touch meme]

Is it bad that I saw something the other day that made me think "there's no way I can vote for this party", but I've already forgotten what it was? Either I'm getting old or there's officially too much news. Probably both I guess.

I suppose the duration of Terrible Stuff doesn't help. Posting trivial things feels a bit inappropriate somehow (and was also a bit passé by about 2011 anyway, more's the pity), but there's only so much you can say about Terrible Stuff. I don't really know what to say here most of the time.

I can't really begrudge Coventry having good stuff, but is every indiepop band just gonna play Just Dropped In and skip Birmingham completely from now on? It was already pretty hit and miss here, but recently we're getting nothing.

Crazy. What a nightmare situation. I don't know or understand all the details, and probably never will, but this seems like something that... shouldn't be possible? www.birminghamdispatch.co.uk/landlord-fre...

Oh man, Liza Tarbuck leaving her show is a bit of a disaster. It was the perfect Saturday evening show, and the last place on Radio 2 (possibly radio generally) where you could hear something from the 1930s played, without fuss, next to something from last year. I'll miss it a lot.

Ok, am I missing something obvious here, or is it pretty much impossible to get a reservation at Rabbit? I've been looking quite often and it's always full, even three months ahead, and I'm guessing it's only going to get worse.

Yep, mystique is the thing. There are still great matches in this competition, and I don't doubt that some of these ties will be entertaining too, but most of these teams play each other so often that there aren't really any unknowns any more.

I'm sure this is entirely unfair on Kamel, but the format of the new Green Party leaflet instantly made me think of Insincere Dave from Digitiser and it just made me laugh out loud.

I think the sheer breadth of things here is important. Even if you aren't enraged about every thing on this list, there's likely to at least one thing you care passionately about and feel genuine anger and disappointment about.

Think twice about doing it themselves?

The fact that he's my MP and yet I have absolutely zero opinion about him probably isn't a good sign. I've never seen him, never seen anything from him, have no real idea what he stands for (despite it being quite a eventful year in the area).

Come on you are just making this up now

BREAKING: Our newly published data on #TheEnforcementProblem shows the UK is home to systemic breaches of animal protection laws but no prosecutions. Scroll to see what we found 🧵👇

The Countryside Alliance are absolute freaks. Like seriously, what the hell is wrong with them.

It was really great to see @thepainsofbeing.bsky.social again! Still sounding as good as ever. Hopefully it won't be the last time. (Would it be too much to hope for some new music one day? 😉)

I'd be interested to know if anyone more knowledgeable than me has ever written about why major British cities outside of London just can't seem to maintain momentum in the long term. Glasgow had a bit of a renaissance in the 90s; Birmingham in the 2000s, and Manchester now.

This is what I don't get. Irrespective of what the final decision is - we can judge that in a couple of weeks - it doesn't exactly fill me with confidence that they still don't have clear idea of what they're doing at this late stage.

These people are really bad at keeping their stories straight. How hard is it to not to obviously weird racist shit? Apparently too hard for anyone involved in putting up flags. For a while I thought this guy was surprisingly ok at the PR bit, but I guess the donations are just too hard to resist.

Zack Polanski was pretty good on the Last Leg to be fair; definitely more at ease than most politicians are. Would've preferred it if he actually clarified his stance on NATO when he had the chance though.

Well, it was only a matter of time I guess.

Honestly, it's a decent place! City centre isn't quite what it was 15 years ago, admittedly, but JQ is great, the good suburbs are better than ever and the less good bits are kinda just the same as any other city really. The worst thing is the roads, but there are plenty of nice parks and trees.

Stirchley community coming together; a pint at Attic after a dog walk past the carillon playing Bach; a Mateta hat-trick; making French onion soup; listening to Liza Tarbuck while looking at photos of the joyous crowds in America; it's been a nice day considering I'm on my own for the weekend.

Fun to see an inflatable frog costume in the flesh(?) at the Stirchley thing. It's a good trend! (Also thanks to everyone who said hello to my dog - he appreciated it.)

I know I'm just repeating myself here, but this is so stupid. The obsession with 'red tape' is preventing easy wins that have virtually no public opposition. It's cheap! It's simple! People like swifts! What are you doing?! www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Oh wow, I just found some folders of old banners I made for forums circa 2001-2007. Nostalgic, but also when I look at the later ones especially, it's like... what the hell, did I really make that? I never realised they were that good at the time.

This should be extremely easy to argue against. There are so many examples of hypocrisy from 'free speech advocates', and some fairly obvious examples one could bring up of restrictions on free speech which I think almost everyone supports.

Kinda wish trip hop would make a come back. There's only so many times you can listen to Dummy and Maxinquaye, but nothing else quite hits the spot when you want melancholy but without feeling like you're back in 6th form or something.

Obviously what he says is almost certainly untrue, but even if we take it at face value, I think Bridge shows a real lack of understanding of the set of conditions that gave rise to 'Cool Britannia', as well as about how... [Rant incoming] www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

This is good. A warm, nostalgic kind of album, and quite a rare one where the slow songs really hold their own amongst the more uptempo ones. 2025 is quietly turning out to be a pretty good year for indiepop, I think! thetelephonenumbers.bandcamp.com/album/scarec...

Quite an astonishingly poor article. How can you write so many words on the subject and fail to mention the fact that in 2024 fatalities were down 75% on 2023 (16 to 4), and lower than 2022 and 2021? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Utterly beholden to lobbyists, staggeringly ignorant and dismissive of the natural world: Rachel Reeves might not look or sound like Donald Trump, but she is behaving very much like him. This government is even more of an ecological hazard than the Tories were. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Bit of a weird assortment for my 'show us the last four albums...' thing.

I see the flag weirdos have been out in Harborne too. Quite interested in what the response will be, especially how proactive the council is here.

Lol just took my dog for a walk and saw the Stirchley flags, they already look so shit in this wind.

Quick thoughts on Saint Paul's Market: the food is excellent, as expected, and quite reasonably priced. We tried things from a couple of the traders that would normally be difficult to get here, Corner Shop and Zindiya, and it was all great. Left feeling full for less than £25 including a drink!

Well done lads! uk.news.yahoo.com/england-flag...

In the year 2025, I just used Spotify for the first time ever. Quite quickly discovered that Bust 'em Green isn't on there. And so ends my brief foray into the world of normal people music streaming.

New theory: the world started to go wrong when Going Steady split up after releasing a series of outrageously good singles in 2002. I mean, I like Ging Nang Boyz too, but man, the stuff Going Steady were releasing towards the end... just 10/10 after 10/10 shit. What a loss.

In one of those moods where there's like 30 records I want to listen to at the same time (probably not recommended). In a few months' time I'll be struggling to find anything I feel like. Anyway! Songs About You by Language of Flowers, what an album! Perfect jangle, perfect melodies, beautiful.

No idea if it's _unique_ in that respect, but it's quite scary how quickly and thoroughly it's cooked the brains of some people I would have thought of as normal or even good before they started going down this path. What's happened to Linehan in the past 10 years or so is almost unbelievable.

Strange really that so many people went to the trouble of illegally streaming sports when it's so easy to watch them legally for the perfectly normal and reasonable price of £140 a month. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

And so we face the question: is it more dystopian for the US govt to fake a video of the military assassination of civilians in international waters to make POTUS feel good, or to actually carry out the military assassination of civilians in international waters to make POTUS feel good?

This week's column. The details will make you gasp and rage. This massive desecration of nature is almost unbelievable, but it is happening in the UK right now. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Flipper's Guitar is like the perfect intersection of all my interests. Except football - I have no idea how they felt about football. Anyway, Three Cheers and Camera Talk are such sweet, fun records! Not so keen on the shitty Madchester stuff on the third album, but it has its moments still.

www.theguardian.com/society/2025... Not massively fond of kids myself, but to be honest I think the more access they have to public spaces the more likely they are to learn how to behave in them. Or more to the point, the more likely parents are to teach them. (Allow dogs everywhere too though!)

RSPCA getting in early before the yearly fatality statistics show that the ban is, in fact, working well.

I know there's probably a need for consistency from year to year, but why does the Big Butterfly Count always seem to miss the peak of butterflies by a few weeks? Even a week ago there were Commas everywhere in my garden; today, none. Hardly anything, in fact, other than Whites and Red Admirals.

Cutting "red tape" (aka public protections), as Reeves is doing, does not save money. Instead, it transfers costs from the rich to the poor. Other people pay for financial recklessness, filthy rivers, air pollution, lax building standards and consumer rip-offs. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...