>>30015

Do you have a reason to believe that porn has mostly negative effects?

Also your child will work out that it's a loveless relationship pretty damned quickly, so they'll be better off if you make a clean break now rather than a messy break later.

>>30014

>most straight vanilla lads will have grown up wanking to models like Imogen Thomas, when in reality the best they can do is a bird like Scarlett Moffatt

You thin fetishists really do get the shitty end of the stick. I'd take Moffatt over Thomas in a heartbeat.

Don't listen to that nofap bullshit - porn does no harm. If it did work that way then the logical conclusion would be to wank while doing the housework and other chores.

>hot traps don't really exist in real life unless you have £150-£200 to spend on escorts

Have you tried? Clubs usually do transgender nights if you're willing to travel and I imagine it's quite a lonely life. Or if its just a no-strings fantasy you want to try then £200 is nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Failing that, I enjoy pornographic games so do that if you don't mind an enormous time-sink.

>>30013
>People would generally rather watch Premiership football than their local non-league team

Am I really such a wrong'un that I quite prefer the mid-low leagues? It feels more...real and it's enjoyable to fantasise that you probably could. Give me a brunette with a nice smile and a bit of character, average body that has the weight in the right places and body-hair.

I suppose it's only logical that with age I've come to appreciate women that my mind associates more with motherhood.

>>30016
>I'd take Moffatt over Thomas in a heartbeat.

You might want to do your googling before you make any rash decision. Moffatt is skinny these days while Thomas has a body.

>>30018

At that point it's rude not to call it a BAWDEHH.

>>30017
>Don't listen to that nofap bullshit - porn does no harm.

Porn can very much do harm, as can almost anything. Pointing out porn has been a detriment for one person doesn't mean it's inherently shameful or evil.

Personally, I also believe I'd have been far better off if I'd not watched porn, or reduced my viewing. It wasn't even so much about developing unrealistic expectations (in fact, the sheer variety and availability of porn probably increased the scope of my sexual attractions, and made it easier to see that side of people in real life), but I've also developed some really unhealthy associations between sex and certain emotional states.

Ultimately, porn is a pretty isolated and passive form of consumption. It can be distracting, expensive (in terms of time and/or money), and can really cause certain wires to be crossed psychologically.

There are better ways of dealing with stress or sexual needs, but I guess it all depends how you use these things.

>>27842

>This is what privatisation gets you lads.

If they're too dim to draw up a sensible contract, I'm not optimistic about their ability to commission services in-house.

>>27844
No one is looking to commission ANYTHING in-house anymore. Even Labour councils in bum-fucking nowhere don't do it. In fact, a few councils started "downsizing" and started a major privatisation work. Not sure if it was directed by central government because councils were begging for money because of Covid, but that's how it turned out.

The juice is all about contracts to the private sector. I work in commissioning, procurement and finance, and I let out, since March, contracts worth £600 million for both central government and local government. I am not even a senior officer. It's all direct awards, variations, such nonsense.

The best part is "Emergency - Covid", because you can bypass EU procurement regulations too.

Sorry lads, I'm too drunk. I hope Boris doesn't get me.

>>27850
>The best part is "Emergency - Covid", because you can bypass EU procurement regulations too.

This is it. Next year when the "public inquiries" start, it won't be the number of people who died that is the scandal, it will be the millions that we've pissed away on fake furlough, the millions (!) of fake meals we pissed away on eat-out-to-help-out and other schemes, and how many of the contracts being hurriedly signed right now bypassed all the normal procurement rules.

This will be the scandal of the past six months that will haunt taxpayers for years to come and will cause a change of government.

>>27850
My girlfriend's mum works in adult day care services for a Labour run council. A lot of the services have been outsourced in recent years to private companies, who charge the council more than it cost to run them in-house, but they've cherry picked all of the 'cheap' disabilities and left the council to still look after the most expensive users. Then again, when it was all in-house it was also a massive shitshow.

>>27851

>the millions (!) of fake meals we pissed away on eat-out-to-help-out and other schemes

I have one foot still in the restaurant game and it really is that bad, because it's so fucking easy to do - there is quite literally no way to prove or disprove how many meals you've sold in a day. I'm sure some tiny hole in the walls will get done for selling four thousand burgers a day, but otherwise everyone will quietly double or triple their sales and get away with it. And why not, it's not like the scheme was that useful anyway - it just caused backlogs.

>>41267
I think he's just in the middle of shouting something, probably "FUCK OFF PAPS LIVE ROUNDS!", which is fair enough all things considered.

>>41268
Where is he now, do you think?

>>41266

What on earth is that chap with the G36 up top doing? That's definitely not how you're meant to hold a weapon you're intending to use unless you want to hurt yourself.

>>41270

he's looking 'hard' for the camera obviously

>>439192
>But it's not entirely certain if it was just a natural fluctuation of temperatures within an interglacial, or if we really would have been at the start of a new full-on glacial period
I suppose there's an outside chance this smooth fluctuation up and down could suddenly act out for no reason at all.

Image source: https://colinmathers.com/2020/08/23/the-climate-crisis-has-not-gone-away/

>>439195

The consensus among climatologists is that the models they have nowadays, which are infinitely complex and are being run on some of the world's most powerful computers, cannot explain the increase in global temperatures from within the climate models themselves. Simply put, the scope of the climate variables they are working with does not allow for the kind of resulting outsize temperature trends that we are seeing now. You only get the values we are increasingly experiencing in our time when you introduce an anthropogenic element in your equations.

>>439196

Are you trying to say that the climate models don't already presume anthropogenic climate change? Because they do.

>>439200

They are factoring in human CO2 release. It's not like they aren't. Again, what I said was that our weather the last few years can't be explained by nature alone anymore.

>>439202
Why doesn't "nature" include you? Fucking twatty humans. I'm gonna enjoy this.

I swear I'm not an alien, mods.

>>27819

It's a state of mind as much as anything. I know pensioners who are still youthful and dynamic, and people in their mid-twenties who have basically given up. Being curious and engaged and willing to change your mind is far more important than how many birthdays you've had IMO. Even if you're physically in decline, you can still grow as a person.

>>27845

Quite. And if you keep pushing yourself to keep doing new and interesting things, then that's not only a sign that you're still switched on, but it can actually slow down your brain's aging process altogether. There have been studies that if given the chance, you can be almost as quick to pick up new things as you were in your younger days. It's called neuroplasticity, and it was once thought that it fades dramatically with age, but if you keep challenging your brain even in middle age, then a lot of that ability can be retained into your 50s or 60s.

What I do struggle with being in my mid-40s are the new currents of public opinion and social acceptance of certain things that have taken hold in the last 15 years or so. I know that just by not being the same generation as all the Millennials or even people that came after them, I'll never quite relate to them. But their views on such things as identity politics or social justice are just something that I can't get my head around. I'm sort of stuck in the late 90s to early 2000s with most of my opinions in that respect. Most people forget that those were liberal times, too, and that the envelope just hadn't been pushed as far as it has today. We weren't homophobes, or racists or sexists. In fact, we thought that people in our parents' generation were. But I guess that always depends on what your vantage point is. My parents seemed to spell the end of all that was good and holy to my grandparents when my mum and dad decided to wear their hair long, listen to hard rock, and join student protests in the late 60s.

>>27846

>I'm sort of stuck in the late 90s to early 2000s with most of my opinions in that respect. Most people forget that those were liberal times, too, and that the envelope just hadn't been pushed as far as it has today. We weren't homophobes, or racists or sexists.

There's a lot of try-hard bullshit in lefty politics and always has been, but I think the young people do have a point in this respect - we were a little bit racist and sexist and homophobic back in the early 00s, we just didn't realise it.

To our generation, it's obvious that something like The Black and White Minstrel Show is totally unacceptable, but we grew up with a lot of really iffy stuff on telly. It's natural to feel attacked when people are criticising things that you fondly remember, but if we can't face up to our mistakes then we're no better than previous generations. It'd be quite remarkable if we had just completely solved discrimination and there was no more progress to be made.

There's a vocal minority of twats on Twitter, but mostly young people strike me as thoughtful, sensitive and deeply principled. They've handled lockdown with far more maturity than I would have, they're leading the way on climate change and they're remarkably stoical in the face of inheriting an absolute shit-show.

>>27847
>There's a vocal minority of twats on Twitter, but mostly young people strike me as thoughtful, sensitive and deeply principled. They've handled lockdown with far more maturity than I would have, they're leading the way on climate change and they're remarkably stoical in the face of inheriting an absolute shit-show.

You sound like an online journalist m8. What else do the coming generation do that you're on your soapbox about?

>>27846
I'm on the same boat (a bit older), but as an non white. Things were much more inclusive then (in your class) - but only because racism was overt (back in the 90s/80s compared to now). I don't know how to explain it. I don't want to say the bourgeois, corporate and media types are stamping out how it was, but it truly feels that way. There was a real understanding, whether you were brown, white or black, we were all fucking proletariats & peasants, and we looked out for each other (at least in London and Bristol). Now, everyone is an individual, and nobody can match the state. Union memberships have crashed since the 30s. Wtf? How?

I hate this shit, and my kids don't understand it when I get too drunk and rant. I'm just the mental old uncle/dad from a "century" ago.

Fuck off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdixQDPA2h0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKISdd2mKzU

This song has been sampled in so many fucking places.

>>12497
Sorry mate, I didn't catch your name there.

Sorry not sorry

It's surprisingly good.

>>12497
That's Chas and Dave playing the guitar and bass on that track btw, bit of trivia for you.

>>439193
For £40 I'd want a happy ending too. She can clean it up after.

Went to see the new Christopher Nolan film, Ten ET's last night. It was alright, not as good as inception but better than Interstellar. It can be summed up without spoilers as a mash-up of the film Primer, that episode of Red Dwarf where time goes backwards, and that one Doctor Who plot point about River Song and the Doctor meeting each other in opposite direction. If it had one weakness it seemed to just rush you along through the foundations of the story without taking the time to establish any of the characters, a bit like the first hour of Inception where you're still a bit like "Okay but who are these people? Why?", the difference is Inception pulls it back with a very gripping personal storyline for Cobb, whereas this film had literally nothing. I think it was an intentional decision to keep things focussed on the broader strokes though. Overall I quite liked it, it's no masterpiece but I enjoy films that give you a few breadcrumbs and then let you say "I knew that was going to happen!" when the pieces start falling together.

On the other hand, my girlfriend sat there sighing and rolling her eyes because "it was dumb", but I think she just wanted to dislike it because people on the internet had been saying it was clever. She still hasn't grown out of that contrarian teenage reverse-snobbery phase yet honestly, and it does wind me up. She just sits there actively trying to be unimpressed with something for two hours, and then she'll sulk when I disagree and tell her to stop being a pretentious dickhead.

Anyway yeah 7/10.

>>439197
Your time must be very cheap if you think thats a bad deal (happy ending or not).

>>439144

Am I missing something or have they put the price up since Friday? It's currently £329.00 at that link.

>>439199
Not him but that's £40 a week to run the hoover round. How long is it really going to take? The hardest part in my mind is that you would instinctively keep the place tidy yourself knowing that someone is dealing with your mess and judging you. Then there is the part where you would presumably have to manage them if they start taking the piss or even fire them - they might even talk to you.

It makes much more sense to live in mild filth and pay someone once a quarter to give the place a proper clean. Or do what I did at uni and buy a couple twenty bags to keep yourself always slightly stoned so the mess doesn't bother you.

>>30840
addendum: but, gym cycling and x-training is so painfully boring, and as I live in a hotspot I don't really fancy going into a room full of people electing bodily juices in both liquid and aerosol form everywhere. I do have a bike, which I use, but winter is coming.

>>30840
>being fat doesn't help that situation, and I know it's 80% diet

You can't exercise away a bad diet.

>>30842
That's, uh, literally what I said m8.

>>30840

I'm not sure what the situation is regarding COVID, but swimming is an excellent option if you've got dodgy joints.

>>30844
At my local gym the pool is under a strict booking system, and I'd still not be comfortable really. I do (or at least did) swim from time to time, once every couple of weeks, but the lack of entertainment makes the seconds feel like hours.

Still, nothing beats getting into the pool after a sauna.

Among Us is very fun. It's pretty much a multiplayer Chatoom Mafia game with extra visual and proximity mechanics - you run around solving simple puzzles to land your spacecraft while trying to figure out which one of the crew is killing the rest. When you find a corpse, you have a choice to reporting it and discussing who might be responcible for causing it. You can also call an emergency meeting for similar purposes, after which you vote on who to throw out the airlock. There are security cameras for you to spy on suspicious crew memebers, facilities useful for proving your innocence, and other cool little things to engage with while the killer is on the loose.

It's pretty much a light experience of what I imagine Space Station 13 to be like. If you find a group willing to perform some light roleplay and actually discuss who the 'Imposter' could be it's a very fun experience. There are plenty of morons though who just want to push through the game as fast as they can and completely miss the point of discussion. Thankfully, the different maps seem to apeal to different types of player - the spaceship map has offered the most engaging players and actual intelegent social dynamic from my experience.

For just a few quid it's really worth it. I've probably played over 6 hours today [spoiler]Go on, judge me[/i].

>>24377
>[spoiler]Go on, judge me[/i].

Oh, I shall.

>>24378
>intelegent social dynamic

>>24379
Well, have you played it? We're not exactly discussing philosphy or whatever you twats do in univercity but can be a great deal more engaging than anything else I've played.

>>24380
It may do, I'm just being pedantic about how you couldn't spell "intelligent" and now I'm going to expand it to "philosophy" and "university". That's only spelling though, it doesn't really reflect on intelligence beyond retention of really specific forms of information.

>>27618
How long did you spend doing that?

>>27618

An ACTUAL PROFESSOR has done studies on the caloric expenditure of popular VR games.

https://vrhealth.institute/vr-ratings/

>>27619
About 1 hour on drums and 30 mins of Beat Saber.

>>27621
Well, I'm glad it was more fun than an hour of walking.

GTA V VR mod works surprisingly well. It's very fun to explore the world map in full VRw.

However, the mod renders the left and right eye alternately, so each eye is always one frame offset from the other, though this can be disabled at the cost of losing stereoscopic effects (which doesn't affect the game all that much, imo). What it does mean though is that now I've come out of about an hour of playing it, the real world feels very strange indeed.

The game is fully playable though, although the Menyoo's laser sights option is a good one to turn on.

>>66725

Not them but it is an absurd expectation and it shifts the burden of responsibility for investigating mafia ties on to the man in the street for all aspects of their life from the various bodies that should be investigating such organisations.

>>66727
We seem to be interpreting it quite differently. My understanding was the opposite - if ethical consumption in capitalist markets is impossible (due to the opaqueness inherent in global supply chains), then it follows that individuals should worry less about their individual purchases and instead demand more regulation and enforcement at higher levels.

When you say "it is an absurd expectation", what exactly are you referring to?

>>66728

You can look at it in both ways if you want to.

Either it's a cop out and gives you an excuse to buy everything from Nestle and Monsanto because what's the point worrying if you can't avoid it, or it means every company you buy from is up to no good at some point down the line even if you try do your homework so the system itself needs uprooting.

still not sure which side the original lad meant it from mind.

>>66728
It is an absurd statement. What it should have called for is investigations and more regulations. Would you be okay with a report on hospitals killing people ending with, "patients should chose better doctors"?

It's a cancerous brand of capitalism that expects the consumer to fix all the world's problems by being informed and moral consumers. Buy electric cars if you don't want global warming. Don't eat at Nandos if you care about the welfare of chickens. Don't buy from Nike if you don't agree with Uyghur slave labour. The government doesn't need to step in.

>>66730
>Buy electric cars if you don't want global warming.
Even in the example you gave, the consumer is uninformed. Electric cars are still really terrible for the environment. I'm not criticising you, this just underlines the point you're making.

>>439153
The poor thing. He must be struggling to make his last couple of thousand last each month.

>>439156

This why he needs to do all those odd jobs at dairies, building sites, and laboratories.

>>439156
His take home is £7.5k - I imagine most of that goes into paying the maintenance of his kids/divorce, which is entirely his own fault to be honest.

I do think it's slightly unfair around the HMRC "benefit in kind" of using the flat attached to Number 10 - he would be criticised if he didn't lived there, and it seems entirely reasonable to me that it should simply be a perk of the job.

>>439159
I'd always figured it was, the way they make such a big deal of the sitting PM moving into Number 10. And Bodger does do a lot of sitting.

There's a real scarcity of Xbox One controllers at the moment. No shops in town had them in stock, and even online retailers like Argos, Amazon, Smyths etc had none in for delivery. I ended up paying slightly more than I would like to get one from the Microsoft store. I assume it's because the Series X controller will replace the One ones when they launch in a couple of months, but the newer models are smaller with a worse d-pad so they're no good for me.

>>66712

Because then you'd have to defrost the whole thing to use any of it. Unless you fancy going at it with power tools.

>>66714
Oh. I see. I thought there was some other reason.

>>66714
You can cut the cheese beforehand and have frozen treats ready for a hot day. Serve with dip at your next party.

>>66716
> HAD A FIVE CHEESE PIZZA

>66714
BECAUSE THEN YOU'D HAVE TO DEFROST THE WHOLE THING TO USE ANY OF IT. UNLESS YOU FANCY GOING AT IT WITH POWER TOOLS.

>66716
YOU CAN CUT THE CHEESE BEFOREHAND AND HAVE FROZEN TREATS READY FOR A HOT DAY. SERVE WITH DIP AT YOUR NEXT PARTY.

Q anons are right /boo

>>66717
">"
Learn how image boards work.

>>13824
You can't have been the first person to have had that idea. I imagine there's just not enough money in it, particularly since most places have gluten-free options anyway.

>>13820
He doesn't look like the kind of person who would get offended by this.

>>13826
Fucking hell I hope I don't look anything like that in my sixties. Literally the shape and colour of gammon.

>>13827

Alan Brazil gets his blood pressure checked at Kwik Fit.

If it drops below 80psi, he thinks about Thatcher while eating fistfuls of rock salt.

>>13826
He looks like he could do with a fried egg and a pineapple ring.

>>7939
It's always a good time to buy your own place if you can get the funds together and deal with the 6 months+ heartache it all tends to take. If your parents are able to help you, then take that help; most of us don't get it and you and they are lucky to be able to do it.

Commuting is rapidly going out of fashion. Depends on what job you're in, of course, but I think the homeworking/flexible hours thing is here to stay.

>>7941
I broadly agree, but there is a big difference between a free hold, a lease hold and owning a flat. The former has no "hidden" fees, the middle has ground rent which tends to be fairly nominal while the latter has service charges which can easily reach several thousand pounds a year. So on top of your mortgage your effectively still paying rent. Make sure to have a chat with other owners in the building if you buy a flat to find out how onerous the lease holders are. And (fat chance in The City) if several of you are long term owners, see if you can acquire the lease nad form a co-op.

>Cut in stamp duty

ike all these sorts of actions this will just lead to increased house prices. It is good only for speculators, builders and boomers. I fucking hate it.

>>24328

> Same with Kindle and to a certain extent iPhones - when you control the only means of getting content onto the devices [...]

My current Kindle is from ~2014 and the one before that was the original 3g one from 2010 so I'm not exactly up to date with the latest devices, but at least with the older ones you could just plug them into your computer with a USB cable and copy over whatever PDF/mobi files you'd downloaded from the interwebs / bought on other ebook stores over to it.

>>24344
My ancient kindle with a physical keyboard died recently, and I can confirm that on the new one (which incidentally feels like cheap, flimsy, low grade plastic shit compared to the old one) I was able to copy my extensive collection of Victorian literature and Linux user manuals in this way without issue.

>>24332
That article ignores the 30% fee Apple charges on all Appstore and in-app transactions.

>>24343
>built around being a gateway drug

It's absolutely no secret - Bezos calls it the flywheel.

>>24348
Point is that they aren’t taking a loss on the initial purchase, unlike the traditional razor and blades strategy.

>>4498
I've got no problem driving 3.5t box vans but there's something about a rangie, especially ones of that age, which makes me really unsure of my 'size' on the road. I hated parking them.

>>4499

I have noticed that too - there is a reason I've parked it in the corner away from everyone else. I haven't been brave enough to park between two cars yet, let alone reverse into a space. Multi storey garages are fun, as well.

The 12 seater ford transit bus at work feels smaller than this when it comes to manoeuvring.

>>4498

I forgot to mention it's the 3.6 litre V8 diesel engine - it's faster than a three tonne car has any right to be and does surprisingly well on fuel - 38mpg on the motorway.

>>4498
That's a fine looking vehicle for the money.

I've lately become a little bit fascinated with really old cars.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZBFR-jxb9U

It's interesting to see sow much has changed and yet how much remains the same, and I always find it a little bit enchanting when pre-WW2 tech and machinery is still serviceable and usable today. It feels like it comes from an altogether different era of history.

>>24350
Has any version topped the original? Just curious considering its widely regarded as a masterpiece.

>>24354
RCT2 is the best one, but 3 is still pretty decent.

>>24352
Can I just say I only had to look up one thing on the web about Subnautica and that was where the Big Sub bits were, which it turned out I'd been past half a dozen times already I just hadn't been paying attention. I'm not saying that to be smug, I just think it gives you exactly the right amount of info, both in speech, text and visuals so that you know what you need to do.

Cracking fun, the biggest of recommendations from me too. I couldn't stop smiling when I got the Big Sub.

>>24371
It'll never beat Sub Culture.

>>24372

None of my extensions will turn back on now either. What the fuck?

>>27625
It's easier to build discipline when you can free yourself from constant distraction and can occupy yourself with fulfilling hobbies.

>>27627
>>27628
Werks on my machine m8. I just turn it on for 15 hours every morning. Are you using Linux or summat?

>>27629
Something went wrong when it tried to install its extension for firefox and it just fucked the whole thing up.

I really barely use the Internet any more. I browse this place on my lunch break, I make a few controversial posts on lefty Rudgwick subs, and I'll stick youtube on when I'm eating. But the whole thing has really rather lost its appeal. I think I've already read all there is about the subjects I used to get lost in deep wiki walks and so on for.

So much of the Internet is just vapid shite now,, and it's harder to find the stuff that isn't because Google massages its results to put shopping and entertainment sites above anything else.

>>27631
Google may massage your results to do that.

I often search up technical standards documents, etc, and often find that using Google to get to the IEEExplore page is easier than its integrated search.