deegee

I’ve noticed this trend getting bigger all year. I was saying to the other half just the other day that I can’t fathom out why folk illuminate all around their house (often a generic new build or refurbished old ex council house). I can understand folk wanting a few lights out to the back, if they had to nip out etc but to “showcase” their house all night to resemble something out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind isn’t something I like much. Same folk in these houses are the type to have a hot tub and been to B&M for the mandatory “Love,Life, Laughter” wall ornaments.

My customer in Ireland pays approx €100+ per month for health insurance for his family. I haven’t a clue about the nuances of their HSE but whenever I am over, the radio is always filled with stories of lack of nurses leaving for better pay in UK, USA etc. Always issues with lack of rural services and their Children’s Hospital in Dublin has caused a scandal due to budget overspending, location heart of Dublin suits highly paid doctors but no low cost accommodation or ease of parking for other staff and patients’ families etc. I personally think a blend of NHS (with protection of access to services for all) but option to go private for some services will be the future, as current funding versus demand versus results really isn’t working as well as it could.

..more of a pain in your other half’s gums though, I would have thought!

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go into my local Sainsbury’s again, without looking out for folk squatting over the cheeses and cooked meats, depositing jobbies all over the aisle!! I’m all for folks’ right to protest but that would be literally a step too far.

I think a lot of councils are either playing the political game of being seen to “care more” or dressing up the cancellation of this and umpteen firework displays next week due to restrictions, when it’s more than likely about finance and making savings, with a sprinkling of politics thrown in for good measure. The local (to me) bonfire & fireworks at Bridge of Allan is 100% going ahead and it is run by the Round Table. It’s always a great evening and raises loads for charities. I’ll definitely be there and enjoying the show along with several thousand other locals, with more risk to my health caused by the indulgence of burgers and chips to heat me up on a chilly evening.

Not a single check at Celtic Park a week past Tuesday (I sit in 113 section of Lisbon Lions Stand, the traditional “away end”) but tv that evening showed checks upon access at the front of the stadium. On Saturday, there was a total ring of new COVID stewards around all access points. I am personally really unhappy with these measures, even if they hardly impact on me, and walked around stadium to find a few stewards nearer the access at superstore, seemingly not caring less and waving everyone through without any checks and that’s how I got past the cordon. As you say, I am in no more close contact than at any other ground in Scotland where a chunk of fans choose to sit/ stand together. I was at Kirkintilloch Rob Roy versus Pollock the other week and the covered terrace was packed due to the rain and dare I say it, fans were more closer and vocal than at an SPL stadium!

https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/scottish-news/7911414/glasgow-christmas-lights-cancelled-virtual-moment/ Between Glasgow’s Christmas Market on George Square today (non COVID related I believe), the City Council have sucked even more joy out of families’ Christmas by ditching the lights switch-on, due to COVID passports etc. Whilst we’ve taken great strides on the road to more normality, albeit frustratingly slow, this year, it’s surely time we had the courage and confidence to be able to have folks and their kids out for an hour in an evening to see the lights going on? Even more so if you consider the same volume of crowds can shop in places like Braehead, Silverburn etc over the festive season!

Personally I get very drained and have a low mood over winter, punctuated by a few days rest over Christmas. I actually love Autumn and the glorious colours we see in forests, love the great Scottish larder and warming foods at this time plus, like Oaksoft I get a peculiar Christmas feel around now where I’ll listen to carols on YouTube etc. However by around now and the change of clocks, the dreich dismal darkness and feeling colder in the house, I get the onset of SAD. I was on holiday in the Canaries over xmas/ New Year in 2018 and 2019 and would love to make a winter sun holiday a permanent feature. We are off to the Caribbean in February this year ahead and it’s only the thought of that that improves my state of depressed mood tbh. I even have started to loath the greed around Christmas and since my kids are now adults, I’ve no need to really look forward to the “Festive Season”.

Just watching the Budget on the telly and interesting to see the majority of the Conservatives, especially the Front Bench Cabinet Ministers mainly masked up. It’s a total rewind from even only a week ago and it seems we are destined to have these dammed useless masks and the theatre around them for a while yet.

On the back of this thread, I had a lovely bovril and a steak pie yesterday afternoon at Celtic Park. Wasn’t really a chilly afternoon but the bovril did go down a treat.

It’s the only thing I’d drink at the football as I’m a bit of a coffee snob tbh and wouldn’t drink tea or coffee out of a pre-packed plastic tub. If anything I find bovril to be a bit cooler than I prefer it at the match these days; health & safety seems to have stopped the sale of nice hot bovril. I have bovril at home and enjoy a salt and peppery mug of it on a chilly evening.

I totally agree mate; the rules aren’t too harsh in the grand scheme of things and I want nothing more than for all of us to be as safe and healthily as possible. It’s just my view that we should be critiquing every government decision, especially the ones that are clearly non- medical and (like probably every government throughout the world) have a slight self- interested agenda but impacts on the population.

I needed in in Ireland to eat/ sit indoors with a customer last month as well as travel with Aer Lingus (checked at Glasgow). I had no sway over their rules which were different to ours at many points this year. I had to goto Donegal in early Spring and could sit indoors with a beer whereas my contractor man who lived literally up the road couldn’t enter the hotel. In Derry City the rules were different to a town 10 mins drive away. None of this really is relevant to your point but my point is that I fully accepted the rules as part of my job going to a different country 6 weeks ago but I’m really not keen on supporting this circus over here when we have 85% or so vaccinated and everywhere open for the past two months. It’s a pointless virtue- signalling exercise which tbh I would probably agreed was useful in Springtime this year but is now an overreach of Government, in my humble opinion.

I will do mate. That’s why I like these forums as you’ll always get an opinion that’s worth considering and looking up, whether you agree or not.

Last time I had a look the other week, the Canaries were something like 30 per 100k cases versus our 300-350 cases. This is where it all gets confusing in every region as we move out of this phase. I caught the end of Juventus- Roma on telly last night and the crowd was clearly limited and spaced out whereas in UK we are back to full stadia. It was only the other month you had to wear a mask anywhere outdoors, including on the beach in Spain unless swimming in the water. In a nutshell we are far less likely presently to catch this virus on Tenerife than here.

There’s always one idiot in the village that can’t take a simple question, relevant to topic at face value without trying to be smarmy and smart- arsed with their needless, “look at me” reply. Thanks anyway for taking the time to respond.

Will tomorrow afternoon's match at Celtic Park be the first high- profile, large attendance event where this is legally enforced? I wonder if Celtic have said how they will administer this as I am going and haven't the app. I do have the paper certificate (as I needed it for a work trip to Ireland recently) but tbh I would refuse to show it tomorrow if challenged. I would either try another turnstile and hope the steward is less of a jobsworth type or simply go home rather than be forced to show this "passport". The other half isn't happy but I told her she can go in and I will give it a miss if stopped. I doubt there is any other venue or event I will practically need to have to show this passport unless we go abroad soon.

I think 9/11 turned (understandably tbh) a lot of very well intentioned politicians, military folk and UN representatives more than a bit blood- thirsty and doo- lally. Up until that point, your man Colin Powell always came across as a fairly balanced heavyweight on the US political arena, who I tended to listen to as his voice appeared to carry the real- message and gravitas of government. You forget where the last 20 years have gone when you hear folk like him are in their mid- 80s and dropping like flies.

There’s some very angry, shouty man from the RMT on the BBC Nine tv programme just now. They’re not going to gain much public support or get much interaction with the management, if this bloke is representative on their discussion process. It was a stream of confrontational cliches to the presenter bloke; “no resolution”, “let me be crystal clear”.

I went 5 years ago and really enjoyed the trip. I went independently to Auschwitz on a public bus. It might have changed but if you were in before 10ish, you could look around own. After that time you were on a timed and guided visit. If you are into history, the Nazi HQ (and torture cells) are equally chilling and located 15 mins walk from the city in a building on edge of Kraków centre. There’s an old fashioned cafe bar just off main square which had the Free Polish resistance radio station based secretly upstairs. The main square is large, beautifully laid out and has plenty of architecture, bars, restaurants, street stuff going on. I liked too the one hour classical music concerts in the small but very ornate churches on the square. The Jewish quarter is also worth a walk, especially for the market. Alternatively if it’s a lads’ trip, there’s plenty of bars, vodka bars and a ubiquitous British sports bar on the square and plenty of lapdancers if that’s your thing.

The other half’s dad (he’s in his late 70’s and doesn’t keep the best of health; has ongoing cancer treatment and was in hospital with a suspected mini stroke this year) was confirmed as having COVID this morning. Couple of things that are on my mind... I was saying yesterday that he only had cold- like symptoms and I was saying to the other half she was exaggerating getting him a COVID test, as she goes mad taking tests all the time. Even though the LFT did show a faint 2nd positive line, I was still sure he just had a cold! It shows how well the vaccine works as he would probably be hospitalised and on a ventilator if he had caught this virus a year ago.

I didn’t really enjoy The London Eye. Seeing a load of roofs didn’t really do it for me. Far better seeing the buildings as they are intended to be observed; either at street level with all the hustle and bustle or on a river trip enjoying the architecture from that perspective. Similarly I probably prefer Blackpool Tower to the Eiffel Tower in Paris; at least Blackpool has a circus and a bar attached, as well as the scary clear glass floor at the top, where folk get nervous looking down . Paris, like London Eye had views of roofs which you can see for free when you fly into the city.

On one hand, it’s quite good to see the current bickering on this thread relates to validity of Norwegian data (or otherwise). It shows we have at least moved on from the darker periods in spring 20 and winter 21 where the agenda was serious illnesses that swept through the country and stretched the NHS, high number of deaths, not knowing and the push for a vaccine to lead us out this mess. In my mind, there’s no doubt it has been a political “show” since this springtime and I have no hesitation in saying the masks and vaccine passports are doing no clinical good and we need to move on to living with this virus. I’m beyond getting angry; that was how I was feeling in early summer, with all the Scottish Government showboating of delays to reopening and blatant denial that vaccines were able to allow us to open up all the things we enjoy in normal life. Way I feel now is I am weary seeing masked-up folk walking literally 2 yards to the bar, then walk back 2 yards and sit down with mask off. I am exhausted by the still seemingly reluctance of Government to accept this passport is an absolutely baffling and ill-prepared “tool” that penalises narrow and specific sectors of society, yet no restrictive regulations needed to enter any other retail, business or leisure property. At this point, we need a strong positive message from Government and dare I say it clinicians (not jumped up dentists or social scientists) to get people feeling mentally less fragile and admit we surely to goodness are at herd immunity levels and as high an uptake of vaccines as we can expect.

There’s nothing more to be said or add that hasn’t been today, however it was a tough listen on the car radio on way home this evening. Absolutely horrific and the poor girl’s family are victims as much as the girl herself; how on earth you can go through life with the constant agony about how much fear, pain and pure evil she had to face in her last hours and beyond? On the radio, some ex high- up old school detective was saying he was glad we don’t hang folk and we should do our best to ensure the filthy beast doesn’t top himself, but make him face his crimes every day for the rest of his life. Valid point even if raw emotion would prefer to let the girl’s family have 30 minutes alone with him. May she rest in peace and may women be allowed to feel safe in their own homes and communities.

Yip pretty much how I've seen it. Pubs not even looking for masks moving around or entering and I certainly haven't been asked to do T&T since the rules changed. I was in Dobbies yesterday late afternoon. Spent 30 mins browsing on my own, picking up a few things and decided I’d get a coffee in the restaurant. It was quiet but the lady asked my details for track & trace. Absolutely no sense in this as I was free to wander around the store but they needed this information for a 15 mins sit down with a blooming latte