SpringTime

Dress

Rated

Range

Loud

It will indeed be messy in places - especially with some pubs opening early morning. I'm not sure how much trouble we'll see round here though, I don't know anyone planning to visit a pub tomorrow. It's not like we've had Prohibition or anything, the pub can wait just a few more days.

Vogue

Chat rooms and Whatsapp are of course more forms of social media and they can be useful (the EDF is quite good) but how useful have any other social media really been when it comes to, for example, the dreaded B-word? If you voted out or in then that's how you are; that's you, black or white, one or the other, this side or that and nothing else, full stop. It hasn't helped bridges at all - it's further divided us on a binary issue* when it actual fact we forget the truth: regardless of our politics, sex, gender, race or age, in fact most of us agree on most things in life. It's good to turn these things off more often. I'm not on FB anymore (though they'll enable my account in one key-hit), I don't look at Instagram (no account), try to avoid Twitter (and don't have an account), and enjoy turning my phone off - good for my health. We humans got on fine without this stuff for 100,000 years and more. Shall be looking forward to the pubs being open to be frank, and not just for the sauce. I feel strongly about a lot of the differences we have but there are real people to discuss them with. And it's often easier and more productive in the flesh. (*Brexit has other threads)

You're more likely to pick up Weil's disease if you're dipping at the edge of freshwater where it's slower moving and more likely to be stagnant, and especially if you have cuts. Infected cows' urine also contributes to Weil's disease - it isn't just down to rats. Accidentally swallowing water isn't a big factor. For the 10,000s of swimmers using UK freshwater every year the infection rates are low. Cover any cuts with plasters and always wash yourself properly after swimming. Have fun!

Gorge

Encounters

Grape

I'm also for higher taxes. Stuck with me for the better part of 30 years when a teacher told me "this country needs the f****** sh** taxed out of it" - sounded extreme at the time but keeps making more and more sense. Happy to be schooled by anyone in the know but as I remember things the French were taxed proper from the early 1980s and look at the difference now between France and the UK. It's embarrassing. There's so much scorn for public services here, and at the same time some people seem to want Scandinavian levels of provision on US levels of tax. Doesn't work, sorry.

Aztec

Will PM you

Dared

Even if he was drunk and/or on drugs this is still serious. A description will be useful.

With Jezza and the amazing Diane Abbott at the helm, or anywhere near it, this could have been much worse. Unless of course they had done the sensible thing which would have been to lock down several weeks earlier than we did. You don't need to be a virologist to know that would have been simpler, cheaper (in the long term less damaging) and more humane. Would the WHO actually have been able to implement an air travel ban though? I don't know.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/pm-a-new-deal-for-britain There's actually loads of good stuff in here (even some "shovel-ready" stuff whatever that means... we've had already the oven, now it's the shovel) but even so it's just nowhere near enough cash. Not saying the government should be a tap of liquid money or anything, but it's just not enough money at all. Sadly some people will be impressed with the figures but spread this around for a few seconds and it's peanuts. On the other side, it's better than nothing.

Third

Yes it is. It's causing people to become malicious, dogmatic, scared, bullied, jealous, lonely, semi-literate, unsociable, angry and so on. The unusual thing about social media is its name - it's the most anti-social thing around. As Zuckerberg said of social media: "Instead of building walls, we can help build bridges" As Zuckerberg did to his own house: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/17/mark-zuckerberg-hawaii-estate-kauai-land-rights-dispute That trumps Trump. My name is also Spartacus by the way.

Sarah Vine in today's Daily Mail. Even as a bad joke this was a dumb thing to print, unless it was in Viz in which case it'd be pretty funny.

Crate

Chest

Burp