Robert Poste's Child

Ventured

I've got the 'quiet' Russell Hobbs one too. It's a bit quieter than my previous Tefal one, but only as if a slightly smaller train has entered the station. When it conked out briefly a while back I bought a cheap Asda own-brand 'fast boil' one which was much quieter and leas than half the price. At the time it was the only budget one on Good Housekeeping's recommended list.

Elphinstone's Army Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Lordship Lane needs a dedicated > vegan restaurant and takeaway. Doesn't the Blue Brick Cafe do takeaways? You could maybe suggest it to them if not.

In past threads on this kind of thing people said the tickets aren't enforceable as they're on private land and done by a private company. Does anyone know if that's true? Though even if it is, I think it would be stressful to face them down about it.

'Divine decadence!'

'Do you mind if I smoke?'

'Infamy! Infamy! They've all got it in for me!'

'Assassin! Assassin!'

'Stand up, your father's passing.'

That was very naughty of them [ETA: this was in response to tomskip but crossed with above.] Many hairdressers don't seem to have a clear price list that they stick to and the final figure can vary a lot depending on the length and thickness of your hair, meaning you often get a nasty surprise at the end. I tend to ask the cost when making the appointment and double-check with them when I get there. But I'm old and don't like being ripped off, and it would probably be an unusually assertive teenager who'd feel comfortable doing that.

'There can be only one.'

That sounds a lot for a barbers, child rate or no child rate.

'There are 106 miles to Chicago, we have a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses.'

'Is it safe?'

'Broadsword calling Danny-boy.'

'They're called boobs, Ed.'

'It is the most shattering experience of a young man's life when one morning he awakes and quite reasonably says to himself, "I will never play the Dane."'

'Thank you for coming back to me.'

'Gordon's alive!'

'Round up the usual suspects.'

ruffers Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > "Get away from her you bitch!" Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, Molly Weasley to Bella Lestrange.

The Donmar cancelled tonight's performance 15 mins before curtain up. Frustrating that they didn't mention it was a possibility when I collected my ticket half an hour before that or when I booked two hours before that. There were clearly some intense conversations going on. ETA that, two days later, it has been announced that a member of the cast has sadly died. Perhaps that's why they didn't give any explanation at the time.

Look, I haven't commented again because (a) I've got enough to do prepping for a meeting tomorrow and (b) it's off-topic, but I'm not 'arguing for a more PC form of language' (rendelharris) or expressing 'a set view that conforms to the current PC brigade' (uncleglen, whatever that means). I'm talking about what we express when we use words. My initial comment was actually tongue in cheek, but when rendel leapt with his boots on I thought it was worth defending. The word 'lunatic' may not be the best example, but it's still a valid one. So here we go. Language is morally neutral. It has no value or fixed meaning of its own: it exists purely to express our ideas and pass them on to other people. We customise and reinvent it endlessly to do that. All the excellent recent efforts to raise awareness and insight into mental health have gone some way to reduce stigma around mental health problems and people who live with them so that they can live their lives as people first and foremost, like everyone else, rather than be written off by virtue of a label (particularly one applied casually rather than a proper clinical diagnosis). However, the same label (even an old-fashioned one that wouldn't have been part of a diagnosis 20 years ago) carries its bundle of original meanings with it, so they're still part of the resonance in the here and now. (It wouldn't work as a put-down if they weren't.) Using it in a different context - usually to dismiss something or someone you disagree with going to the effort of debating the topic - keeps alive the underlying attitudes and prejudices, and so the stigma of having a mental health problem. By arguing that it's in the dictionary / normal / the BBC does it, effectively you're defending the underlying attitude, perhaps unwittingly. Race, gender, sexuality etc have made better progress in this; hopefully mental health will soon catch up. God knows I'm bored of the casual labelling we all use, usually to put down a person or an idea, or just to sound knowing (ever noticed how much we all speak for effect these days?). Even BBC presenters ask guests if they're 'OCD' to mean 'fussy' or 'obsessed', or 'schizophrenic' if there is more than one cultural identity in their life. We say 'on the spectrum'/'autistic' about someone who doesn't want to engage with us or who we find difficult or just different. How much worse is that for people who live with the distressing reality of those conditions day in, day out, either themselves or in someone they care about? I'm not going to dig out sources for you, rendel,(slightly bewildered as to why you think someone with access to the media writing about it is any more 'evidence' than us talking about it), but if you want to find out more you could google 'stigma, mental health and language'. Plenty of stuff out there. Hope that explains and also answers JoeLeg's Q. (PS: the traveller word wasn't the one rendel used.)

Rendel, what's tiresome is how quickly you retreat into moral outrage and personal attack when someone has an opinion that's opposed to yours. For what it's worth, I've worked in communication and mental health so perhaps I just have a more developed awareness around this than you do!

I tried it in the past but these days I tend to exercise on my own. Nice group for anyone who needs some moral support to get going though.