Vic Vaughan

How about we shut down the government for this very popular and specific goal and then, hear me out, we hold out for like a month and a half and then, ok this part is important, after a watershed election where we ran the table, ONLY THEN, fold and don't get the one thing we said we wanted.

Best rabbit-hold thread of my week

i wonder if the number 68 ever feels left out. living in the shadow of 69 must have been a lot already, and now to live in the shadow of 67 also? brutal

A rain-slick backalley containing two men, both tall and dressed predominantly in black, each walking a cat on a leash

Took the cats out for a walk with my brother and accidentally created a 90s Britpop album cover

Respect to pharmacies for finding a gap in the market

Dogs are great because you never need to worry if they match. Two similar dogs? Yes. Great. Two opposite dogs? Also great. Better, in fact. One big dog and one little dog? Yes. One long dog and one short dog? Absolutely. One sweet little angel baby and one unknowable disaster creature? Perfection.

I knew it would take less than a day for a tiktok dj to make something.

LOL just saw the same list and realised I had my PhD before their mean age. Not Kids!

YES I came here to say exactly this. They are expecting English at a level equivalent to an A-level in a foreign language. So, for example, the same language skills as someone taking A-Level French or Spanish would have in those languages. No citations of WWI war poetry required.

You must be exhausted!

Oh no — sorry — I read it the opposite way — and was agreeing with you! xxx

Which they also fail to mention.

Nodding and smiling from France.

* just ‘cos I know you lot are geeks like me and this might be inaccurate but if so please share the info xxx

I love his timing: mansplaining the Bible — which he’s probably only read in English —to the only Pope in history* whose first time reading the Bible was ALSO in English. That’s a niche window in a very long timeline!

Choice skate… I mean skeet.

Londoner here: you might need a slightly larger sample.

Meanwhile in Germany, in addition to paid vacations etc., you get mandatory ‘Go And Learn Stuff holiday.’ Could be work-related training. Could also be ‘learn Spanish beside the beach in Spain’. Paid.

This is one of my fave Hollywood tidbits; apparently she said it wrong in rehearsal and the entire cast and crew were instructed NOT to correct her. Thx for the reminder!

Other confusion

This is literally what the actual "siege" of the auxiliary ICE building looks like

I think ‘optionally digital’ is the idea. Have a physical card if you want one.

Ugh. USA. Sorry.

But the recent UK attempt to stop kids seeing porn isn’t working. They all learnt about VPNs when the YSA banned TikTok.

But they will be given that choice in France (the land of the cheque book ;) I can’t see it ever being mandatory in our lifetimes.

Petition: Do not introduce Digital ID cards We demand that the UK Government immediately commits to not introducing a digital ID cards. There are reports that this is being looked at.

Well that all very much depends where you are in the USA but yeah, Streeting is causing actual harm at this point. Meanwhile in good news, this petition got 1m signatures in the last 24 hours: petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

Can’t imagine France EVER making a digital-only option. One can typically opt out of that stuff. Everyone’s just so familiar with physical cards.

Just like that bogus misgendering of USA passports palaver earlier this year. I’d like to think the UK is better but how about we just scrap the whole idea?!

I personally still moan that my driving license isn’t a fold-out ordinance-survey-map-sized document with no photo!

And after what DOGE did to previously well-guarded social security data in the USA, we shouldn’t assume that any bad actors would be external.