dAVe80

If we're on sport, I don't get the British and Irish Lions. I'm not the biggest fan of rugby full stop, but the Lions as a concept is just odd. So England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland can all play New Zealand, South Africa and Australia at any point, and sometimes they beat them. When they do, it's normally seen as a good result, but it's not out of the question. Like they're not unbeatable normally. So why is it such a big deal if the home nations pool their best players, and then play them and beat them? Surely you'd expect a team made up of the best players from 4 different teams to win? How come the Southern hemisphere teams are held in such high regards that the UK and Ireland feel they have to join forces to beat them? How come the Norther hemisphere teams are held in such poor regards that NZ, Aus and SA don't join forces to try and beat them?

I don't like those snooty cans of pop, that think they're better than the other cans of pop, and wear tinfoil lids. Pretentious.

I think the last time I bought some was one pancake day. The lass I was seeing wanted pancakes with lemon juice and sugar (sadly that's not a euphemism).

I think I could count on one hand the number of bags of sugar I've bought in my adult life. Don't have it in tea or coffee, and don't have it on cereal.

My dentist always tell me not to drink fizzy pop. I tried to give it up for a little while, but there are some occasions when only a can of Pepsi Max Cherry will do.

I can't imagine the turn out would have been massive. Probably comparable to Unite. Those who make the effort to vote, and campaign for particular candidates missed the opportunity. I speak to a few mates who are Unison members, one of who I know was furious with them having two different slates, and not learning from the Gen Sec election. The voter turn out for most unions when it come to picking NEC and GS positions isn't normally massive. Unless you have someone who is particularly woeful, most members won't care. My union do have a fantastic reputation for getting the vote out when it comes to industrial action though. Other than the NEU, I don't think anyone has touched us in the past few years. We get them out, and we get them to vote with us.

If the left of Unite don't learn form Unison, then the left might as well give up. I know Unison was slightly different, where there was a Labour left backed candidate, and then a candidate backed my the Socilaist Party (plus a few other fringe groups), but they've ended up with a Starmer pick as GS, even though more people voted for left candidates than voted for her. Happened again in the recent Unison NEC elections, when the SP split the vote with their slate, for positions that should have seen a single left candidate romp home. I'm glad we've managed to avoid this kind of crap in my union in recent elections.

Morgan just got out, probably puts Surrey in the box seat.

Middlesex vs Surrey has been a bit tasty in the T20. Middlessex doing a half decent job of chasing down 224. Also had an amazing catch from Tom Curren. Should be an exciting finish this.

I cut down over lockdown, but I'm ready to rock again. First proper opportunity for a few scoops since restrictions got lifted.

I'm going for a piss up in a brewery tonight. Place I've wanted to go for a while, but not got round to yet, cus you know, covid and that. Steam Machine Brewery

Not quite Starmzy level, but still made me howl.

They need to be bloody careful with the flag shagging, considering the connections with Jo Cox to Batley and Spen.

I was going to post an article from the New Statesman, where an unnamed shadow cabinet member was putting the blame at the door of Jenny Chapman. Having sat through many CLP meetings with her, it's not hard to see why the Labour Party is in such a mess if she's whispering in Keith's ear.

I've not checked, but apparently that's been removed from his twitter account already. Man like Keith Stalin. It's hard to feel too sorry for her. She's absolutely made her own bed, but in what universe is sacking the working class norther woman "taking responsibility"?

Joy Allen won Durham PCVC for Labour after going to second preference, so at least one person I votes for on Thursday won! Yay! On the flip to that Ben Houchen absolutely trounced Jessie Joe Jacobs in the Tees Valley Mayor election. If you get chance to see her speech, I thought it was excellent. Really dignified in defeat. Feel really sorry for her as the party dropped her like a stone when Paul Williams was installed as Hartlepool, and gave her no help.

The idea of a centrist is unity. I know we can't compare to the US, but my thinking is have someone in the mould of Biden, who will take on board left (or if we're being honest not particularly left, but for the sake of the argument) policies.

Fair point. At some point though we're just going to have to deal with the fact that you can't have the press onside, and be a radical, transformative Labour government in the traditional way that we probably want to be. So at which point, we've probably got to say forget the press.