Lichfield Dean

How was the Chelsea penalty ever a penalty? That was absolutely insane, and the Burnley player got sent off for it as well!

The complete AI generated Demonic Odyssey song cycle is available now here. It is kind of amazing, but also hilarious how many "wrong" things there are (checkout the guitar solo in Battle Across Time to see what I mean) https://app.suno.ai/playlist/433cc965-5c31-42c7-8141-7908518a5465

Yeah, I agree. And I also imagine the fans were perfectly happy to see their teams manage out the required result rather than blow it by letting in an injury time goal. Maybe they could have "disguised" it a bit better in hindsight?

And, as I know you've all been waiting for part two of Demonic Odyssey, here is Druidic Defiance: https://app.suno.ai/song/34c9c318-5107-42b8-b48a-43bd791cc851

I have created a plot summary and review of Dune 2 for those who are curious:

Oooh yeah! I present Demonic Odyssey: https://app.suno.ai/song/f5d1681a-2f3b-4434-b621-0f4d864c5772

Year before last, and we were going to go last year but couldn't make it at the last minute.

Didn't come across as a joke!

Can't believe people are advocating knocking down Aston Hall for a football stadium. It's an amazing building, grade 1 listed, full of history. Have we not learnt enough yet in Birmingham about destroying its heritage and culture for a quick profit? As a Villa fan I'd flat out refuse ever to set foot in a new stadium if they engaged in a piece of vandalism like that.

Also don't forget that on top of poor transport service and not every town having access to stations, many of us have other reasons to drive - disabilities or elderly or very young. Blaming the population of the Midlands for their "car first" attitude is a bit unfair when, as you say, there isn't really any choice in the matter for many. I use public transport or walking whenever I can, and would love not to use the car, but certain things, like travelling to the football, it can't really be avoided for me.

Yeah, if the new trains do what they say (and I'll believe it when I see it) then it'll make the Cross City line far and away the best transport facility in the Midlands. I just hope they really are that good.... I've always had problems at International. There may be a few platforms, but the intercity trains still often seem to get jumbled up with the local trains and all sorts of delays end up happening.

I don't really know what has changed but I've just stopped being interested this season and last. I always always watched the F1, during Schumacher's dominance, the McLaren dominance, the Vettel years, the Merc years, all of them. But this is different - and I don't really know why. As others have said, maybe it's a perfect storm of a dominant driver, ultra reliability, boring circuits and lack of in-race tactical thinking. It's just broken now. I don't see how it can be brought back.

Can they even see the pitch?

Been discussed before, and there are now obviously financial issues and other problems at the Alexander (although I don't know exactly what) but regardless, I'd hate to see Birmingham's premier athletics stadium and the home of Birchfield Harriers ruined by a football club. And equally, as west ham have proven, trying to make a football stadium that also needs to host athletics events doesn't really work very well. It's a huge 'no' from me.

Me too, apart from the issue of the trains. HS2 is going basically through there, but I don't imagine it will be stopping nearby, and that's obviously a long way off in the future anyway.

I've often wondered whether Victorian Talk was full of the same arguments about renovating Wellington Road vs moving a mile down the road (although I guess they didn't have the motorway/car parking issue to worry about). Bear in mind, Villa were the most successful and most famous club in the 1890s so I guess a top stadium was necessary and moving was the only real option.

Was exactly my thought lol

Not sure how comfortable I'd be with destroying an entire community like that. Guess it depends if the residents would be ok with it, but not sure they'd be best pleased!

Well, you'd hope a large majority would use the trains! I mean, in real life I don't know obviously how it'd pan out. My experience of the NEC over the years though is: 1) Exiting the car parks is usually horrendous 2) The trains are remarkably unreliable, even though you have both local services and West Coast Mainline trains passing through. HS2 may change this, but that's about as near to realisation as hover cars at this point. I'm not really knocking the location of the NEC though, it's about as good as anywhere in terms of infrastructure and available space (I think). But I can't ignore the fact that it's (for many) on the wrong side of town.

Tinker is talking about the NEC. It's totally the wrong side of Birmingham for me to be acceptable, despite some of the obvious listed advantages. Edit: also, anyone who's been stuck in the NEC car park after a concert will probably get the shivers at the thought of 50,000+ people trying to leave that area, despite what on the face of it appear to be excellent travel connections.

Two railways stations within walking distance, a major UK motorway on the doorstep... Yep, I know that place

Not sure what they are getting at here... I suppose Konsa is mostly known as a CB but even so...

And yet, I would still know that was England, weirdly enough.

When it's good, it's very very good. Measure Of A Man, Best Of Both Worlds, The Inner Light, Chain Of Command, Darmok... It's as good as any TV has been when it's on form. Then you have lots of tedious episodes and some downright offensive episodes. Overall though I love it.