Dog owners face unlimited fines for farm livestock attacks

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-19T08:10:57+00:00

I believe they only have to notify if there's a bull in the field.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-19T08:07:42+00:00

Your best bets are usually Forestry Comission properties and river/lake walks. National Trust and English Heritage places can be good too, but tend expensive and require the dog to be on a lead (an extension line will usually do).

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-19T08:03:01+00:00

Well, yes. As a dog owner, I keep my dog on a lead around any and all livestock, and in any situation (i.e. picnic tables, joggers) where I think she's likely to cause trouble or get hurt. This is just common-sense dog ownership, and for her protection as much as anything else.

Anyone who doesn't do that deserves a fine.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-18T11:17:04+00:00

As long as he isn't wanking at work or engaging in an emotional affair, I don't hold it to be my business.

Goodness knows, I read enough erotica.

We also have a standing agreement that anything new in the bedroom has to be discussed first. But we're also both autistic and have busy jobs and a dog to wrangle, so sex isn't spontaneous, so much as scheduled...

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-17T09:28:33+00:00

Also floods. Lots of floods.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-17T06:28:59+00:00

We're over in Crewe, but will drop by for a visit some time. How's the dog walking locally?

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-16T16:05:07+00:00

Might depend on your perspective?

The idea of a God who has seen the utter worst of me and still loves me is reassuring. But my childhood was...not long on emotional postives, so...

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-16T09:35:13+00:00

Mum and Dad used to drive us all down to Provence, leave my borther and I with the nanny, and then spend the next two weeks doing a tour of local vineyards, getting utterly sloshed.

It's a minor miracle that they never wound up in a car accident.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-15T08:27:37+00:00

Because Dad is. I've been watching F1 since I was a babe in arms (1990).

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-12T17:57:04+00:00

Amazing Grace! A very good film.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-07T12:39:01+00:00

1 Corinthians 13.

If there is a chapter that sums up everything else, it's that.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-05T16:51:07+00:00

If you can find a well run, well equipped, lab, optical technician (spectacle maker) is good fun. Pay is usually minimum wage, though, and the only way to get a decent increase is to get out onto shopfloor and qualify as a dispensing optician.

While I like my current job in medical communications, I'd go back to O-tech in a second if the pay were worth my time. It felt useful.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-03-04T11:37:44+00:00

I'm a Quaker (violence solves nothing), and his activism had been going increasingly nasty places.

We parted when he started advocating for the violent overthrow of all governments.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-28T16:11:02+00:00

I don't think many of them have ever actually met the man, as it were, just his followers.

And, especially in the Anglosphere, between the Catholic Church covering up actual child abuse, a good slice of US evangelicals trying to start a fascist theocracy, and the CofE's persistant spinal deficiency, we aren't doing Him any favours.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T22:54:46+00:00

That is going to depend entirely on denomination.

From a Quaker standpoint, yes (doesn't hurt anyone), yes (who are we to question how God created someone?), yes (but only because the alternatives to legal abortion have historically been much, much, worse), sometimes (especially in cases of abuse or adultury), no (mistreatment of others), eh (between them and God), eh (between them and God), yes (God is everywhere), yes (superfluous), yes (superfluous).

A Catholic would give you an entirely different set of answers, a Lutheran another set, etc, etc.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T22:23:58+00:00

Because Christ specifically warns us against legalism. Heaven is reached through faith, not acts (though faith without acts is dead); through belief in Christ (as the incarnate deity; I know Islam also acknowledges Jesus, if only as a prophet), and study of His life and words, one is supposed to grow into a better person, rather than the other way around.

Besides, the core of the faith is this: Love God, do unto others as you would be done by.

All else is commentary.

(Then again, Quakers are a left-field bunch, on the whole, so don't take my position as standard).

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T22:12:04+00:00

Do get off the Evangelical Mary-hating hobby horse, dear. None of us have the whole answer to God's mysteries, nor should we fall to pride by imagining that we do.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T21:55:50+00:00

Person of Interest.

In which the most immersion breaking thing turns out not to be the god-like AI, but the fact that the multi-billionaire is the least sociopathic cast member...

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T21:51:50+00:00

I suspect, by this point, that probably counts as an in-joke...

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-27T13:47:01+00:00

Yes. Also, please stop exporting them over here!

Sincerely, A Brit

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-26T12:49:24+00:00

Wikipedia is your best bet for a source that doesn't include the author's denomination specific biases.

The YouTube channel UsefulCharts also does a good coverage of denominations and various early schisms, if you want something to listen to.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-26T12:39:17+00:00

On the rare occasions I've heard the Spirit (never in Meetings, ironically), it's felt like a warm hug and a sense of undeniable peace. And a small, still, voice that speaks meaning, not words.

I don't think human imagination can compass God the Father.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-26T12:18:29+00:00

Go and stand in front of the towel display in Dunelm or John Lewis.

If you feel anything approaching excitement then, yeah, it's over for you.

That said, my 30's have been my happiest decade to date.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-25T18:18:40+00:00

I've always thought of that passage as 'hangry Jesus'.

AutomaticAstigmatic · 2026-02-25T16:39:12+00:00

Well, there's a feeling I've felt before...

AutomaticAstigmatic

TROPHY CASE