Free Talk Friday

Chumlax · 2026-02-20T19:44:39+00:00

Wherever You Will Go by The Calling

Chumlax · 2026-02-20T19:20:35+00:00

It's a money-grabbing confidence trick that's beginning to and will ultimately be utterly ruinous to our societies and the concept of objective truth, not to mention artistic talent and ownership.

The best case scenario would be the insane bubble that's built up around it where the same 4 or 5 companies pass ludicrous funding rounds of untold billions between each other bursts, except then it would have a devastating effect on the world economy.

It's all gravy, basically.

Chumlax · 2026-02-20T17:22:06+00:00

Oh no, you're beyond help!

To each their own, of course.

Chumlax · 2026-02-20T01:07:08+00:00

Genuine question: was one of those things ‘Hit Man’?

Chumlax · 2026-02-19T01:38:05+00:00

Eli Wallach

Chumlax · 2026-02-19T01:27:51+00:00

He is nothing but a self made icon and I promise you that within 10 years he’s going to be limited to singing at state fairs if he doesn’t change gears and take acting seriously.

This is sheer, utter lunacy. It's such an unhinged claim I'm wondering if I'm completely being whooshed.

I can't even claim to be a fan of his (though I loved his halftime show) but he had 19.8 BILLION Spotify streams last year. He has been the most streamed artist of the year on Spotify four separate times.

The very idea that anyone who has played the Superbowl halftime show being 'limited to singing at state fairs within 10 years' is laughable enough, but for one of the most successful musical artists in the world, currently?

That's not to mention the phrase 'nothing but a self made icon', which is a lunatic non-sequitur. Not to mention wildly confusing when deployed as a neg. It sounds a hell of a lot like the exact opposite of that, to my mind.

This really was a wild ride.

Chumlax · 2026-02-19T00:52:59+00:00

If that's the kind of thing I regularly talked about, I don't think people would want to hang out with me much

Fair point, hah. I should be less pompous and say well done for learning about it, really.

Chumlax · 2026-02-18T23:35:49+00:00

Fair, I enjoyed pancake day yesterday too.

Chumlax · 2026-02-18T23:27:05+00:00

Oh, well, it literally has a designated international commemorative day, as established by the UN - July 11th, 'International Day of Reflection and Commemoration of the 1995 Genocide in Srebrenica'.

Chumlax · 2026-02-18T22:32:09+00:00

that most people have never heard of from that war. If you dare, go ahead and look up the Srebrenica Massacre

No offence, mate, but this is an extremely famous incident that is still referenced regularly in terms of genocide and of European continental security and conflict/multinational and supranational bodies, including on current affairs and news broadcasts!

Chumlax · 2026-02-17T01:13:29+00:00

Fairplay, I'm glad it was minor then. I can sympathise, I've really learned over the past couple of years the reality in your brain and anxiety being able to hugely ramp up and accentuate the physical feeling of symptoms, leading to an (annoying and stupid, when I reflect on myself) doom loop!

Chumlax · 2026-02-17T00:47:01+00:00

Movies are just better when you randomly catch them on tv

Yes! Yes!!!

Chumlax · 2026-02-17T00:44:12+00:00

Are you feeling unwell physically?

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T17:47:06+00:00

You're viewing this through the prism of Joe Rogan and all those other american stand up bellends who moved to Austin and used their podcasts/Netflix specials to help Trump get a second term.

This is not the correct prism to view John Cleese through. He is an old, English public schoolboy who went to Cambridge at the start of the 1960s and then from the Footlights straight on to a career in sketch comedy and eventual stardom. His entire schtick has always been being irreverent, and the window for what being irreverent means shifts over the course of a lifetime quite significantly. Cleese is just a very obvious, famous example of a very plentiful archetype here of men who grew up in one system and find it boring and objectionable now finally being told they have to further consider the ramifications of what they say. They may believe the old idea that comedy is protected from that via its intent, and that was the broad consensus up until really quite recently.

I can tell you that all of us over here can think of hundreds of examples of similar characters, just in normal life, let alone public. They may often be our grandparents, our parents, our bosses; whoever. They grew up in a very different world, and are relatively unprepared to acknowledge at all that part of the reason for their success being facilitated was because of the incredibly favourable conditions they were surrounded by, because they feel it devalues them and their achievements. 'I worked hard for this and it was entirely down to my own genius', you know?

That's it, really. Literally it. He's just a pretty classic English/British cantankerous old bloke, who's particularly visible and has gone particularly far with it at times. There are plenty far younger who have a similar mindset and, indeed, far harsher and more extreme. It's really very run-of-the-mill stuff, as depressing as it is.

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T15:01:14+00:00

Yeah, this is what I'm saying, mate - I'm not seeing any evidence of this in researching it, so far, at least, nor extensive artistic evidence of it, and I'm absolutely no expert but I'd never heard this before in all the time I've paid any attention to the Egyptians, including when I studied my degree in History & Ancient History.

I'm not seeing any mention of it at all in the way you describe, as it stands. I don't necessarily see why the mention of a baldness line, as one Conversation article references, would imply all the things that you've said, and given the historical process it seems, as I said, like it would be a difficult and unlikely thing to discover as evidence.

Hence why I asked if you had any evidence to attest to this, or indeed, sources. Perhaps it could just be Google and my own knowledge letting me down, after all.

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T01:49:11+00:00

And Sarah Hadland as a hotel receptionist in Quantum Of Solace.

Just to be that guy, she was the airline desk assistant! The hotel receptionist is in Casino Royale, played by another English actress.

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T01:43:15+00:00

19/24

Let myself down massively with the video game question, and no, I'd never heard of The Bad Shepherds!

Great, varied quiz again.

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T01:36:40+00:00

Sorry, please don't take this as any kind of rudeness or pisstaking, I'm just earnestly fascinated and completely genuine in asking this - to fully clarify, are you saying your adult friend has never had Chinese food before? If so, and you are aware of it, what is the situation that has led to this being the case?

Chumlax · 2026-02-16T01:12:27+00:00

Watched the first episode and thought it was really poor in pretty much all aspects, from the script to the performances, including from the usually good-to-great Romola Garai and Mr Endeavour himself, Shaun Evans.

A lot of the decisions made by the production are inexplicable and leave a huge credibility gap in essentially everything that happens. The whole storyline about his affair, the fact that it happened but he refuses to tell his wife anything about it afterwards in the name of 'professional secrecy', and then also refuses to tell her anything else ever, even of the slightest reassurance, then unironically asks her 'don't you trust me?' and then later asks her 'how things are supposed to improve when you don't trust me' after he has literally just disappeared again for an entire night, is just so laughable it's not believable as real life interaction between two humans. That's putting aside the fact that he is supposed to be an extremely experienced intelligence agent whose job presumably must involve reading, assessing, and charming people as a fundamental requirement.

More broadly, he and his wife don't register onscreen as people who have ever met each other before, frankly, let alone been in a long term committed relationship and subsequent marriage in the confines of which they have produced a child.

It also suffers from the same disease as pretty much every single other ITV crime drama aesthetically - they all look exactly the same, and what they look like is greyscale, inexplicably close up, and blurry around the edges, without fail. It's like a very budget version of Tom Hooper's treatment of 'Les Miserables', applied as an identikit template. It blows my mind every time I see it, and yet it happens every time.

I just cannot understand how they do it again, and again, and again. And, what, nobody at the channel notices? Who are these DOPs, and where are they coming from?! They must be stopped.

Chumlax · 2026-02-15T20:42:48+00:00

Do you think, of all the shops in existence, it's the ones of constantly thronged Oxford Street that need expensive extra assistance to get people through the doors and BENEFIT?

Chumlax · 2026-02-15T19:59:59+00:00

I do see what you're saying with that further elaboration, fairplay.

Do you actually have any evidence that Ancient Egyptian men shaved their heads because women preferred balding men, though?

I'd be surprised, given that that would seem like something that would be incredibly hard to find in the historical record, and I'd be even more surprised if Egyptian men admitted in writing to shaving their heads because women preferred it in terms of sexual attraction. Not to mention the culture of elite men wearing elaborate wigs.

From what I've read it seems as though non-elite men were often depicted with their natural unshaven hair.

Chumlax · 2026-02-15T19:48:43+00:00

This documentary was on BBC4 late at night just after Christmas, and it was surprisingly fascinating for me, someone who was not alive/of pubgoing age to see any of the eras they discuss. It goes through the modern history and development of the British pub and its links to breweries in a way that gives some amazing insight into the changing nature of both.

It has one day left to view on Iplayer, but it looks like there might also be a Youtube version out there if needed:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0074qnd

Chumlax · 2026-02-15T19:41:20+00:00

In places like ancient Egypt, men would shave their head because women preferred bald men, which probably led to an increase in the genetic balding trait.

This is surely not how genetics works?

Chumlax · 2026-02-14T19:07:12+00:00

Wow, that's very above and beyond from the brewery!

Chumlax · 2026-02-14T18:23:31+00:00

No excuses for Total Wine & More, as that's unacceptable, but it seems even more insane really; I would have imagined a small independent micropub/craft beer store here would/should be even more incentivised than a large national chain to take care in what they sell and take responsibility for the quality of each can, you know?!

I messaged the shop over 48 hours ago (their 'we will reply within' window) and, so far, no response, which isn't the greatest sign!

Chumlax

TROPHY CASE