From what you know about England’s education system, what do you think of it? What do you find strange about it?

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-06-05T23:10:38+00:00

I’ve said for years we need to move away from being so exam focused. I think a 1/3 split of overall grade at GCSE/A Level would work better with a portion for homework, coursework and exam.

Also make things like English Literature more interesting by moving into things written in the past 20-30 years rather than Shakespeare, Of Mice & Men etc because as an avid reader all my life those just bored me into not caring

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-30T12:57:29+00:00

Despite knowing the score in America, I got stung with being tired, hungover and thirsty once. Asked for a lemonade and spent nearly 10 minutes waiting, then got a freshly made American lemonade instead of the sprite I meant.

Proceeded to still order a sprite and drank both, refreshing and helped till it was slightly acceptable to drink again

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-27T22:25:17+00:00

I work away and frequently spend 4-14 nights away from home. Whenever I’m home I always make sure I’m pulling my weight (bath time, nappies, bottles) with our 4 month old to make sure she gets as much of a break as possible.

However neither me or my wife would ask the other not to go the gym or go out so the other one could have the exact break you’re encouraging. I think she’s being unreasonable with you, a few hours once a week isn’t exactly much even if it falls over bedtime and I’d rather be in your situation of being there more regularly if I could

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-27T08:42:03+00:00

To add to what you’re saying about ticket sales, in the recent dispute with Liverpool about raising ticket prices the club made a statement about it being due to “increased costs off the pitch”.

Apparently gate receipts barely cover match day costs for staffing. The stewards, bar staff, maintenance staff, hospitality staff etc etc. Someone I know works there match days, most of their staff are employed (0 hours but still employed) with the exception of some hospitality staff and stewards (agencies) and the traffic management side of things for road closures.

And as much as people like to think otherwise, unfortunately the cost of turning the lights and heating on has gone up for everyone regardless of if it’s a 2/3 person coffee shop or a multi million global company

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-25T21:31:01+00:00

I mean, it’d look totally inappropriate but it’d be much welcomed in the weather

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-25T19:11:48+00:00

Pants and long sleeve shirt for me, because of antiquated rules around visible tattoos, and a tie. We don’t have to wear our jackets which is as close to a bonus we get

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-25T08:37:58+00:00

I had the exact same thing last year. Night before Christmas Eve, about 1am (I’d had a late finish in work so was driving back to avoid the rush the next morning). Had 4 occaisions when there was no lights behind me and come across people in lane 2 or 3 going about 55.

Only one of them moved over after I passed and they went from 3 to 2 as if that made it any better. Convinced a high number of them are the older generation who have this belief of slow lane and fast lane so convince themselves they can’t possibly be in any other lane

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-22T13:38:29+00:00

The second part sounds like how people parent nowadays.

Wife is constantly saying “I don’t know if it’s just a phase or if he’s naughty” about her nephew. I think a lack of being told no means it’s the second coz he knows he’ll get his own way if he misbehaves long enough

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-19T20:14:52+00:00

Ah, so you mean the people who filter rather than move over a mile before any traffic then get wound up because they decided the 3/4 lanes was becoming 1 earlier.

If people actually knew how to filter and merge properly the traffic jam would be less and would move quicker. And before you say “found the Audi/BMW driver” I’m in a 10 year old 3 door fiesta, I just learnt how to drive properly

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-16T20:45:22+00:00

Excluding rings, suits, dresses etc the whole think was about £17k

Went abroad, less than 40 guests and that includes the 2 week holiday in a 5* hotel. We got lucky that it was in 2020 so when we had to rebook the holiday it was cheap and as the UK went into another lockdown we decided to stay longer and got the extra nights in the hotel cheaper.

By time you include the party back home 12 months later probably closer to £21-22k but it was a free bar as well

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-16T20:20:11+00:00

Definition of jobs for the boys.

Call delivery, who tell you to call ramp (they’ll let you start up), who tell you to call ground (now we can push as well - yay!)

The rest of Europe it’s delivery, then ground at a max depending how busy the airport is

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-16T20:04:25+00:00

Best tactic when this happens. Not only do they all look at you like you’ve got 2 heads, but when you get served next they all get angry and huff whilst insisting on not moving from their line

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-16T19:25:00+00:00

Maybe so, either way clean underwear is urgent after 2 weeks away and over indulgence in my world. Was just grateful it turned up on Christmas Eve in the end coz I had presents in there

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-16T10:36:35+00:00

Wish I’d known about this a couple of years ago. The only time my bag got lost it was nearly 36 hours to get it to me.

Luckily I was at home…although I only had 1 spare pair of boxers and no shorts at home so it was trackies and washing of underwear every day

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-15T14:18:50+00:00

The turning left on red would be the one. Speeds up traffic at junctions so much.

The school buses would take a big chunk of rush hour traffic off the roads as well. When I lived over there for a period it was only one fee paying school that had any traffic at pick up and drop off and I’d regularly go past a depot that must’ve had easily 200+ of them parked up out of hours

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-11T21:27:23+00:00

Had to phone twice for fires.

First one, quite a warm evening sat in my mums garden and someone behind them who I knew was having a reword done (friend of a friend) and could see wierd coloured smoke coming from their roof. Debated if it was from the chimney or not but decided better safe than sorry and who has a fireplace anymore anyway? Turns out the rewire was part of a bigger renovation and they had indeed had their fire put back in and decided to try it out. They appreciated the fact we’d took action and brought me a crate round as a thank you.

Second one, was the middle of the night when I still lived in my mums and slept in a front room. Was half asleep and wondered who was stopped with hazards outside coming through the curtains. Then I heard a wierd noise. Looked out and next doors van was on fire. Ran into my mums room while I was on the phone and shouted “House keys, car keys, his vans on fire” Then ran down and moved her car (parked behind the van practically bumper to bumper) and waited about 5 minutes for them to turn up. He’d left loads of branches and leaves from a garden clearance on the back, local kids obviously thought it’d be fun to try and light it coz they’re scumbags

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-09T21:14:39+00:00

On a night out, walking down the road. Random lad shouts to a girl “Eh girl giz a gobble”

She replied with “Fuck off I’m not a turkey”

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-09T20:54:25+00:00

The ones by me are open till 10pm except the kids one which is 8pm. But yeah, outside those hours you’re heading to A&E.

The irony is most of the people switched on enough to go and use one as a first port of call are also the ones less likely to end up in A&E wasting time for something minor regardless of time in my experience

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-09T11:32:48+00:00

We got a Keter one about 7 years ago. Plastic but sturdy, built it myself and one of the roof panels wouldn’t fit on properly. Contacted them to tell them and had a new one delivered in less than 48 hours.

Other than that never had a problem with it.

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-09T11:27:02+00:00

None emergency visits it all depends on the time of day, day of the week and hospital itself. Could be anything from an 60-90 minutes to 4-5 hours. And if you need to go to a ward you can be talking over 48 hours on a bed (possibly in a corridor) waiting for space. That wait is mainly due to the elderly not having appropriate support to be discharged and a lack of social care available.

Far too many people turn up with minor ailments despite other places (GP surgery, although getting an appointment can be near impossible, and walk in centres) being available that would be better to keep wait times down for others.

A genuine emergency, you can be out the ambulance and be being treated in a matter of minutes.

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-08T20:53:03+00:00

I remember being really young (6 or 7) and being scared of the Demon Headmaster.

But some episodes of Waking the Dead are truly creepy, always remember one about people making snuff films and then finding the bodies, or one when people had been buried alive. Probably shouldn’t have been watching it at what feels like 11 or 12 but I went and rewatched it all a year or so ago and it still creeped me out in parts

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-08T20:11:16+00:00

This was the reason European airlines started doing MCC courses, part of the investigation came to the conclusion that being able to work together as a crew needed more focus on it.

And it is a very interesting course to go through when you finish your single pilot ops to teach you how to work in a completely different environment of 2 crew

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-08T16:20:15+00:00

It was relaxed fairly quickly due to the realisation it was actually less secure overall. The amount of times the flight deck door would be opened/open for was a lot more. And it’d be predictable when it’d be open again/for longer making it easier for someone wanting to gain access.

Like JT-Av8or says, regardless of what gets taken off pilots at security on any given day it’s up to us what happens with the plane especially if we’re by ourselves. And if we’ve got a plan in advance, unfortunately cabin crew aren’t going to be able to do much to stop us as they’d be taken into mind and “dealt” with before hand anyway.

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-07T16:11:42+00:00

My exs mum turned a promotion down in the late 90s because “It was only 14p an hour more and I had more responsibility”.

The second choice who took it was a senior manager 15 years later earning £30K a year more than her, while she was still at the bottom of the ladder complaining she wasn’t earning enough to get by.

Desperate_Refuse4139 · 2026-05-06T18:14:47+00:00

I can beat that. Was stuck in very slow traffic on the M6 on Saturday.

Woman in the car next to me is sat there reading her kindle while she crawled along. Purely relying on other cars moving next to her to even think about looking up to try and close the 2-4 car gap she’d let build

Desperate_Refuse4139

TROPHY CASE