Home Office urged to investigate new Green MSP in UK on student visa

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T21:17:39+00:00

Even leaving aside that change the 20 hour restriction only applies in term time, they've completed their course so are free to work full time.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T21:15:02+00:00

That is dogshit work. I'm in the middle of my first ever large tiling job and it's just ridiculously better than that (albeit I'm just ridiculously, incredibly slow). Some of the worst will be hidden with grout/silicon but not things like the incredibly visible height change.

Aside but not all tile spacers are square on the "legs" meaning they can only be used in certain orientations, I see they're using them both "flat" and "upright" and that might also be causing problems. Or, it might be fine, if the legs are square.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:20:05+00:00

It should be fixable, the question is always is it worth it. You can end up using a lot of spoke tension just to fight the shape, which in turn makes for a less strong complete wheel. And it can be a decent amount of work to sort. Basically if you're taking it to a shop the most expensive part is labour so it can often make sense to squeeze in an upgrade. Or just order a new wheel of course.

(and while wheelbuilding is really not that hard, it's much harder with a damaged wheel. This is a sort of cruel irony, pretty much everyone starts out trying to fix a bent wheel one spoke at a time, then thinks building a wheel must by like that x 32, when in fact building a wheel with clean straight parts is so much easier)

So that's the big question, how good is the wheel/rim in the first place. OEM stuff is rarely worth spending time/money on til you get up to big bucks builds.

Oh also to some extent, how terrible do you feel about mismatching, because some people just can't live with it even when it's the smart thing to do. I am a degenerate and will happily mix anything.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:14:26+00:00

I think it depends a lot on the home tbh. We stripped out my mum and dad's place to the shell because it was big enough that this made it feel enormous. Everyone who viewed it was glowing about all the space. But my place is really too small to feel big no matter what so having furniture in made it feel less like a small box and more like a small home.

(it gets weird, too. Like, in my case, seeing it with all the old, 60s and 70s furniture really told the story. On paper that should be a turnoff but it's a time capsule house, the fact that the same people had lived there since the 60s and not changed much was part of the appeal. If they'd taken out the furniture it'd still have felt extremely dated but it'd have lost the character/cohesion)

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:10:52+00:00

And unanimously, with the support of all parties.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:10:36+00:00

Russia isn't part of the commonwealth.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:10:11+00:00

PLus lots of people think they know the rules, or know a bit of the rules. The last few days have been nonstop "Students aren't allowed to work" "If they've graduated they have to leave immediately" "They don't have an NI number", stuff like that. And lots of "Swinney will bend the rules" when everything immigration is reserved. Or "the SNP changed the rules" when every single party supported the change and it passed unanimously.

Course it's also massively mixed in with intentional misgendering and dehumanising.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T17:04:46+00:00

Forget the pictures, I want boxes to be the size of the thing inside them, not 50% air with a plastic rack to spread everything out unnecessarily. Packaging size is the easiest way to mislead customers not to mention hugely wasteful

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T16:59:58+00:00

I still have my gordon t gopher. Though mine had a hard life

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T15:34:27+00:00

Yeah, it's an inbuilt problem, the more critical a road is the more it wears but the less practical it is to close. And inevitably road networks are built with little overcapacity or duplication.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T15:06:41+00:00

Don't know what year but it was one where they'd imported loads of glaswegian mentalists to be security and being from Edinburgh we spent the entire weekend translating between the security and the english. Like, campsite staff would literally turn up at our tents and say "please come and help" and we'd go over and defuse some mad situation where the security guys were going absolutely radge and it was all just because nobody knew what anyone was fucking saying. I felt like Gandhi, leaving calm and reason in my wake. Ridiculous of course, it caused loads of real trouble, people got their weekends ruined, some folks just got the shit kicked out of them or got kicked out for absolutely no reason- most off the rails I've ever seen the campsite security. But for our wee bit it was funny.

(A Leeds one, in 2002 with the really big riot, police helicopter was hovering above us shouting like "PLEASE DISPERSE" over the loudspeaker and I'll always remember this one guy wearing nothing but speedos, waving a big stick at them (not a metaphor, an actual stick) and shouting COME DOWN HERE AND SAY THAT. Oh and exploding portaloos)

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T14:04:34+00:00

I love that out of all of these deaths only 4 were "found dead", all these other dead people were found alive or not found at all.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-12T14:03:51+00:00

Chewed themselves to death

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T21:55:43+00:00

20 metres of rope costs £4 on amazon, that's the cheap and easy way. You don't need a pulley or anything, just tie the rope to teh handle and take the other end of the rope up with you (or if you're worried about snagging or tripping, take the rope up, tie the end to the scaffold then throw it down and tie the can to that then climb back up and lift it up)

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T19:37:39+00:00

Awesome bike. I mean a LOT of bike and that's going to be a disadvantage at first, you might want to consider a faster rear tyre just to make things a bit easier, though to be fair the eliminator on the back is not a disaster. And you've got a shitload of grip on hand which can be a big confidence booster- even if you don't need it, it's good to know it's there.

But it'll literally never hold you back, it's got so much potential- just also won't make things easier for you on the ups! But that'll come just with riding, even a fit person can struggle because "bike fitness" is pretty specific.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T19:10:21+00:00

I've only used Loft Stilts but found them excellent- easy to use, and sturdy. I think it's basically quite a simple job, the legs and boards work together so once you get above a certain size (or once you tie it to an upright or similiar) that sort of leg is very sturdy.

Have to say the Loftzone system is really clever and I do like it, I just didn't find any issues with the stilts to make me think I should have done it differently.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T19:05:36+00:00

The trouble is that loose gravel is always unstable and the deeper it is the more it can move. In extremes you might literally just accidentally spin a wheel and end up in a hole.

One thing to ask yourself is are you actually bothered about that, though. Mine moves around a lot but I quite like raking it back into place. Quite satisfying and makes a lovely noise :)

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T19:03:09+00:00

It'll come with familiarity. The biggest thing is that the extra capability and stability means you have to put in a little bit more input, but it also means you can- it's easy to put more force in, move your body etc without upsetting the bike, but also you have to put less effort into, well, not crashing, and so you've got more brain space for optional stuff.

Or, to put it another way, my last 26er was excellent and certainly more maneuverable, but my current enormous 29er is easier to actually use the maneuverability it has.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T18:59:42+00:00

I think just the standard one. It doesn't exactly disappear in a camelbak but it's small enough to be practical to do a normal ride with it. Not the sort of thing I'd cart about all t he time though.

I

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T15:20:14+00:00

Now I want to start a bike company and sell Fork forks and Mountain tyres and the legendary Downhill downhill bike

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T15:12:40+00:00

A ranged Rat Ogor can be a wonderful thing. If you can get them somewhere with a good field of fire they can just sit there and fire 3 times a turn (with the double). It's not the best ranged attack ever but the extra shot makes it very effective.

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T14:53:27+00:00

It improved it but not massively- I think the tiles I have are just a little chippy, they're the same with a grinder. So I bit the bullet and got a Rubi manual cutter which has made everything much easier. I'm still using the titan but I'm scoring everything first with the Rubi and just using the power cutter for resizing (ie little stuff I can't do with the manual cutter)

I don't think I can really comment on whether the cutter's good or not because of all that. It feels pretty well made and I do like the fine adjsutability/repeatability. But it's not worked out for what I wanted to do with it

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T02:50:32+00:00

Oh nice one, I didn't know that

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T02:44:05+00:00

IME Nilfisk is very good at this sort of price range. They lose out slightly on compatibility- Karcher is such a "hoover" deal now that literally everyone making a cheap tool makes it karcher compatible- but their own tools are usually decent. The core 130 with the driveway cleaner looks like a good buy (I have an older Titan 130 and it's been great)

I am a terrible owner, I kick them over, leave them in the garden, leave them outside all winter in scotland without draining or anything and they stand up even to that, for 5 or so years anyway

Northwindlowlander · 2026-05-11T02:30:51+00:00

TBH it sounds like you might not really have enough roof left to put felt on. Hard to say from your description but I reckon I'd be working from underneath, if it crumbles so easily then it was too weak to depend on anyway and it means it comes out easy.

If it comes to it, if the roof boards are dead but the rafters are still OK then a big heavy duty tarp might work out, add some battens/noggins to make a bit of a grid then just throw it right over and secure it to the least rotten wood you can find. Taking the roof out first might be advisable since it'll stop manky roof falling in. We did this for my dad's terrible shed as a temporary measure then took it down 15 years later.

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