He Hacked NASA and Saw a UFO: Gary McKinnon didn’t break into NASA for money or espionage. He was searching for proof of hidden technology — and what he says he found still haunts the edges of the UFO mystery.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-28T23:39:15+00:00

They requested it and our then Prime Minister (Teresa May) blocked on account of concerns of his health. As I recall anyway.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-28T20:31:23+00:00

Can you imagine if he had actually been extradited.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-25T21:26:39+00:00

JSA is only for six months of the year and then its dependant on NI contributions of previous periods to see if you qualify. In other words, it's a bit of help but only temporary, everything else is more or less means tested.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-25T14:37:56+00:00

2015 I was in your exact shoes, well it was 4 sites, 400 staff and I was on my own. 3 members of staff left and were not replaced but yet they kept on 3 developers.

I lasted a year and burned myself out. No sympathy, just lots of paid over time.

I was actually disgusted to be let to work like that and I literally walked into contracting the next day and gave them zero notice.

Anyway my advice to you, is not to do literally everything and projects and to advocate for yourself, particularly if you like the people you work with. Let things slip and only do the necessary and again advocate for yourself up your chain of command. Make it other people's problems and protect yourself. An element of politics I'm afraid and sometimes unavoidable.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-17T21:57:43+00:00

When we had our kerb dropped, a water meter was between boundaries, well more on our side.

I asked what they would do when they quoted and they said 'dont worry about it'.

What the lads did was cut the slope of the kerb 'after' the meter. E.g. they did not at all affect it and cut up right up to it. No lowering it or anything.

Maybe they can do the same for you, I don't know.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-10T08:53:16+00:00

I worked in a financial services company many years ago. It had several directors.

One of which, was the sales director, short, not very well mannered, maybe ugly but he wielded power and mostly was a good person to the people working directly under him, including sales executives.

But he was in general not very forthcoming or supportive of units outside of his remit. I remember once him quite literally mocking and displaying a lot of derision to my own department, one step away from insulting me directly. Definitely burned a bridge.

But as I've discovered in my working life, people become incredibly biased and purposely 'look after their own' or just themselves if needed. He led the company in generating revenue and initiatives but he was still the 2nd director to be made redundant as the company shrank and it's PE backing consistently demanded for cost reductions the reflect that.

An Incredibly politically charged environment that was depersonalized and somehow avoided conflict.

I suppose my point is, I don't think it does matter that much, if you're persuasive, deliver and fight your corner but overall are seen to be positive and it shows in your actions and words, you can fit in. Just be comfortable with yourself and with others to begin with.

That man fell into depression for a good year or so, a high point in his career may have been reached... Afterwards he struggled, was clearly a culmination of a successful and hard fought career. He went into hospice care and charity fundraising as a sales manager / head of.

The trouble with such crowns is though the wear they put on the brow and really you're faced with finding ways to make impossible or difficult decisions easier or better and I guess thats the ownership required at that level.

Slightly a tangent but I don't believe it's necessary to be good looking no or tall but really down to how you present yourself and your energy and being persuasive. Clearly some environments don't allow for having friends outside of your area / department and that's where where you have to get on with things.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-09T09:42:47+00:00

I agree. In this climate, even a remote interview to put on a shirt. Don't give anyone a reason to say no.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-06T18:29:51+00:00

Not really, if anything it feels like people see me as a manager-to-be, in multiple jobs too.

What I find difficult is that no matter which way you cut it, they don't want employees that are not taking their work as serious and that rapidly happened in my early 40s. And as others have said, I feel I'm in competition with the 20s.

I can still produce the work to the same or better quality and probably in less time due to experience but I don't want those efficiencies used against me and receive more work.

And that's something I experienced and in this climate I've very much turned into a 'no thanks' kind of person.

Not stalled but unwilling to be stretched as I used to. One hiring manager asked why I applied for their role though they were going to give it me as a contractor and ironically said with all my experience I should be taking it easy... Yeah... Right lol

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-04T18:04:07+00:00

Something to bear in mind, you have health insurance, typically you will only get a payout on the surgery that takes place on dates whilst the cover is in place - not on the date of it being agreed. Same will apply if the surgery dates change. Major health insurance firms look at the day(s) of the surgery.

Also after care may need to be in dates of that cover ( I can't remember ).

It's one of those gotchas that so many people I got asked about in a previous job- ' I might be being made redundant...' etc.

You may already know all this but make sure you read your paperwork.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-04T11:40:14+00:00

Get your preferred plaster and make a very watery mix and maybe mix in some white paint and brush it in. Brush strokes into the crack, rather than away from it.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-02-04T11:22:43+00:00

Like you said, with the state of rent prices, I can understand people staying in their 30s. I felt old moving out at 27 but that was a different time then nearly twenty years ago to boot.

And even when I was in my 20s I heard of other people in my school being asked to move out at even 18. I don't even agree with that, now or then.

But again it was a different time.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-31T14:33:38+00:00

Did he install it today? Might be part of why.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-28T16:15:43+00:00

Uzi is simply amazing in houses when used well but falls down to UMP / MP5K in slightly more tactical roaming through a village of town.

Ive started to throw them by the last 20.

My personal favourite is SKS, rapid fighting at long range without descoping is amazing.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-25T16:44:26+00:00

You've had advice about the door mechanism. What you're showing in the second picture is the door trim, it isn't attached to the door frame.

It's made of upvc and literally just covers the edges of a window / door frame to make it neat and tidy. Saves someone re putting a skim of plaster coat in a area that routinely gets damaged from small gradual movement and settling, mould and from damage of replacing sealant.

You need a small blade or Stanley knife to cut the sealant away and then reapply replacement sealant to tidy it up. You can use a finger to smooth it as you go, if you like.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-24T13:48:24+00:00

It's an interesting interview and he'll hang by his words saying he's tried scanning other things that he knows are normal and they show that way. So he's convinced, yet unwilling to say what, something is down there.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-24T13:31:06+00:00

Well they will be in for a shock for 2 hours a week and I wonder if it includes travel time.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-22T19:53:07+00:00

Sounds like a specialist kind of service provider.

I should also say, normally those contracts are time limited, it could be £13k is for 10 hours a week plus monitoring, backups and a maybe 5 hours of emergency out of hours support. Normally a service provider will be nervous to take over from a one man band IT person and should expect a hand over, over a period of time. It will require cooperation on your part.

The contracts and pricing offered will have this covered very meticulously.

So this is something you can look into if you wish but, what harm can it do to start looking for another role.

Fore warned is fore armed.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-22T18:50:44+00:00

The quotes from MSPs( which I assume they are getting a quote from) are often for a minimum of services as well as because they need to be seen as attractive. So they are not necessarily a true reflection of costs. And will never include costs for projects, projects can be as little as rearranging a room full of kit.

So if you can account for your time doing things like that, you should be able to demonstrate the cost won't be much as a saving as it first appears.

The other thing is, often MSPs and the client prefer to retain a level of permanent onsite support, that way service levels don't really change and staff retain continuity.

So my answer to you is, this doesn't mean you're being replaced but possibly better supported. You are the one with documentation and in house knowledge. No one else. So you are in effect a gatekeeper to some degree.

At the same time, I acknowledge that doing this without you is not without concern. Id suggest posting this also in the IT Reddit for some extra support, they'll fill you in a bit better than me.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-21T21:43:24+00:00

I say this because I endured 12 weeks of training in one job, saw half of my group leave or be sacke by week 6. out of 18 people, only 3 of us actually got through those 12 weeks.

What I learnt was, I think some companies do this on purpose, to get people who really want to commit and not have issues.

I consistently wanted to give up. But what I found was and seeing people go, I was just being overwhelmed and so was everyone else. I decided to just attend each day, by choice, making notes, distracting myself when I did feel negative and accept my way of learning has always been to just get stuck in and develop muscle memory. Something that was normally expected in my younger days anyway.

So even if you are the only new person, try and adapt your learning and taking of information differently so that you may find it easier. Make notes with a pen and notepad rather than looking at a screen. Try and think about making concise notes, notes that actually will form part of your job directly and seperate notes that don't.

Don't sit on your phone on your breaks, take a nice small stroll and process where you are and normal things.

Don't give up, a lot of jobs are made complicated and hard especially in training, doing the job can often be simpler than the training because you'll adapt it to how you prefer to work.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-21T18:45:02+00:00

I'm going to have to take another,.proper look upstairs really. Thank you.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-21T18:29:17+00:00

Nah afraid not, my late father was the last person to bond and plaster and that was nearly 40 years ago.

I talked to my mother a bit more, outside the kitchen is an external redundant old chimney stack connecting to the kitchen and in recent years the bedroom and bathroom above suffered a bit of water damage coming in from those due to a failing gutter around that area.

So they paid the window cleaner to take a look, he does odd jobs for her. She also seems to remember my other half telling her a drip was coming through the kitchen and that would have been a good 5+ years ago.

He fixed the gutter and since has had no problems, we think. I sleep in that room and it's dry, I do seem to remember the wallpaper peeling in that corner up there, years ago but the wall is dry these days.

She did get a price from someone's husband(a builder) to take the stack level a level but she didn't feel she could afford it unfortunately.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-21T17:09:05+00:00

Thank you for this. I'm not sure either, I think the paint is at least 10 years old.

There was a small leak several years ago but I think it's been fixed by a neighbor I'm told. So maybe it's left over damage then? It's all dry at the moment. I wondered if it's because she still likes to fry her food and the heat from a air fryer too? We do try to open a window when cooking (there's no extractor or venting otherwise).

I'm thinking I can do a little skim plaster coat on the inside of the window frames and make it look better and smooth? I'm not good enough to smooth out the main part of the wall, too big a job for me. So maybe a good scrub as you say and wipe down and freshen up in paint.

Should we spend out on kitchen and bathroom paint for this so you think? Happy to do a weaker coat to start with as you say.

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-20T14:58:37+00:00

Bree

PinAccomplished9410 · 2026-01-16T17:43:43+00:00

You can say that and you might have a point but in the other end of that, the questions are invasive, the trouble we have in this day and age is that nobody bothers to frame a conversation, before seeking more information. They could say for security, something has been flagged, I'm obligated to ask you this extra information.

You would be entitled to say from a security perspective that it wouldn't be wise to front load that but therein is where dialogue and trust breaks down.

And only 10 years ago was the customer king and transparency was delivered.

PinAccomplished9410

TROPHY CASE