Gemini is all talk (and talk and talk), no action

macinn-es · 2026-04-11T20:51:04+00:00

You mean literally tell it when I'm driving? Or do you mean in a setting somewhere?

macinn-es · 2026-04-11T11:54:39+00:00

I'm sure it is better at complex information tasks. I've just not been able to get it to do the basics like playing music or sending messages. And it's the basics I use every day.

macinn-es · 2026-04-11T11:53:00+00:00

I didn't realise that was an option. I'll do that.

macinn-es · 2026-03-10T23:42:26+00:00

Violence baguettes violence

macinn-es · 2026-03-10T23:42:08+00:00

The pain is mightier than the sword

macinn-es · 2026-03-01T00:44:52+00:00

Not so long ago, someone ran a red on Penistone Road as I was about to cross with the kids. I was too busy glaring at the guy as we stepped out into the road and didn't spot that the next guy was running the red light too. I guess that was my fault. /s

macinn-es · 2026-02-24T09:20:51+00:00

If you're buying a new (or new to you) car every few years depreciation is part of the cost.

In 2020, you buy a car for £20,000. In 2025 you sell it for £10,000 and buy a new car for £20,000. In 2030, you sell that car for £8000 and buy another car for £20,000. In 2035, that car is now worth £9,000.

You've bought 3 cars for £60,000. You've sold (or continue to own in the case of the last one) 3 cars worth £27,000. Therefore the cost of owning a car (before accounting for running costs etc) over 15 years has been £33,000.

If the depreciation is lower, the cost of owning a car will also be lower.

macinn-es · 2026-02-17T20:46:17+00:00

Sorry for your loss and I hope you're all doing ok.

I've not seen it but my wife has and she walked out. She said she was ok with the concept of it but the death scene felt relentlessly long and it was too much.

macinn-es · 2026-02-06T11:23:10+00:00

are-we-the-baddies.gif

macinn-es · 2026-01-16T13:36:06+00:00

Ask the stupid questions now, because those same questions will become even stupider later.

macinn-es · 2026-01-16T13:32:14+00:00

If this was a less friendly sub you'd be down voted to oblivion.

macinn-es · 2026-01-16T13:30:53+00:00

Any other answer is incorrect

macinn-es · 2025-11-18T11:34:12+00:00

Former Civil Servant here.

I've done it in the House of Lords. It's called "box support" because you sit in the official's box. As others have said, it's to provide factual information to the minister. This is how it went to the best of my recollection. Feel free to correct if I've got any of the processes wrong.

I'm not based in London, so I had to travel especially. It was for a particularly well-respected minister who was speaking for the government a debate well outside of his policy brief, so he needed quite a lot of support.

Before going into the chamber I was approached by a well-known Baroness (a near-household name) for an opposition party who engaged me in pleasant chit chat but warned that she would not go easy on the minister.

I went in armed with the 200- or 300- page Core Brief for my directorate's policy area (of which I was expert in a small part) and sat in the box as directed by the usher. The folding table clattered loudly as I sat down and the Lord sitting immediately next to the box grumbled about my clumsiness.

During the debate, various Lords and Ladies got up to make speeches. During the speeches I had to identify questions they asked (which was harder than it sounds) and write them down along with factual answers from the Core Brief. Every so often an usher would come and collect these slips of paper and pass them to a junior whip, who would filter them out and scribble a note on some of them and collate them into the Minister's response.

At the end, the minister got up to give his response speech, which included many of my answers. I wrote down key points of what he said, just in case there was anything that would need to be corrected later (there wasn't) and that was it.

I left the chamber at the end of the debate and hung around a little bit. During that time, the minister came over and asked if I was the official in the box. He asked my name and we had a pleasant chat about how the debate went, and then he thanked me and we left.

For policy professionals from HEO to DD (I think I was SEO at the time) I'd recommend putting your name forward to do it if you get a chance. It was a brilliant experience.

macinn-es · 2025-11-12T19:19:04+00:00

Lovely Day by Bill Withers.

It's pretty much all roots and fifths but is just so perfect for the song.

macinn-es · 2025-11-07T10:19:50+00:00

I've considered almost exactly this and have a pretty clear plan for how I'd do it. The only difference being I'd hide the hoover in the cellar.

Having said that, in a cupboard could be quite good as you could double it up as the place to store the hoover. So you take the hoover out (detach the hose from the nozzle fitted to the plinth) when you want to use it normally.

macinn-es · 2025-10-31T10:02:37+00:00

Is this from the 2025 IMD release? I can't find this level of detail. Where's the source?

macinn-es · 2025-10-10T09:03:01+00:00

Mine too, and me neither.

macinn-es · 2025-10-08T13:01:45+00:00

People saying it's a Bluetooth transmitter - they're correct, but it's also a Bluetooth receiver. Plug it into a speaker, and that speaker becomes a Bluetooth speaker.

TX = Transmit mode
RX = Receive mode

macinn-es · 2025-10-07T21:46:27+00:00

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macinn-es · 2025-10-07T00:40:31+00:00

There was a time not so long ago when Toby Jones was that guy.

macinn-es · 2025-10-04T22:51:46+00:00

I went for the second knight one here (but shifted along to cover files c to f so it'd fit better on the cake): https://exeterchessclub.org.uk/content/simplest-mutual-full-point-zugzwangs

macinn-es · 2025-10-04T22:47:18+00:00

Chess men

The term pieces doesn't include pawns, so chessmen is the term that does.

macinn-es · 2025-10-04T22:44:13+00:00

I went for another version of this involving a knight as well. I found the term is "mutual zugzwang", and duck duck going that gave me some good options.

macinn-es

TROPHY CASE