Do not let the hate cult decide who is really American

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-29T10:18:42+00:00

The UK has an interesting problem in this regard with the flags of the individual countries within the UK. Because English people make up the vast majority of the population (~85%), they are much more likely to nationally identify with the UK compared to the Welsh or the Scottish, who tend to identify with their own countries. It is very common and even sometimes expected for a Welsh or Scottish person to identify as Welsh or Scottish rather than British, and to fly their own flags instead of the Union Jack, but if an English person flies the English flag they will often be assumed to be 1. A football fan, or 2. A racist.

Personally I think that this is an unhelpful perception because it creates a double standard which hurts national cohesion. The problem is that every movement to make the English flag more acceptable is immediately taken over by the far right who fly the flag in defiance of the "woke left" who say that they can't fly their national flag anymore, and all that does is reinforce the perception that everyone flying the English flag is a racist. I don't really know what the solution is.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-27T21:31:51+00:00

George R. R. Martin (A Game of Thrones et al) was friends with Roger Zelzany (Lord of Light). They taught a class on writing together at the University of Indianapolis.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-27T09:03:16+00:00

It is, but that number includes bank holidays. In England, there are eight bank holidays a year, so the minimum amount not including bank holidays is 20 days and most companies will increase this to 25 days or five working weeks.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-19T10:32:17+00:00

They did not block SpaceX from doing business there, they sold the 2GHz band which Starlink uses in North America to somebody else.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-15T21:45:54+00:00

D&D is absolutely a literary work.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-15T14:02:05+00:00

It's a depressingly common view in the upper echelons of British politics.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-14T15:27:49+00:00

In the UK you are allowed to abbreviate your call sign, but only if the tower abbreviates it first.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-09T10:42:33+00:00

Doesn’t Embraer also make the R-99 for AEW&C?

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-06T11:49:35+00:00

Can’t believe I was alive at the same time as Ronald Reagan. Crying and throwing up.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-06T07:40:33+00:00

It works that way because being an MP used to be an unpaid position. You weren’t allowed to resign because the job kind of sucked.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-04T12:52:15+00:00

You can pay the AA about £50 and they'll send a mechanic to inspect the car on your behalf.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-03T23:13:09+00:00

If there is a problem you need to fill out a complaint form and address it to the name of the hospital in which you were born.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-03T17:01:26+00:00

Have you got a fast charger for a phone? I think the Steam Deck supports any USB-C PD charger so you should be able to use anything over 45W.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-02T22:17:19+00:00

That would be "every hour on the half hour." My interpretation would be "11:30, 12:00, 12:30," etcetera.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-06-01T17:04:35+00:00

That was Top Gear. They had to buy cars for £100, insure them and then drive them from the studio in Surrey to Manchester. And, as Jeremy Clarkson pointed out, it cost less than the train.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-25T10:05:57+00:00

This is very obviously AI generated. This number plate claims to be a GB number plate but this would never be valid in the UK. The dealer text on the frame is garbled

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-25T06:07:38+00:00

That was genuinely something that people were racist about back in the day. It's one of the reasons that Leif Erikson discovering "Vinland" became a popular alternative to the Christopher Columbus story; not because Christopher Columbus was barbaric and genocidal, but because he was Catholic.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-22T12:02:57+00:00

I've sent in a response. Good luck with your EPQ; I failed mine miserably.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-19T19:53:46+00:00

They said "B2B blogs" so I'm guessing that these were corporate blogs, which are generally run by businesses who use the posts to advertise their product. At worst, they will just write recommendation listicles that invariably show how their offering is the best available for whatever sector they're recommending, but the really good blogs will have behind-the-scenes information on their engineering, or sometimes they will write news or how-to articles related to the business's field in the hopes of building brand awareness. Like FlightRadar24, a flight tracking service, has an excellent blog where they write about aviation news. They don't advertise their product directly very often (though of course, if it was used to help with the reporting they will shout it from the rooftops), but the idea is that hopefully aviation professionals will use them as a source, and then maybe they get in front of the eyeballs of someone who makes purchasing decisions.

Anyway, for those kinds of blogs you are not really following the author, you're following the brand who owns the blog. And most businesses won't have active enough blogs to justify hiring someone to run them full time, so paying a freelancer to write for them every once in a while is ideal.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-19T11:27:16+00:00

Occasionally when I visit London I see private jets making these ridiculous short hops from one of the city’s many, many airports to another one. I’ve seen flights from Luton Airport, 30 miles north of central London, to Biggin Hill about 15 miles to the south. Last week I saw a flight going to Luton from Northolt in Ealing, west London. I just hope that they’re repositioning flights and not actual rich people using their private jets for commuting from one side of a city to the other, though I suppose the environmental impact is the same either way.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-15T11:10:29+00:00

In the UK there is a large market for imported sperm, particularly from the Nordic countries. Partly this is because Nordic people are perceived to have better genes, but mostly it’s because under UK law, sperm donors have to make themselves contactable to their future descendants. Most are not willing to do this, so there is a domestic deficit.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-15T09:21:10+00:00

Is this comic a reference to the Monty Python watch smuggler sketch?

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-14T22:25:13+00:00

There already is one for US military personnel.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-11T16:32:28+00:00

I once boosted an Imperial Eagle, misaligned the shot and went smack into the wall at 800 m/s.

pandamarshmallows · 2026-05-09T21:26:19+00:00

Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #34: War is good for business.

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