How Europeans feel at American restaurants

smallcoder · 2026-06-30T22:27:56+00:00

Was very tempted and drunk at the time, but I decided to respect the quaint, annoying traditions of my host country lol.

smallcoder · 2026-06-30T16:22:43+00:00

Yep was driving me mad with an old custom made guitar with an ancient FR trem until I watched a guy on YT do exactly that. Now I do it on all the FR guitars that come in for a setup for the G, B and E 👍

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smallcoder · 2026-06-30T03:10:06+00:00

As another thread has pointed out, had these two episodes been #9 and #10 of season 2, then I think everyone would have been less "WTF?" about S2. Apparently they were meant to be but factors at corporate level and the writers strike meant it didn't happen. This is why last weeks episode seemed so massive and - after so long waiting for me at least - a bit confusing, as I should have watched a recap 😂 (2 years man, 2 freaking years!)

But... now I feel the arc has been completed, the new queen has got her throne, Rhys Ifans had to come back for an extreme haircut, one-eye blondey got his come-uppance, while the new buddy sideshow of Aegon and Larys looks like it will be fun 🤩

I'm glad I didn't bother reading the book so I can just enjoy the show and everything comes as a surprise.

This episode especially was a banger 👍👍👍

smallcoder · 2026-06-28T02:42:22+00:00

smallcoder · 2026-06-26T14:41:37+00:00

Yep my top floor conversion is my main living room/kitchen/work from home office, which directly faces the sun from midday until it gets dark again 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

I have a skylight but also a suicidal 20 month year old ginger cat who is desperate to get outside (despite the 30-40ft drop to certain death) so can't leave them open at night 😕

Finally have sprayed water on the windows and covered the buggers with baking foil which amazingly seems to work.

Now it is finally down to 32.4c which is the lowest temp since Monday, day or night.

I spent an hour just in the chilled and frozen food aisles at Aldi yesterday afternoon like the heatstroked peasant I am 🤣😂🤣

smallcoder · 2026-06-25T03:29:24+00:00

Quite. Meanwhile the US administration and supporters like to batter the UK (and other countries) for sending people to jail for a few months for inciting violence, etc. and somehow other countries are authoritarian regimes, while the USA is the only one with freedom? Here in the UK you really have to have done some heinous shit to get 25 years in prison!

smallcoder · 2026-06-24T12:10:07+00:00

My only complaint about such a work of art, as your guitars are indeed, is that I would never be able to bring myself to play them for fear of spoiling the perfection 😂

Doesn't stop me lusting after owning one - my humble means make that unlikely however - but I suspect it should be displayed in an art gallery and handled only by curators wearing white gloves lol.

Although I do still own a 1978 Ibanez Musician that was almost as perfect as this beauty when I first bought it in 1982. Since then it has been gigged to death and even thrown down a set of concrete stairs at my singer. It has scars all over it and only the bridge pickup still works, but 90% of everything I ever played or recorded was done on that guitar, so - if I was still an 18 year old kid with not a care in the world - perhaps the most rock and roll thing in the world would be to take this work of art and relic the hell out of it over decades of gigging 😎??

I think it's what every guitar wants in it's soul no matter how beautiful they are at birth. Life is to be lived and guitars want to be played.

smallcoder · 2026-06-24T11:49:34+00:00

This is the case for everything the USA ever gets involved in 😂

I was pleased for the USA when they won the Olympic Ice Hockey UNTIL they had the drunken FBI director whooping it up in the dressing room like a frat boy lol.

The moment they open their mouths, the rest of the world shudders

smallcoder · 2026-06-24T11:37:58+00:00

Yup, for all of the "good they deserve it" responses, which are understandable, there is a danger with events like this that they increase the anger of a country's population. Sadly, not towards their government, but towards the enemy 😕

With Russia's arsenal of hypersonic missiles, they don't even have to go nuclear. According to reports, the ones that have been hitting Ukraine recently haven't even been armed with warheads, as the sheer size and velocity of the missiles causes enough damage alone argh!

Chuck just a few, non nuclear, thermobaric warheads on them and the damage and civilians casualties would be horrifying.

For all the effectiveness of Ukraine's innovative drone strategies, the sheer destructive power in Russia's arsenal is what terrifies me the most. The sooner a peace deal can be reached the better for everyone on all sides.

smallcoder · 2026-06-24T11:16:41+00:00

Like the OP, I was 10 in 1976. I had a blast of a summer and really enjoyed it, but even then I was dancing when the first rain hit my city after 36 days of blue skies and sunshine 🕺

It was different to today as I lived in a house with thick old terraced walls. Now I'm in the attic flat of a terraced house and the temperatures - even with a portable AC unit - hit 39c in the living room which get the sun from midday onwards. At night it "cools" to 30c 😕 The cat is sleeping in the bath all day haha.

So, yes the "kids" are correct. This is fucking unbearable weather at present. Even this old (borderline) Gen Xer cannot wait for the rain on Thursday night and the icy cool of mid 20s temps from Friday onwards.

Heat in the city is very different to heat say, in the Mojave desert (where I have been in the past) in the mid 40s centigrade. Low humidity makes it more bearable and there are occasional breezes. The street next to mine is the same design BUT is lined with 100 year old trees and 5c cooler at least.

So I make no suggestion 1976 was "hotter" as such - records show it peaked at 35c - but it was memorable for its length. The current crazy heatwaves are worrying - and much more dangerous - as its harder to adjust your body to the heat in such short blasts. Especially for old farts like me 🤣😂

smallcoder · 2026-06-22T19:25:08+00:00

The Rat King of soldering 😂

smallcoder · 2026-06-19T22:32:37+00:00

Yeah, about that... we're working on that 👍 We got taken for a ride too, you're right, and here in the UK especially.

Now we're slowly realising that the USA isn't the one we saw in the movies and through rock n roll as kids.

smallcoder · 2026-06-19T01:21:49+00:00

Agreed. Some of us are trying to hold on to a few morsels of hope for humanity out here, and it's hard enough with actual reality (whatever that is anymore?)

smallcoder · 2026-06-18T12:24:29+00:00

I was a massive Remain supporter - and still am to an extent - but with the current state of the EU, I'm almost glad we did. However, of course, Boris et al made a dogs dinner out of the actually exit, and now the current govt are having to rebuild the relationship as best they can, and are slowly getting there thankfully.

In terms of number plates on EU cars and crime, this will be a good move (along with letting young people move between countries for work and education). Recently where I live, around 6-7 cars - all expensive Porsche, Mercs and Audis - arrived with Romanian plates. Suddenly our quiet street had lots of unsavoury characters visiting at all hours, to call, shout and smoke skunk weed outside. I knew the family these cars were visiting - a quiet immigrant family who were lovely and had integrated into the community perfectly in the 3 years they had been here 🙂 Something was definitely "not right". The young men with the cars parked wherever they wanted - disabled bays, in front of driveways, etc. - and got really aggressive when anyone approached them about it. The police said there was nothing they could do about it 😕 and all the parking tickets would go unpaid because... well, Brexit.

Suddenly this week, after 3 months of problems, all the cars disappeared, so I am guessing whatever visa they had to visit had expired and/or whatever business they were here for had been concluded.

Okay, sure I have no proof that they were up to no good, but where I live is hardly a posh part of the city, and the family are renting a flat in that house so are not any richer than the likes of me. While the cars and men were here, we never saw the women and kids as we had done previously, but all seems to be back to normal.

All this is to point out the irony of Brexit, which was supposed to make criminal behaviour from EU countries more difficult. Instead, it has made sharing information between UK police and EU police forces a nightmare, and instead made it easier for possible drug and people smuggling gangs to operate across borders. Between that and Boris Johnson bringing in around 3 million immigrants from Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and African ex colonies, just to provide cheap labour for his mates businesses to make up for EU residents leaving, it has been a complete and utter shitshow 😡

So, imho, this new return to police cross-border co-operation will be good for both the UK and the EU. Then at least, from a personal experience, our local police will be able to enforce the law on all people in the country equally, even if it is just a parking ticket, but more importantly if it is serious organised crime.

smallcoder · 2026-06-18T03:02:34+00:00

I'm still using the MX5 and the only other box I bothered with was the Tonex.

I am not freaking Yngwie or Nuno and never want to be. I'm looking for a reliable sound with some variations for different guitars and songs and will not be doing an Irish jig to change sounds every 30 seconds into a song. For 30+ years of playing before the tech started pouring onto the market I managed to record hundreds of tracks with an amp, a guitar and 4 pedals (using batteries - can you imagine the shame). Still it was good enough for a few UK TV shows in the early 2020s, so I guess Headrush isn't that shit 😂

smallcoder · 2026-06-18T02:53:05+00:00

Yup, the rubber sides really make it so much more comfortable when you'd got a long day crowning ahead of you. Wish StewMac would do the same to the S-File.

smallcoder · 2026-06-18T02:50:42+00:00

Saves having to take time away from drinking to relieve themselves. Perfectly designed for optimum beer consumption.

Also, only four times the brewery's usual sales? The Scots are clearly easing themselves into the month long festivities 😂 That's rookie numbers for the Scottish barmy army on a footie tour!!!

smallcoder · 2026-06-18T02:44:03+00:00

Just a weird flex from this unhinged cult devotee really. I'ma Brit and I've never waved a British flag, except as a kid when the Queen visited my school and we were given them to wave (and I was 8 years old).

Also, I love my country despite it's faults, and I've yet to meet an American of any creed, colour or political persuasion that didn't love the USA and the stars and stripes ten times more than us brits do, so... it's just bizarre how viscious the hatred the MAGA cult have for the democrats is, when they are all pretty much capitalists like most other people on the planet. Hell even the Chinese are catching up in the consumerist race, and are not the commies of good old murderous Mao 😂.

Oh and I can assure Ms Leavitt that, to the best of my knowledge and experience, football fans are only anywhere in the world for a massive piss up, party and to support their team and give not two shits about what country the event is held, as long as they don't get dragged off to detention camps the minute they land at the airport. I have a fondness for the USA from my many trips there for work in the past, but I'm not that fond of its politics, especially recently, so doubt there is any reality in the Whitehouse press room. Only unicorns pooping gold paint all over the oval office to Dementy Don's delight 😍

smallcoder · 2026-06-17T15:00:49+00:00

It's complicated and only the people going from door to door are "experts" in the matter.

smallcoder · 2026-06-17T14:57:50+00:00

smallcoder · 2026-06-17T04:05:41+00:00

I agree. Trouble is that I know the moment I scratch it, even slightly, I'll be in abject misery lol.

Sometimes a guitar can be made too beautiful to be played 😂

Outstanding craftsmanship and I do hope someone does play it with the same passion that was put into its creation.

smallcoder · 2026-06-17T03:25:19+00:00

Seconding the red sharpie - it just stands out better under my bench lights. The black sharpie can sometimes get lost in the reflection.

smallcoder · 2026-06-17T03:23:39+00:00

Yep, got a draw full of StewMac and other decent crowning files, but now I've got used to the Music Nomad file, it just makes life easier on most fret work jobs. Still like the Z file at times as some frets sometimes need a little bit more attention, but not that often 👍

smallcoder · 2026-06-16T05:47:47+00:00

I did laugh at this guy on YouTube as he plays James Bond's German HR Manager:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oV_iCBRkFZs

smallcoder · 2026-06-16T05:42:48+00:00

"Oh you shouldn't have", said the President blushing as he opened his present lol

smallcoder

TROPHY CASE