I see your “40 chick pickup” and raise you “why are there chickens in your bed?”
But, yes, I think we’ll be looking for Glitterluck again soon because the kids have enjoyed it when we played it at the game cafe.
4 Likes
Obligatory Candyland philosophy comic link:
9 Likes
Further tales from the world of UK house hunting:
-
The tenant who had chosen to prominently display a copy of Mein Kampf on her bookshelf in the living room.
-
Looking around a flat that met all our requirements… Until the estate agent asked us whether we would need a mortgage because “there is a cladding issue”. (For anyone unfamiliar with cladding issues, see here )
On the plus side, we did meet a very friendly cat in one of the properties.
11 Likes
#1: “Why, yes, we have had some trouble with our neighbours. Why do you ask?”
5 Likes
The last time I looked for an apartment, the agent pulled up to the curb by the building, looked at it, and said “I thjnk we can skip this one.” I looked, saw the nazi flag in a window (different floor, so not the apartment I was looking at) and said “yeah, good idea”.
6 Likes
While having a mortgage is certainly not fun (trust me, I know!), even if you didn’t need one (lucky you!), it certainly would be wise to maintain their standards because they’ve done the math(s).
3 Likes
A lot of lenders in the UK won’t mortgage a property with the nasty, flammable cladding. Presumably because a) the work required to replace it is extremely expensive, b) not many people want to buy them and c) they’re a bit too flammable…
3 Likes
I don’t know about over there, but around here if you can’t get homeowners insurance, you can’t get a mortgage, because the latter requires the former.
4 Likes
Yup, the lender wants their money back if the place [huge array of disasters] just as you do.
(Seriously, the first night I slept in a house I theoretically owned, I was woken by every creak, every drip…)
5 Likes
I mean context is king here, on it’s own. Time to swerve.
With a load of books about WW2, probably OK.
I’m guessing it was the former
4 Likes
I do have a copy of The Turner Diaries, but it’s on a shelf next to The Anatomy of Motive and Extraordiary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds…
1 Like
It was difficult to tell because all of the other books were in Polish. It’s definitely A Choice to have that as the only book arranged cover out rather than spine out…
6 Likes
Donut has pulled through her surgery, and so far everything looks positive.
She has her voice, she’s walking around (albeit with a limp), and she has a very healthy appetite.
She’s so delicate. She’s so precious. It breaks my heart seeing her like this, but all signs are she will pull through okay and continue to be a little princess for at least a few more years.
19 Likes
Today we drove past someone mowing grass by the road side, and the side window of the car imploded next to my head. Thankfully the window absorbed all the impact of what I presume was a stone thrown from the mower; so while shattered glass fell all over me, there were no injuries. I don’t know where the projectile would have hit specifically, but all things considered I’m grateful the window was up and that we’re only dealing with car damage.
14 Likes
We traveled for a week to Spain, visiting Bilbao and San Sebastian.
Now that we are back I have to say it was not worth it, we should have left on day 3, the day the weather got bad.
The last days were extremely rainy and these cities didn’t offer great museums. I’ve been to cities with amazing museums like Tallinn, Rome, London, Washington D.C. and I could have and did spend days just inside of different museums.
In Bilbao we went to their famous Guggenheim Museum which looks amazing from the outside but is a modern art museum which felt mostly pretty boring (and empty). There are several big rooms with just one piece of art. Once again I found out that abstract art is not really my thing. Felt very disappointed afterwards.
In San Sebastian we went to the Basque museum which was highly recommended. It is situated in an old monastery which is nice and it had a chapel with amazing murals about Basque history and mythology. I found them very impressive.
(It was darker there when we were there which made the murals look better in my opinion)
But in other parts the museum was missing stuff. Not all descriptions were in English which is annoying. The google translate app allows to take pictures and instantly translates them more or less accurate but it is annoying to do so. But worse than that I didn’t learn anything about how the Basque regions ended up being part of Spain or France which was something I wondered about. And I really wanted to learn more about the ETA the Basque terror organization fighting for Basque independence. They didn’t talk about that at all even though ETA gave up all their weapons in 2018 and are kinda abolished now, so it is a “finished” part of their history now.
Instead they talked a lot about how Basques tried to resist the Franco regime. I found that a bit too one sided.
We tried to do some other outdoor sightseeing, both cities are surrounded by hills which offer a great view of the cities and the ocean but with the weather being bad that didn’t really work out as we hoped for.
We did two food tours (our favorite thing to do in a new city, I recommend to do that on the first night you arrive), one in each city and the food is great. Their pintxos (little portions of any kind of food, we even got some soup once, basically like tapas) are amazing and a lot of fun. Wine is good and very cheap too. The bars serve them and it encourages a culture of bar hopping. Going to one bar for one glass of wine and 1-2 pintxos and then go on to the next place.
On the second day when we still had great weather we went to San Juan de Gaztelugatxe. A little church on an island which also served as a Game of Thrones castle. It has this beautiful stone walled path leading up the small church which offers a very nice view and place to sit for an hour or two. And because you need a reservation for a time slot it is a manageable amount of people there.
This picture doesn’t convey how exhausting the hike was because first you had to get all up on a hill just to go all down to the beach to get up again to the church… 
The GoT castle after some CGI:
That was a nice hike all in all even though especially the way back was hard on our calfs. They hurt for some days afterwards
But I enjoyed that a lot, it is a very quiet place and beautiful too.
The vacation got also a really bad ending… our flight back on Saturday got canceled, our next one on Sunday too, then they gave us a third flight on Monday for which we didn’t get tickets when we were trying to check in on Monday, so they gave us a fourth flight on Tuesday which finally worked. Caused a lot of problems at work, my wife got sick and was just sleeping all the time in the hotel room and we went back and forth between hotel and airport for four days being stressed, frustrated and annoyed. When we finally left on Tuesday the lady checking the IDs before boarding just waved me through with a laugh saying “Oh I know you, no need for an ID.” which was the perfect statement for that adventure…
Would I go there again? Not sure, funny enough my wife and I both decided to travel to Rome again. The food there is even better, the place is oozing history…looking forward to that!
If you are interested in Bilbao and San Sebastian, visit them they are nice cities, nature is beautiful there. San Sebastian is pretty small, cozy and charming. But I would recommend going when the weather is good. It felt to us like a lot depended on it.
17 Likes
The property institute has a fire safety hub containing various updates on cladding and the fire safety act.
Talking to the person maintaining it, they say they have to update it daily because government guidance, industry comments etc.
Let’s say it’s a less than ideal situation.
We’re also apparently getting reforms to leaseholder rights and tenant powers, if the current government can last that long.
6 Likes
Good luck with that… The Basque country is green on the countryside for a reason.
One of the perks of fascism. I find that happens a lot with Hollywood about WWII. It tends to be also a bit too one-sided. I wonder why…
I must admit I have not been there too much, it was one of those parts of Spain that even though the food is amazing, and the countryside looks beautiful and different from the rest of the Peninsula, it was always a bit tricky to go to because of the “troubles” (think Belfast in the 80s with less tanks and more molotov cocktails) by the abertzale (radical independentist youth). Besides terrorrism. I have been to Bilbao and Barakaldo (close by) and they were very ugly cities then (early 90s). From there I went west towards Santander, which I really recommend.
I don’t know if I would go there more than a weekend now. I know they have worked hard to clean Bilbao (it used to be very heavily industrialized and polluted) and apparently the beach in San Sebastian is a beautiful sight, but the main reason to go is for the food.
I have been to Rome and I don’t think the food there is better, I found it very 'fake" and overprized for tourists. The sights, though, that is another story, they are amazing.
5 Likes
There are some very good places in Rome but few are on the tourist route!
3 Likes
Without straying into politics too much, I think many MPs can’t comprehend you may not own a home and want safety and stability of tenure. Particularly as many are landlords themselves
1 Like