The Off Topic Topic

[Richard Hakluyt]

In unexpected side-effects of covid and lockdown - deer herds are at their largest in the UK in 1000 years and are causing merry havoc in the countryside. Estimates are there's about 2 million wild deer on the loose:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jan/10/wild-deer-set-to-wreak-havoc-in-uk-woodlands-as-venison-demand-plunges

A big issue has been the decline of the hospitality industry meaning there aren't as many orders for venison which is, of course, a deeply sustainable red meat.

So for Brits who eat meat - help the countryside and order some venison
https://deerbox.co.uk/

I do love venison.
But 60 quid a shot.... Holy cow that's deer.

We got the deer box, £67.99 including post and packing. I calculate that there are nine meals there for four people, so £2 per head; pretty reasonable. I will report back in a month or so after we have had a few meals 

I'm going to start by cooking a pack of the deer mince and making a pseudo-bolognese sauce for it, we'll have it with spaghetti or linguine. I hope that no Italians see this post.

[Josquius]

Everyone here knows this. But I like this image.
That taxes worked this way was something I didn't realise until I was into my 20s, schools really need to do more education on the topic. Is this just a British and American thing I wonder or a global problem?

[Threviel]

You want German accents and dialects, nothing is more beautiful than Holsteinian low German


https://youtu.be/iLBKGXaM7ds
https://youtu.be/JNR0fFMlgs8

My grandfather spoke Hamburger Platt (i think it's called). Could not understand a thing.

One thing has been bother me for a few years. When i was a kid in the 80'ies he taught me that one platt-thing was to say moin as a greeting. I learned that it was an old thing and that no-one does it anymore apart from a few oldies.

The last few times I've been to Germany in the 2010's moin is everywhere. It's like a patriotic "look at us special northerners by the coast, we're special and say moin. Take that you Grüss Gott bavarian bastards, we are also special". It's on souvenirs and t-shirts and more or less everywhere in the tourist traps I frequent.

What's the deal? Is my memory broken and moin is something that has always been widely used or is it something that has been revived in the last decades?

[Syt]

Moin is a pretty common greeting in North Germany (at all times of day). Some say "moin moin", but that's usually the mark of a non-local.

It's an informal greeting, though. So you wouldn't greet a lawyer or your banker that way (unless you know each other well). In shops, bars and restaurants it kind of depends on the type of establishment. Saying "moin" in a small pub or at a gas station or a little bakery would be fine. In a fancy restaurant not so much.

Take that with a grain of salt. I haven't been up North in 15 years.

[The Brain]

Everyone here knows this. But I like this image.
That taxes worked this way was something I didn't realise until I was into my 20s, schools really need to do more education on the topic. Is this just a British and American thing I wonder or a global problem?

Does it describe the American progressive tax system specifically? In Sweden the high rate hits you if you're educated middle class.

[Threviel]

Moin is a pretty common greeting in North Germany (at all times of day). Some say "moin moin", but that's usually the mark of a non-local.

It's an informal greeting, though. So you wouldn't greet a lawyer or your banker that way (unless you know each other well). In shops, bars and restaurants it kind of depends on the type of establishment. Saying "moin" in a small pub or at a gas station or a little bakery would be fine. In a fancy restaurant not so much.

Take that with a grain of salt. I haven't been up North in 15 years.

Probably my memory messing then, I could not remember it being such a thing earlier. Thanks.

[Duque de Bragança]

Moin is a pretty common greeting in North Germany (at all times of day). Some say "moin moin", but that's usually the mark of a non-local.

It's an informal greeting, though. So you wouldn't greet a lawyer or your banker that way (unless you know each other well). In shops, bars and restaurants it kind of depends on the type of establishment. Saying "moin" in a small pub or at a gas station or a little bakery would be fine. In a fancy restaurant not so much.

Take that with a grain of salt. I haven't been up North in 15 years.

I remember using "moin moin" for laughs in Frankfurt, i.e not in Germania Septentrionalis

[garbon]

Everyone here knows this. But I like this image.
That taxes worked this way was something I didn't realise until I was into my 20s, schools really need to do more education on the topic. Is this just a British and American thing I wonder or a global problem?

Series 2 seems questionable as that doesn't really seem like an answer to taxes taking your hard earned money. While it is true that we are in a negative place with wide wealth inequality and low social mobility, that isn't always the case. My parents started out their lives on food stamps.

[Admiral Yi]

A prerequisite for drawing a cartoon about taxes should be to know what the hell you're talking about.

[garbon]

There's at least two copies of the full 1 hour 20 minute meeting on Youtube.

Interesting posts on Reddit from someone who seems to have watched more of it -

https://www.reddit.com/r/CasualUK/comments/lbvl53/the_first_8_minutes_of_this_parish_council_zoom/glxxd5l?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

At one point one of the councilors (I think) says that they have been blocked from the council website so can't put the letter from the Director of Governance and Compliance Cheshire District Council on it - well, whatever was the case then it's there now -

https://www.handforth.org.uk/

Scrolling down, apparently every council meeting between the ones on the 10th March 2020 and the 25th August were cancelled.

Problems with working out how to use Zoom?

So apparently the Chair (who was the first person removed from the Zoom "You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver!" ) hasn't held a meeting in all of that time which has been one of the issues and this committee has had even fewer. No doubt this is due to some arcane dispute between the Chair and his Vice-Chair ("Read the Standing Orders. READ THEM AND UNDERSTAND THEM!") and other members of the council like a planning application they do not want approved but the rest of the council supports.

I did note Sue's attempted coup half-way through where she tried to move the Planning and Environment Committee into a sub-committee, presumably excluding the Chair and Vice-Chair, which was quickly snuffed out by Cyn and John.

Edit:

"A very good example of bullying in Cheshire East - and its environs."

Andrew Lloyd Webber apparently has now created a musical ode to her.

[Tamas]

Andrew Lloyd Webber apparently has now created a musical ode to her.

She was bullied pretty badly but did she actually have the right to just kick the chairman out of the meeting and move to replace him? Felt like a coup.

[Sheilbh]

Andrew Lloyd Webber apparently has now created a musical ode to her.

She was bullied pretty badly but did she actually have the right to just kick the chairman out of the meeting and move to replace him? Felt like a coup.

Shamelessly stolen - Did Jackie Weaver have the authority?
The Guardian: Yes.
The Times: Technically, no. Morally, yes.
The Telegraph: Read the Standing Orders.
The Spectator: READ THEM AND UNDERSTAND THEM!

[Tamas]

 

So yeah, it was a coup.

[Josquius]

A prerequisite for drawing a cartoon about taxes should be to know what the hell you're talking about.

The historic tax levels are wrong?

Series 2 seems questionable as that doesn't really seem like an answer to taxes taking your hard earned money. While it is true that we are in a negative place with wide wealth inequality and low social mobility, that isn't always the case. My parents started out their lives on food stamps.

Aren't your parents north of 60 though?

[Admiral Yi]

The historic tax levels are wrong?

They look alright to me.

The main problem is that he jumbles progressivity with a whopping high rate on fat cats and billionaires(c).  If he wanted to advocate for a whopping high rate on fats cats and billionaires(c) he should have done that, instead of falsely trying to frame opposition to whopping high rates on fat cats and billionaires(c) as opposition to progressivity.  Only flat-taxers oppose progressivity in toto.

There's also a bait and switch in the second pair of panels.  He starts out in the first of the pair talking about taxes in general then switches in the second "rebuttal" panel to talk about whopping high rates on fat cats and billionaires(c).