Canadian Bacon Rush live 1977 Florida.

Yes, good to see Valentin emulating his brother with a Giro stage win.

TV commentators were wondering if Pogi is tiring because he just followed at the end, but Luke Rowe thinks he's just being conservative. If he was on a bad day it hasn't harmed him.

I have a 1 part-year shortfall of National Insurance contributions to get the full state pension at 67. I thought I'd pay it as it's only £205 (for an extra £3 a week woohoo). Should be easy right? Nope it's virtually impossible. To pay you need an 18 digit payment request number that you can only get from HMRC. Except there is absolutely no way to get through the automated questions on the help line to even get into a queue. I tried every combination of answers I could think of but it always ended the call due to one reason or other. So I looked on the MSE forums and a lady there had described over 30 attempts to get into a queue. So, the automated call kept directing me to on online chat (yeah, we all know about those). Again whatever I put in the chat would ended with a redirection to the online tools - aaahhh. Anyway after about the 100th attempt I eventually got a reply saying an advisor would be required - click here - YAY. Erm no, no advisors are available - end chat. Fuck. So I just kept asking that same question over and over again, clicking on the advisor required. Holy shit I eventually got onto an advisor queue. After that it took a few minutes to get the 18 digit code and pay the £205. It really should be easier than this to pay money TO HMRC - it took me 2 hours and I think I was very lucky in the end.

It seems the whole system was to be rejigged to make it easier to pay any shortfalls and the tool was to launch 01 April 24. I can't seem to find out when it's going to go live though. Anyone needing to do this give me a shout and I'll give you my tips to get to a human at HMRC.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6430325/how-do-i-actually-pay-voluntary-national-insurance-contributions-for-a-shortfall

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

Wordle 1,060 3/6*

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🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

The limitations in what I could use as vowels after my 2nd attempt led to an inspired choice for my 3rd attempt.

Well done to the 23 year old PP brother. Watched the last part, it's a good thing there was no wind. The lad weighs 52kgs.

Bardet 2nd, not bad.

Not quite a century, but not far off.

What an influential film-maker. A legend. I doubt that there is anyone on this here forum who hasn't seen at least one of his films, even if you perhaps didn't realise it.

Here is an obituary from the Telegraph

Great!  Looking forward to Thursday.  Off to see John Cooper Clarke tonight

Riverside were simply stunning in Birmingham last night. They weren't too bad in Norwich on Sunday, but last night was special. Gone was Polish Melancholy and in its place full on Powerful, Pogoing Metal, maybe a slight exaggeration, but not far off it. Mikal Lapaj must be the happiest man in ROCK, never looks like he's not enjoying himself.

I think an enthusiastic audience helps, I don't normally like whooping hollerers, but the bloke next to me really got Riverside going. He was ENTHUSIASTIC, made Captain Ron look like a wallflower. He also thought that I must be a Rock Star, because of my deportment

And how could I forget, trains willing I do it again three times next week

Quote from: The Picnic Wasp on Today at 12:18:58 AMLock And Key

Been running through my mind at various points over the past few days. I'd forgotten just how clever and intense this song is. Playing it usually means my brain will finally put it to bed again.

Love what's effectively a mini-drum solo just before the fade-out.

This is a photo that I took in Wales in March, on the Pembrokeshire coastal path.



The camera (actually a Samsung phone) was only about 20 - 30 metres above sea level when this was taken. But I wondered if I'd be able to see the curve of the horizon if I compressed the pic sideways, like this (image is cropped but shows the whole breadth of the first image):



Although it's tempting to blame the curvature present in the image on lens distortion, I don't think that's the case here. The horizon was actually slightly below the centre of the image, so any barrel distortion would tend to suppress the curve, not exaggerate it. However I have no idea how to do the maths for the degree of curvature you'd expect to see from that elevation. So I suspect that is just an exaggerated view of the Earth's curvature.

Anyone any thoughts?