🏍 LynneG #2 (👻 of Mike R., d.2022)

🏍 Merry Christmas '24 & HNY to Twitter friends following the @BalladeerMike account, & any who followed my old A/c, @GL650_LynneG. Annoyingly, the old account looks as if it's still there, but I can't access it, DMs on it, or the list of followers! Doh!🫣 Thanks for yr support.

@urbanponds101 They used to breed under our garden shed at a previous address. We liked seeing them around in late summer.

How do we feel about Stag Beetles !?!

OMG I’m dying 💀🤣🤣🤣 The background props in the video are unreal. The girl with the shirt “Pubic Lice Survivor”. I couldn’t breathe. Hilarious 😆 You simply have to watch this

🚨 COUNCIL POTHOLE KILLS BIKER, 43, AFTER BEING FLAGGED FOR REPAIR TWICE IN FIVE MONTHS! Andrew “Andy” Freakley was overtaking a van on his motorbike in Stoke-on-Trent on September 25 when he slammed into a ONE-METRE-SQUARE crater, catapulted into the path of an oncoming Volvo and died at the scene. The killer pothole had been reported to Stoke-on-Trent City Council on May 7 and AGAIN on September 11 – yet they waited 154 DAYS before finally patching it on October 8, claiming it was “lower risk”. Stepfather Kevin Freakley: “Why wasn’t it fixed sooner?” Tributes pour in for the “loveable rogue with a heart of gold” dad, son and partner. Coroner confirms the crash was unavoidable. Roads falling apart… and councils don’t care until someone dies!

It had to be done. (Australian species?)

Oops .. 👋🏻🚗 Byeeeee

@ReturnofColin2 What a little beauty 😍

Good morning all 🤗 Happy Sunday ♥️

Patient attends A&E with a chest infection… standard stuff. Decides to pop outside for a vape and a bit of fresh air because, let’s be honest, the waiting room atmosphere could finish anyone off quicker than the illness. Next minute… casually clocks a bloke acting a bit off outside the maternity ward. Not aggressive, not shouting… just that “something’s not right here” vibe every frontline worker knows all too well. So what does he do? Doesn’t walk away. Doesn’t ignore it. Goes over for a chat. Two hours later… 🧠 Talked down a “lone wolf” terrorist 🎒 Convinced him to open the bag (yeah… that bag) 💣 Found himself staring at a pressure cooker bomb 📏 Asked about blast radius like he’s doing a dynamic risk assessment 🚪 Moved the whole situation away from the hospital entrance 🤝 Built enough trust to keep the bloke calm 🤗 Given him a hug when asked 📞 Got him to agree to call police before he “changed his mind” All while his own phone’s dead and there’s not a single staff member in sight to wave over. Genuinely the most British de-escalation imaginable: “Alright mate… talk to me… what’s going on?” No PPE. No backup. No radio. Just vibes, empathy, and absolute nerves of steel. Meanwhile inside: Crews stacked 8 deep Handover delays hitting biblical levels Someone asking “can you clear please” every 30 seconds And this guy is outside single-handedly preventing a mass casualty incident like it’s just another shift problem. Police turn up, job gets wrapped up, and he just wanders back in like: “Yeah I’m back… still got that chest infection by the way.” Probably still had to wait for discharge as well. Massive respect though. That’s not luck, that’s character. Calm under pressure, compassion when it mattered most. George Medal couldn’t have gone to a more deserving person. Proof that sometimes the difference between a normal day and a major incident… …is just one person deciding to step forward instead of walking away 🚑

@benonwine Good grief!! To put pictures of either of them next to the comedic genius that was Victoria Wood is a heinous insult. I can't stand either of them, you couldn't pay me enough to sit through a whole show.

Rosie Jones funnest comedian of all time and Eddie Izzard 3rd who put together this list. Do you Agree? 👇

@MotoNutJob Have thought for the last few years that a lot of cars look as if they're driving round in just undercoat, often Admiralty grey.

@BalladeerMike Bar the colour is a bit boring Nice but we're a bit done with anthracite grey gun metal etc etc

Right who lives in Ipswich ! Just pop round and see if this is clean as it looks autotrader.co.uk/car-details/20…

Trump just said Iran hit the USS Gerald R. Ford “from 17 angles” and the crew “had to run to save our lives.” His own Pentagon says it was a laundry room fire. A sitting president publicly contradicting his own DoD during an active war is extraordinary — regardless of which version is true.

Friendly reminder: Hormuz was open before we launched the war

@Ashesof_Pompeii Expecting today's generation of US policy makers to actually consider learning, & LEARNING FROM, their own 1960s history is several steps too far for their intellect to encompass, it seems to me. But what do I know 🤔.

The coming military and psychological unravelling - Tet v2? Late 1960’s, America at the zenith of its power, its economy dominated, military unstoppable, confidence unshakable. The Vietnam war was going swimmingly, MacNamara’s body counts were the proof of it. Then came Tet. January 30th, 1968, Tet, the Vietnamese lunar new year. On that day and the next North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces launched coordinated attacks on over 100 cities, and hundreds more rural sites, across South Vietnam. It was not merely a surprise attack, but a fundamental inflection point. The Viet Cong struck everywhere at once, proving they were not a ragtag insurgency, peasants in sandals, but a coordinated, disciplined force with sophisticated low-tech commincation and coordination networks. They eventually lost the battles, yes, but they shattered the myth of American invincibility. The psychological blow was irreversible. Public trust collapsed. The war wasn't lost on the battlefield that week; it was lost first on the 6 o’oclock news, and then in the American mind. That is the lesson we miss when we reduce Tet to just a "surprise." It was the moment the trajectory of American power bent. Not because the U.S. stopped winning battles, but because the world, and Americans themselves, realized victory was not just a question of firepower, and was not inevitable. Today, we seem to be approaching a similar inflection point in the Gulf. Not a repeat of 1968, but a parallel unraveling. American power projection, naval dominance, air superiority, deterrence credibility, is being tested in real time. The contemplated land operations, Kharg Island, Hormuz, wherever, carry the same hubris that marked early Vietnam: assumptions in the Trump administration of quick success, underestimation of adversary resolve, and overreliance on technology against an enemy that thrives in ambiguity and asymetric warfare. The difference now is the psychological context. In 1968, many Americans doubted the war's morality, but no one doubted their nation's raw power. Today, social media and fragmented news mean more people see the cracks: stalled initiatives, diplomatic friction, asymmetric losses. Yet for many leaders, and for the archetype of the "average American" still shaped by post-Cold War triumphalism, the idea of a swift, visible military debacle remains unthinkable. Despite Vietnam. Despite Iraq and Afghanistan. Despite the American helicoptors in Iran in 1979 or “Black Hawk Down”. The new Tet moment has not yet arrived. In the American mind, all of the above failures were somehow due to individual failures, lack of resolve or coordination, the hippies, Carter or Biden’s weakness, … It hasn’t arrived yet, but all indications are that the next Tet is approaching very fast. A military disaster is already unfolding but it is gradual, there are no headlines (yet?) saying “TODAY WE LOST”. A large military operation in the Gulf involving thousands of troops could well be that moment. Geography, logistics, fighting spirit, and for once possibly even technology, all favor the Iranians. Drones, missiles, mines. Lack of air defense. Shore versus ship. Improvisation and lack of detailed planning. An American command structure without real experience in modern warfare. It all adds up. Hegseth’s 10,000 targets as the modern version of MacNamara’s body counts. The coming days or weeks could deliver this new Tet moment. A failed operation. A strategic miscalculation that exposes limits. An outcome that cannot be spun. In a hyper-connected age, the perception shift would be instantaneous. The already threadbare myth of omnipotence would fracture not over months of coverage, but in hours of viral footage. If January 30, 1968 marked the peak before the long decline of American unquestioned authority, then the Gulf today may be where that curve bends again. Not because America is now weak, but it is unquestionably weaker. And the world has changed, adversaries have learned and adapted. The question isn't whether the U.S. can win a battle, the coming operations might even initially be successful, it's whether the American psyche can absorb a strategic setback without overreacting. We may be days or weeks from that pivot. Not a surprise, but a culmination. Tet didn't create the American crisis in Vietnam; it revealed it. The Gulf's Tet will fully reveal the limits of the old America-centric world order. And when that moment comes, it remains to be seen whether America can face the new reality without losing its bearings. Substack 👇👇👇

@apocalypseos @ochreblue

@apocalypseos The only goal this dumbfuck has is to hit the iceberg at full speed and sink the ship for his fellow demons

John Mearsheimer: This is much worse than Afghanistan, much worse than Iraq. He’s entered a war that he can’t win, and one could argue is likely to have catastrophic consequences. The Iranians hold almost all the cards. I think it’s very hard for most Americans to understand this, especially people who watch Fox News and are loyal supporters of the president. Iran can wreck the international economy. We are in terrible shape. We are the Titanic. And I think President Trump basically understands that, and I think his advisers understand that, and they’re trying to turn the ship so that we don’t hit the iceberg.

This image says it all. Top image: what you actually pay. Bottom image: what fuel could cost without tax and VAT. Unleaded shown at 143.9p becomes 67.0p. Diesel shown at 166.8p becomes 86.1p. That tells you exactly how much of the pain at the pump is government-loaded cost. And then they wonder why people feel like they’re being robbed.

Trump Said He Won. Iran Blew Up a $300 Million Plane. Here’s the thing about declaring victory in a war. It helps if the other side has actually lost. Trump has now announced that the United States has won this conflict thirteen times. Thirteen. Most people can’t win an argument with their wife thirteen times in a decade, but apparently winning a war against Iran is something you can do before breakfast, repeatedly, and still have the missiles keep coming. Because while the President was presumably drafting his fourteenth victory announcement, Iran put a $300 million American aircraft on the ground in pieces. Not a drone. Not a supply truck. An E-3G Sentry. The flying radar station. The aircraft that sees everything coming from 400 miles out. The one that manages the entire battlespace. Gone. The 552nd Air Control Wing out of Tinker Air Force Base would like everyone to know that 81-0005 is no longer with us. Iran is not neutralised. Stay connected, Follow Gandalv @Microinteracti1