Interesting Links for 24-10-2019

A nicely even handed Joker review

(tags:review dc batman movies )

Checks will be on goods going both ways between mainland and Northern Ireland

(tags:UK NorthernIreland Europe trade )

Finally, a critique of Marvel movies we can all get behind!

(tags:marvel sex movies )

BBC News launches 'dark web' Tor mirror to avoid foreign censorship

(tags:BBC tor )

Edinburgh's bus stop tracking boards set to be replaced after 14 years - "no longer maintainable"

(tags:transport buses edinburgh )

So what's going on with the French position on Brexit?

(tags:UK Europe France Doom )

New "LGB Alliance" facing backlash... from lesbians, gays and bisexuals

(tags:LGBT Transgender )

Anti-vaccine doctor charged with gross negligence over bogus exemptions

(tags:vaccination )

Rumor: Marvel to Replace Jeremy Renner in Hawkeye Following Allegations

(tags:marvel movies )

Canadian Gothic

(tags:Canada horror weird )

Scientists cure all kinds of flu! (in ferrets)

After all, there's no reason why mice should have *all* the fun!
(tags:flu )

Formation of elements detected when two stars crash into each other

(tags:space physics chemistry stars )

Female scientists up to 40% less likely to be asked for comment than male colleagues

(tags:research inequality women )

UK Children's Commissioner recommends loot boxes be regulated as gambling

(tags:gambling children games )

How trauma affects people, even when it's not acute. (Several of my friends could do with reading this)

(tags:trauma ptsd psychology happiness )

Maybe It's Not YouTube's Algorithm That Radicalizes People - It's The Communities It Creates

(tags:fascism racism youtube community )

Remain should push for an election

(tags:UK Europe elections )

Election time again

So, it looks very much like we'll be having an election in about six weeks time. In an ideal world we wouldn't do this - we'd have a referendum, knock Brexit on the head and _then_ have an election. But there's no majority for a referendum, there's no extension time for a referendum, so election it is!

It's probably about as good a time for an election as possible, to be honest. The Conservatives will be going into it with the Brexit Party on their flank, draining off a bunch of their votes, and Farage complaining loudly that his deal is Not Brexit. Providing Remainers vote tactically we have a chance at a hung parliament with a Labour/Lib-Dem/SNP/PC alliance as a majority.

Of course, this was the election result I wanted back in 2015, and I didn't get it. Nor in 2017. I shall continue to hope. And if not, and the Conservatives get an actual majority, then Johnson can bring in his Brexit, and take responsibility for everything that happens afterwards.

(I'll be voting SNP, but in a constituency that will probably go Labour, as it's the safest seat in Scotland.)

Cat-pains Log: Supplemental

Jim is definitely picking up. We were quite worried on Monday afternoon. We'd set up the hot blanket for him, and he'd lain on it, and after about twenty minutes had given two or three sudden jumps, and then shortly afterwards curled up and been almost comatose in the afternoon, in a way I'd only seen when he'd just had his Gabapentin. So I arranged a vet visit for later on. And then about ten minutes after that he woke up and wandered about the house quite happily, being more like his old self.

I took him to the vet anyway, who checked for white blood cell count, bacteria, crystals, and urine concentration. Everything was fine except the urine concentration, so I picked up a bunch of special wet food that's supposed to help with this, and brought it home. We did make a potential appointment for Wednesday morning - and decided that if he hadn't recovered by then he'd go in for further tests. But Tuesday evening he was basically acting fine, so I didn't bother starving him overnight.

At the moment he's not 100% back to his normal self, but doing dramatically better. He's had a checkup in the diary for this Saturday set up for ages, so we're going to use that to make sure that everything has returned to normalish.

One of the interesting things that has come out of this is that after three months of being nervous about the garden, he clearly decided that pressing his undercarriage on the grass would be nice, and has now wandered out on several occasions to take it all in.

Thank you all so much for saying lovely things during this. I know that for some of you "The cat is peeing blood" is a regular occurrence, but having had him almost die the previous time we were exceedingly worried, and it was lovely to have people rally around.

Here he is happily asleep with Sophia. (And my shoulder protruding slightly into shot):


The one nice thing to come out of it is that we'd had the Monday booked off for travelling back from my parents, so we put Sophia into nursery as usual and had a lovely walk along the Water of Leith, which had very high waters, and popped into the Botanic Gardens, where there was a really good exhibition with incredibly detailed huge photos of insects. If you're in Edinburgh between now and the 10th of November then I highly recommend it.