General bitch and moan thread

Largo's Shark wrote:

Hate to be the resident killjoy, but am I the only one finding it utterly boring around here lately? As a mod I'm ashamed to say it, but most of the time I'd have devoted to BaB in the past is now directed at other fora - mostly film music-related. Visiting this board and posting is like throwing rocks at a stagnant pond.

Where's Sykes, Tux, Harms, HJackson, Santa, Retro, Rave, Brandon, LA, Vesp, trev? It feels like Ten Little Indians. Who's going to be that last guy/gal standing?

Somehow I doubt the banner/layout's helping our appeal (if the previous one was AUSTIN POWERS then this is BATTLESHIP POTEMPKIN). One gave off a vibe of warmth and escapist fun - the current one is just cold and oppressive.

I dunno, maybe it's just the winter blues, but with an AWOL admin and this forum stuck in limbo, being optimistic ain't easy.

I hear you. I didn't realize M had been gone for a whole month, so that was right after he had his fit over the banner and banned you. Seems to me that's when it just fell apart for everyone and many decided to move on.

I'm new and still here although this place does seem a little dead

Seems there are a few...a resonable few still here but without a focus we tend to be spread over different subjects. This is where a blog or new centre can help to drive people together, although any forum is going to ebb and flow - in Bond terms we are now beyond the influence of Skyfall's release and a long way from Bond 24 so there is an inevitable lull at the heart of things.

Unfortunately I've been distracted off forum with work and writing (which hasn't happened much this year). Even something like a change of banner might benefit. And God knows from there.

Exams next week. Has anyone else tutored students at midnight? I had 8 of them in over the weekend  

I've had a wickedly busy month and then the flu hit me last week. Been meaning to at least pop in to say that it's just the job nothing else keeping from here. Anyway, there you have it. Bizzzzeeeeeh!

Makeshift Python wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Hate to be the resident killjoy, but am I the only one finding it utterly boring around here lately? As a mod I'm ashamed to say it, but most of the time I'd have devoted to BaB in the past is now directed at other fora - mostly film music-related. Visiting this board and posting is like throwing rocks at a stagnant pond.

Where's Sykes, Tux, Harms, HJackson, Santa, Retro, Rave, Brandon, LA, Vesp, trev? It feels like Ten Little Indians. Who's going to be that last guy/gal standing?

Somehow I doubt the banner/layout's helping our appeal (if the previous one was AUSTIN POWERS then this is BATTLESHIP POTEMPKIN). One gave off a vibe of warmth and escapist fun - the current one is just cold and oppressive.

I dunno, maybe it's just the winter blues, but with an AWOL admin and this forum stuck in limbo, being optimistic ain't easy.

I hear you. I didn't realize M had been gone for a whole month, so that was right after he had his fit over the banner and banned you. Seems to me that's when it just fell apart for everyone and many decided to move on.

That happened? Damn, I missed that somehow.


I think it's just a busy time of the year for a lot of people. I figure November and December is going to be pretty quiet. I know my work schedule is going to be pretty insane until the end of the year.

lachesis wrote:

Seems there are a few...a resonable few still here but without a focus we tend to be spread over different subjects. This is where a blog or new centre can help to drive people together, although any forum is going to ebb and flow - in Bond terms we are now beyond the influence of Skyfall's release and a long way from Bond 24 so there is an inevitable lull at the heart of things.

True, given how this forum really got going only a few months before shooting so there was plenty of anticipation. We have a whole year before that happens with Bond 24, and so far the biggest news since Mendes being confirmed directing was the rights of Thunderball going back to EON.

I lost my password.

And have been tackling the thirteen years of various eating disorders and the other results of long term childhood abuse that I'd kind of suppressed/ignored for a long time, whilst trying not to flunk uni, but mainly I just lost my password. I'll be around now that I remembered it.

*waves* I'm still around. Going through one of my 'far too many hobbies and not enough hours in the day' routines lately. Not helped by various emergencies or illnesses springing up when I had planned some 'me' time.

I really need to book my Hobbit tickets....

Britains most inept chancellor Alistair Darling, part man, part caterpilla sanctuary is apparently the chair of the committee to campaign to keep Scotland part of the UK!!!

Bloody hilarious that Darling is so active in it. Though if he's the chair, Scotland might gallop into independence.

Managed to destroy a 70cl bottle of 16 year old malt and a MacBook Pro in one fell swoop yesterday. Don't get drunk and put them in the same cabin bag seems to be the moral of this story.

Only consolation was my Mac was almost as old as the whisky and I'd been thinking of getting an Unnecessary Shiny New Thing. Quick diversion from the airport and I now have a lovely retina job, which I'll have to justify to the taxman in January. And the publisher.

It took me all of this afternoon to restore the hard drive.

Eh, that's no good. Aside from spending money to buy them, restoring the hard drive or transferring files is a complete bitch. I'm guessing the retina displays are as gorgeous as they're advertised to be.

Something similar happened to me. Got drunk, threw my laptop in my bag, thought I zipped the bag, whipped it around when I got up to leave and the laptop flew about 6 feet across the room. It worked for about a week after that.

True shame about the malt, though.

WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD:



These people are C.H.U.D.: cannibalistic, humanoid, underground dwellers. Yes, I'm talking about fans of the New Orleans Taints. Trash. Pure trash. What kind of "man" steals a football from a woman when it was clearly meant for her? And gives her an elbow to the chin to get it!!! She begs and pleads for it, but to no avail.

To the defense of some of the Taint fans, the Superdome did erupt into a chant of "Give her the ball!", but he refused. Later in the game somebody gave her a football, but she ought to be glad she got out of the Superdome with out being raped and murdered.

I need to move. Simple.

Down with some beast of a cold, on top of pisspoor job/location, no writing to speak of, and then worsened today by train SNAFUs in southwest London PLUS medication side effects for something else.

2015 has conspired to start off much like 2014 ended.

According to an ode to a failed but apparently noteworthy novel called "I Love Dick" in The Guardian today, women have only really been given an opportunity to 'speak out' in the last half-decade.

The absurdity of modern feminism is really beyond my comprehension.

I assume these are the same people who called Germaine Greer a misogynist.

Vesper wrote:

The absurdity of modern feminism is really beyond my comprehension.

Amen to that, brother.

And sister.

And trans.

And asexual.

And asocial.

God, language is complicated these days.

Vesper wrote:

According to an ode to a failed but apparently noteworthy novel called "I Love Dick" in The Guardian today, women have only really been given an opportunity to 'speak out' in the last half-decade.

The absurdity of modern feminism is really beyond my comprehension.

I assume these are the same people who called Germaine Greer a misogynist.

I believe that Greer is what the current gender-cult would call a TERF.
But who can keep up with that stuff?

Salomé wrote:

But who can keep up with that stuff?

We're relying on you, Sabs.

Actually, I agree with Greer about trans - there's a bit more to being a woman than cutting off your dick and bolting-on some tits. My longtime barber had the op 18 months ago and, while the new cleavage is nice to look at, I'm more discriminating than I realised.

It seems like an odd discussion anyway.
So much of it seems governed by emotion, since Greer is not advocating a ban on the procedures, nor is she against the use of the "correct" pronouns.
So basically they are against the fact that Greer personally does not deem them women?

On the other hand, it all makes sense in a world with trigger warnings and micro-aggressions.

It is a cruel twist of fate that humanity's greatest ever challenges will likely have to be tackled by its most sissified generation ever.

Salomé wrote:

It is a cruel twist of fate that humanity's greatest ever challenges will likely have to be tackled by its most sissified generation ever.

The term sissified may only apply to Western men; I've been impressed by the toughness of some of the young people I've met from elsewhere. No auditioning in underpants for them.

If by challenges you're talking about Islamism rather than Climate Change, it depends on how you look at it. I was somewhat shaken by Michel Houellebecq's suggestion in Submission that many Western men's positions in life would be improved by the imposition of Sharia law. He made a sad, but convincing case.

Erica Ambler wrote:

If by challenges you're talking about Islamism rather than Climate Change, it depends on how you look at it. I was somewhat shaken by Michel Houellebecq's suggestion in Submission that many Western men's positions in life would be improved by the imposition of Sharia law. He made a sad, but convincing case.

But Ambler, what even is Islamism? What even is Sharia? There are so many different iterations that we can't possibly make sweeping judgements about it. And at the end of the day let's not forget we're looking at it through our culturally biased Western lenses, we should be less prejudiced and consider the fact that Sharia is really just an alternative value system with its own pros and cons that we may be able to learn from and utilise to build a more inclusive and harmonious society.

Well, it was Houellebecq at his most provocative. He's no friend of Islam, but conjoured up a near-future Paris where everyone is either fat on Saudi-financed pensions or has full-time employment because women have been sent back to the home. And- very Houellebecq - all his middle-aged colleagues have acquired new 15-year-old wives. I don't expect the BBC will be adapting his work anytime soon ...