Happy birthday 🎉

Image taken from below a tree showing some of its branches. There is vibrant pink in colour blossom in the foreground set against a rich blue in colour sky with white in colour clouds in the background.

The tree blossom is very beautiful at this time of year 🌸

The part that hit home for me was the case of the girl in jeans and trainers, who was told that she was "not serious".

I am certain as to the clinician who said that, given the same happened to me when I turned up to an appointment in jeans (with lovely floral embroidery), only to be told the same.

Image showing a (teal in colour) kick scooter with a silver in colour stem and handlebars; perched against the inside of (closed) cream in colour train doors. There is a bright sunbeam lain over the scooter's front wheel. The windows of the train doors show green in colour foliage, slightly blurred; indicating that the train is moving at a high speed.

I had to make a 100 mile round trip to fetch it ~ but I'd say it was worth it to have another Zero in our household 🛴

Beautiful weather today too 😀

#Kickscooter #Kickbike

I do a similar think when making this style of curry.

I (fairly often) will dehydrate apple slices to eat as snacks.

By blitzing some of the dehydrated apples in to a fine powder; and adding it to the sauce, you get a concentrated burst of sweetness without necessaily watering the curry down.

In my opinion, this current iteration of the Labour government are the most actively anti-trans government I have known in my lifetime.

bsky.app/profile/marl...

🌸 www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
🌸 www.thenational.scot/politics/251...
🌸 www.thepinknews.com/2025/05/15/w...
🌸 www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article... 
🌸 www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/202...
🌸 www.thepinknews.com/2025/05/22/t...
🌸 www.attitude.co.uk/culture/musi...

Electric Light Orchestra - Twilight (Audio) YouTube video by ELOVEVO

Personally, I think 'Twilight' is the most underrated ELO track 😌

youtu.be/ONxp_lLXWGk?...

Image showing a folding adult kick scooter/kick bike that is black in colour with silver in colour applique (mudguards; stem; handlebar). The spokes of the two wheels are adorned with red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple (in colour) appliqué in an alternating pattern. The kick scooter is set against a metal railing and sits upon a brick canal pathway located next to a canal. The kick scooter and pathway are set in sharp focus; the canal as well as a bollard (in the foreground) are set in soft focus.

I took some time at the weekend to fix up my commuter scooter and I'm so glad that I did 🛴

Aside from practical things (such as new tyres & breaks), the rainbow spokes certainly seem to have brightened a number of people's days whilst out this morning 🌈

#KickScooter #KickBike

Let's look at the revised agenda for my business following this absolute nonsense.

9am - meeting with myself to ban myself from using the female toilets (unless I'm cleaning them).

9.30am - clock out and walk to Tesco to use their toilet.

10am - session on "dignity and respect for all".

#Clarity

We had an ironic saying in our household during the pandemic;

"The only way to defeat COVID is with a debit card(,)"

because restrictions on spaces were relaxed when spending money (IIRC in restaurants and public houses).

This very much feels like it has the same incomprehensible nature to it...

It can be a struggle sometimes, even with a (NAL) legal background.

Though I do find it highly amusing that (since I started signing letters with my qualifications again,) my GP felt the need to call to ask me for advice on how to interpret a letter advising them how to alter my HRT dosage.

It is prohibitively difficult to commit to outlawing a course of action that your government is intrinsically complicit in effectuating.

Image from the Japanese language movie "Kamen Rider Den-O: Pretty Den-O Appears!" showing the titular character striking a heroic pose. The character is adorned in red; gold and silver in colour armour atop a black in colour spandex suit with a large gold and silver in colour bow on the chest. The character's helmet is adorned with two large, red in colour eye pieces, and a large gold in colour bow at the back of the helmet. The character is set against a backdrop of an outdoor stairway, a lamppost and three trees devoid of leaves.

From 俺 to 私, you have arrived!

Denial of personal identity and segregation to a solo facility to achieve respect and/or provide dignity is a fallacy in and of itself.

I still cannot understand how one can ascribe anything but an ideological bias to those who seek to apply a defacto 'separate but equal' doctrine to this area...

Image showing a sharp in focus raspberry plant (with small; green in colour foliage) in the foreground, set against a soft in focus background. The background shows white in colour snow in the bottom half of the image and a brown to grey in colour fence in the top half of the image. The background of the image also shows sharp in focus; white in colour snow droplets cascading down the windowpane separating the foreground and background of the image.

It's an interesting contrast to see this early sprouting raspberry plant (which will live on my kitchen windowsill until spring) set against the heavy snowfall in my garden ❄️🌱

If the BBC can't survive without me and mine purchasing a TV licence and the BBC refuses to stop using slurs to refer to me and mine, it is the BBC and not me that has failed in this regard.

That's wonderful to see 😊

I've been telling my GP for near half a decade that I believed my (e) was too low.

I'm glad that they have recently (finally) allowed me a blood test to check.

Given the highest (recent) result was 106 pmol/l, I'm hoping they will raise me to 8mg soon and book a retest.

I have had relatively few issues with LibreOffice in the latest build of Zorin OS.

I believe there is a stable branch for Arch, though I have not tested it myself.

My favourite spelling quirk is one I picked up from a fee earner way back when I did the LPC.

✏️ "Judgment" - earnest, good decision; well thought out; consistent with previous decisions.

✏️ "Judgement" - derisive, poor decision; terrible reasoning; creates bad law; unworthy of respect or adherence.

Best wishes Emmy, if you can get what you need elsewhere then that's wonderful.

Please take it from someone who first asked the NHS for surgery back in the late 2000s (and is still unfortunately waiting) that patience is not always a virtue one needs to express.

One could argue that they are not actually vegan.

One of the philosophical rationalisations within veganism is that veganism is, at its core, the pursuit of reducing suffering as much as reasonably possible.

They do not (certainly in my opinion) seek to reduce suffering in any quantitative manner.

I have a photo somewhere of Pat McFadden engaging with the 'Ally Week' campaign more than a decade ago that I might have to search for.

What an absolute turnabout; disappointment he has turned out to be...

The notion of continuing to pay membership rates to be treated under a defacto 'separate but equal' doctrine is beyond appalling.

Although my own opinion, I'd argue that it's explicitly worse than simply being expelled for being trans...

Oh Charing Cross, I (unfortunately) remember you well 😣

As we approach the end of October (and the fast approaching first frost), I have made some time to dig up the last of the potatoes for this year 🥔

It is always the most fun part (for me) to dig through the soil and unearth them, not knowing how many there will be 😄

Image showing (on the right of the image) the bottom half on a dice box, cylindrical in shape and dark blue in colour (with white, light blue and yellow appliqué flowers) offset with a gold in colour trim. The dice box has a centre divider and is adorned with soft black felt. The dice box is holding 4 visible bright blue in colour D6 dice with white pips and the word "GO" in place of their number 1 faces as well as a visible metallic and dark blue in colour Pikachu (dressed as a beefeater) Worlds 2022 coin. On the left of the image is a gold in colour, cylindrical tray adorned with soft black felt. The tray is holding another D6 and Pikachu coin as well as two silver and bright blue in colour metallic coins featuring a poison skull (left coin) and burned cross (right coin) symbol. The background of the image is bright white, offset with shadow.

A touch of creative recycling later, I've repurposed a former tin of tea in to a fancy new dice box with a little tray 😄

#PokemonTCG #PokemonGO

I made this exact point in the first letter I sent to my MP and the response received was entirely unhelpful...

"I don't think it's the place of a member of Parliament to comment on these matters – nor do I have relevant expertise. But I have read and noted your comments."

bsky.app/profile/marl...

One has to understand that we are in this for the long run.

There is a lot one can do today, however, unless there is an imposed time limit, it is always ok to take a day to keep oneself in the fightback tomorrow.

One's skillset is not at all useful if they have lost all motivation to use it.

Thank you West Midlands Railway for delaying the Gender Affirming Care that I have been waiting nearly two decades for because you cancelled all of your trains this morning and didn't put on a rail replacement bus service 🙃