Fiasco Leeds Sunday 29th October

[goat major]

in order to stand out at a wargames show can i recommend wearing cargo shorts, a heavy metal tshirt and carry a large backpack

[garyp]

Don't forget the grubby anorak tied at the waist with string . . . .

[Tony of TTT]

What do you mean 'grubby', the string was new only last year - cheek !!!

[tim.w]

I used to live in Ormskirk. Last lived on Wigan road just up from town centre. I went back last year, its changed a lot!

[Tony of TTT]

Were you at Edge Hill Tim ? Or here for some legitimate reason ?

We started our married life not that far from You in Northallerton. We were back there not long ago and it seems to have changed for the better, unlike Ormskirk.

[tim.w]

5 years a stoodent. Terrorizing the poor locals 1995-2000.

In those days we lived amongst the natives. It was a little market town then, it seems to be struggling to cope with the numbers now. All the decent pubs gone too. No more Buck n' th' Vine I hadn't been much at all since I left in 2000 and was mildly shocked.

[Tony of TTT]

The Cricketers is just down the street from us and that is a good pub and good eats but I know what you mean - no Buck, no Windmill etc., mind you the beer in the Buck wasn't that great, the Greyhound was a crap pub but the beer was always good.

The town is swamped with students, probably more than tripled since your day and all the cheap housing has gone to student places so our kids can't find anywhere to live locally any more.

[tim.w]

Same with York, locals ready to riot over students taking all the affordable places.

[Buff Orpington]

Chester's the same, they are building unaffordable ones for the overseas students. The level of collusion between the University and the council is highly suspect. The council pushed through planning permission for a truly monstrous Travelodge just outside the city walls because of the need for yet more tourist accommodation in the city. Within two years it had gone bust and was bought by the university. We twigged that the uni had bought up every house in a terrace just outside the campus when they all got matching curtains. The fiasco over County Hall is still rumbling. It really was an epic saga of greed & incompetence.

• The police HQ was moved to Winsford to be more accessible to Cheshire's scumbag hotspots.
  
  The building was replaced by a mixed use development, the central part of the scheme was that it would provide prestige offices for premium businesses.
  
  They built it but no one came. In desperation the council decided to move into it themselves. This left County Hall empty so they sold it to the university.
  
  Now they've decided they can't afford to stay in the new building so they are going to find somewhere new, probably well away from the city.

[Tony of TTT]

The best bit is that so few students get decent jobs that all those loans won't get repaid and it will end up costing twice as much as the grant system ever did.
What will we get in exchange ? - half a bloody million 'sports scientists' or 'leisure management' graduates and the entire staff of McDonalds & KFC with an MA in 'Catering Management'.
Did you know that you can even get a degree in nursery nursing nowadays - that used to be a certificate course at the FE college I used to work at with an entry qualification of being female.