Author | Lightnews

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Stephen Collins @stephencollins.bsky.social · 3d

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Nurse:
It’s become a real problem in this area

2
Nurse:
We’ve seen the whole community lost to addiction

3
Show a building sign posted:
Westminster ‘X’ Addiction Clinic
With various Westminster people or looking at their phones outside it

Nurse:
Ministers, Spads, Researchers…

4
Nurse:
Most mornings we’ll get a call about someone acting strangely

[Nurse on phone taking a call]
Ok - we’ll be right over

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Nurse:
We just have a gentle chat

[Nurses approach a minister –Robert Jenrick? - standing in the Palace of Westminster

Minister:
I understand your concerns…

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Nurse:
Are you OK love?

Minister:
Yes I’m just hearing legitimate concerns from real voters

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Nurse:
That’s a robot, a Nazi and a poorly-disguised Russian

[Show that the people he is talking to are precisely these characters]

Nurse 2:
Give us your phone, love

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Nurse:
At the clinic we put them in a Grass-Touching Pod, with a real voter to talk to

[We see them back at the clinic, holding the minister's head and pushing him into a glass isolation booth with a grass floor. And it is a baffled looking woman, on a chair, ready to talk to him.]

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Minister:
YOU MUST BE WORRIED ABOUT THE COMING CIVIL WAR

[woman looks baffled]

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woman:
I just want a bus service

Minister:
LOOK AT MY FLAG
[produces a St George's flag]

[ends]

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Simon Pegg @simonpegg.bsky.social · 3d

"Parking is such sweet sorrow"

Sky News @news.sky.com · 4d

Shakespeare family home damaged by reversing driver

A 17th-century building that housed William Shakespeare's family has been left damaged after a driver reversed into it.

news.sky.com

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 6d

Patri-Arkle

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 7d

That story speaks to your son's honesty, I think.

The wheeze my two boys have worked out is to ask their mum to transfer money to their accounts, pledging to "pay you back later" from their Saturday job wages, which are still paid in cash.

Amnesia ensues and the hoard of used banknotes grows.

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Adam Roberts @adamroberts.bsky.social · 7d

The New Midas.
profadamroberts.substack.com/p/money

Money

... it’s a Gas/Grab That Cash With Both Hands and Make a Stash

profadamroberts.substack.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin Bot @leguinbot.bsky.social · 7d

We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art, the art of words.

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caasbrey @caasbrey.bsky.social · 9d

“Phillip K. Dick. Ray Bradbury. Like so many in tech, I draw in completely misunderstanding the authors.”

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 9d

Mine starts to flash when the battery is low, providing a clear signal for the game of chicken to begin. Will it do two brushes before it dies? Three? FOUR?!?!?

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 10d

Wow. This is almost a hometown con for me. So it would be rude not to go, right?

Octocon @octocon.bsky.social · 10d

We are delighted to announce that #Octocon2026 will be taking place in Cork City with special guests @cemurphy.bsky.social and @aptshadow.bsky.social.

Find out more at
https://2025.octocon.com/announcing-octocon-2026/

#Octocon #Fantasy #SciFi #Fandom #ReadingCommunity #SciFiConvention #CorkCity

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Sarah Murphy @13sarahmurphy.bsky.social · 10d

“I’m old enough to remember when mainstream British politicians, who should know better, stirred up racial hatred as a path to power. You’re old enough to remember too because it was last Tuesday. And it was Robert Jenrick”

Cathartic anger at flag-flying racism.

www.thenerve.news/p/stewart-le...

Stewart Lee: The thugs have taken my flag. So I’ve taken theirs

What do you do with a lot of cheap banners hanging from motorway bridges once you’ve torn them down?

www.thenerve.news

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Donald Clarke @donaldclarke.bsky.social · 11d

I hammered out a few more unworthy words on Diane Keaton. It really does feel as if the evening is drawing in. www.irishtimes.com/culture/2025...

Charming, eccentric and likeable, no star had energy quite like Diane Keaton

Laid-back Californian built a 60-year career unlike any other, from Annie Hall to The Godfather

www.irishtimes.com

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Ruth EJ Booth (she/they) @ruthejbooth.bsky.social · 11d

So that some good might come of this, I'd like to encourage everyone reading this to make a donation towards Barnardos' work with victims of child trafficking. Here's the link.

@barnardos.org.uk

donate.barnardos.org.uk/donations/

donate.barnardos.org.uk

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Dave Hutchinson @hutchinsondave.bsky.social · 11d

“the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa”

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 11d

Friendly suggestion to people running cons. Glasgow 2024 Worldcon had "voice of the con" roles who could relay questions from people attending via streaming.
How about an "eyes of the con", who can tell whether streaming attendees are actually seeing anything? (Ideally before the panel starts)

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Norncon sff convention, Belfast @norncon.bsky.social · 11d

It’s official! We decided to have a small convention next 8-9 May.

We have the terrific @annasmithspark.bsky.social and Adrian Tchaikovsky as our guests of honor. You can find out more on our website norncon.org

We’d love it if you could join us! And if you’re at Octocon today say hi to Tommy!

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Fiona Moore 🇨🇦 @drfionamoore.bsky.social · 12d

I'm having some thoughts about the "AI will never replace human creativity" cliche, based on the fact that I went and watched some videos by The AI Bible, and now YouTube is serving me a lot of classic-SF AI slop videos (you know, Star Trek: TNG but in the style of Miami Vice, etc). 1/🧵

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 12d

"You can pun on for a long time
Pun on for a long time
Pun on for a long time
Sooner or later God'll cut you down"

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Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 13d

"There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face" is all well and good, but I'm guessing the Bard never encountered young Tory weirdos.

Finbarr O'Reilly @finoreilly.bsky.social · 15d

But you can only determine that it's three scientists by opening the coat.

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Mike Sowden @mikeachim.bsky.social · 16d

Damn. This is amazing. £325 per week, paid monthly, for 3 years - and the result was a profit for the Irish economy:
www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employmen...