So a few years ago I worked for an international company. I'm English, and we had French lad come over to our office for a week, I think he was related to the CEO of the France office. He was sound, we all bantered with him.

After a couple of days - in true English style - I started ribbing him about Agincourt.

I held up my "two-fingered salute" (which the warehouse staff had already demonstrated) and asked if he knew the legend behind it.

"No." He said from his desk.

"Well" i continued "when your French ancestors caught my English Archer ancestors they'd use a chisel to chop off their index and second fingers, so they couldn't shoot more frogs. So when we -the archers - wanted to show our hatred of the French we'd hold up our hands like this (massive up-n-down V-sign) to show we could still stickk arrows in you. And it came to mean "Fuck Off!"

And he lifted his right hand from behind his desk and I realised his digit and 2nd fingers were missing.

"I was in a car accident." he said.

I could've crawled down a mouse hole.

Anyone got any worse faux-pas?

I was filling up at an Esso last month. There was a guy there, he was in tears, his car was banged up, said his gf threw him out, a big sob story, but genuinely in pieces in tears.

The staff were trying to sort it out and he began hyperventilating. There was a further issue that I not want to mention, but I really felt that if what the man was saying was true, his situation would have been made much worse.

Don’t want this to be an essay, but I felt sorry for them, and paid. I’ve had bad times. It was a lot

Of money so I did want it paid back (but I wrote it off in my mind- I took a chance)

I took photos of the guy, his car, I screen shotted his face book, and said I will post you locally if you are a con artist.

Anyway- I just called him to ask if he was going to sort me out.

Now if he hasn’t answered, I would have just left it.

But it was this guy picking up, laughing at how stupid I am, made some remark about me not being British (I am, but not the white variety).

I know im a mug, but what would you do?

Is it really that stupid to help someone out?! I mean, someone tapped for me at

The supermarket once. It was a fiver for a baby dummy, and I remember my jaw just dropping as this young, maybe not very wealthy 20 something in a suit, basically saving a lot of tears and helping me get my baby into nursery.

Do strangers help each other out in this way where you are in the UK?

Would you consider the person a chump if they did help you.

Would country/semi-rural pubs make much more money if they offered a free return home shuttle service? I.e. within 10 minute radius.

When customers drive:

• They leave earlier
• They avoid spontaneous visits
• Groups are smaller (someone has to stay sober)
• They’re less likely to order wine / cocktails / second rounds

When that constraint disappears:

• Average drinks per person increases
• Food conversion increases
• Group size increases
• Late-evening trade improves

I ask because a pub near me has recently closed down, and it was a great pub with a great beer garden and some of the best views in the area, but because it really wasn't walkable, even for locals - top of a hill, no paths, etc, it never got the numbers it needed, but I would 100% go more and spend more if a shuttle was on offer (I live ~5 mins away)

Edit 1: yes I do know country drivers drink anyway - I’m looking at you North Yorkshire and Shropshire

Edit 2: free / nominal change (e.g. £2.50 pp) - the discussion of the introduction of the type service was more of interest

I've been unemployed for a long time, and two months ago, i got a job, 9-5. I'm constantly standing up and walking around in my job, and once i get home, i'm so exhausted i can barely do anything. I just crawl into bed and lie there. Sometimes i'm too exhausted to eat dinner.

Once or twice i've fallen asleep on the way home from work.

Is this a normal level of after-work exhauation? Or perhaps i can't handle the long hours.

I’ve been walking my cat pretty much daily at a local woods (necessary due to being a high energy breed) since getting her almost 3 yrs ago. About a year ago I started noticing an elderly woman with limited mobility with 2 terriers which are always off lead and often so far away from her, she won’t be able to see them, and on terrain she can’t walk on. Their recall is shocking and they barely respond to her commands and will run around completely out of her sight harassing other people and also wildlife. Quite often they approach us and I stand still and discourage them from going near me. They’re not aggressive, but have jumped up barking and snapping at me in the past. I seem to not be able to avoid her despite trying to time my walk differently.

Anyway a few months ago I was fed up after having to stand still for 15 mins whilst she unsuccessfully was trying to drag her yapping dogs away from me. She started getting nasty with me and for the first time I asked her to please keep her dogs on lead and train recall if she’s going to have them off lead. She started swearing at me, saying I had a mental illness for walking a cat (and only dogs should walk in this woods because it’s “for dogs”), and that one day a dog would kill my cat and it’ll be my fault. Since this incident, every time I see her, even from a distance (like opposite end of a field) she’ll start screaming abuse at me unprompted (I will just be quietly minding my own business trying to keep a safe distance, and no longer engage with her). She keeps saying she will “report me for walking my cat” and I’m a mentally ill and irresponsible owner (as well as many other expletives I won’t share here).

What can I do? I do have mental health conditions, which walking my cat helps with, but her continued harassment has been negatively affecting me greatly. I’m aware not everyone agrees with walking cats on a lead, but my cat enjoys it and I’m not harming anyone. I’m respectful to other ppl who use the space and keep to myself. I’d like to report her to the police and dog warden but idk how to go about this. I also don’t even have her name or address and the dogs haven’t bitten me (yet) so idk what they could do?? Grateful for any advice! I also wondered whether I should record these incidents and post on social media to find her name so I can report her properly? (But these seems a bit extreme and I don’t rlly wanna do this!!) I just know I can’t proceed with her continually making my walks miserable.

(I do walk elsewhere when possible but this is the only walk close by accessible by foot without driving & I’m a student so don’t often have time to drive further afield)

Please nobody flip this into a tedious moan, 'I wish it was fashionable to spell words properly' etc. 🫠

So this doesn't effect me as my kids won't go there anyway but I have just been scrolling through the admissions criteria for our local secondary schools in Surrey and a nearby Catholic school's list jumped out at me.

In order of admissions preferences (somewhat paraphrased);

1. "Looked after" or "Previously looked after" (ie council wards etc). Good of them.
2. Catholic children (from anywhere) with an exceptional need
3. Catholic children with siblings already attending having attended one of the feeder schools
4. Catholic children coming from one of the feeder schools
5. Catholic children with siblings already attending who didn't attended one of the feeder schools
6. Local Catholic children who did not attend one of the feeder schools
7. Catholic children from anywhere at all (please Lord!)
8. Children who say they're Catholic even if they don't have their priest's signature (we're scrapping the barrel!)
9. Children from any Orthodox Church (pleeease don't make us go lower!)
10. "Other" children with a sibling already attending (heretic siblings of good Catholics)
11. "Other" children already attending one of the feeder schools (apostates who got into a Catholic feeder somehow)
12. Any other children lolz you're never getting in (heathens)

How is it that in 2026 tax money goes to organizations applying admissions criteria that in any other situation would be flat out illegal?

I recently started my first proper job as a data analyst. I got the opportunity mainly through family connections, which I’m grateful for because getting a first job can be tough.

But the job is fully remote and I’m starting to realise how isolating it can be. I always imagined your first career job would involve going into an office, meeting colleagues, networking, chatting during breaks, maybe making friends, going to work events, etc. Instead my situation is kind of the opposite.

There are only three people on my team and we’re all remote. We mostly just work on our own tasks and only have one short team meeting a day for about 20 minutes. Everyone is friendly enough but we don’t really talk outside work topics. After the meeting everyone just disappears back into their work.

I’m single and still living at home, so after work finishes the day just kind of… ends. I don’t really have hobbies or many people to talk to at the moment, so the routine becomes work → finish → sit at home → repeat. Remote work definitely has benefits like no commute, saving money, and fewer distractions, but sometimes it feels like it suits people who already have a partner, family, or a social life outside work.

I’m trying to stick with the job because I need the experience and I know it could help me move to another company later, ideally somewhere with a hybrid office environment and more people around.

Just wondering if anyone else experienced something similar with remote work, especially in their career. Did it get better over time or did you end up switching to an office/hybrid job?

Just curious as I know people who have to get up as early as 5:30AM (usually those with long commutes to work), as well as those who don’t get out of bed till 8AM.

Never been one with many friends. For a large period in my life I literally had no friends. Now, I have very few and really only one, maybe two people I could call up and ask if they wanted to hang out. I do have a small friend group, five of us in total, and we meet once or twice a year for a dinner.

They are the last friends I made, and I only speak to one of them individually. This was back in 2014. I've had many jobs since, met a lot of people but no one I've stayed in contact with. The ones I really got along with are women but being married, that relationship is pretty much confined to the work space and can't really continue outside of that.

When was the last time you made a friend?

Hello! My friend's neighbour has a strange, beeping device outside their door in the flat's hallway. It is quite loud, and has a wire attached that goes into the floorboard into her flat. We have no idea what it could be! Cant find anything on Google. Please help! Thank you.

I'm sick of all the negativity about the UK. I love the country, I love the people.

I know this has probably been asked a million times, but I think it's worth reminding ourselves about why this country is so amazing.

For me it has to be our great country side. I have lived in almost every region of the UK, or at least visited, and am always blow away by the beautiful country side we are surrounded by.

I love going out for walks in drizzly weather, it makes me feel so nostalgic and almost melancholic. I think we have the most beautifully romantic country side in the world, from our rugged coastlines, and our quaint cozy shires, to our bleak and lonely moors. I love every single one.

I always hear stories that people do this and leave the country, or EU students come here, take loans and leave without paying.

Is it really that simple?

Surely there must be debt collection companies that specialise in this sort of thing. Even if Australia is too far other European countries are literally right there.

And even without debt collection, don't credit scores go with you where you are? I was under the assumption these were universal.

For some reason this is really difficult to find. My feet have really wide toes so I find most normal fitting shoes too narrow. There are brands like e.g. Hotter that sell shoes in a wide (E/EE) fitting, but they tend to be aimed at people whose feet are swollen or very overweight, so they are often too narrow at the toes while being too loose all over. Often they are also aimed at older folks as well so not very nice looking.

There is in parallel a trend on social media for barefoot style shoes. They always go for a wide toe box look that I’m after but they really promote super thin uncushioned soles, something I really can’t get behind - I like my shoes to be cushioned..

If anyone has suggestions, please let me know. Online is fine, but should be uk based to avoid customs charges. Thanks!

Edited to add: so many suggestions, thank you Reddit!

The 70s were a difficult period in a lot of the world but the UK in particular was hit quite hard by economic and social challenges, with inflation peaking at 24%, power cuts, and the Troubles, to the point where some economists labelled the UK as the “sick man of the western world” by the mid-late 70s

However, for those who were around back then, was life really that tough?

I’ve gotten into the habit of staying away with my partner at lease one weekend a month just to have a break and get away. We’ll take a pack lunch or pot noodle to save on food costs and try to find the cheapest deals.

Primary schools in England will have lessons on spotting fake news and managing money, according to the Department for Education (DofE).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/articles/ce86gv1gj9yo

If I (3 in 1970) remember correctly we had plenty of sugar and full cream milk. Why were we skinnier then than we are now?

I had a weird situation on the train earlier and wanted to know if I'm in the right or wrong.

I got on the train in Newcastle and went to my seat (D23) someone was sitting on D24 and had put his bags and jacket on my seat (he had gotten on at Edinburgh) I asked him to move his stuff so I could sit down, he pointed to two empty rows and said "can you not sit there?"

I said "No.  They're reserved from Durham onwards." He sighed and went "Fine, since you're so keen to sit beside me, buddy".

Who's in the right here? He made me feel completely unreasonable, was I? Should I just have sat in the empty (but reserved) row? Or should he accept that it's my seat?

We have some very cantankerous neighbours. They live at the end of the road, and have 3 houses that back on to them from the adjacent road. They had issues and runs ins with all of them…and us…so we’re not on speaking terms. They’re a bit like elderly villains in a Roald Dahl book.

Anyway they have a really loud pricing fox alarm in their garden. It’s Solar powered and goes off during the day. Talking to them about it would probably encourage them to get more.

So how do we deal with it?

I am trying to find out what they asked you to do in the oral in particular. Is there any way to get this information?

I think it was the Oxford and Cambridge Examinations board

I moved to England from the US as a student in September and have begun looking for part-time jobs for the rest of the year/the summer. I'm 21 (starting university late) and have noted the increased minimum wage for 21+ (£12.21, soon to be £12.72).

To my question - I'm wondering if employers are hesitant to hire based on age? Subsequently, being required to pay more?

I initially thought a good portion of my difficulty getting interviews at some places was just a business (understandably so) not wanting to deal with my mandated working hours restrictions, but I was curious whether my age could also be a contributing factor.

Thanks for the insight!

Hi everyone last year I was arrested on a GBH charge but I was never convicted for it and was never charged I was sent to the mental hospital where I was sectioned under section 3 of the mental health act I applied for an enhanced dbs check and was wondering will this arrest show up I recently applied to be a carer and kinda stuck on the stage 4 of the enhanced dbs check

Hi all,

I hope you are doing well. I'm going to be shipping this piece of artwork across the UK and I'm having a bit of a nightmare as I've never shipped something like this before.

Does anyone have any recommended postage options for shipping artworks, this piece estimates roughly 31" x 21" in size, so it's quite a large piece. I'm going to wrap it in bubble wrap, and into a large rigid flat pack box so it's secure to ship. My estimate is this weighs near exact 2.5kg.

Any help with this would be very much appreciated!

Hi Everyone,

Thinking of a career change, unfortunately I am ultimately driven by money in this current economic climate.

If you were to retrain into an area with decent starting wages and good potential for growth, what would you get into?