Alaina Bamfield | Untouchable | Full Comedy Special Alaina Bamfield does a 24 minute standup special about getting money from being molested by Larry Nassar. Brilliant.
Politieauto’s, geschrokken buren en glazenwasserspullen verspreid over de straat: dat is het beeld van de Joop den Uyllaan in Schiedam in de middag van 13 april. Een paar maanden later moet de Schiedamse Dursun Y. voor de rechter verschijnen voor poging tot doodslag op een andere glazenwasser. “Ik wilde hem bang maken”, zegt de verdachte.
Politieauto’s, geschrokken buren en glazenwasserspullen verspreid over de straat: dat is het beeld van de Joop den Uyllaan in Schiedam in de middag van 13 april. Een paar maanden later moet de Schiedamse Dursun Y. voor de rechter verschijnen voor poging tot doodslag op een andere glazenwasser. “Ik wilde hem bang maken”, zegt de verdachte.
Saliva and gut sensor-based tests hailed as ‘gamechanger’ for millions of women who can wait years for diagnosis
Two tests that can dramatically speed up diagnosis of endometriosis are to be made available on the NHS in England and Wales, in a move hailed as a “gamechanger” for millions of women.
One in 10 women of reproductive age are affected by the condition, where tissue similar to that found in the womb lining grows elsewhere, such as the ovaries and fallopian tubes. Symptoms include painful periods, painful bowel movements, pain when urinating and pain during or after sex.
Continue reading...Collector of dream stories from across continent finds ‘surprising consistency’ in the way they are structured
A young woman discovers in a dream that she is responsible for the Holocaust and tries to come up with schemes to make amends – and then gets distracted by a business meeting. Another woman dreams she is being chased by murderers – and ends up chilling in front of the TV with them. A man gets to advise Emmanuel Macron on social policy – and talks to him about haircuts and dog training instead.
Dreams can turn our innermost fears and darkest fantasies into miniature dramas. But an anthology of recollected dreams harvested from online forums across Europe shows how the story arc of the subconscious often bends towards anticlimaxes.
Continue reading...Treasury select committee also says ministers have moral obligation to reverse last year’s repayment threshold freeze
Slideshows that compared student loan repayments with the cost of a mobile phone contract, and YouTube videos that did not mention the fact that loan terms could change amounted to mis-selling by the government, MPs have said.
The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, caused a furore last year when she announced that the repayment threshold on plan 2 student loans would be frozen at £29,385 for three years from April 2027.
Continue reading...The collision was catastrophic. Jane Ouartsi suffered a fractured collarbone, two spinal fractures, a broken femur that took three operations to fix, and she had to learn to walk again like a baby. Why has no one taken responsibility for her life-changing injuries?
As Jane Ouartsi walked across a pedestrianised square in central London, on a Friday evening in early August three years ago, she linked arms with her partner, Dave Mathias, and told him how much she had enjoyed the afternoon they had spent together, eating pizza in Soho and visiting an art installation. It was the last time she can remember feeling properly happy and relaxed.
“We were walking quite slowly, talking about the art. It’s hard to remember exactly, but I think I was saying what a lovely lunch, and then all of a sudden there was a horrific impact,” she says. “I felt my spine and body split and I thought my life was over.”
Continue reading...Meeting of 32 member states comes at crucial time for alliance after tensions with US over Iran and Greenland
Nato leaders will gather in Ankara on Tuesday after a turbulent six months. And as the US continues to pressure its allies to increase defence spending, the other 31 members of the alliance will be hoping to mollify an unpredictable Donald Trump.
On Monday, Mark Rutte, Nato’s secretary general, called for the allies to present “clear, concrete and credible plans” to reach the organisation’s spending targets. “President Trump fully expects that all allies will step up immediately and get on the path to 5% and do it with urgency,” he said.
Continue reading...Wars in Iran and Ukraine have expended stockpiles of sought-after missiles, leaving gap in military resources
There are growing concerns in Europe that the US defence industrial base is no longer providing the weapons pledged to Nato allies with US stockpiles depleted owing to the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran, leaving allies to consider new avenues to arm and defend themselves.
As Nato leaders including the US president, Donald Trump, convene in Ankara, Turkey, the US plans to address European defence spending and concerns over the Trump administration’s future commitment to the military alliance.
Continue reading...I joined Marilyn Monroe, Walter White, Ozzy Osbourne and other tribute artists on a cruise where imitation is its own art form
INT. DECK 7, LE CABARET ROUGE, 11.37pm
Frank Sinatra, palming a can of Sprite in one hand and the fist of his beautiful red-headed wife in the other, sat in a dark corner across from Jeff Bezos, who looked like he was waiting for him to say something. But Sinatra said nothing. He’d been mostly quiet all evening, and now in this cabaret he seemed even more distant, staring out past fog and strobe and Bezos’s strong bald head and into the large room where at least half a dozen men had basically shattered a bistro table trying to get a better look at Marilyn Monroe. Sinatra’s wife knew, as did Roy Orbison and Austin Powers, who stood nearby, that it was only minutes before he was supposed to go onstage, and that forcing any sort of conversation on him in this mood of focus would be extremely stupid.
Continue reading...Our new PM will be hit by multiple crises when he enters No 10. Success or failure will depend on the decisions he makes in first 100 days
On the day the new prime minister steps into No 10, the heap on his doormat will be ceiling-high with missives imploring, advising, warning and counselling. No doubt there will be many pearls of wisdom and some bad ideas too. Each one will involve getting or spending money, decisions for his first totemic 100 days.
It so happens that his first day, 20 July, is the first week of school summer holidays in England and Wales. As he walks into Downing Street, millions of children will leave the school gates “walking into nothing”, as one child told the Children’s Society. Lonely, isolated, caring for siblings, many hungry, some at risk – for those children, six weeks will loom ahead with Covid-like emptiness, home alone as parents work, no splashing in the sunlit waves of the holiday ads.
Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist
Continue reading...Ukraine’s drone and missile campaign on oil infrastructure has brought impact of war to citizens of Moscow and elsewhere
Five hours into the queue, tempers were already fraying at the gas station. Then a black Audi Q7 swept past dozens of waiting cars and pulled straight up to the pumps. Within minutes, motorists were shouting, mobile phones were recording and a police officer had drawn his pistol to calm the crowds.
The confrontation, filmed on Saturday night at a petrol station in the Siberian town of Ust-Ordynsky, captured the growing frustration over Russia’s worsening fuel shortages, which have spread across a country that remains one of the world’s largest oil producers.
Continue reading...Thousands of women are killed in dowry disputes each year, despite the practice being banned in 1961
Dowry deaths in India no longer provoke the public anger they once did, despite thousands of women’s lives still being lost every year, according to new research.
The killings – women who are murdered or driven to suicide following dowry disputes between families – have also faded from political debate, despite an increase in cases.
Continue reading...Leader of France’s far-right National Rally and a contender for the presidency set to hear appeal decision on Tuesday
Marine Le Pen, France’s far-right figurehead and a leading contender for its presidency, will learn on Tuesday whether she can run in next year’s election when a Paris appeals court rules on her attempt to overturn a ban on holding elected office.
The ruling will determine whether the far-right National Rally (RN) will be led by Le Pen, 57, or her young protege, Jordan Bardella, 30 in next year’s general elections.
Continue reading...The formidable actor talks about the challenge of finding meaty characters, tough times in the US – and co-starring with her dad’s hero Kenneth Branagh in The Cherry Orchard
It’s lunchtime in Stratford-upon-Avon and Helen Hunt has 30 minutes to spare. She’s preparing for her Royal Shakespeare Company debut and is taking time out to speak to me via Zoom, just her head and shoulders, with what looks like a sleek-surfaced kitchen in the backdrop. Hunt is all sleek surfaces herself: polite smiles, even tones and an inscrutability so strained it makes me wonder what might be bubbling underneath.
Hunt is starring alongside Kenneth Branagh and Bill Pullman in a new version of The Cherry Orchard. She plays Madame Ranevskaya, the Russian aristocrat and matriarch who returns home to find her family estate in jeopardy. The play, like so many of Chekhov’s, is about the apathy of the elite class in the dying days of the Russian empire. So why this play, for her, and why now?
Continue reading...By selling AI glasses as aspirational, cool and fashion-forward, tech elites are trying to pacify their entry into the mainstream world
We have a habit of dismissing social media trends as inane and vapid while ignoring the disturbing undercurrent. A few weeks ago I was reminded of that when I saw an Instagram carousel by British fashion personality Alexa Chung. Shared with her 6 million followers, she showed different outfits through screenshots of herself entering and leaving her home on her security camera. Rita Ora commented, “Good angle keep this series going”. Security system company Ring commented, “Fit checks on Ring cam? Next level.”
The post caught my eye among the feed of curated noise, a counterculture take on the traditional iPhone outfit photo. Its presumed effortlessness felt intimate and off the cuff. Social media loves that sort of thing.
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