Help!

Things that annoy me?

Beyond those who run schools more for own benefit than than that of pupils and their parents and inept politicians of all political colours the big one for me is getting about as a disabled person as it seems all to often the "disabling world" actually gets in the way of me doing things.

It can be something like the weight of door being such I can't easily open it if you don't put step steps I struggle to walk up or stairs in the building or just not thinking and leaving things in shops cluttering the approach to each set of shelves that at heights even I on foot can't reach.

Schools for all there talk of being inclusive aren't such as our combined infant juniors that isn't easy to get about in in a wheelchair and doesn't make arrnangements for disabilty sports you can do before we get to the many secondary schools that despite being on more than one level have no lifts.

A constant in each is getting your meal which can be workable if you have a wheelchair with a tray fitted at the front or if fully walking when many use cafeteria system but as I was I wan't able to carry a tray and no one provided for assistance when just out of class, your mates are like released lions charging for food utterly ignoring you.

Usually I have to ask for assistance if I'm out in anywhere self serving and pre-booked assistance on trains is very hit and miss not always helped by cancellations and platform changes at the last minute.

The call of that time of year

You can't escape it, no not the straw like stuff in the fields and in your garden which still needs much rain to recover from that really hot period a few weeks back  but the "Back to school" promotions in the popular press, in store where T G Jones were pushing geometry sets, folders, note pads while you encounter them online.

For some us it was either Martins or Hayden's with branches across most towns here in North Staffordshire who also stock school specific items while market stores stocked more generic items by Banner David Luke and Trutext.

Unlike him this is exactly what I wanted back then having had the misfortune to be in the era where Longs were taking over which I found less than comfortable.

Truthly this time of year makes me sad for just the lack of that whole feel of going back to school, the comradeship and sense of purpose of it all.

Oh Miss Manners

Hello and welcome back after last weeks egg frying weather which I'm only just recovering from glad as I am it's a good eight to ten degrees cooler than it was and life continues at the forum even if understandably people were flagging during the daytime.

Communication styles vary if you've ever been in chat rooms with some using the clipped comments heavily laden with abbreviations that don't have full stops (AmE: periods) between each abbreviation per word so it's no always apparent just what they're saying.

Others just seem to type in what they themselves want without consideration of what you be looking for which really doesn't achieve anything that resembles a good face to face chat or just feel it's okay to keep you up because...they're bored.

Sometimes we get I certainly get message from people who appear to be very desperate to reach out to others or even attempt a two way conversation over my blogs.

Let's start with the basics.

They exist to help explore and discuss what this life all about and that can certainly include a comment about a post and if I get a few, chances are they may influence another post.

What isn't good is when you just type out your contact details with no reference to what was posted coming over as a bit rude and expect me to authorize that for publishing.

It won't be when it makes no reference at all to the post.

You wish to talk about ALB/ASB life, then come on over to uniformedregressors join in and if you wish talk to people via direct messaging or share your email address using it.

All you need to know is on site.

"You like what, Chris?"

Not the best start to the week with sudden and very powerful miagrain so this weeks post will be short as overing catchup only brings things back on again.

During this period of enforced rest thoughts went back to that time when your mate would indicate "You did what?" intimating it was beneath boys like you and maybe your friendship might be tested if he felt he'd get grief from others about it.

Strong infants memories with me was Music and Movement where Mrs Bell attempted to play the piano or the BBC School program was put on and we'd have to dance to it which wasn't so bad when it was pretending to  be a dragon but something like an icicle with lots of delicate movements didn't do your street cred much good as much I liked things like that.

Back then to had said you'd love to take dance or ballet classes would of been reputation suicide back them for most boys.

Thankfully we've moved on a bit.

Changes at the forum Summer 2026

Back and with a shortish post as we've been busy catching up on things since the start of the weekend, looking at changes at our Forum.

When we or more accurately I set it up it was really around the time of forum softwear issues with asb.net, Misterpoll running out of steam plus Robbies narrow focus on just boys school uniform and Tumblr starting on became the great purge of 2018.

Thus in a lot of ways the rules and many of the threads we created refected we were a set adults but still in spirit lads talking about the things that interested us as if we're still in our beloved grey short trousers playing very much on boys only terms not that we barred girls, we just didn't consider they'd really want to join.

Forums are on a downward trend with social media with its very much short term bits of stuff way of looking at things with no threads and that just stuff you say and by weeks on it's just lost and that has meant forums that allow for more role playing or regression for both adult boys and girls too have mainly gone.

We also have to recognize some boys do like role playing girls and so any site has to cover all of us who love doing this.

We already have members who fit that and bearing that in mind and Jo joining us I feel we need to say we're for anyone who is prepared to follow our rules.

Some people may of put a rigid gender split in the forum - a boys club and a girls club - but I think it's better for people to be able to join in talking about anything however gender untypical  letting people add whatever threads they need and Jo has set a few more girlcentric ones and she can if she has something to say talk in those we set up.

That is very much the way UR is going to be, adapting incrementally to changes, adding as we've done with our fiction and Ai inspired art recently to our offering to everyone.

If a thread isn't for you - not everything is for me - then just move along to something that does or if it's missing, create it.

Over and out

Awayday

This weekend I've been away so really not much time to prepare posts apart from me not being keen taking a chromebook with me to start posting, looking at sites like our own as really going away is supposed to be more about taking a break.

With health challenges and other things that break is the thing I need more than all this online stuff.

This is something near where I am, Arnside which a quiet village in the far south of Westmorland which has a old style charm to it unspoilt by mass tourism that you find around the main Lakes although it can be a bit busy.

That's one reason I like to go there.

Plimsoles

We're in a bit of rush today as I have a number of things to get done while I'm away for the weekend which given some of the stuff I've mentioned on the forum is much needed.

Of course going away does sometimes mean reviewing and replacing the odd thing as you sort your stuff ready to pack your travel case.

Canvas soled footwear was very much a part of my childhood and for good number a part of their casual side later on in life but aself fastening pair of plimsoles have a allure that's just for us being so tied into our old-new lives.

Seeing my older pair were a bit of a tight fit I bought a new pair to take with me as there will be  sports and water pistol fight taking place.

Getting back to things

It's been yet another hot week requiring hydriation, the art of finding places in the shade, having the fans running full on at home and rooting out the shortest loosest fitting tops and shorts just in order to be comfortable and not suffer as I did during the first heatwave of the year from heatstroke and related issues.

We've had a couple of more members at the forum making a splash including one wearing a dress - unusual but hey why not - because it is for all of us and that does include girls that will in time lead to some differing discussion threads that may more for them but like every other open to all if they have something to say.

Imagine  a world where we were all returned - and for some more placed in attire they'd of prefered - being they boys they felt they were still, being able to do more of what they wanted together, play, trips together free from anything adult.

Part of the movement that saw quite rightly the abolition of child labour was the belief that children should be allowed to be children but in the build up to it no doubt inpromptu play existed where they could get the time even though they worked long hours.

There is a movement more for legal adults to be able to play more, the growth of playgrounds for adults as well as children, to be able to let off steam playing games that aren't tied into a serious aim like a competition or fund raising.

Heck to be able to at least some of that childhood freedom back.

Tossing a chunk a adulthood back was one of the most liberating things I ever did.

Spankies

In some ways a bit of a follow on from last weeks post but all very relatable stuff if like most of us you did actually have a childhood.

Big adult worries add words and expressions but they were further away from our immediate world having dug out massive amounts of sand on the beach where the car tyres were situated to much of Dad's annoyance whilst on our hols.

We hadn't thought through just how we were going to get back to our guest houseand if apart from anything else rather ouchie, we'd be pushing the car past where we'd dug!

There's a lot in a Peanuts strip, some sad, some really serious but this is one that takes me back to conversations about what our home life was like or just whey did we leave the lesson half way to see the Head Teacher.

Suprisingly to some today , as painful as it was to us personally we'd uphold those standards back then.

Even a certain cat appears to have had similar views

Lessons from the class room...

Last week was hot, too hot actually for some of us as I was very poorly towards the end of the week with it so I read a few old Dandy Summer Specials, probably as well as the last two years of what should be the Dandy Summer Specials have been given over totally to late 2000's Jamie Smart drawn Desperate Dan.

Normally in a comic you gravitate to those stories whose characters are more like you and your mates like Winker Watson, Brassneck or otherwise relatable like Korky the cat so a cartoon about a nosey girl like Keyhole Kate or mischievious girl like Beryl the Peril wouldn't be your thing, something you just quickly scan through before concentrating on one you did.

Summer Term for us always meant tests or exams, no not your GCE's but end of year ones to see what actually went in subject by subject something that would be communicated to your folks and to which you would be given some clues when it comes to what to revise and maybe how to do that.

Some make grand revision plans others just cram it in on the last minute and pray it all comes out.

This is an interesting cartoon that is set in that context with past memories and return to home where we'll see if plays out again.

It's interest to note Beryl has vivid memories of last time - those of us who were brought up with being spanked just do - and yet we see her not escaping a repeat but trying to escape the exam itself even when taken to school to avoid that option.

She continues to create a scene until the headmaster steps in and "forces" her to sit down and start her Exam paper.

Many of us can recall - and being painfully honest I did at times too - trying to rewrite on the fly the whole narrative of how our exam went when envitably the report card was presented in a sealed envelope  to present to your parents.

You knew pretty much what it would say having being informed directly about what you did and what your tutor(s) thought about your work.

I can remember only too well what my GCE Geography tutor wrote on the report prior to the mocks, pretty much calculated to drive Dad into spanking me.

Beryl's  attempt spinning hers out into a poor result in absolute terms but softened by Trying Hard failures as her dad spots the missing additional words.

Looking at this from outside angle there are two sets of thoughts that arise:

Does Beryl's falsehoods and deception of themselves warrant attention which back then would of been a spanking in itself and today a lecture, loss of previledges and grounding?

Secondly as far as her result AND attitude to studying go would you draw a distiction between the two elements?

I was back the punished for bad results even when it was the case I had reading difficulties and wasn't able to complete the test in time because of my disabilities. I feel that's not justified - we need help with learning much more.

On the otherhand if you were offered it and still didn't say attend extra tution, made no effort to revise or work to the best of our (limited) abilities isn't some sanction justified as we aren't helping ourselves that in the long term limit our opportunities?

Should we not be disuaded by whatever means from getting into that?

Personally, and having seen examples of people that have in later life got stuck into that pattern of behaviour then frankly yes.

By the standards of my time back then, it it was me, then a spanking was more than appropriate and the only thing I should be expected to do is be responsible afterward.

School's out!

This week it's so hot, schools have been closed in some districts which is quite right as little will be learned as you're being roasted even if they lay off thems awful grown up School Rules a little never mind the torture of Cross-Country.

Much prefered something more useful like orienteering in the forest with a compass and map.

So if school is out what is in as just running about playing torturing enemy soldiers or climbing trees is out?

Well we can still sit on the bed, fan full on sipping fruit juice, milk and sucking Rowntree Pastels like there's no tomorrow reading the Beano even if Biffo the Bear needs to come out of hibernation and I'm sure modern boys and girls could relate to him

Keep hydriated and stay safe this week!

Social media reset time

 

It was announced on Monday Under 16's would be banned from social media sites including Tic Tok, Instagram, Threads, Facebook, X, Youtube (although Youtube kids might be exempted), Snapchat and Reddit.

In addition 16-18 year olds who are children will be subject to a curfew limiting hours online, the exact means not being specified as yet with the measures expected to be in effect Spring 2027.

In broad terms I agree having seen how much social media drama has moved into with hardly a day going by with pupils (purr-lease no students) and teachers dealing with matters that can just be an extension of traditional bullying, sexual matters shared for maximum emotional devastation and incitements for the most idiotic death inducing stunts. It's a long cry from scrumping apples, no homework and name calling.

Just on Monday a teacher had a child turn up late for class as they were on social media to 3am. Just think about that  -they are in no state to learn -, one pupil interviewed revealed they did 14hours a week  and more even when phones were allowed in school, another admitted his mate had a devasting time on social media and it upset him to see it.

It isn't that any kind of restrictions will be totally perfect but we have reach a crisis that everybody in society working with children are struggling to deal with and I hate to say it some adults are scarely any better either seeing the zombified masses, backs bent staring into screens as young children they are supposed to walking with are ignored.  It is clearly very addictive too. 

From my perspective things are out of control.

8 tracks

 This week we on about something else as this is typed on a wet summer Monday afternoon,

Some artists have a big influence on popular music because they push the boundaries well out, one of key prog rock groups and Pink Floyd was one having a good many studio albums and a few compilations of sorts over the years covering the 1967-71 era and 1971-94.

Some have tried to be almost suites made from original songs from the individual albums, others collections of curios - the sort of thing that appeals to hardcore fans - with obscure 'b' sides and remixes, others straightforward playlists that are largely redundent today in age of streaming.

Last Friday one came out that had a number of head scratching from the artwork with is lazy beyond words to just why they bothered.

8 tracks is an odd name as that's precisely how many tracks we have and three of them One Of These Days Wish You Were Here and Another Brick In The Wall are duplicated with 1981's A Collection of Great Dance Songs and that featured a re-recording of Money, a U.S. Single for contractual reasons as Capitol records wouldn't give permission to use the original.

So just do you get?

The big one is Pigs On The Wing which was split on the lp and cassette versions but a whole 8 track program with an exclusive Snowy White solo that we never had before and why some of us kept our Columbia 8 track tape copy around well after that faded from the audio mainstream.

Another Brick In The Wall is the whole Pt II version not an an edit of lp and the II singles version which is welcome as is Comfortably Numb one of the essential tracks from The Wall plus Time from Dark Side of the Moon with its striking clocks intro.

Wot's...Uh the Deal makes an appearance from 1972's Obscured By Clouds, the album that broke them on U.S. Underground FM Radio as unlike the UK, the US Radio regulator the FCC would not give simulcasting licenses so AM and FM stations had to have different programming.

The segues are handled well gently moving into each track so it's a good compilation but it needed to be programmed to compliment "Great Dance Songs" by using When Tigers Broke Free from 1982, Another One of My Turns (b side of Another Brick In The Wall) and Take It Back from Division Bell so the sets act as a retrospective with the odd twist.

What we had was nice but it needed much more thought and definitely a much better cover.

Worms and communications

It's Wednesday apparently and we're actually in Summer now.

Okay this week is cooler but that does tend to make for more time outside as the extremes of heat had in all honesty take it's toll on me, feeling rather off by thursday and friday so I tend to make up for thing by being out rather more.

Thus I don't just sit staring into my Chromebook all day suitably dressed as an asb/alb for hours on end reading this site, that site and checking over ours, I really need the fresh air and, yes, the exercise walking difficulties aside.

Sometimes you might be a bit rushed in responding to posts, I know sometimes I might with my wonky paws miss a word  with tremoring just to get yours in before you forget what whit fuelled comment or fact you wanted to toss into the discussion.

And that's before you bring in my Dyslexia and that affects all of us with it differently with ordering and especially spelling.

Sometimes to a few it's an irritant that gets them positively wild if there and their get muddled  or speech gains a middle ea  instead of ee as it were fruit hanging from a tree but most of the time people can make sense of what you're saying and be fairly sure what you mean.

While it's a pain I try to capture mistakes with either a dictionary, trying to learn some more every day spellings, a spellchecker on the Chromebook and that as I care to try to get as many right as I can.

What is trying for all is when words that form the Subject and Object cannot be easily made out and your friends and especially those of us who look after sites really haven't a clue just what you're talking about as without it we can't even try to correct it for you if you'd wish us to.

If you can possibly take a little more time and care when you post I'm sure we'd all appreciate it.

Little and Middle footwear

This week we're going back with an idea for a post that goes back a few years but is contempary too

Much of this is very much me, going back almost a decade in my exploration of what being an adult little means and how as one I'd present, the charcoal short trousers, the long just below the knees socks even the white shows although generally we didn't wear white back in infants.

I did wear shoes more like this once the leather mary jane type that breathed so well we dropped as you were a "big boy" although the one big issue was being laced might of appealed to traditionalist head teachers, this boy couldn't tie laces even if the refinement is obviously more Middle wear for things like parties and dancing apart from school.

This is more the kind of loafer's I wear made by the same company, very hard wearing in the seams and heels given I walk off balence wearing them down quickly but generally well made and very presentable with the distinct advantage  I can fasten the Velcro tm myself as often as needed.

Saves finding a grown up to fasten them up for me.

Where are we?

It is supposed to be hotting up this week so maybe you'll be out a bit but  if you're from some places in the UK where you may be going may be known or associated with may be different to what younger generations may recognize.

A generational difference for many of is is what is the North of the Island of Ireland, part of the British Isles was know to us as Ulster but today goes under the title Northern Ireland perhaps a good thing given the dual histories and traditions of communities there as it doesn't have Unionist (and Protestant) baggage.

Like a number of us who were educated in the late 1960's and 70's our "map" of Great Britain differs from that later generations being based more on the Traditional Counties, rather than local goverment regions of Wales, Scotland and Metropolitian areas of England, some of which haved changed again in the last quarter century.

Much of this map is where my mental map is at although for a map showing traditional counties, although Yorkshire folk will wonder what "South Yorkshire", a 1970's area centred around Sheffield is doing there when we all learned of the Three Ridings of Yorkshire, North, West and East.

London, our Capital always was an exception as The City slotted into Middlesex and from the seventeenth century grew outwards with rather adhoc governance that resulted in the establishment of a London County Council but that remained different to the traditional (ceremonial) counties and that of the Post Offices boundaries.

Can any one really say where "Greater London" really ends? Epsom, Staines, Chesham?

You can make good arguments for saying whole areas that may cross counties might be better served by local administration operating within it but the sense in which we have affilation and feel for our County Identities matters and "changing the map", removing signs, rewriting historical accounts with local government names today when at the time it wasn't misrepresents the past.

For me the County Boroughs of Walsall, Wolverhampton, West Bromwich and  nearby Urban Districts remain like Perton, Kinver and Wombourne in our glorious county of Staffordshire with its two massive conurbations at the top and bottom of it. Never part of Brum.

May memories

Well it is Wednesday here and I have a few things to get done as much as I'd like just play and get the viewmaster out, watching the Pink Panther and the Lion King.

May always had certain memories with me, later on when I was out of school, often I went away then as it was just at the start of the season but generally a fair bit cheaper  when it comes to accomodation but most facilities being open like heritage railways and zoos.

When I was in school it meant practising our Maypole dancing for public display which is an age old tradition certainly in England and I believe elsewhere within the United Kingdom.

 The dance is performed by pairs of boys and girls who stand alternately around the base of the pole, each holding the end of a ribbon. They weave in and around each other, boys going one way and girls going the other and the ribbons are woven together around the pole until they meet at the base.

While I was never brilliant at it, I did manage and enjoy this traditional dancing.

Bad memories and a disc

This week we go back a bit to the early days of the great rebellion against longs clad outside school wearing red with white side panel trim sports shorts with a one a half inch inseam around 1980/1 when we were getting the hang of leaving subtle hints for what records I wanted for Christmas and birthdays.

It also came around a period of more hifi awareness around getting decent crackle free sound from them so I had a brush to clean them with having been suitably chastised by my my older brother for leaving the Beach Boys 20 Golden Greats in chocolate stains at the age of 12.

Anyway come Christmas hint had worked as a copy of the current AC/DC album from July that year, Back In Black was in the christmas pile with the £3.99 price sticker on it.

This was the album issued after Bon Scott had died in February and Brian Robertson had taken on vocal duties and remains one of their finest with a few pictures of eternal schoolboy Angus Young on the inner sleeve who I wanted to resemble in class time.

Anyhow time went on, a copy of Denim And Leather, the Saxon album and a original 1967 3d cover version of Their Satanic Majesties Request on green Decca arrived as disaster struck.

Note I mentioned about keeping records clean and Dad had suggested using neat Surgical Spirit BP on a cloth so thinking he might have a point I duly cleaned them with it.

The first signs something was wrong was white thick paste covering the stylus after a couple tracks that never went and then any lined inners developed funny wavy lines that seemed to stick to the surface of the record.

One day borrowing my older brothers part tubed hifi, I decided to tape the AC/DC album which went well enough on his hand tweaked and tuned cassette deck.

A couple of days later all hell broke loose as seemly he'd gone to play a record and the stylus had become unglued from the holder on the cantilever necessitating replacement which wasn't cheap and this was because of the Surgical Spirit had melted the glue used at the factory to bond the stylus tip to it.

I did well to escape a sore behind but that now mean any records treated could no longer be played on anyone elses equipment and didn't play to well on mine as the gunk on my stylus needed cleaning every few tracks.

In time those records left because of those issues that had ironically started with the nobel idea of clean discs leaving cassette copies.

Recently I managed to get a near perfect copy of that AC/DC album that matches the very copy I had rather than a later repressing that sounded great and more importantly but all the emotional baggage associated with it to bed.

Getting set for Summer

Warm week and one that takes us though spring into summer so obviously we get the point Summer Specials traditionally would of been announced but DC Thomson have made announcements but it's been very low key this time.

Traditionally you'd of bought them from places like train stations - perhaps you remember going on your hols by train? - as much newsagents when you arrived at your destination and today if boys were more dressed as we recall they'd have the Smartphone out, checking connections.

The Pink Panther Show was a big thing with me - the spin off from the classic Pink Panther films with the hapless Inspector Clouseau - shown typically on saturday afternoons to the point of having plushies and calendars.

It was the same era as the beige Viewfinder I used to own was in heavy usage and recently I was able to find a three reel set for my new-old Viewfinder based upon the Pink Panther's cartoon adventures although it had to got from the United States so will take around a fortnight to come while I relive the adventures of the classic 1966 Batman with Adam West having got a set which while made in 1978, was just the original tv tie-in set from 1966 reprinted.

There will be a Part II on the other blog once we've run though a couple of planned entries.

Words

For once I'm actually a bit ahead of myself with a combination of both getting up a bit earlier and blitzing chores and generally being a bit more "on the ball" across the days.

I can remember some of the conversations around that kind of thing well cos while I'd never say I was perfect and did need some chastising, the thing that still rankles a bit with me is really the way in which there appeared to be double standards.

I may of left things in ways that of been untidy or in the way but say dad may of left heaps of things for over a month and nothing got said about that that or the time I was told to reduce my coats down to three from four cos did had nowhere to put all his - over ten - by mum.

He might of threatened grevious bodily harm to a cat after a bird but my protesting was a "you are under my roof and if you have any issues with my actions leave" matter.

It's that kind of thing really but women can be just as capable of it too - and some certainly have an issue with males full stop - but you can't avoid the need for adults to actually parent us and tragically we've seen instances where they've failed utterly in that allowing much suffering to others

Reliable, fair and supportitive adult authority is what boys need, ideally from men.