Simon Hawthorn

a pink clown with yellow polka dots and a bow tie ALT: a pink clown with yellow polka dots and a bow tie

Or.. And hear me out, we could have this psychic damage inducing horror show?

These plagiarism machines simply regurgitate what has been fed into them. They are not capable of true art, real creativity, the kind of structure, nuance and depth that are the hallmarks of worthy acts of creativity. These slop machines are wrong a lot of the time, they encourage people to do terrible things, and they are simply bad for the world. I feel sad for anyone who uses them, because they’re degrading the human condition — the ability to know and care and understand. All this theft, stupidity and degradation is not only bad and harmful — it's unnecessary

A good read by a human author.

www.moryan.com/an-open-lett...

On the plus side, at least he is admitting he was wrong and that his wrongness has created a significant mess. Not that he will do anything about it and beyond the moral standing of admitting to fault this doesn't really do squat all.

I noticed this too, and wondered how it’s possible to simply insert the EA2010 “proportionate / legitimate” schtick without defining explicitly what the “aim” is.

Smacks of “dignity’n’respect”, although I expect NHSE would claim that their aim is the “safety” of trans kids 🤬

The best Scottish city then ;-) But yes, I can see counting it as a cross border, the M25 is a decent enough border hehe

1. Very fair and can't fault it in the least

2. I love thinking of that as a cross-border trip!

Was there last week, would recommend taking a couple of the water busses as well. Get to see more of the city.

A red Docklands Light Railway train

Well, you know what you need to do!

Yesterday the NHS banned all under 18 prescriptions of HRT for trans young people.

This ban was justified by 10 new studies that largely stated NO EVIDENCE for under 18s HRT exists.

The study underpinning this played one particular trick.

Let's briefly look at how the NHS rigged the game 1/5

Simon with the Eurostar

And back at STP. Now to head for the tube and train and home.

Anyway. On ES9153 now. Soon to be London bound. And then get across London and to home, bed and the promise of several hundred emails tomorrow morning

Even the usual one. Just chivvying us through the *Expensive* / Duty Free shop and up to the platform.

Somewhat annoyingly after a longer than usual queue at Brussels they have decided to close the lounge and not let me use the toilet or top up my water bottle. That's not great #Eurostar service.

A yellow fronted train in platform

Feeling very slightly tired as I climb aboard another Alstom M7 train, the IC13505 towards Brussels-Zuid. Then time to kill before I finally head back to London properly - or at least for more than 15 hours this time.

A Cambrinus bottle of Czech pilsner

A plain green bottle with a cork

We ended up in a bar with a "vintage" menu. I have a pilsner from 1996. Rhys has a Liefmans Oude Kriek from 1986.

Mine is interesting. His smells like a Christmas pudding.

Glass of white wine and some snacks

Party split. Friends entered the Beer Museum. I respawned at the nearest wine bar as is traditional. Different playstyles. No wrong answers. (There are wrong answers.) My build has always been INT/CHA with wine specialisation.

Honestly, I take people to interesting and historic buildings and this is what happens. Still, shouldn't be surprised!

📸 P-trein Leuven - Hasselt (voor het IDREM nemen) 📍 Leuven, bundel Q 🚆 2 breaks (MR80m)

📸 S2-trein Leuven - Braine-le-Comte 📍 Leuven, lijn 36, spoor A 🚆 1 desiro (MR08)

📸 S2-trein Braine-le-Comte - Leuven (na uitwijken) 📍 Leuven, bundel Q 🚆 1 desiro (MR08)

🗺️ het traject van deze dienst

🗓️ vrijdag 6 maart 2026

Braine-le-Comte op het programma, dat was bijna 2 maanden geleden.

‼️ Beelden uiteraard gemaakt in veilige omstandigheden!

Electric trains. Will work out my footprint but it won't be as much as for example, driving to the Lake District. We should electrify all train lines and encourage modal shift from roads to rail. And especially improved cross border rail for huge gains.

A yellow and white Belgian M7 train

Anyway, ticket purchased and all aboard this SNCB/NMBS M7 train, IC1535 towards the coast.

By the way, this is not so much a shenanigan as a pleasant weekend in Belgium to drink some of the best beer in the world, maybe some light tram riding but mostly rest in a lovely place.

SNCB train pulling into Brussels Midi

Oh damn I let my Train+ lapse. Oh well, full price ticket for me.

*plots emails to send you on Monday. Fiendish ones*

I spent nearly 15 hours in the UK so I feel like this is an entirely rational decision.

But alas I am back at work on Monday so this will be a much shorter trip. And more sedentary.

Simon with a Eurostar train

Ok. But. Hear me out.

This would appear to be a breach of UNCLOS Article 98 and the Geneva Convention. Even the US Naval War Academy would seem to suggest this digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cgi/viewcont...

Well for entirely mad reasons, I might be doing the same thing again sooner rather than later... Hope you enjoyed your day off!

Thanks for sticking with me and following my random ten days of madness, Romans, trains and pictures. I took over 2000 photos and have to work through the almost 8gb of space that's taking up on my phone.

But first. Shower, dinner and sleep.

Have a great evening all!

Simon, out.

A very tired and slightly blurred Simon by the Eurostar

St Pancras station roof and clock

View from Blackfriars station of the Thames and London

And back to jolly Old London St. Pancras. Decided to take the Thames link down to black fries and walk to Waterloo. And now just made it home, just under 23 hours since I left Innsbruck.

A total of 7,056km travelled over the ten days; by train, tram, bus, ferry and a few cable cars.

SNCB double decker train

Waving at random Belgian trains as we approach Brussels just in case one of them contains @traindrivertom.trains.blue

Rotterdam Centraal station platform and sign

"This could be Rotterdam or anywhere"...

Actually the other day when I was in Rome, I spotted that @raves.bsky.social was in Rotterdam and another friend was in Liverpool. So we might have created the song via the medium of shared map locations.